Top 1200 Self-Absorbed Quotes & Sayings - Page 18

Ironically, often the thing that keeps me from experiencing joy is my preoccupation with self. The very selfishness that keeps me from pouring myself out for the joy of others also keeps me from noticing and delighting in the myriad small gifts God offers each day. This is why Walker Percy describes boredom as "the self stuffed with the self."

Self-discipline is the key to personal greatness. It is the magic quality that opens all doors for you, and makes everything else possible. With self-discipline, the average person can rise as far and as fast as his talents and intelligence can take him. But without self-discipline, a person with every blessing of background, education and opportunity will seldom rise above mediocrity.

As quickly as it started, our business model evaporated. But while Traf-O-Data was technically a business failure, the understanding of microprocessors we absorbed was crucial to our future success.

There is an energy, a romance in writing the first novel that can never be duplicated again. I was entirely absorbed in that world as I wrote the book [The Kite Runner] and to see the final page of that manuscript whir out of the printer was a very special feeling indeed.

When you are in the mundane from what is deeper than your self, you realize the mundane to be more than your self, and your self opens. It opens in its structuring and in its form, enabling you as the form of your self to move in the deeper levels of the mundane

He lost his Self a thousand times and for days on end he dwelt in non-being. But although the paths took him away from Self, in the end they always led back to it. Although Siddhartha fled from the Self a thousand times, dwelt in nothing, dwelt in animal and stone, the return was inevitable; the hour was inevitable when he would again find himself in sunshine or in moonlight, in shadow or in rain, and was again Self and Siddhartha, again felt the torment of the onerous life cycle.

… it wasn’t pretend, I wasn’t in a fairytale or a fable. I shut my eyes and absorbed the silent whoomp that always accompanies this revelation. It’s the sound of the real world, gigantic and impossible, replacing the smaller version of reality that I wear like a bonnet, clutched tightly under my chin.

What does God hate or punish except self-will? Let self-will cease, and there will be no hell. On what does that fire feed except on self-will?

So now I have confessed that he is thine, And I my self am mortgaged to thy will, My self I'll forfeit, so that other mine, Thou wilt restore to be my comfort still.

This self-respect and sense of self-worth, the innermost armament of the soul, lies at the heart of humanness; to be deprived of it is to be dehumanized, to be cleaved from, and cast below, mankind.

Ethics doesn't require us to ignore our self-interests or demand a life of self-sacrifice. It requires that we know the difference between what we want and what we should do

In reading Ameen Rihani... I seem to have become absorbed to the point of forgetting my prejudice... and my envy of Mr. Rihani because he was permitted to enter many remote parts of Arabia which were barred to others.

Even a monotonously undeviating path of self-examination does not necessarily lead to self-knowledge. I stumble towards my grave confused and hurt and hungry.

Fichte takes an I or free will to be not a thing or being but an act which is not undetermined but self-determined, in accordance with reasons or norms rationally self-given.

Self-sufficiency is vitally important to my self-respect. I never wanted to rely on my parents in that way, because I knew that if I got used to it, I'd be reliant all my life.

What you really are isn’t loyal to your self. It won’t favor your self. It will turn your self into what you really are.

When all the Self was conquered and dead, when all passions and desires were silent, then the last must awaken, the innermost of Being that is no longer Self - the great secret!

Those are not the tears of repentance!... Self-loathing is not sorrow. Yet it is good, for it marks a step in the way home, and in the father's arms the prodigal forgets the self he abominates.

It's always difficult to see yourself as other people do, but I'm realistic about my appearance. I wasn't born with one of those pretty, pretty faces, so I've never been absorbed with the way I look. I just try to make the most of what I've got.

But Captain Vere was now again motionless, standing absorbed in thought. Again starting, he vehemently exclaimed, "Struck dead by an angel of God! Yet that angel must hang!

The poet, however, uses these two crude, primitive, archaic forms of thought (simile and metaphor) in the most uninhibited way, because his job is not to describe nature, but to show you a world completely absorbed and possessed by the human mind.

