Man is his project Sartre says that man is sovereign in assigning himself existence through the act of will. This existentialist view describes the idea that one is not based on the essence of a soul, but rather on the decisions made throughout life. Sartre also believes that every man is responsible for all men. Man is independent and the decisions he makes will create an overall set of principles and beliefs for all humanity. Man is nothing other than his own project. Sartre writes that man is one who gives himself a purpose and creates himself. Sartre writes: “Man is not only what he conceives himself to be, but what he wants to be, and since he conceives himself only after having existed, just as he wants to be after having been thrown into existence, man is nothing.” other than what he does with himself." (Sartré, 22). Sartre is saying that man is not what he thinks he is, he is what he does and is constantly changing. Man cannot be what he considers himself to be unless what he considers himself to be is what he has already completed or what he is currently doing. He also states that man is what he is only until he exists, because man knows what he wants to be until he exists, he cannot know what he wants to be before because he does not yet exist. This idea that man creates his “self” is linked to the idea that existence precedes essence. Sartre states that humans are different from objects in the sense that objects usually have a purpose before they are made. Sartre states: “We mean to say that man first exists: he materializes in the world, meets himself and only then defines himself. If man, as the existentialist sees him, is not definable, it is because in the first place he is nothing. It will be nothing until later, and that will be what he makes of himself” (Sartre 22). What Sartre is saying here is this