89 Friedrich Nietzsche Quotes That Will Change Your Mind

Looking for the best and inspirational Friedrich Nietzsche quotes?

German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche famously said, “Without music, life would be a mistake.” It is not hard to see why Nietzsche loved music so much. He was a composer himself and wrote many musical compositions. He also had a great appreciation for all forms of art and music.

He was born in 1844 to a Lutheran minister and his wife in Prussia. His father died when he was four years old, leaving him with an overbearing mother who wanted him to become a pastor as well. He had three younger sisters who died young after contracting scarlet fever from him.

Nietzsche was one of the first philosophers to write extensively about what it means to be a “superman,” which is someone who is a master of his emotions, intellect, and will.

He was also one of the first philosophers to see the value of existentialism. This school of thought believes that humans are responsible for their destinies and no immutable truth or logic.

We’ve collected his most inspiring quotes that will change the way you think and get you to be the extraordinary person that you want to be.

89 Inspirational Friedrich Nietzsche Quotes

“I’m not upset that you lied to me, I’m upset that from now on I can’t believe you.”

“You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.”

“We hear only those questions for which we are in a position to find answers.”

“When one has not had a good father, one must create one.”

“The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die. As well the minds which are prevented from changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.”

“Be careful, lest in casting out your demon you exorcise the best thing in you.”

“He who cannot give anything away cannot feel anything either.”

“It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.”

“A pair of powerful spectacles has sometimes sufficed to cure a person in love.”

“There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophy.”

“Art is the proper task of life.”

“A matter that becomes clear ceases to concern us.”

“What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not a goal.”

“Many are stubborn in pursuit of the path they have chosen, few in pursuit of the goal.”

“In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations, and epochs, it is the rule.”

“Today as always, men fall into two groups: slaves and free men. Whoever does not have two-thirds of his day for himself, is a slave, whatever he may be: a statesman, a businessman, an official, or a scholar.”

“Talking much about oneself can also be a means to conceal oneself.”

“When we are tired, we are attacked by ideas we conquered long ago.”

“We love life, not because we are used to living but because we are used to loving.”

“What does your conscience say? — ‘You should become the person you are’.”

“You must be ready to burn yourself in your own flame. How could you rise anew if you have not first become ashes?”

“To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.”

“The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude.”

“He who cannot obey himself will be commanded. That is the nature of living creatures.”

“Sometimes people don’t want to hear the truth because they don’t want their illusions destroyed. ”

“Thoughts are the shadows of our feelings — always darker, emptier and simpler.”

“I was in darkness, but I took three steps and found myself in paradise. The first step was a good thought, the second, a good word; and the third, a good deed.”

“Sleeping is no mean art: for its sake one must stay awake all day.”

“There are no beautiful surfaces without a terrible depth.”

“Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truths than lies. ”

“Underneath this reality in which we live and have our being, another and altogether different reality lies concealed.”

“A thought, even a possibility, can shatter and transform us.”―

“I know of no better life purpose than to perish in attempting the great and the impossible.”

“There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.”

“There are no facts, only interpretations.”

“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who couldn’t hear the music.”

“All credibility, all good conscience, all evidence of truth come only from the senses.”

“People who have given us their complete confidence believe that they have a right to ours. The inference is false, a gift confers no rights.”

“Whatever is done for love always occurs beyond good and evil.”

“The demand to be loved is the greatest of all arrogant presumptions.”

“The true man wants two things: danger and play. For that reason he wants woman, as the most dangerous plaything.”

“What is the truth, but a lie agreed upon.”

“The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends.”

“A sedentary life is the real sin against the Holy Spirit. Only those thoughts that come by walking have any value.”

“The lonely one offers his hand too quickly to whomever he encounters.”

“Necessity is not an established fact, but an interpretation.”

“Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of their blunders.”

“All things are subject to interpretation whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.”

“In the consciousness of the truth he has perceived, man now sees everywhere only the awfulness or the absurdity of existence and loathing seizes him.”

“One ought to hold on to one’s heart; for if one lets it go, one soon loses control of the head too.”

“If there is something to pardon in everything, there is also something to condemn.”

“The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.”

“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.”

“Morality is the herd-instinct in the individual.”

“No price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. ”

“A good writer possesses not only his own spirit but also the spirit of his friends.”

“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”

“Here the ways of men divide. If you wish to strive for peace of soul and happiness, then believe; if you wish to be a disciple of truth, then inquire.”

“One repays a teacher badly if one always remains nothing but a pupil.”

“Our treasure lies in the beehive of our knowledge. We are perpetually on the way thither, being by nature winged insects and honey gatherers of the mind.”

“To forget one’s purpose is the commonest form of stupidity.”

“If you know the why, you can live any how.”

“Convictions are more dangerous foes of truth than lies.”

“Every deep thinker is more afraid of being understood than of being misunderstood.”

“Great indebtedness does not make men grateful, but vengeful; and if a little charity is not forgotten, it turns into a gnawing worm.”

“What is good? All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to power, power itself in man.”

“The secret of reaping the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment from life is to live dangerously.”

“When one has a great deal to put into it a day has a hundred pockets.”

“In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.”

“At times one remains faithful to a cause only because its opponents do not cease to be insipid.”

“Fear is the mother of morality.”

“Life is that which must overcome itself again and again.”

“You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.”

“He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.”

“All truly great thoughts are conceived by walking.”

“The higher we soar, the smaller we appear to those who cannot fly.”

“How little it takes to make us happy! The sound of a bagpipe. Without music, life would be a mistake. The German even imagines God as singing songs.”

“In every real man a child is hidden that wants to play.”

“The most common lie is that which one lies to himself; lying to others is relatively an exception.”

“Character is determined more by the lack of certain experiences than by those one has had.”

“One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.”

“The future influences the present just as much as the past.”

“He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.”

“Man is the cruelest animal.”

“Hope in reality is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.”

“No one can construct for you the bridge upon which precisely you must cross the stream of life, no one but you yourself alone.”

“He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.”

“People are always angry at anyone who chooses very individual standards for his life; because of the extraordinary treatment which that man grants to himself, they feel degraded, like ordinary beings.” “In heaven, all the interesting people are missing.”

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