Quotes About Self-improvement

Why was pushing yourself more important than what she wanted?

Before I die I want to have kids. Live in London. Own a pet giraffe. Skydive. Divide by zero. Play the piano. Speak French. Write a book. Travel to a different planet. Be a better dad than mine was. Feel good about myself. Go to New York City. Know equality. Live.

It's not your fault. And sorry wastes time. You have to live your life like you'll never be sorry. It's easier just to do the right thing from the start so there's nothing to apologize for." Not that I'm one to talk.

Don't interrupt a man when he's giving himself hell.

When a peasant begins to feel the need for instruction, he usually becomes fiercely calculating.

Whenever he had spoilt a piece of work he always set himself below the meanest labourer who had at least brawn enough to do his job. (53)

He had been content with daily labour and rough animal enjoyments, 'till Catherine crossed his path. Shame at her scorn, and hope of her approval, were his first prompts to higher pursuits; and, instead of guarding him from one and winning him to the other, his endeavors to raise himself had produced just the contrary result.

Sometimes you must shed your skin to save it.

A nadie se le obliga a morir más imbécil que cuando nació.

Don't be an old dirty leaf, be a neat new leaf if you are an old dirty leaf you can't feed the plant and the plant will throw you from it if you are a neat new leaf you can feed the plant and the plant will keep you with it. The old dirty leaf means bad habits. The neat new leaf means good habits. The plant means every one around you.

If evil be said of thee, and if it be true, correct thyself; if it be a lie, laugh at it.

Epictetus being asked how a man should give pain to his enemy answered, By preparing himself to live the best life that he can.

If you wish to be good, first believe that you are bad.

The philosopher's school, ye men, is a surgery: you ought not to go out of it with pleasure, but with pain. For you are not in sound health when you enter.

The condition and characteristic of an uninstructed person is this: he never expects from himself profit (advantage) nor harm, but from externals. The condition and characteristic of a philosopher is this: he expects all advantage and all harm from himself.

An uninstructed person will lay the fault of his own bad condition upon others. Someone just starting instruction will lay the fault on himself. Some who is perfectly instructed will place blame neither on others nor on himself.

You ought to realize, you take up very little space in the world as a whole—your body, that is; in reason, however, you yield to no one, not even to the gods, because reason is not measured in size but sense. So why not care for that side of you, where you and the gods are equals?

Be happy when you find that doctrines you have learned and analysed are being tested by real events. If you've succeeded in removing or reducing the tendency to be mean and critical, or thoughtless, or foul-mouthed, or careless, or nonchalant; if old interests no longer engage you, at least not to the same extent; then every day can be a feast day – today because you acquitted yourself well in one set of circumstances, tomorrow because of another.

Adopt new habits yourself: consolidate your principles by putting them into practice.

It is the act of an ill-instructed man to blame others for his own bad condition; it is the act of one who has begun to be instructed, to lay blame on himself; and of one whose instruction is completed, neither to blame another, nor himself.

It is the act of an ill-instructed man to blame others for his own bad condition; it is the act of one who has begun to be instructed, to lay the blame on himself; and of one whose instruction is completed, neither to blame another, nor himself.

The philosopher's lecture room is a 'hospital': you ought not to walk out of it in a state of pleasure, but in pain; for you are not in good condition when you arrive.

If you have assumed any character beyond your strength, you have both demeaned yourself ill in that and quitted one which you might have supported.

You're not yet Socrates, but you can still live as if you want to be him.