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Selfishness is a lack of concern for others

• Selfishness: Lack of consideration for other people. Oxford Dictionary
• Selfishness: Concerned excessively or exclusively with oneself: seeking or concentrating on one’s own advantage, pleasure, or well-being without regard for others.  Merriam Webster Dictionary
• Intensely selfish people are always very decided as to what they wish. They do not waste their energies in considering the good of others. Ouida
• Selfish, adj. Devoid of consideration for the selfishness of others. Ambrose Bierce
• A man is called selfish not for pursuing his own good, but for neglecting his neighbor’s. Richard Whately
• Giving,  Generosity,  Transcending the ego,  Greed

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Selfishness takes and never gives

• Selfishness is a swamp that sucks in all and gives out nothing. John Thorton
• He who takes but never gives, may last for years but never lives.
• It is the height of selfishness to merely comsume what others create and to retreat into a shell of limited goals and immediate pleasures. Robert Greene
• Some men think that the globe is a sponge that God puts into their hands to squeeze for their own garden or flower-pot. Henry Ward Beecher
• Giving

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Selfishness uses people for its own ends

• When the healthy pursuit of self-interest and self-realization turns into self-absorption, other people can lose their intrinsic value in our eyes and become mere means to the fulfillment of our needs and desires. P.M. Forni
• Your interest in others is egoistic, self-concerned, self-oriented. You are not interested in others as persons, but only as far as they enrich, or enoble your own image of yourself. And the ultimate in selfishness is to care only for the protection, preservation and multiplication of one’s own body. By body I mean all that is related to your name and shape – your family, tribe, country, race, etc.  Nisargadatta Maharaj

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Selfishness imposes itself on others while unselfishness lives and lets live

• Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live; it is asking others to live as one wishes to live. And unselfishness is letting other people’s lives alone, not interfering with them. Selfishness always aims at uniformity of type. Unselfishness recognizes infinite variety of type as a delightful thing, accepts it, acquiesces in it, enjoys it. Oscar Wilde
• Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live. Oscar Wilde
• Live and let live

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We are all selfish to some degree …

• There are no perfect human beings! Persons can be found who are good, very good indeed, in fact, great. There do in fact exist creators, seers, sages, saints, shakers, and movers… even if they are uncommon and do not come by the dozen. And yet these very same people can at times be boring, irritating, petulant, selfish, angry, or depressed. To avoid disillusionment with human nature, we must first give up our illusions about it. Abraham Maslow
• Each one of us is selfish, including me. Santosh Kalwar
• We are all selfish and I no more trust myself than others with a good motive. Lord (George Gordon) Byron
• I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle. Jane Austen

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… even from a young age…

• Self-interest, that leprosy of the age, attacks us from infancy, and we are startled to observe little heads calculate before knowing how to reflect. Madam de Girardin
• Next to the very young, the very old are the most selfish. William Makepeace Thackeray

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… and especially when we’re under any kind of threat

• When your own life is threatened, your sense of empathy is blunted by a terrible, selfish hunger for survival. Yann Martel
• Self-interest is but the survival of the animal in us. Humanity only begins for man with self- surrender. Henri Frederic Amiel

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In many ways, self-interest is what makes the world go round but not necessarily for the best

• The force of selfishness is as inevitable and as calculable as the force of gravitation. Hailliard
• The world is governed only by self-interest. Friedrich Schiller
• The greatest productive force is human selfishness. Robert A. Heinlein
• The world says: “You have needs — satisfy them. You have as much right as the rich and the mighty. Don’t hesitate to satisfy your needs; indeed, expand your needs and demand more.” This is the worldly doctrine of today. And they believe that this is freedom. The result for the rich is isolation and suicide, for the poor, envy and murder. Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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Some argue selfishness is inherent in our nature and our genes

• The argument of this book is that we, and all other animals, are machines created by our genes. Like successful Chicago gangsters, our genes have survived, in some cases for millions of years, in a highly competitive world. This entitles us to expect certain qualities in our genes. I shall argue that a predominant quality to be expected in a successful gene is ruthless selfishness. This gene selfishness will usually give rise to selfishness in individual behavior. However, as we shall see, there are special circumstances in which a gene can achieve its own selfish goals best by fostering a limited form of altruism at the level of individual animals. ‘Special’ and ‘limited’ are important words in the last sentence. Much as we might wish to believe otherwise, universal love and the welfare of the species as a whole are concepts that simply do not make evolutionary sense. Richard Dawkins
• Selfishness must always be forgiven you know, because there is no hope of a cure. Jane Austen

