Lillian Hellman Quotes

Whoever you pretend to be, you must face yourself eventually.

To be authentic is to stop pretending to be what think you are, because you are not.

Let the world know you as you are, not as you think you should be, because sooner or later, if you are posing, you will forget the pose, and then where are you?

I think I spent a lot of my mid-twenties thinking it was a problem of my onstage persona. But, actually, it was my actual personality. I was still working out what kind of person I was.

To me, the main thing about living on this planet is to know who the hell you are and be real about it. That's the reason I'm still alive.

(M)aybe we too busy being flowers or fairies or strawberries instead of something honest and worthy of respect . . . you know . . . like being people.

If you re not speaking your own truth, you will never be able to be all you are meant to be. You cannot be pretending to be somebody else.

Truly know thyself, and to thine own self be true.

The most dangerous thing you can do is know who you are.

Don't get confused with what people say you are, with who you know you are.

This is myself, baby. All of my selves. I own each and every one of them. I know who I'm pretending to be and who I am." The look he gives me is withering. "Do you?

It was then that I realized that while playing the well-meaning tolerant individual (in short: liberal) garnered you fans and grades, it didn't matter. In my heart and head, I was a fraud.

It's a hell of a responsibility to be yourself. It's much easier to be somebody else or nobody at all.

Do we dare be ourselves? That is the question that counts.

My problem was I let myself become known before I knew myself.

I'd reached a point where there was a direct conflict between what I was trying to be and who I really was.

I don't think it's about entertainment. I think it's about being ourselves.

Do whatever it takes to convey your essential self.

Argue with anything else, but don't argue with your own nature.

One of my problems is to find the self.

I don't know what else I would be if I wasn't me. I am not looking from the outside, looking back. I am who I am.

Getting in touch with your true self must be your first priority.

Everyone kept telling me, Just be yourself. Be yourself. I kept thinking, there's got to be more to it than that!

Be that self which one truly is.

It's hard to live in a blind and aimless - or dishonest, rather - narrative when somebody in your family is going farther toward - or at least think they are and say they are - their true self.