I have played characters where I haven't been absorbed - you know, what I call a typical film leading man role where you just have to look gorgeous and be attractive and charming. It bores me. I like a bit of dirt, a bit of sand in the oyster.

I do not yet know why plants come out of the land or float in streams, or creep on rocks or roll from the sea. I am entranced by the mystery of them, and absorbed by their variety and kinds. Everywhere they are visible yet everywhere occult.

In 1828 we raised the duties, on an average, to nearly fifty per cent, when the debt was on the eve of being discharged, and thereby flooded the country with a revenue, when discharged, which could not be absorbed by the most lavish expenditures.

I know that's how things have gotten, but I appreciate to listen to it the way it was intended to be listened to. The way the intro to the record starts. I just want you to stare at the cover, get absorbed in the whole vibe and let it take you on that journey.

No one seriously doubts Socrates' maxim: The unexamined life isn't worth living. Self-assessment and attempts at self-improvement are essential aspects of "the good life." Yes, we should engage in ruthless self-reflection and harsh scrutiny, but we should simultaneously acknowledge that such introspection will, at best, only result in a partial view of our minds at work. Complete objectivity is not an option.

Now this spirit is admirably mortified by the exercise of patience. It involves also a continual practice of the presence of God; for we may be come upon at any moment for an almost heroic display of good temper. It is a short road to unselfishness; for nothing is left to self. All that seems to belong most intimately to self, to be self's private property, such as time, home, and rest, are invaded by these continual trials of patience.

All the classical meditation traditions, in one way or another, stress nonattachment to the self as a goal of practice. Oddly, this dimension is largely ignored in scientific research, which tends to focus on health and other such benefits. I suppose the difference has to do with the contrast in views of the self from the spiritual and scientific perspectives. Scientists value the self; spiritual traditions have another perspective.

Obesity is the result of a loss of self-control. Indeed, loss of self-control might be said to be the defining social (or anti-social) characteristic of our age: public drunkenness, excessive gambling, promiscuity and common-or-garden rudeness are all examples of our collective loss of self-control.

I will not allow myself to be so absorbed in the whirlwind of work as to forget about God. I will spend all my free moments at the feet of the Master hidden in the Blessed Sacrament. He has been tutoring me from my most tender years.

Man is spirit. But what is spirit? Spirit is the self. But what is the self? The self is a relation which relates itself to itself.

I can't describe it in words, but I can see it in my head, its color, its light, its shapes, and I've managed to synthesize my love for myself by way of many different reasonings and processes, and I've been able to really synthesize my own satisfaction and things that do it for me. They've usually been self-taught, self-instructed, self-refined. So to be with anybody else has to somewhat lie in that comfort zone I've created with myself so well.

A self does not amount to much, but no self is an island; each exists in a fabric of relations that is now more complex and mobile than ever before.

Sometimes, the only way to learn something really well is to revert to the state of mind of a novice and reawaken to the raw observations that you have accumulated instead of relying on the conclusions you have reached from the exogenous premises absorbed through teaching and bookish learning.

You have to work from one point to go to another. So I admire work ethic, I think it should be reinforced through our neighborhoods, that everybody should work hard, practice makes perfect, you have to be diligent with what you want, you have to apply yourself, you have to motivate your self. You have to do for self by yourself, and then you can do things for other people. That's what I had to do, I had to do for self.

Our everyday self is a narrow construct...Our total self is far broader, ultimately infinite. Actors who seem to be playing themselves are actually playing roles they have become so skillful at that they seem pure and natural...Much bad Acting is the result of being too close to the Actor's everyday self, confining him in its rigid mold.

The foolish being who lives making even the slightest distinction between the supreme Self and his own self will always be subject to fear.

I work out all the time. Cardio, resistance and a lot of jogging. I love to go hiking. I'm going to invest this in myself, into my self-worth, into my self-esteem.