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Selfishness is a vice we often condemn in others but justify in ourselves

• Selfishness is that detestable vice which no one will forgive in others, and no one is without himself. Henry Ward Beecher
• Modesty and unselfishness – these are virtues which men praise – and pass by.  André Maurois
• Selfish— a judgment readily passed by those who have never tested their own power of sacrifice. George Eliot
• We are not slow at discovering the selfishness of others; for this plain reason–because it clashes with our own. Fulke Greville
• Selfish, adj. Devoid of consideration for the selfishness of others. Ambrose Bierce

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Many judge selfishness with great contempt …

• That man who lives for self alone, lives for the meanest mortal known. Joaquin Miller
• He who lives only to benefit himself confers on the world a benefit when he dies. Tertullian
• Glory built on selfish principles is shame and guilt. William Cowper
• How a sickness enlarges the dimensions of a man’s self to himself! He is his own exclusive object. Supreme selfishness is inculcated in him as his only duty. Charles Lamb
• The same people who can deny others everything are famous for refusing themselves nothing. Leigh Hunt
• There are some tempers wrought up by habitual selfishness to an utter insensibility of what becomes of the fortunes of their fellow-   creatures, as if they were not partakers of the same nature or had no lot or connection at all with the species. Laurence Sterne
• I would tear out my own heart if it had no better disposition than to love only myself, and laugh at all my neighbors. Alexander Pope

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…. arguing that selfishness is the root of all sin and trouble …

• Almost every sinful action ever committed can be traced back to a selfish motive. It is a trait we hate in other people but justify in ourselves. Stephen Kendrick
• Selfishness is the greatest curse of the human race. William E. Gladstone
• Selfishness is the root and source of all natural and moral evils. Nathaniel Emmons
• Supreme and abiding self-love is a very dwarfish affection, but a giant evil. Richard Cecil
• The very heart and root of sin is an independent spirit. – We erect the idol self, and not only wish others to worship, but worship it ourselves. Richard Cecil
• Selfishness and greed, individual or national, cause most of our troubles. Harry S. Truman
• Human history is the sad result of each one looking out for himself. Julio Cortazar
• Think about yourself, about what you want, what you like, what respect people ought to pay you, what people think of you, and then to you nothing will be pure. May God keep our hearts pure from that selfishness which is the root of all sin. Charles Kingsley
• Sin,  Vice

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… and a destroyer of virtue

• In proportion as a man is selfish, so far has he receded from the motive which constitutes virtue. Percy Bysshe Shelley
• The virtues are lost in self-interest as rivers are in the sea. La Rochefoucauld
• Virtue

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Selfishness, they say, makes you empty and small

• He who is wrapped up in himself makes a mighty small package.
• None are so empty as those who are full of themselves. Benjamin Whichcote

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Selfishness can come at a heavy price

• No man is more cheated than the selfish man. Henry Ward Beecher
• Sordid selfishness doth contract and narrow our benevolence, and cause us, like serpents, to infold ourselves within ourselves, and to turn out our stings to the entire world besides. Sir Walter Scott
• Where all are selfish, the sage is no better than the fool, and only rather more dangerous. James A. Froude
• The reason to let go of selfishness is not because of guilt. Not because it’s a “sin.” Not because it’s “wrong.” All such motivations come from lower consciousness and self-judgment. Rather, the reason to let go of selfishness is simply because it is impractical. It doesn’t work. It’s too costly. It consumes too much energy. It delays the accomplishment of our goals and the realization of our wants. David R. Hawkins

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Selfishness corrupts us, especially the soul

• In an individual, selfishness uglifies the soul; for the human species, selfishness is extinction. David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas
• The man who lives by himself and for himself is likely to be corrupted by the company he keeps. Charles H. Parkhurst
• The howl of self-interest is loud … but the heart is black which throbs solely to its note. Percy Bysshe Shelley
• The soul

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Selfishness blocks our vision and good judgement

