Quotes About Self-preservation

Once you encounter people who are really testing the limits of kindness, that's when you start to build up a shield and close yourself down.

Homicide detectives know it as well. Emergency room nurses, paramedics—they all know the dirty little secret: It doesn't get any easier. In fact, it lives in you. Every trauma, every horrible sight, every senseless death, every feral, blood-soaked act of violence in the name of self-preservation—they all accumulate like silt at the bottom of a person's heart until the weight is unbearable.

Every person has a right to risk their own life for the preservation of it.

Like the bath, my old clothes could easily bring back poignant, painful memories. But I see in the clothing a symbol of continuing life. And proof that I still want to be myself. If I must drool, I may as well drool on cashmere.

Every man has the right to risk his own life in order to preserve it. Has it ever been said that a man who throws himself out the window to escape from a fire is guilty of suicide?

To those who would argue, correctly, that the teachings of the East offer deeper, richer levels of subtlety and sophistication than the more youthful and boisterous Americans, I'd reply that waking up is a youthful, boisterous business and that those who seek ever deeper layers of understanding are merely fulfilling ego's agenda of stagnation and self-preservation.

After all I'd been through, I didn't need to be wiping other people's eyeballs off my cheek.

But minds find ways to protect themselves, build fortifications, and some of those walls become traps.

The real challenge is not simply to survive. Hell, anyone can do that. It's to survive as yourself, undiminished.

One way to protect yourself is by not needing or wanting anything. If you expect nothing, you cannot be disappointed. And, if you don't want or need anything, you can avoid abusive reactions to your needs.

Listen to me, kid. Don't forget that you are in a concentration camp. In this place, it is every many for himself, and you cannot think of others. Not even you father. In this place, there is no such thing as father, brother, friend. Each of us lives and dies alone. Let me give you good advice: stop giving your ration of bread and soup to your old father. You cannot help him anymore. And you are hurting yourself. In fact, you should be getting his rations...

Speak to your darkest and most negative interior voices the way a hostage negotiator speaks to a violent psychopath: calmly, but firmly. Most of all, never back down. You cannot afford to back down. The life you are negotiating to save, after all, is your own.

Over time, I've found the right tone of voice for these assertions, too. It's best to be insistent, but affable. Repeat yourself, but don't get shrill. Speak to your darkest and most negative interior voices the way a hostage negotiator speaks to a violent psychopath: calmly, but firmly. Most of all, never back down. You cannot afford to back down. The life you are negotiating to save, after all, is your own.

I would not allow anyone into the center of myself; I would make myself a place to go, deep inside, no matter what happened.

They were taking my natural feelings away, so quietly that it could have occurred without my noticing. I understood in a flash that I must keep my mind safe, whatever came next.

My advice is, the next time you see someone you think you need to rescue, walk quickly away on the far side of the street.

Oh, my dear, relations are like drugs, - useful sometimes, and even pleasant, if taken in small quantities and seldom, but dreadfully pernicious on the whole, and the truly wise avoid them.

But what if you are the only resting point you know of? What if you are absolute zero? What if only you can catch yourself?

And I withdrew into myself when I understood that they wanted to extract every thought in my head, one by one, like decayed teeth.

No one can pull anyone back from anywhere. You save yourself or you remain unsaved.

I steel myself to ignore his taunts and his coarse language. I no longer care what he says or does. It doesn't matter anymore. I am detached, contained in my own private world where he cannot reach me. It is my last refuge.

Do you know what pain is, Cammie? It's the body's physical response to imminent harm. It is the mind's way of telling us to move our hand off the stove or let go of the broken glass.

If you don't want to be a victim, don't act like one.

Because the truth is, it's just a whole lot better to not let yourself get too involved with anyone, or anything. Because in the end - everything comes to an end.