It's a familiar quote, one that has been used in many different contexts, and appropriated in countless sundry ways.  It's from Walden, Henry David Thoreau's perennially popular meditation on the joy of parsing living down to its bare necessities so as to more fully focus on the profound delights of solitude and reflection.

          "If a man does not keep pace with his companions," Thoreau observed as he drew his ruminations to a conclusion, "perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away."
     Thoreau's words are timeless, snippets of wisdom that have inspired many, many people.  And why not?  Though it's difficult to tell from Thoreau's writings exactly what he believed about God (given that he was a New England Transcendentalist), Walden overflows with assertions about the importance of individuality.  Each person is special, each person is unique, gifted, he seems to suggest, by God.
     I certainly cannot disagree.  As we continue to walk in the afterglow of the Christmas celebration, we note that in Christmas's narrative we see undelible evidence of God's endorsement of human uniqueness.  Jesus came to earth as a unique and one of a kind human being--just like every one of us.  In expressing himself as a man called Jesus, God is telling us that he affirms human worth.  He is saying that he believes in us, that he wants great things for us, and that, as Thoreau rightly observes, he understands that we all have a special path to pursue in this adventure of life and existence.
     Find your place, find your calling.  Find your path, your individual path with God.  Be like God was on earth:  yourself.