Quotes about self-centeredness

She would be one of those who kneel to their own shadows till feet grow on their knees; then go down on their hands till their hands grow into feet; then lay their faces on the ground till they grow into snouts; when at last they are a hideous sort of lizards, each of which believes himself the best, wisest, and loveliest being in the world, yea, the very centre of the universe. And so they run about for ever looking for their own shadows that they may worship them, and miserable because they ca

When we fear what other people think about us, we are frequently more focused on 'being interesting' and less focused on 'taking an interest.' That's why many people talk a great deal when they are anxious and why many people never feel heard. If both people and conversation are trying to be interesting, there is no one left to genuinely listen.

Seeing myself or my church or my denomination as "the blessing" — like so many mission trips to help "those less fortunate than ourselves" — can easily descend into a blend of  benevolence and paternalism. We can start to see the "poor" as supporting characters in a big story about how noble, selfless, and helpful we are.

The most capricious modern entitlement is not just Social Security but to self-esteem.

I am most thankful for what I don’t have, for had my life’s wish list been filled in the manner I had chosen I would be steeped in meaningless trinkets verses bathed in God’s treasures.

I think myself so terribly ‘clever’ that the need for God is blatantly irrelevant. And all the while, in the rapidly growing mess that I’m ‘cleverly’ creating, I rather quickly begin to realize that the only thing that is relevant is His relevance.

Cultivate the understanding that the self is not really an independently existing entity, and begin to view self instead in terms of it's dependent relation to others. Although it is difficult to say that merely reflecting on this will produce a profound spiritual realization, it will at least have some effect. Your mind will be more open. Something will begin to change within you. Therefore, even in the immediate term there is definitely a positive and beneficial effect in reversing these two a

How can one ever do anything nobly Christian, living among people with such petty thoughts?

Failure to recognize one's own absolute significance is equivalent to a denial of human worth; this is a basic error and the origin of all unbelief. If one is so faint-hearted that he is powerless even to believe in himself, how can he believe in anything else? The basic falsehood and evil of egoism lie not in this absolute self-consciousness and self-evaluation of the subject, but in the fact that, ascribing to himself in all justice an absolute significance, he unjustly refuses to others this

It's the essence of a degenerating mind periodically, to lose all sense of continuous self, and therefore any regard for what others think of your lack of continuity.

[Schulz] came to see that the better part of his shyness was really vanity, or self-centeredness. "Shyness is an illusion," he would say, late in life. "If you get out and do something and talk to people, you don't have to be shy. Shyness is the overtly self-conscious thinking that you are the only person in the world; that how you look and what you do is of any importance.

To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others.

In 1948, psychologists asked more than 10,000 adolescents whether they considered themselves to be a very important person. At that point, 12 percent said yes. The same question was asked in 2003, and this time it wasn’t 12 percent who considered themselves very important, it was 80 percent.

Selfishness, self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles. Driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity, we step on the toes of our fellows and they retaliate. Sometimes they hurt us, seemingly without provocation, but we invariably find that at some time in the past we have made decisions based on self which later placed us in a position to be hurt. So our troubles, we think, are basically of our own making.

Indeed this gentleman's stoicism was of that not uncommon kind, which enables a man to bear with exemplary fortitude the afflictions of his friends, but renders him, by way of counterpoise, rather selfish and sensitive in respect of any that happen to befall himself.

It is a poore Center of a Mans Actions, Himselfe.

In addition to an open heart and open mind, I also brought (to the small group Bible study) an open mouth.

The passive righteousness of faith frees me from passing final judgment on myself.

When God interrupts your life, He is calling you to follow Him in a new way. By breaking into your settled pattern, He is moving you to a new place where you can make fresh discoveries of His grace. Embracing God’s call is never easy, but this is where the pursuit of a God-centered life begins, and where the shame of a self-centered life is exposed.

There are ultimately only two possible adjustments to life; one is to suit our lives to principles; the other is to suit principles to our lives. If we do not live as we think, we soon begin to think as we live. The method of adjusting moral principles to the way men live is just a perversion of the order of things.

We are molding Jesus into our image. He's beginning to look a lot like us because, after all, that is who we are most comfortable with. The danger now is when we gather in our church buildings to sing, and lift up our hands in worship, we may not actually be worshiping the Jesus of the Bible. Instead, we may be worshiping ourselves.

All we need to release our inner God is a pulpit and an audience, both of which the Internet supplies in great abundance. Too bad that the corollaly to being in God mode in cyberspace is an explosion of narcissism and self-centeredness.

...the human being to lack that second skin we call egoism has not yet been born, it lasts much longer than the other one, that bleeds so readily.

white middle-upper class guys in highly educated families have a unique burden placed on us to be the hero of every story that we tell. I don’t think it’s merely that we’re self-centered and arrogant, but that we feel like we’re supposed to be in charge, and if we’re not the hero of the story, we’ve somehow failed in our life duty.group

The ego is a palpable body part in an attorney, perhaps the most prominent body part.

The image of God infused in us never sees the light of day in the service of self, but it becomes the light of day in the service of others.

The shape of evil is much more superficiality and blindness than the usual list of hot sins. God hides, and is found, precisely in the depths of everything.

Alex Rodriguez seemed not to fit in with the rest of his Yankee teammates. For instance, he wanted a clubhouse attendant personally assigned to him, when there were four or five for the whole team. Seeing the rift between him and the rest of the team and how Rodriguez's major focus on how HE was perceived, Joe Torre suggested in the individual meeting that Rodriguez at least get his own coffee rather than send someone to get it for him. Later that day, Alex Rodriguez made a point of telling the

One of my biggest challenges is figuring out how to shoehorn my newfound knowledge into conversations.

One of Lincoln's intimates as a presidential candidate urged him to make no promises and not to part with those kind words which could be interpreted as promises.

Pride is a by-product of insecurity. And the more insecure a person is, the more monuments they need to build.There is a fine line between 'Thy kingdom come' and 'my kingdom come.' If you cross the line, your relationship with God is self-serving.You aren't serving God. You are using God.You aren't building altars to God. You are building monuments to yourself.

Pride is nothing more than us highlighting us.

A sense of messianic purpose makes the national interest almost indistinguishable from the political interests of the president.

When we're constantly thinking about ourselves, our world shrinks.

There is nothing more irreligious than self-absorbed religion.

There is a huge amount of freedom that comes to you when you take nothing personally.

The pain of the narcissist is that, to him, everything is really a threat. What doesn't surrender in reverence is blasphemous to a high opinion of oneself - the burden of self-importance. The narcissist reconstructs his own law of gravity which states that all things and all creatures must adhere to his personal satisfaction, but when they do not, the pain is far more intense than it is for one who is free from the clamors of 'I'.

You and I were put on this earth to serve something greater than our narrow interests. When our focus becomes self-centered instead of God-centered we lose our greatest source of power. Our God-given talents are meant to benefit others. When we use them for that greater purpose, we put faith into action to fulfill His plan for us. We make a difference in this world that helps prepare us for the next.