• Those who do not hate their own selfishness and regard themselves as more important than the rest of the world are blind because the truth lies elsewhere. Blaise Pascal
• Will not a tiny speck very close to our vision blot out the glory of the world, and leave only a margin by which we see the blot? I know no speck so troublesome as self. George Eliot
• 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. Alexander Solzhenitsyn
• If you think about yourself then you’ve lost sight of the ball. Mike Willesee
• Vision

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Selfishness blocks integrity and noble action

• He who makes an idol of his self-interest, will often make a martyr of his integrity. Lydia H. Sigourney
• The essence of true nobility is neglect of self. Let the thought of self pass in, and the beauty of a great action is gone like the bloom from a soiled flower. James A. Froude
• Integrity,  Right action

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Selfishness blocks love and compassion

• Selfishness and self-preoccupation obstruct compassion by blocking the attention and sensitivity that is needed for compassion to arise. One benefit of letting go of selfishness is that compassion arises more easily.  Gil Fronsdal
• Some people think that all the world should share their misfortunes, though they do not share in the sufferings of anyone else. Achille Poincelot
• Self-absorption in all its forms kills empathy, let alone compassion. When we focus on ourselves, our world contracts as our problems and preoccupations loom large. But when we focus on others, our world expands. Our own problems drift to the periphery of the mind and so seem smaller, and we increase our capacity for connection – or compassionate action. Daniel Goleman
• Love,  Compassion

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Selfishness blocks spiritual connection

• The more our hearts and minds are turned to assisting others less fortunate than we, the more we will avoid the spiritually cankering effects that result from greed, selfishness and overindulgence. Joe J. Christensen
• One thing is clear to me, that no indulgence of passion destroys the spiritual nature so much as respectable selfishness. George MacDonald
• Rm   Connection,  Spirituality

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Selfishness stops you from being truly alive

• If you live only for yourself, you are always an immediate danger of being bored to death with the repetition of your own views and interests. No one has learned the meaning of living until he has surrendered his ego to the service of his fellowmen. Beran Wolfe
• Being fully alive

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Selfishness creates a selfish, uncaring world around you

• When you look at the world in a narrow way, how narrow it seems! When you look at it in a mean way, how mean it is!  When you look at it selfishly, how selfish it is!  But when you look at it in a broad, generous, friendly spirit, what wonderful people you find in it.  Horace Rutledge
• If you think only of yourself, if you forget the rights and well-being of others, or, worse still, if you exploit others, ultimately you will lose. You will have no friends who will show concern for your well-being. Moreover, if a tragedy befalls you, instead of feeling concerned, others might even secretly rejoice. The Dalai Lama
• Caring

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Selfishness brings unhappiness and suffering

• The human being who lives only for him or herself finally reaps nothing but unhappiness. Selfishness corrodes. Unselfishness ennobles, satisfies.  Don’t put off the joy derivable from doing helpful, kindly things for others.  C. Forbes
• Selfishness is a vice utterly at variance with the happiness of him who harbors it, and as such, condemned by self-love. Sir James Mackintosh
• Whatever joy there is in the world arises from wishing for others’ happiness. Whatever suffering there is in the world arises from wishing for your own happiness. Shantideva
• God creates us free, free to be selfish, but He adds a mechanism that will penetrate our selfishness and wake us up to the presence of others in this world, and that mechanism is called suffering. William Nicholson, Shadowlands
• The selfish man suffers more from his selfishness than he from whom that selfishness withholds some important benefit. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Unhappiness,  Suffering

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Selfishness makes it hard to be lovable and to find a generous partner

• You must be what it is that you’re seeking. This is a universe of attraction and energy. You can’t have a desire to attract a mate who’s confident, generous, non-judgmental, and gentle, and expect that desire to be manifested if you’re thinking and acting in nonconfident, selfish, judgmental, or arrogant ways… Wayne Dyer
• Here I am going to say something which may come as a bit of a shock. God doesn’t necessarily want us to be happy. He wants us to be lovable. Worthy of love. Able to be loved by Him. We don’t start off being all that lovable, if we’re honest. What makes people hard to love? Isn’t it what is commonly called selfishness? Selfish people are hard to love because so little love comes out of them. William Nicholson

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In many ways, selfishness is destroying the planet

