off one's own bat

I daresay one profits more by the mistakes one makes off one's own bat than by doing the right thing on somebody's else advice.

"I should like to start something - something off one's own bat - that's what I should like."

When we approach Nietzsche's philosophy we must be prepared to be independent thinkers; in fact, the greatest virtue of his works is perhaps the subtlety with which they impose the obligation upon one of thinking alone, of scoring off one's own bat, and of shifting intellectually for oneself.