Quotes About Selfish

Writing is a demanding profession and a selfish one. And because it is selfish and demanding, because it is compulsive and exacting, I didn't embrace it. I succumbed to it.

I have learned to go fully in the face of my dreams. I would recommend you do the same. Now is the time in your life to be selfish. To explore. To take chances. Remember being selfish is not the same as being self-indulgent. You have the gift of time. Use it to do what you love. Believe anything is possible and then work like hell to make it happen.

Selfishness is the key quality that all successful people share. To be the best at what you do in any field, and to accomplish the goals you set for yourself, you have to be somewhat selfish.

I've got to do something to make up for all those self-absorbed and selfish years when I just, you know, was taking drugs, sitting in my room, doing bad things, whatever.

Today, the sun is everywhere, and everything solid is nothing but its own shadow, I know that the real things in life, the things I remember, the things I turn over in my hands, are not houses, bank accounts, prizes or promotions. What I remember is love -- all love -- love of this dirt road, this sunrise, a day by the river, the stranger I met in a café. Myself, even, which is the hardest thing of all to love, because love and selfishness are not the same thing. It is easy to be selfish. It is hard to love who I am. No wonder I am surprised if you do.

I think I'm hornier than most dudes. I'm not a selfish lover - but the bottom line is... I guess I am horny. I'm insatiable. I can never get enough.

As a director, you have a thousand things going on in your head, and of course, that's going to be difficult. That's going to mean that some things get overlooked. And so, for us as performers, being the selfish pricks that we are, we're sitting there being concerned about ourselves all the time and our character's through-line.

I didn’t do anything wrong. All I know is I saw two people struggling to get inside these walls and they couldn’t make it. To ignore that because of some stupid rule seemed selfish, cowardly, and…well, stupid. If you want to throw me in jail for trying to save someone’s life, then go ahead. Next time I promise I’ll point at them and laugh, then go eat some of Frypan’s dinner.

Those who are esteemed umpires of taste, are often persons who have acquired some knowledge of admired pictures or sculptures, andhave an inclination for whatever is elegant; but if you inquire whether they are beautiful souls, and whether their own acts are like fair pictures, you learn that they are selfish and sensual. Their cultivation is local, as if you should rub a log of dry wood in one spot to produce fire, all the rest remaining cold.

You instantly become less selfish. You can't be the biggest person in the world anymore-they are. [Motherhood] really grounds you.

What you learn about yourself is that you continue to see that you're selfish. It's so easy, in our Laodicean culture with all the different things that grab our minds that aren't of eternal value, to let those tentacles wrap themselves around your heart. That's one of the reasons why we love going overseas. It helps us to break free of those things. We've been on all of these trips, but it's easy to slide back into the selfishness of life. That's what we find out about ourselves.

The Clinton paradox: How could a president so intelligent, so compassionate, so public-spirited and so conscious of his place in history act in such a stupid, selfish and self-destructive manner?

A selfish person can still love someone else, can't they? Even when they've hurt them and let them down.

In the middle of a conversation, she'll frequently say something like, "Young people are heartless, they don't have any respect anymore." I nod agreement in hopes that she'll stop right there, but secretly I'm convinced that the heart is the same as it's always been; there's simply less hypocrisy, that's all. Young people aren't naturally selfish, any more than old folks are naturally wise. Your age doesn't have anything to do with whether you're sensitive or shallow; it's a question of the path your life takes.

As an athlete you're taught to be selfish. When I'm training, it's usually all about me.

I resolve to be more patient, less selfish, cherish my friends, and in my small way help whoever needs help. I cannot conceivably influence the world's destiny, but I can make my own life more worthwhile. I can give some help to some people; that is not vital to all the world's problems and yet, I think if everyone did just that, we might see quite a world in our time!

When you assemble a number of men to have the advantage of their joint wisdom, you inevitably assemble with those men all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests and their selfish views.

Selfish prudence is too often allowed to come between duty and human life.

My mom can't defend herself to the world. She is such an amazing woman, with such an open heart. It's a real hard line, and I crossed it. I took everyone's life story and assumed it would be a great thing to put on screen. I was being selfish and I feel so horrible about it. I feel so guilty.

The American goes to Paris, always has, and comes back and tells his neighbor, always does, how exorbitant and inhospitable it is, how rapacious and selfish and unaccommodating and unresponsive it is, how dirty and noisy it is-and the next summer his neighbor goes to Paris.

Christian morality (so called) has all the characters of a reaction.... In its horror of sensuality, it made an idol of asceticism, which has been gradually compromised away into one of legality. It holds out the hope of heaven and the threat of hell, as the appointed and appropriate motives to a virtuous life - in this falling far below the best of the ancients, and doing what lies in it to give to human morality an essentially selfish character.... It is essentially a doctrine of passive obedience; it inculcates submission to all authorities found established.