• By avarice and selfishness, and a groveling habit, from which none of us is free, of regarding the soil as property, or the means of acquiring property chiefly, the landscape is deformed, husbandry is degraded with us, and the farmer leads the meanest of lives. He knows Nature but as a robber. Henry David Thoreau
• Here is your country. Cherish these natural wonders, cherish the natural resources, cherish the history and romance as a sacred heritage, for your children and your children’s children. Do not let selfish men or greedy interests skin your country of its beauty, its riches or its romance. Theodore Roosevelt
• It has been written that the meek shall inherit the earth. What has not been written is that they shall inherit it after the greedy and the selfish have already polluted the air, fouled the water and poisoned the food chain. The actual moral of the parable is stand up for yourself, for our planet and for all who dwell here.   Prophet
• Some men think that the globe is a sponge that God puts into their hands to squeeze for their own garden or flower-pot. Henry Ward Beecher
• Care for the environment

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Here are some suggested expressions of selfishness (some controversial)

• Cowardice rightly understood begins with selfishness and ends with shame. Jose Rizal
• Greed: An intense and selfish desire for something, especially wealth, power, or food. Oxford Dictionary
• Greed: A selfish and excessive desire for more of something than is needed. Merriam Webster Dictionary
• Being sorry is the highest act of selfishness, seeing value only after discarding it. Doug Horton
• Heroism, magnanimity, and self-denial, in all instances in which they do not spring from a principle of religion, are but splendid altars on which we sacrifice one kind of self-love to another. Charles Caleb Colton
• Forgiveness is almost a selfish act because of its immense benefits to the one who forgives. Lawana Blackwell
• Personal importance or taking things personally, is the maximum expression of selfishness because we make the assumption that everything is about “me”. Don Miguel Ruiz
• It is love rather than sexual lust or unbridled sexuality if, in addition to the need or want involved, there is also some impulse to give pleasure to the persons thus loved and not merely to use them for our own selfish pleasure. Mortimer Adler
• Those who live to the future must always appear selfish to those who live to the present. Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Being unselfish can bring great rewards

• If you wish to travel far and fast, travel light. Take off all your envies, jealousies, unforgiveness, selfishness and fears. Glenn Clark
• As selfishness and complaint pervert and cloud the mind, so love with its joy clears and sharpens the vision. Helen Keller
• It is astonishing how well men wear when they think of no one but themselves. Edward Bulwer- Lytton

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Being unselfish makes it easier to make friends

• If you want to make friends, go out of your way to do things for other people–things that require time, energy, unselfishness, and thoughtfulness. Lawrence G. Lovasik
• When a gifted team dedicates itself to unselfish trust and combines instinct with boldness and effort, it is ready to climb. Patanjali
• Friendship

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Being unselfish brings peace, happiness and joy

• Give up your selfishness, and you shall find peace; like water mingling with water, you shall merge in absorption. Sri Guru Granth Sahib
• The ingredients of happiness are so simple that they can be counted on one hand. First of all, happiness must be shared. Selfishness is its enemy; to make another happy is to be happy one’s self. It is quiet, seldom found for long in crowds, most easily won in moments of solitude and reflection. It comes from within, and rests most securely on simple goodness and clear conscience. William Ogden
• Scientists have discovered that the small brave act of cooperating with another person, of choosing trust over cynicism, generosity over selfishness, makes the brain light up with quiet joy. Natalie Angier
• The unselfish effort to bring cheer to others will be the beginning of a happier life for ourselves. Helen Keller
• There is no satisfaction that can compare with looking back across the years and finding you’ve grown in self- control, judgment, generosity, and unselfishness. Ella Wheeler Wilcox
• Those who are most disinterested, and have the least of selfishness, have best materials for being happy. Lydia H. Sigourney
• A selfless act out of even the purest desire to do for others, will be selfish in the satisfaction and happiness it brings to one doing it. Ashly Lorenzana
• Inner peace,  Happiness,  Joy

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Being unselfish brings personal power

• When we move from being selfish with a small “s,” we move into being Selfish with a capital “S.” We move from our smaller self to our greater Self. We move from weakness to power, and from self-hatred and pettiness to lovingness and harmony. We move from strife to ease, and from frustration to accomplishment. David R. Hawkins
• Power

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Being unselfish increases your capacity for compassion and connection

