Quotes About Self-deception

But then, we all tell ourselves stories about ourselves. The money man tells himself that by getting rich he is actually enriching others, the artist tells himself that his creations are things of deathless beauty, the soldier tells himself he is on the side of the angels.

But then, we all tell ourselves stories about ourselves. The money man tells himself that by getting rich he is actually enriching others, the artist tells himself that his creations are things of deathless beauty, the soldier tells himself he is on the side of the angels. Me, I told myself that in court I could make things turn out right—that when I won, justice was served. You can get drunk on such thinking, and in Jacob's case I was.

In all of history, we have found just one cure for errora partial antidote against making and repeating grand, foolish mistakes, a remedy against self-deception. That antidote is criticism.

Suppose we were able to share meanings freely without a compulsive urge to impose our view or conform to those of others and without distortion and self-deception. Would this not constitute a real revolution in culture?

The two biggest self-deceptions of all are that life has a 'meaning'and each of us is unique.

Drugs, it seems to me, do not conjure demons, they access them. Was I faking it then, or am I faking it now? Which, you might ask, of my two selves did I make up?

Science is what we have learned about how to keep from fooling ourselves.' By

What if you'd rather not know? You may not like these predictions. Your friends and colleagues may ridicule them. You may try to modify the explanation so that it will not make them, without spoiling its agreement with observations and with other ideas for which you have no good alternatives. You will fail. That is what a good explanation will do for you: it makes it harder for you to fool yourself.

Richard Feynman said, 'Science is what we have learned about how to keep from fooling ourselves.

Sensing its fundamental unreality, the false self wraps itself in experience—experiences of power, pleasure and honor. Intuiting that it is but a shadow, it seeks to convince itself of its reality by equating itself with what it does and achieves.

The human capacity for self-deception is astounding. This is taught by Scripture (Jeremiah 17:9) and confirmed by psychology. Some people are highly skilled in deceiving others. However, their duplicity pales in comparison with the endlessly creative ways in which each and every one of us deceives our self.

Where ambition can cover its enterprises, even to the person himself, under the appearance of principle, it is the most incurable and inflexible of passions.

Self-deception is an indispensable element of war, and that despite the fact that wars are calculated and planned, there is a sense in which human beings do not know what they are doing when they cut one another down on the battlefield.

To pray to God is to flatter oneself that with words one can alter nature.

The only person you have to think about lying twice to is either yourself or to God. The press isn't either of them. And I just figured they're irrelevant.

I have heard of your paintings too, well enough; God has given you one face, and you make yourselves another.

The point that I think myself to be so terribly clever is the precise point at which I am beginning to think myself to be god-like, which causes me to become God-less.

The thing with pretending you're in a good mood is that sometimes you can actually trick yourself into feeling better.

Affectation is a very good word when someone does not wish to confess to what he would none the less like to believe of himself.

It is almost intrinsically impossible for ideas about how we are fooling ourselves to gain an adequate hearing. We are good enough at it to keep them nicely at bay.

Good intentions are only lies the weak tell themselves.

Where we have strong emotions, we're liable to fool ourselves.

We take less pains to be happy, than to appear so.

If we have no inner peace, we deceive ourselves into thinking that comfort and prosperity will bring happiness.