Quotes About Selfishness

To one degree or another we all struggle with selfishness. Since it is so common, why worry about selfishness anyway? Because selfishness is really self-destruction in slow motion. No wonder the Prophet Joseph Smith urged, "Let every selfish feeling be not only buried, but annihilated" (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 178). Hence annihilation - not moderation - is the destination! . . . Meekness is the real cure, for it does not merely mask selfishness but dissolves it!

Satan had two conditions [to his plan]: the first was the denial of agency, and the second, that he would have the honor. In other words, something had to be in it for him. And thus he became the father of lies and selfishness. Taking up one's cross and following the Savior means overcoming selfishness; it is a commitment to serve others. Selfishness is one of the baser human traits, which must be subdued and overcome. We torture our souls when we focus on getting rather than giving.

Selfishness is like a disease that suffocates our capacity to love. While love asks us to deny ourselves for the sake of another, selfishness demands we put ourselves first at their expense. When we choose to be self-centered, we become less kind and content—more needy, sensitive, and demanding. More unsatisfiable. Moodiness and impatience, laziness and irresponsibility, are only selfishness in disguise.

The selfish man suffers more from his selfishness than he from whom that selfishness withholds some important benefit.

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.

The inescapable fact is that when we build a society based on greed, selfishness, and ruthless competition, the fruits we can expect to reap are economic insecurity at home and international discord abroad.

I don't think the revisionist historians are accurate. I think their agendas are clouded by selfishness and anger and rage.

Following Jesus means taking up one's own cross to accompany him on his path, an uncomfortable path that is not one of success or earthly glory, but which leads to true freedom, the freedom from selfishness and sin.

Certain beliefs must accompany every action: One should act without selfishness, cultivate compassion for all living things, and develop respect for others.

By obliging men to turn their attention to other affairs than their own, it rubs off that private selfishness which is the rust of society.

I don't think there's any need to have essays advocating selfishness among human beings; I don't know what your impression has been, but some things require no further reinforcement.

I'm really disturbed by the degree to which I don't hear people saying, "Are we leaving the world better than we found it?" I think we are a generation that perhaps could not answer in the affirmative, and it is the evasion of the larger responsibility of being only one generation in what one hopes will be an infinite series of fruitful generations. There is a selfishness in refusing to understand that we are passing through; others will come, and they deserve certain courtesies and certain considerations from us.

The dictionary describes a selfish person as one who is 'concerned excessively or exclusively with oneself: seeking pleasure or well-being without regard for others.' May we add, a selfish person is often one who refers to 'I,' 'me,' and 'mine' rather than to 'we,' 'ours,' 'yours,' or 'theirs.' This person is anxious to be in the limelight, to be on center stage in life's little dramas. He or she may be a poor listener, or a conversation monopolizer. Selfishness is the great unknown sin. No selfish person ever thought himself to be selfish.

Asceticism is the trifling of an enthusiast with his power, a puerile coquetting with his selfishness or his vanity, in the absence of any sufficiently great object to employ the first or overcome the last.

It is also important to guard against mistaking for good-nature what is properly good-humor,--a cheerful flow of spirits and easy temper not readily annoyed, which is compatible with great selfishness.

Undoubtedly there are, in connection with each of these things, cases of fraud, swindling, and other financial crimes; that is to say, the greed and selfishness of men are perpetual.

I think for anyone who follows the 'artistic life,' a certain amount of selfishness and self-involvement is part of the package. You're probably already disregarding a certain material life you could have.

Commerce has set the mark of selfishness, the signet of its all-enslaving power, upon a shining ore, and called it gold: before whose image bow the vulgar great, the vainly rich, the miserable proud, the mob of peasants, nobles, priests, and kings, and with blind feelings reverence the power that grinds them to the dust of misery.

A gene might be able to assist replicas of itself that are sitting in other bodies. If so, this would appear as individual altruism but it would be brought about by gene selfishness.

