Being selfish is defined as putting one’s own needs, interests and desires ahead of those of others.
It’s a bad quality that hinders mutual respect and collaboration, both of which are necessary for good partnerships.
However, it is an uncomfortable truth that everyone has some level of selfishness, which is often necessary for self-preservation and personal growth.
The irony of selfishness is its universality: although it is widely condemned when witnessed in others, it is a flaw that everyone shows from time to time.
We all have times when our own interests take precedence over the needs of others, resulting in a widespread contradiction.
Various thinkers have looked into this concept, resulting in thought-provoking selfishness quotes.
These quotes shed light on the delicate balance of self-interest and compassion, urging us to consider our actions and how they affect others around us.
Top 10 Selfishness Quotes
Selfishness creates greed and greed destroys the soul. ~ Zarina Bibi.
Selfishness is blind. ~ Mahatma Gandhi.
Selfishness is thinking more of the benefits you will get on helping someone. ~ Unknown *
Love makes people less selfish, It makes them give away all that they have with them, all of it. ~ Unknown *
Selfish people try to keep or get things but they lose people. ~ Hannah Garrison.
Selfishness and self-absorption are deadly charm exterminators. ~ Loretta Young.
Our ability to love ourselves doesn’t determine how much friends love us. ~ Unknown *
Selfishness is when you only remember a friend if you need something from them. ~ Unknown *
Nothing resembles selfishness more closely than self-respect. ~ George Sand.
Selfishness stops the flow of blessings to you and others. ~ Brenda Johnson Padgitt.
Related Quotes: 80 Best Selfish People Quotes To Change Your Perspective and 87 Selfish Parents Quotes, Sayings, Captions and Images
Famous Selfishness Quotes
Sometimes you have to be selfish to get what you want and move forward in life. ~ Kristen Stewart.
Selfishness, when it is punished by the world, is mostly punished because it is connected with egotism. ~ Sir Arthur Helps.
The hardest work you and I will ever do is to put off our selfishness. It is heavy lifting! ~ Neal A. Maxwell.
There seemed to be three choices: to give up trying to love anyone, to stop being selfish, or to learn to love a person while continuing to be selfish. ~ Lydia Davis.
We all should rise, above the clouds of ignorance, narrowness, and selfishness. ~ Booker T. Washington.
If I am selfish I might have achieved great things, but achieving great things out of my selfishness is one of the most devastating ways I can think of to fail. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough.
Putting someone before yourself is possible only if that is done literally. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana.
Selfish persons are incapable of loving others, But they are not capable of loving themselves either. ~ Erich Fromm.
There is nothing born out of selfishness, You just have to give the best you can in everything. ~ Unknown *
Selfishness is one of the qualities apt to inspire love. ~ Nathaniel Hawthorne.
There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up. ~ Oscar Wilde.
A selfish man is a thief. ~ Jose Marti.
Selfish people are in a way terribly capable of great loves. ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Selfishness is the biggest form of helplessness as it makes the person blind so much that he fails to search his true self for being always in the lurch. ~ Anuj Somany.
Your conscience is the measure of the honesty of your selfishness. Listen to it carefully. ~ Richard Bach.
Selfishness is the greatest curse of the human race. ~ William E. Gladstone.
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.
Best Selfishness Quotes
Selfishness may result in one’s sense of superiority, but life as such will surely deny them. ~ Eraldo Banovac.
Selfishness is innate to all of us, that is the sad reality of life and no one really cares. ~ Unknown *
Thorough selfishness destroys or paralyzes enjoyment. A heart made selfish by the contest for wealth is like a citadel stormed in war, utterly shattered. ~ Henry Ward Beecher.
The man who lives by himself and for himself is apt to be corrupted by the company he keeps. ~ Charles Henry Parkhurst.
The moment you stop thinking of only yourself is the moment you stop being a selfish person. ~ Unknown *
Sometimes you have to be selfish to be selfless. ~ Edward Albert.
Nowadays, even love is selfish; there is so much selfishness that surrounds the planet we have. ~ Unknown *
We are all selfish and I no more trust myself than others with a good motive. ~ Lord Byron.
A great person is that who have let go of his selfishness and wants to help other people too. ~ Unknown *
The subsistence mentality of a person is a prison in which his personal joy is detained. If you want to live in joy, you don’t live for yourself alone. Live for others too. ~ Israelmore Ayivor.
Being sorry is the highest act of selfishness, seeing value only after discarding it. ~ Douglas Horton.
Selfishness is the root and source of all natural and moral evils. ~ Nathaniel Emmons.
Thought-Provoking Selfishness Quotes
Selfishness can be a virtue. Selfishness is essential to survival, and without survival we cannot protect those whom we love more than ourselves. ~ Duke Ellington.
