#selfish

Tyranny or slavery, born of selfishness, are the two educational methods of parents; all gradations of tyranny or slavery. ↗

— Franz Kafka

#educational #gradations #methods #parents #selfishness

Let us reject violence and selfishness which could destroy our country's unity. ↗

— Mwai Kibaki

#country #destroy #let us #our #reject

Walter had never liked cats. They'd seemed to him the sociopaths of the pet world, a species domesticated as an evil necessary for the control of rodents and subsequently fetishized the way unhappy countries fetishize their militaries, saluting the uniforms of killers as cat owners stroke their animals' lovely fur and forgive their claws and fangs. He'd never seen anything in a cat's face but simpering incuriosity and self-interest; you only had to tease one with a mouse-toy to see where it's true heart lay...cats were all about using people ↗

— Jonathan Franzen

#animals #cats #cats-being-needed #dogs #dogs-and-cats

He could not believe that any of them might actually hit somebody. If one did, what a nowhere way to go: killed by accident; slain not as an individual but by sheer statistical probability, by the calculated chance of searching fire, even as he himself might be at any moment. Mathematics! Mathematics! Algebra! Geometry! When 1st and 3d Squads came diving and tumbling back over the tiny crest, Bell was content to throw himself prone, press his cheek to the earth, shut his eyes, and lie there. God, oh, God! Why am I here? Why am I here? After a moment's thought, he decided he better change it to: why are we here. That way, no agency of retribution could exact payment from him for being selfish. ↗

— James Jones

#bell #death #fear #geometry #machine-guns

It is an occult law moreover, that no man can rise superior to his individual failings without lifting, be it ever so little, the whole body of which he is an integral part. In the same way no one can sin, nor suffer the effects of sin, alone. In reality, there is no such thing as 'separateness' and the nearest approach to that selfish state which the laws of life permit is in the intent or motive. ↗

— Helena Petrovna Blavatsky

#selfishness #sin #theosophy #virtue #life

California is a queer place in a way, it has turned its back on the world, and looks into the void Pacific. It is absolutely selfish, very empty, but not false, and at least, not full of false effort. ↗

— David Herbert Lawrence

#back #california #effort #empty #false

I want to know what it's like to play in a Super Bowl and win one. My career will be great without it. But, personally, selfishly, I want to know what it feels like. ↗

— Dan Marino

#career #feels #great #i #know

My mom can't defend herself to the world. She is such an amazing woman, with such an open heart. It's a real hard line, and I crossed it. I took everyone's life story and assumed it would be a great thing to put on screen. I was being selfish and I feel so horrible about it. I feel so guilty. ↗

— Nikki Reed

#amazing #assumed #being #being selfish #crossed

It is not because the truth is too difficult to see that we make mistakes... we make mistakes because the easiest and most comfortable course for us is to seek insight where it accords with our emotions - especially selfish ones. ↗

— Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

#because #comfortable #course #difficult #easiest

I've come to the point in my life where I encourage young Native Americans to become much more selfish about their personal needs and wants. ↗

— Sherman Alexie

#become #come #encourage #i #life