Selfish Quotes - Page 42

But I think writing should be a bit of a struggle. We're not writing things that are going to change the world in big ways. We're writing things that might make people think about people a little bit, but we're not that important. I think a lot of writers think we are incredibly important. I don't feel like that about my fiction. I feel like it's quite a selfish thing at heart. I want to tell a story. I want someone to listen to me. And I love that, but I don't think I deserve the moon on a stick because I do that.

The hatred and cruelty which have their source in selfishness are ineffectual things compared with the venom and ruthlessness born of selflessness.

It needs some intelligence to be truly selfish. The unintelligent can only be self-righteous.

Real love, no matter how unworthy the object, is a glorious adventure. It bursts the shackles of selfishness. One's world is bigger, broader; one's sympathies are amazingly more tender. No matter what the result, if you haven't really loved, you haven't really lived.

Let me not hurt, by any selfish deed Or thoughtless word, the heart of foe or friend; Nor would I pass, unseeing, worthy need, Or sin by silence when I should defend... "The world is better that I lived to-day."

Shall an invention be patented or donated to the public freely? I have known some well-meaning scientific men ... to look askance at the patenting of inventions, as if it were a rather selfish and ungracious act, essentially unworthy. The answer is very simple. Publish an invention freely, and it will almost surely die from lack of interest in its development. It will not be developed and the world will not be benefited. Patent it, and if valuable, it will be taken up and developed into a business.

Selfishness and separatation have led me to believe that the world is not my problem. I am the world.

Be incredibly, ruthlessly selfish with your equity.

I believe in aliens. I think it would be way too selfish of us as mankind to believe we are the only lifeforms in the universe.

We make allowance for a certain degree of selfishness in men; because we know it to be inseparable from human nature, and inherent in our frame and constitution. By this reflexion we correct those sentiments of blame, which so naturally arise upon any opposition.

Having been created in the image and likeness of God, unlike trees or flowers or fire or the moon, we are most fully human when we love, forgive and work toward peace. To be violent, vengeful or selfish is to be un-human!

Our Savior gave Himself in unselfish service. He taught that each of us should follow Him by denying ourselves of selfish interests in order to serve others.

But the reality is we often become our kindest, most ethical selves only by seeing what it feels like to be a selfish jackass first.

Actors - we're selfish, but we can't think about the work in that kind of selfish manner. I think that you have to step away from yourself, if you're going to do it. Otherwise don't do it; otherwise why do it?

What the writers do, and we hopefully can bring to life, is that they present characters who, on the surface, aren't always heroic and their acts aren't always devoid of selfishness.

Love is a balance between independence and interdependence. In love, you want to be independent and interdependent. You want to be a little bit selfish and a little bit selfless. Love can be an antidote to loneliness, as long as there is some aloneness in it.

These are uncertain times. We cannot be content to rest on yesterday's laurels. These are times when we must strengthen rather than let down those standards which have stood in such good stead in crises that are past. Baseball cannot be selfish, or irresponsible, or lax. Neither can the men who operate it.

Heaven would be Hell in no time if every cruel, selfish, vicious soul went to Heaven.

Aggression is the first step on the slippery slope to selfishness and chaos.

The perception of the West as mostly a "knight of democracy" has been replaced with the disappointed belief that pragmatism, often cynical and selfish, lies at the core of Western policies. For many Russians it was a grave disillusion, a crushing of ideals.

Love is a virtue; it grows stronger and purer and less selfish by applying it to what it loathes; but theft is a vice involving the slave-idea that one's neighbor is superior to oneself.

My mother said I broke her heart...but it was my integrity that was important. Is that so selfish? It sells for so little, but it's all we have left in this place. It is the very last inch of us...but within that inch we are free.

When you win, you often lose, that's just a fact. There's no currency to straighten a warped spirit, or open a closed heart, a selfish heart.

I have learned, by some experience, that virtue and patriotism, vice and selfishness, are found in all parties, and that they differ less in their motives than in the policies they pursue.

Timothy's great value was that he was always willing to go anywhere; and in his hands a message was as safe as if Paul had delivered it himself. Others might be consumed with selfish ambition; but Timothy's one desire was to serve Paul and Jesus Christ. He is the patron saint of all those who are quite content with the second place, so long as they can serve.