Quotes About Selflessness

Svaki ?ovjek mora odlu?iti ho?e li hodati u svjetlu kreativnog altruizma ili u tami destruktivnog egoizma.

Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.

The surest way to be happy is to seek happiness for others.

Our negative ceasing to possess must be accompanied by a positive choosing to be generous.

Your womanhood is ultimately not about you. It's about displaying the glory of God and His powerful redemptive plan.

But she had the chance now to make things right, at least for her daughter. She may have done a lot of things wrong, but the decision to give up her child would be the one responsible, unselfish act of her life. It was the best thing she'd ever done. But it felt like the worst.

You don't have to say thank you. I'm your mother. It's my job. My pleasure.

She never wanted to hurt anyone's feelings. But in the end, she hurt herself.

Love is wanting to be with someone all the time.It is accepting the other person with all good qualities and bad and not wanting to change any of them. It is wanting to give affection and approval and comfort and everything that is oneself,demanding nothing in return. It is - love is very difficult, Julia. It is an ideal, rarely achieved in reality because we are all selfish and imperfect beings. It is a dream, a goal, something to be aimed for.

He asked me not to kill myself - asked, not told. His wife had done that, he told me, and it was in a sense the ultimate act of selfishness since it left behind untold and endless suffering for those who had witnessed it and been unable to do anything to prevent it. And so I remained alive.

I have wrought my simple plan If I give one hour of joy To the boy who's half a man, Or the man who's half a boy.

Everything comes down to this: the reason for every word I have written and every word I will write. I am recounting my life for you so that you may know this secret without the pain of discovering it: We are unhappy because we think that love is something we require from someone else. Our salvation depends on a simple gesture that is nonetheless the most difficult act we can perform: We must give away the thing we most long for. Not to receive but to give.

Wij zijn ongelukkig omdat wij denken dat we lief moeten 'hebben'. Om gered te worden moeten wij iets eenvoudigs doen dat ons desalniettemin het zwaarst van alles valt: wegschenken waarnaar wij juist het meest verlangen. Niet 'hebben', maar 'geven'. Zo zegepralen wij alsnog. Dit heeft mij mijn gebrek geleerd.

Mijn liefde leefde, niet omdat ik WERD bemind, maaar omdat ik zelf liefhad!

That's only a little thing . . . but . . . that's the kind of guys I had. They didn't die; they killed themselves for each other. I mean that exactly; a little more selfish and they'd've been here today. And I got an idea—watching them go down. Everything was being destroyed, see, but it seemed to me that one new thing was made. A kind of . . . responsibility. Man for man.

Doing good does us good.

Genius is the ability to leave entirely out of sight our own interest, our willing, and our aims, and consequently to discard entirely our own personality for a time, in order to remain pure knowing subject, the clear eye of the world; and this not merely for moments, but with the necessary continuity and conscious thought to enable us to repeat by deliberate art what has been apprehended and what in wavering apparition gleams fix in its place with thoughts that stand for ever!

Compassion is the most likely alleviation of the countless and multifarious sufferings with which our life is beset and which no one completely escapes, and at the same time compassion is the counterbalance to the burning egoism that fills all beings and often develops into malice

Ba?kas?n?n mutlu olmas? seni rahats?z ediyorsa asla mutlu olamazs?n. -Seneca, De ira

per la libertà che aveva rinunciato ai suoi oggi per i domani degli altri. Un uomo con il volto rigato di lacrime

People readily demonstrate a willingness to sacrifice their safety and survival for the sake of something beyond themselves, such as family, country, or justice.

Discipline is hard—harder than trustworthiness and skill and perhaps even than selflessness. We are by nature flawed and inconstant creatures. We can't even keep from snacking between meals. We are not built for discipline. We are built for novelty and excitement, not for careful attention to detail. Discipline is something we have to work at.

Had they stayed just a few seconds longer, they would have plunged into the fire themselves.

A seemingly happy life may be empty. A seemingly difficult life may be devoted to a great cause. We have purposes larger than ourselves.