Heloise Quotes

Most people return small favors, acknowledge medium ones and repay greater ones - with ingratitude.

It can be much harder to be on the receiving end of a transaction than to be the one who gets to give. In fact, being given to can mean being taken from. There is a very strong connection between pride and giving, and those who do the giving get to feel that they are worthy, while those who are given to often feel that they are not.

It is well known to all great men, that by conferring an obligation they do not always procure a friend, but are certain of creating many enemies.

He who will not grant a favour has no right to ask one.

At one store, Gansey had started to pay for Blue's potato chips and she'd snatched them away. "I don't want you to buy me food!" Blue said. "If you pay for it, then it's like I'm... be---be---" "Beholden to me?" Gansey suggested pleasantly. "Don't put words into my mouth." "It was your word." "You assumed it was my word. You can't just go around assuming." "But that is what you meant, isn't it?" She scowled. "I'm done with this conversation.

When people help me out, even with something like a move or a ride to the airport, I'm always thinking 'Are you sure it's okay? Are you sure you don't mind?'

I look upon it as a Point of Morality, to be obliged by those who endeavour to oblige me.

To remind a man of the good turns you have done him is very much like a reproach.

There is nothing that puts a man more in your debt than that he owes you nothing.

It shows nobility to be willing to increase your debt to a man to whom you already owe much.

Too great haste to repay an obligation is a kind of ingratitude.

Great indebtedness does not make men grateful, but vengeful; and if a little charity is not forgotten, it turns into a gnawing worm.

When you're doing a job that benefits other people, it's easy to assume that they feel conscious of the fact that you're doing this work - that they should feel grateful, and that they should and do feel guilty about not helping you.

'Thank you' is often an admission that you needed something that wasn't being fulfilled or you couldn't do on your own, so you needed someone else. There is also guilt. We think, 'Well, too much time has gone by, and it doesn't matter,' but it does. It always matters.

He that has done you a kindness will be more ready to do you another, than he whom you yourself have obliged.

I get mad when people give me presents. I don't want them, I don't need them.

It is not polite to receive a favor without returning it.

It is the nature of men to be bound by the benefits they confer as much as by those they receive.

A favor to come is better than a hundred received.

The man who has received a benefit ought always to remember it, but he who has granted it ought to forget the fact at once.

We have nothing but gratitude for the opportunity we have had here, and any other response would be ridiculous, irresponsible and a lie. It is that simple. I owe China; China doesn't owe me.

From where I came from, the way I was raised, when somebody does something for you, you always want to give something back to them.

A gift much expected is paid, not given.