People who write for reward by way of recognition or monetary gain don't know what they're doing. They're in the category of those who write; they are not writers. Writing is simply something you must do. It's rather like virtue in that it is its own reward. Writing is selfish and contradictory in its terms. First of all, you're writing for an audience of one, you must please the one person you're writing for. Yourself.

Poets seem to write more easily about love than prose writers. For a start, they own that flexible ‘I’…. Then again, poets seem able to turn bad love – selfish, shitty love – into good love poetry. Prose writers lack this power of admirable, dishonest transformation. We can only turn bad love into prose about bad love. So we are envious (and slightly distrustful) when poets talk to us of love.

It is selfish to concern oneself with tragedies.

When it comes to my racing career I'm very driven and very selfish. People who are around me at races will know that I'm a different person here than in my personal life. I completely blank people at races. I need to be focused. I'm rude.

As much as it's awful to learn about all the greedy and selfish decisions that some people make, I know there are many more people who have good intentions.

Remember the people you address are selfish, as we all are. They care nothing about your interests or profit. They seek service for themselves

In matters editorial, I am a believer in totalitarian despotism. Most writers are lazy, difficult, selfish, thoughtless, and unreliable.

Because of my age and because there's more work on the small screen. What it's missing in quality it makes up for in quantity. From an actor's selfish point of view.

Religion! Is what you hear at church religion? Is that which can bend and turn, and descend and ascend, to fit every crooked phase of selfish, worldly society, religion? Is that religion which is less scrupulous, less generous, less just, less considerate for man, than even my own ungodly, worldly, blinded nature? No! When I look for religion, I must look for something above me, and not something beneath.

My big problem with corporate structure is this bizarre sense of loyalty you're supposed to feel -- towards what is basically a virus. It grows or dies, like any virus. And you use it for your own selfish ends." - source

The men who carry their points do not need to inquire of their constituents what they should say, but are themselves the country which they represent: nowhere are its emotions or opinions so instant and so true as in them; nowhere so pure from a selfish infusion.

Selfish persons are incapable of loving others, but they are not capable of loving themselves either.

If the Irish once find out that there are any circumstances in which they can get free government grants, we shall have a system of mendicancy [begging] such as the world never knew”. After a million had starved to death he stated “The great evil with which we have to contend is not the physical evil of the famine, but the moral evil of the selfish, perverse and turbulent character of the people.

People have these weird ideas about artists being romantic, generous people, and sometimes I feel like an asshole, a selfish kid, a brat, the lucky one, because I get to do this and it's how I make my living.

Virtue is its own reward, and brings with it the truest and highest pleasure; but if we cultivate it only for pleasure's sake, we are selfish, not religious, and will never gain the pleasure, because we can never have the virtue.

It astounds us to come upon other egoists, as though we alone had the right to be selfish, and to be filled with eagerness to live.

And, one thing I definitely enjoyed personally, from a selfish point of view, was exploration and going to places that I had never been to before and learning, you know, meeting the people and getting to know, new sights and sounds, etc.

Do not cry for me, Azrael. Do not waste your tears. You made your decision. And this is mine. Sacrifice seems to be my destiny. A funny thing for a selfish man, isn't it? They always called me weak back then.

The ends you serve that are selfish will take you no further than yourself but the ends you serve that are for all, in common, will take you into eternity.

Raw hatred took its time making an outpost of its rage and prepared for me a savage crown with rusty, bloodstained spikes. It wasn't pride that made me keep my heart at a distance from such terror, nor did I waste on revenge or the pursuit of power the forces that came from my selfish griefs or my accumulated joys. It was something else-my helplessness.

Dreams are selfish, in the sense that they always concern issues and events that were weighing on your mind at the time you had the dream. Dreams will warn you about concerns in your career, in your family life, in your relationship with your spouse, and give insight into problems with your children.

The idea that affable Boris[Johnson] is actually divisive, selfish and unreliable is Mr 's biggest weakness.

Although our emotions sometimes behave like spoiled, selfish children, unfortunately we cannot send them to their room or tell them to stop screaming.

I get a lot of joy from playing instruments, and I have a different personality on each instrument. I like to let that come out. I get kind of selfish.

If the people are to be the final tribunal then they must vote for what is right rather than according to their own selfish interests, else we are treading the path of danger.

There's a lot of people that I disagree with that I think I could have interesting conversations with. What I don't want to get into is manufactured conflict. I would much rather talk to someone like Dr. Rhonda Patrick or Randall Carlson and be mesmerized by information. I guess in a way that's selfish, or maybe not objective of me. The older (and hopefully wiser) I get the less interested I am in conflict. I don't mind disagreeing with people in a civil way, but I definitely don't want to go out of my way to have an argument unless it's a really important subject.

If we have chosen the position in life in which we can most of all work for mankind, no burdens can bow us down, because they are sacrifices for the benefit of all; then we shall experience no petty, limited, selfish joy, but our happiness will belong to millions, our deeds will live on quietly but perpetually at work, and over our ashes will be shed the hot tears of noble people.