Alfred Adler Quotes

The French want no-one to be their superior. The English want inferiors. The Frenchman constantly raises his eyes above him with anxiety. The Englishman lowers his beneath him with satisfaction.

It is not true that people are naturally equal for no two people can be together for even a half an hour without one acquiring an evident superiority over the other.

One often has need of one, inferior to himself.

Some prideful people are not so concerned as to whether their wages meet their needs as they are that their wages are more than someone else's. Their reward is being a cut above the rest. This is the enmity of pride.

A man who prides himself on being better than his fellow-men thinks it a disgrace if he does not do something more than they do, whereby his superiority may be apparent.

I had a great deal of arrogance and a great deal of bravado, but I think the bravado was brought on by a huge insecurity.

The most insignificant people are the most apt to sneer at others. They are safe from reprisals. And have no hope of rising in their own self esteem but by lowering their neighbors.

Men have been intimidated by my relationship with Howard. You know, it's hard for them to imagine that they could be number one, seeing this relationship.

Pride is ugly. It says, 'If you succeed, I am a failure.'

Unbridled arrogance is worse than pride; for if pride will not break a superior, arrogance will not brook and equal.

How many, even of the better sort, would choose to be slaves to those above them, provided they might exercise an arbitrary and tyrannical rule over all below them?

I think there's always going to be some kind of bigotry or some kind of racism. There has to be, because people can't feel that they have any hero qualities unless there's someone beneath them.

There is a kind of grandeur and respect which the meanest and most insignificant part of mankind endeavor to procure in the little circle of their friends and acquaintance. The poorest mechanic, nay, the man who lives upon common alms, gets him his set of admirers, and delights in that superiority which he enjoys over those who are in some respects beneath him. This ambition, which is natural to the soul of man, might, methinks, receive a very happy turn; and, if it were rightly directed, contribute as much to a person's advantage, as it generally does to his uneasiness and disquiet.

It's obviously a characteristic of human beings that we like to feel superior to others, but our problem is we are not superior

Not to be egotistical, but I don't think there is a man on this planet who can beat me

No man likes to be surpassed by those of this own level.

The Superclass tries to promote its values. Ordinary people complain of divine injustice, they envy power, and it pains them to see others having fun. They don’t understand that no one is having fun, that everyone is worried and insecure, and that what the jewels, cars, and fat wallets conceal is a huge inferiority complex.

Every man is a king so long as he has someone to look down on.

Envy is a declaration of inferiority.

I have this theory that alpha males are actually not alpha males. They're actually very scared - particularly scared of competition from a lot of men.

It is better for a woman to compete impersonally in society, as men do, than to compete for dominance in her own home with her husband, compete with her neighbors for empty status, and so smother her son that he cannot compete at all.

I am the best. There is nobody better than me.

It seems to be part of the human condition to need someone you can look down on. I still don't get that one.

Mine is better than ours.

I don't think about other people. If I did, I'd wanna compete. But I don't think like that, because I'm above everybody.