What is Transcendentalism?

     Transcendentalism is the idea that the only thing from stopping us from doing anything is ourselves. Potentially if we really believed that we could levitate or fly, then we could. The only reason we cannot is because of the passed down traditional knowledge that creates limitations in our minds. Transcendentalism is simply going beyond these limitations. If we begin to question traditional knowledge and believing in the things that we assume we cannot do, then we can control our own reality. To determine the ultimate reality, we must go further beyond our human everyday experiences.
     Transcend means to live on a level above the physical or common level. Transcendentalism is illustrated in Ralph Waldo Emerson"s "Nature" when Emerson describes retreating into nature. He says, "In the woods is perpetual youth. Within these plantations of God, a decorum and a sanctity reign, a perennial festival is dressed, and the guest sees not how he should tire of them in a thousand years" (Emerson 181).This quotes talks about how nature supplies a youth and how nature never becomes boring. Several transcendentalists also believed in unifying everything together as one "Divine Soul." This means that all things, in some way, are connected. Ralph Waldo Emerson discusses "Divine Soul" in his Self-Reliance writing piece. A quote is "Speak your latent conviction and it shall be the universal sense; for always the inmost becomes the out-most,-and our first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgement" (Emerson 183). By discussing the "inmost" and "out-most," Emerson is showing that everything that the individual thinks or does is connected to everyone else. 

     This picture is a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson. I believe is an excellent example of transcendentalism. It is telling us that we should be ourselves and not follow the crowd. We should not form to society, but rather take a completely different path in life.