• Self-absorption in all its forms kills empathy, let alone compassion. When we focus on ourselves, our world contracts as our problems and preoccupations loom large. But when we focus on others, our world expands. Our own problems drift to the periphery of the mind and so seem smaller, and we increase our capacity for connection – or compassionate action. Daniel Goleman
• As a man goes down in self, he goes up in God. George B. Cheever
• Compassion,  Connection

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Being unselfish makes you caring and supportive friends

• If you think only of yourself, if you forget the rights and well-being of others, or, worse still, if you exploit others, ultimately you will lose. You will have no friends who will show concern for your well-being. Moreover, if a tragedy befalls you, instead of feeling concerned, others might even secretly rejoice. By contrast, if an individual is compassionate and altruistic, and has the interests of others in mind, then irrespective of whether that person knows a lot of people, wherever that person moves, he or she will immediately make friends. And when that person faces a tragedy, there will be plenty of people who will come to help. The Dalai Lama
• Friendship

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Therefore, it is in your self-interest to transcend selfishness and care more about others

• We all should rise, above the clouds of ignorance, narrowness, and selfishness. Booker T. Washington
• Let not a man’s self be to him all in all. Benjamin Whichcote
• Remember how often you have postponed minding your interest, and let slip those opportunities the gods have given you. It is now high time to consider what sort of world you are part of, and from what kind of governor of it you are descended; that you have a set period assigned you to act in, and unless you improve it to brighten and compose your thoughts, it will quickly run off with you, and be lost beyond recovery. Marcus Aurelius

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To be selfish or unselfish is one of life’s greatest choices

• Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness. Martin Luther King Jr
• Just two choices on the shelf, pleasing God or pleasing self. Ken Collier
• Courage is a decision you make to act in a way that works through your own fear for the greater good as opposed to pure self- interest. Courage means putting at risk your immediate self- interest for what you believe is right. Derrick A. Bell
• Choice

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To be unselfish does not mean you automatically surrender to the wishes of everyone else

• A wise unselfishness is not a surrender of yourself to the wishes of anyone, but only to the best discoverable course of action. David Seabury
• Surrender

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Transcend selfishness through showing consideration to others

• From this it follows that consideration for other persons or for other living beings is very vital for goodness and want of consideration for other people makes human beings selfish, regardless for other people’s good. Morarji Desai
• Consideration

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Transcend selfishness through sharing the goodness inside you

• What many people don’t realize is that we can change our attitudes towards life. It takes some work, but it can be done.  The more we accept other people and their faults and quirks, the less judgmental we become. The more we decide to share the goodness that’s within us, the less selfish we become, and the less likely we are to hoard or hang on to material things.  The more we learn about other people’s emotional or physical problems, the more understanding and compassionate we become.  Your attitude is one of your gifts to the world, all day, every day.  What kind of gift do you give?  And is it a gift that remains steady no matter what happens to you?  Tom Walsh
• Goodness

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Transcend selfishness through prayer …

• If you make a habit of sincere prayer, your life will be very noticeably and profoundly altered. Prayer stamps with its indelible mark our actions and demeanor. A tranquility of bearing, a facial and bodily repose, are observed in those whose inner lives are thus enriched. Within the depths of consciousness, a flame kindles. And man sees himself. He discovers his selfishness, his silly pride, his fears, his greeds, his blunders. He develops a sense of moral obligation, intellectual humility. Thus begins a journey of the soul toward the realm of grace. Alexis Carrel
• Prayer

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… prayers of dedication and gratitude rather than request

• Supplication is an act of humility. To lower levels of consciousness, prayer is an attempt to get something for self or others, such as a new car, a job, recovery from an illness, or special favors. With progress, this intention to control God is given up and the act of supplication becomes a dedication instead of a request. In war, both sides pray to win. With progression of consciousness from selfishness to selflessness, the quality of prayer shifts to the willingness to be a servant of the Lord and a channel of His Will without trying to specify the what or the how it is to be done. David R. Hawkins
• Gratitude

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Transcend selfishness through faith

• If faith is lacking, it is because there is too much selfishness, too much concern for personal gain. For faith to be true, it has to be generous and loving. Love and faith go together, they complete each other. Mother Teresa
• Faith

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Transcend selfishness through giving yourself to a purpose greater than you

• This is the true joy in life–being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; being a force of nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. George Bernard Shaw
• Purpose

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Transcend selfishness by sometimes putting your partner’s wishes ahead of your own