Thread of Selfishness in Web of Life.—Deuteronomy contains much instruction regarding what the law is to us, and the relation we shall sustain to God as we reverence and obey

The absolute desire of 'having more' encourages the selfishness that destroys communal bonds among the children of God. It does so because the idolatry of riches prevents the majority from sharing the goods that the Creator has made for all, and in the all-possessing minority it produces an exaggerated pleasure in these goods.

If we do not cling to riches, selfishness or greed - then I believe we are getting closer to God.

There is more selfishness and less principle among members of Congress than I had any conception of, before I became President of the U.S.

One reason that a truth and reconciliation process is needed for group selection is to return to the simplicity of the original problem and Darwin’s solution. As Ed Wilson and I put it in our recent review article titled “Rethinking the Theoretical Foundation of Sociobiology“: Selfishness beats altruism within groups. Altruistic groups beat selfish groups. Everything else is commentary.

Like nature itself, modern economic life is driven by relentless competition and unbridled selfishness. Or is it?

I think that in today's world, by nature, we are all self-centered. And that often leads to selfishness.

The planet should not be used as a warehouse of resources to serve humanity's selfishness

Wisdom means that it gives you detachment, detachment from all that is selfishness, self-centredness, self-obsession, ego - all connected with self.

The rights of the people to the exercise and fruits of their own industry can never be protected against the selfishness of rulers not subject to their control at short periods.

You will find as you grow older that the first thing needful to make the world a tolerable place to live in is to recognize the inevitable selfishness of humanity. You demand unselfishness from others, which is a preposterous claim that they should sacrifice their desires to yours. Why should they? When you are reconciled to the fact that each is for himself in the world you will ask less from your fellows. They will not disappoint you, and you will look upon them more charitably. Men seek but one thing in life -- their pleasure.

Take away someone’s fear, or low intelligence, or dishonesty . . . and you take away their compassion. Take away someone’s aggression and you take away their motivation, or their ability to assert themselves. Take away their selfishness and you take away their sense of self-preservation.

True patriots believe that freedom from responsibility is selfishness, freedom from sacrifice is cowardice, freedom from tolerance is prejudice, freedom from stewardship is exploitation, and freedom from compassion is cruelty.

Selfishness is the root and source of all natural and moral evils.

One thing is clear to me, that no indulgence of passion destroys the spiritual nature so much as respectable selfishness.

Calculating selfishness is the annihilation of self.

Selfishness is weakness. But loving and caring for others is a position of power beyond anything we can possibly imagine.

Romance is alive and well in America, but the 50 percent who can't make it work fail because of selfishness. It gets down to that. You can't oversimplify it because every situation is so complex.

God creates us free, free to be selfish, but He adds a mechanism that will penetrate our selfishness and wake us up to the presence of others in this world, and that mechanism is called suffering.

A gamester, as such, is the cool, calculating, essential spirit of concentrated, avaricious selfishness.

The organization and constant onward sweep of this movement exemplifies the resentment of the many toward the selfishness, greed and the neglect of the few.

To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.

In order to help usher in the golden age we must see the good in people. We must know it is there, no matter how deeply it may be buried. Yes, apathy is there and selfishness is there - but good is there also. It is not through judgment that the good can be reached, but through love and faith.

Let us have but one end in view, the welfare of humanity; and let us put aside all selfishness in consideration of language, nationality, or religion.

Maybe a new religion will rise now. Maybe without it, man will crumble in cynicism and selfishness because he really needs his gods.

He was no martyr. He was no hero But in the last two years, selfishness gave way to selflessness, lies gave way to truth and indulgence gave way to spirituality, and anyone watching that couldn't help but be moved by it.

The effect of capitalism is to steer human selfishness so that, through the invisible hand of competition, the energies of the capitalist produce the abundance from which the whole society benefits.

Selfishness is blind.

Do not be too quick to condemn the man who no longer believes in God: for it is perhaps your own coldness and avarice and mediocrity and materialism and selfishness that have chilled his faith.