In an individual, selfishness uglifies the soul; for the human species, selfishness is extinction. ~ David Mitchell.
Selfishness is really self-destruction in slow motion. ~ Neal A. Maxwell.
It’s hard to trust somebody when the person who you completely opened up to is the person who later completely betrayed you. ~ Unknown *
It is selfish to ask something more than anyone can give. ~ Unknown *
The selfish man suffers more from his selfishness than he from whom that selfishness withholds some important benefit. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Selfishness at the expense of others’ happiness is demonism. ~ Henry Ward Beecher.
Selfishness is the grand moving principle of nine-tenths of our actions. ~ Francois de la Rochefoucauld.
I think that in today’s world, by nature, we are all self-centered. And that often leads to selfishness. ~ Gary Chapman.
Selfishness is the making a man’s self his own centre, the beginning and end of all he doeth. ~ John Owen.
Love is the most selfish of all the passions. ~ Alexandre Dumas.
Wise Selfishness Quotes
Take the selfishness out of this world and there would be more happiness than we should know what to do with. ~ Henry Wheeler Shaw.
Just two choices on the shelf, pleasing God or pleasing self. ~ Ken Collier.
There are points in your life, especially if you have creative ambitions, where selfishness is necessary. ~ Kris Kristofferson.
It is a selfish act to tell your love to stay even if you know she’s not happy anymore. If you really love her, You will let her go and let her find her true happiness. ~ Unknown *
When you are lonely or at least seem to be that way, It would be selfish to excuse yourself. ~ Unknown *
No man is more cheated than the selfish man. ~ Henry Ward Beecher.
It’s way too easy to see the real face of a person. They’re amiable and full of pretense when they want something from you, but the minute you don’t give in, back away or put yourself first, as they do, is the minute they show you who they are. ~ Donna Lynn Hope.
It is sad that most of the people who have great ideas are so selfish and uses them for the benefit. ~ Unknown *
It is selfishness which is the cause of most of our misery. It is as a cankering disease. ~ Gordon B. Hinckley.
Selfishness is depriving others of the choices that they can make, Only thinking of your own. ~ Unknown *
Popular Selfishness Quotes
The best weapon for selfishness is selfishness for the cause of others. ~ Enock Maregesi.
The real measure of selfishness is by asking a person how much he is willing to sacrifice. ~ Unknown *
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.
Someone who smiles too much with you can sometimes frown too much with you at your back. ~ Michael Bassey Johnson.
Insecurities, betrayal, and selfishness are the things that will never make you a happy person. ~ Unknown *
I would not be great to sacrifice too much of yourself as you will then be left with nothing. ~ Unknown *.
Selfishness comes from poverty in the heart, from the belief that love is not abundant. ~ Don Miguel Ruiz.
Selfishness, if but reasonably tempered with wisdom, is not such an evil trait. ~ Giovanni Ruffini.
It’s not my job to make you happy. It’s your job to learn that only those who quit selfishly seeking their own happiness find it. ~ Richelle E. Goodrich.
When you stop thinking of the benefit of other people, That is the moment you become selfish. ~ Unknown *
In order to be happy, one must first let go of all pettiness and selfish attachments. ~ Dee Waldeck.
There are people who are so original that they become selfish and use those ideas for profit. ~ Unknown *
Great Selfishness Quotes
That man who lives for self alone, Lives for the meanest mortal known. ~ Joaquin Miller.
Some people are selfish in all of their relationships. Those people are called sociopaths. ~ Unknown *
Self-interest is healthy to a certain extent, but beyond that it only brings conflicts and primitiveness in the world. ~ Abhijit Naskar.
No man can live happily who regards himself alone, who turns everything to his own advantage. Thou must live for another if thou wishest to live for thyself. ~ Seneca.
People wrapped up in themselves make very small packages. ~ Jessica Kennedy.
People don’t want other people to be people. ~ Gene Wolfe.
Selfish, a judgment readily passed by those who have never tested their power of sacrifice. ~ George Eliot.
Selfishness is the most unattractive virtue a mortal can possess. ~ Suyasha Subedi.
Selfish people are, by definition, Those whose activities are devoted to bringing themselves happiness. Yet. . . these selfish people are far less likely to be happy than those whose efforts are devoted to making others happy. ~ Bernard Rimland.
Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live. ~ Oscar Wilde.
Selfishness and greed, individual or national, cause most of our troubles. ~ Harry S. Truman.
Selfishness is that detestable vice which no one will forgive in others, and no one is without himself. ~ Henry Ward Beecher.
If all the people in this world, in which we live, Were as selfish as a few of the people in this world, in which we live, There would be no world in which to live. ~ W. L. Orme.
So these were the 92 top quotes about Selfishness.
If you like these quotes and sayings, then you can also read my other posts on Expectation quotes and Parents quotes.
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