I definitely think that, for a woman, the biggest turn-on is the mind. Otherwise, obviously you want someone who keeps up with himself and has self-respect and self-confidence.

When man thinks in self-conscious submission to the voluntary revelation of the self-sufficient God, he has therewith the only possible ground of certainty for his knowledge.

I became really absorbed but again I was at that point - and I still remain today - an outsider who has no interest in becoming an insider, let alone in what that insider perspective on [Buckminster Fuller] has come to be and come to represent.

Sleep with Seth Mortensen? Good grief. It was the most preposterous thing I'd ever heard. It was appalling. If I absorbed his life force, there was no telling how long it'd be until his next book came out.

We must strive for freedom if we strive for self-knowledge. The task of self-knowledge and of further self-development is of such importance and seriousness, it demands such intensity of effort, that to attempt it any old way and amongst other things is impossible. The person who undertakes this task must put it first in his life, which is not so long that he can afford to squander it on trifles.

You don't know Mexico, man. You have trivialized Mexico. You are a fool about Mexico if you think that Mexico is five blocks. That is not Mexico; that is some crude Americanism you have absorbed.

......at this point the self has obviously outworn its function; it is no longer needed or useful, and life can go on without it. we are ready to move on, to go beyond the self, beyond even its most intimate union with God, and this is where we enter yet another new life- a life best categorized, perhaps, as a life without a self.

I do not yet know why plants come out of the land or float in streams, or creep on rocks or roll from the sea. I am entranced by the mystery of them and absorbed by their variety and kinds. Everywhere, they are visible yet everywhere occult.

I'm completely absorbed by Peter Guralnick's definitive, two-part biography of Elvis Presley: 'Last Train To Memphis' and 'Careless Love.' Meticulously researched, this is a compelling mix of history, myth-busting, and, of course, some timeless music.

Deeds of violence in our society are performed largely by those trying to establish their self-esteem, to defend their self-image, and to demonstrate that they, too, are significant.

Self-indulgence leads only to misery. Nothing great or even worthwhile is ever accomplished without struggle through adversity and self-sacrifice

The child is born with a Self but not with an ego. The child develops the ego. As he becomes more and more social and related, ego develops. This ego is just on your periphery where you are related with others - just on the boundary of your being. So ego is the periphery of your being, and Self is the center. The child is born with a Self, but unaware. He is a Self, but he is not conscious of the Self.

The aim is not therefore to liberate some 'essential self' by throwing off the burden of government and the State, but to develop the self in creative and voluntary relations with others.

Rise above the deceptions and temptations of the mind. This is your duty. You are born for this only; all other duties are self-created and self-imposed owing to ignorance.

Surrounded and absorbed, we tread like Etruscans on the edge of useless law; we pray to the giver of prayer, we give the cane whistle in ceremony, we swing the heavy silver chain of incense burners. Migration makes new citizens of Rome.

Teenagers, especially girl ones, seem like the perfect canary-in-the-coal-mine characters to me. They capture American culture and its perversion, its hypocrisy - how absorbed we are with youth and beauty and sexualized imagery, for instance, while preaching abstinence and modesty.

I am driven to observe of the ultra-Darwinists the following features as symptomatic. First, to my eyes, is their almost unbelievable self-assurance, their breezy self-confidence.

Self knowledge is the beginning of self improvement.

I want to get rid of the Indian problem. [...] Our objective is to continue until there is not a single Indian in Canada that has not been absorbed into the body politic and there is no Indian Question and no Indian Department.

The self is the class (not the collection) of the experiences (or autopsychological states). The self does not belong to the expression of the basic experience, but is constructed only on a very high level.

I think that whenever soul is present, it's because what you're doing, whom you're with, where you are, evokes love without your thinking about it. You are totally absorbed in the place of person or event, without ego and without judgment.

A gentleman is one who doesn't and can't forgive himself for self-committed mistake even if others forget it and the self-criticism is a mark of his right attitude towards life.