• Nobody knows you as well as our spouse. And that means no one will be quicker to recognize a change when you deliberately start sacrificing your wants and wishes to make sure his or her needs are met. Stephen Kendrick

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Transcend selfishness through selfless love, for true love is never selfish

• Love is always patient and kind. It is never jealous. Love is never boastful or conceited. It is never rude or selfish. It does not take offense and is not resentful. Love takes no pleasure in other people’s sins, but delights in the truth. It is always ready to excuse, to trust, to hope, and to endure whatever comes.  Nicholas Sparks
• Love is patient and kind, Love is not jealous, conceited, proud or boastful, it is not arrogant, selfish, irritable or rude. Love does not keep a record of wrongs. Love is not happy with evil, but is happy with the truth, Love never gives up, and its faith, hope and patience never fail. Love is eternal. 1- Corinthians 13:4
• Love is what is left in a relationship after all the selfishness is taken out. Nick Richardson
• This love of which I speak is slow to lose patience – it looks for a way of being constructive. Love is not possessive. Love is not anxious to impress nor does it cherish inflated ideas of its own ideas. Love has good manners and does not pursue selfish advantage. Love is not touchy. Love does not keep account of evil or gloat over the wickedness of other people. On the contrary, it is glad with all good men when truth prevails. Love knows no limits to its endurance, no end to its trust, no fading of its hope; it can outlast anything. It is, in fact, the one thing that stands when all else has fallen. Elisabeth Elliot
• Happiness is attained, not through self-interest, but through unconditional fidelity in endless love of eternal light. Aaron Cohen
• Love

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However, beware of needy love for it can be the very height of selfishness

• It was because all we wanted was each other’s constant love and attention and for no one else to receive that love and attention, which is a selfish and difficult place to be in a relationship. We were emotionally retarded, and that was the best we could do at the time. Anthony Kiedis, Scar Tissue
• Lovers never get tired of each other because they are forever talking about themselves. Francois de la Rochefoucauld
• It is very natural for a young friend and a young lover to think the persons they love have nothing to do but to please them. Alexander Pope
• Love is the most selfish of all the passions. Alexandre Dumas, The Three Musketeers
• You will think me cruel, very selfish, but love is always selfish; the more ardent the more selfish. How jealous I am you cannot know. You must come with me, loving me, to death; or else hate me, and still come with me, and hating me through death and after. There is no such word as indifference in my apathetic nature. Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
• Love can be a brand of egoism that ignores the feelings of it’s mark, whie insisting on it’s own selfish demands. Centurion Tenebrea

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Some wonder whether selfless love can truly exist in an intimate relationship

• Unconditional love. That’s what he wants to give her and what he wants from her. People should give without wanting anything in return. All other giving is selfish. But he is being selfish a little, isn’t he, by wanting her to love him in return? He hopes that she loves him in return. Is it possible for a person to love without wanting love back? Is anything so pure? Or is love, by its nature, a reciprocity, like oceans and clouds, an evaporating of seawater and a replenishing of rain?  Alan Lightman

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Transcend selfishness by taking yourself lightly and letting go of attachment

• Taking myself lightly means trading my self-absorption for connecting with others…it is really not all about you! One of our workshop participants relates to this principle in this way: Don’t make yourself more important than the situation. Suzanne Mayo Frindt
• To live a pure unselfish life, one must count nothing as one’s own in the midst of abundance. Buddha
• Non-attachment

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Transcend selfishness by following a spiritual life that believes in something greater than you

• I believe the root of all happiness on this earth to lie in the realization of a spiritual life with a consciousness of something wider than materialism; in the capacity to live in a world that makes you unselfish because you are not overanxious about your own comic fallibilities; that gives you tranquility without complacency because you believe in something so much larger than yourself. Sir Hugh Walpole

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Transcend selfishness by raising your level of consciousness

• At the levels below 200, the primary impetus is personal survival. At the level of Pride, the survival motive may expand to comprehend the survival of others as well. As one crosses the demarcation between negative and positive influence into Courage, the well-being of others becomes increasingly important. By the 500 level, the happiness of others emerges as the essential motivating force. David R. Hawkins
• Consciousness

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Transcend selfishness by focusing on your children and providing the right example

• God sent children for another purpose than merely to keep up the race–to enlarge our hearts; and to make us unselfish and full of kindly sympathies and affections; to give our souls higher aims; to call out all our facilities to extended enterprise and exertion; and to living round our firesides bright faces, happy smiles, and loving, tender hearts. Mary Botham Howitt
• Being considerate of others will take your children further in life than any college degree. Marian Wright Edelman

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Some argue that some selfishness has its merits

• To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others. Albert Camus
• Nothing resembles selfishness more closely than self-respect. George Sand
• You have no idea how promising the world begins to look once you have decided to have it all for yourself. And how much healthier your decisions are once they become entirely selfish. Anita Brookner
• To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost. Gustave Flaubert
• Selfishness is one of the qualities apt to inspire love. Nathaniel Hawthorne
• The greatest productive force is human selfishness. Robert A. Heinlein
• If we were not all so excessively interested in ourselves, life would be so uninteresting that none of us would be able to endure it. Arthur Schopenhauer
• The punters know that the horse named Morality rarely gets past the post, whereas the nag named Self-interest always runs a good race. Gough Whitlam
• Most people are far too much occupied with themselves to be malicious. Friedrich Nietzsche
• Selfishness, not love, is the actuating motive of the gallant. Mme. Roland

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They argue that only by putting your most important needs first can you give abundantly

• Even when we are encouraging you to selfishly seek your own joy, we are actually saying to you: Your joy is the greatest gift that you can give to anyone. Because unless you are in your joy, you have nothing to give, anyway. Abraham-Hicks
• Being happy requires that you define your life in your own terms and then throw your whole heart into living your life to the fullest. In a way, happiness requires that you be perfectly selfish in order to develop yourself to a point where you can be unselfish for the rest of your life. Brian Tracy
• Giving yourself some loving attention is not selfish. It is sensible. If you feel loved and cherished– even if it is only by yourself–then you will have more love to give to others, too. Penelope Quest

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Time given to spiritual growth and awakening is not selfish

• Waking up is not a selfish pursuit of happiness, it is a revolutionary stance, from the inside out, for the benefit of all beings in existence. Noah Levine

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Time spent with family and friends is not selfish

• I am confident that nobody… will accuse me of selfishness if I ask to spend time, while I am still in good health, with my family, my friends and also with myself. Nelson Mandela

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Time given to creative work is not selfish

• Creative work is not a selfish act or a bid for attention on the part of the actor. It’s a gift to the world and every being in it. Don’t cheat us of your contribution. Give us what you got. Steven Pressfield
• Work,  Creativity

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Saying no is by no means always selfishness

• Learn to say no. People worry that saying no is selfish. It’s not. Rather, setting healthy limits is important to having healthy relationships. Margarita Tartakovsky
• Learn to say No

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Being happy is not selfish

• The belief that unhappiness is selfless and happiness is selfish is misguided. It’s more selfless to act happy. It takes energy, generosity, and discipline to be unfailingly lighthearted, yet everyone takes the happy person for granted. No one is careful of his feelings or tries to keep his spirits high. He seems self-sufficient; he becomes a cushion for others. And because happiness seems unforced, that person usually gets no credit. Gretchen Rubin
• Happiness

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Committing suicide is not selfishness …

• People pontificate, “Suicide is selfishness.” Career churchmen like Pater go a step further and call in a cowardly assault on the living. Oafs argue this specious line for varying reason: to evade fingers of blame, to impress one’s audience with one’s mental fiber, to vent anger, or just because one lacks the necessary suffering to sympathize. Cowardice is nothing to do with it – suicide takes considerable courage. Japanese have the right idea. No, what’s selfish is to demand another to endure an intolerable existence, just to spare families, friends, and enemies a bit of soul-searching. David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas

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… or maybe it is?

• Committing suicide essentially said to friends and loved ones and the world at large that you were the only thing that mattered, that your problems were hopeless that you deserved to escape from them and to hell with everyone else. Suicide was nothing more than a way to look in the eye of the people who loved you and say, “My pain is paramount and I want it to end. The pain you will feel when I am gone, and the guilt you will experience at not having been able to stop me, do not matter to me. I am willing for you to suffer for the rest of your life so that I can take the easy way out of mine. Christine Warren

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Religion and spirituality preaches strongly against selfishness …

• Every major religion has similar ideas of love, the same goal of benefiting through spiritual practice, and the same effect of making its followers into better human beings. All religions teach moral precepts for perfecting the functions of the mind, body, and speech.  All teach us not to lie or steal or take others’ lives, and so on.  The common goal of all moral precepts laid down by the great teachers of humanity is unselfishness.  Those teachers wanted to lead their followers away from the paths of negative deeds caused by ignorance and to introduce them to paths of goodness.  All religions can learn from one another; their ultimate goal is to produce better human beings who will be more tolerant, more compassionate, and less selfish.  The Dalai Lama
• The only struggle which religions can justify, the only struggle worthy of humans, is the moral struggle against humanity’s own disordered passions, against every kind of selfishness, against attempts to oppress others, against every type of hatred and violence. Pope John Paul II
• Zen asks us to let go of our focus on the ego, to empty ourselves of our selfish attachments, to destroy our mental constructs, and simply be present to the light. Zen teacher
• To practice Zen Buddhism is to train oneself to eliminate hatred, anger and selfishness and to develop loving-kindness towards all. Thich Thien-An
• Selfishness is the only real atheism; aspiration, unselfishness, the only real religion. Israel Zangwill
• Religion,  Spirituality

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… but unfortunately, sometimes indirectly fosters it

• We keep on being told that religion, whatever its imperfections, at least instills morality. On every side, there is conclusive evidence that the contrary is the case and that faith causes people to be more mean, more selfish, and perhaps above all, more stupid. Christopher Hitchens
• It all depends on what people you’re talking about helping. That’s the wonderful think about just about every religion on the planet – they’re all so incredibly selfish. Derek Landy

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Belief in a selfish God creates a selfish man

• It is of course evident that everything in one’s religious life depends upon the sort of God one worships. The character of the worshiper must necessarily be molded by the character of the object worshipped.  If it is a cruel and revengeful God, or a selfish and unjust God, the worshiper will be cruel, and revengeful, and selfish, and unjust, also.  If it is a loving, tender, forgiving, unselfish God, the worshiper will be loving, and tender, and forgiving, and unselfish, as well. Hannah Whitall Smith
• God

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On your spiritual path, beware of a selfish desire for nothing but spiritual highs

• We are not built for the mountains and the dawns and aesthetic affinities, those are for moments of inspiration, that is all. We are built for the valley, for the ordinary stuff we are in, and that is where we have to prove our mettle. Spiritual selfishness always wants repeated moments on the mount. We feel we could talk like angels and live like angels, if only we could stay on the mount. The times of exaltation are exceptional, they have their meaning in our life with God, but we must beware lest our spiritual selfishness wants to make them the only time. Oswald Chambers

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Education that grows away from common people becomes selfish

• Whenever education and refinement grow away from the common people, they are growing toward selfishness, which is the monster evil of the world. That is true cultivation which gives us sympathy with every form of human life, and enables us to work most successfully for its advancement. Refinement that carries us away from our fellowmen is not God’s refinement. Henry Ward Beecher
• Education

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Money doesn’t make you selfish but merely unmasks what’s already there

• Money doesn’t change men, it merely unmasks them. If a man is naturally selfish or arrogant or greedy, the money brings that out, that’s all. Henry Ford

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• Being a parent is a gift, one which most men unselfishly allow women to keep all to themselves. Jarod Kintz
• I say let the world go to hell, but I should always have my tea. Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• The only gift I have to give, is the ability to receive. If giving is a gift, and it surely is, then my gift to you is to allow you to give to me. Jarod Kintz
• If there is one thing I dislike, it is the man who tries to air his grievances when I wish to air mine. P.G. Wodehouse
• Don’t try to hog loneliness and keep it all to yourself. Share it with a special someone. Jarod Kintz
• The first two letters of her name were M and E and I thought, Yes! Finally, a name I can relate to. Jarod Kintz
• I’ve given up reading books. I find it takes my mind off myself. Oscar Levant
• Selfish, adj. Devoid of consideration for the selfishness of others. Ambrose Bierce
• If I have to choose between you and me – I like me better. Charlaine Harris
• Selfishness: Annoying quality of someone who has what I want, but is not prepared to give it to me.
• To be stupid, selfish and have good health are three requirements for happiness though if stupidity is lacking all is lost.  Gustave Flaubert

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