Dalai Lama Quotes

To be extremely self-centred, only interested in your own satisfaction, always brings negative consequences in the long run.

Being all about me is not a good thing - I don't care what 1978 tried to say - because as long as you mostly think about yourself, you're not going to be a wonderful person. You're just not.

It needs some intelligence to be truly selfish. The unintelligent can only be self-righteous.

In short, selfishness is the opposite of love.

By breaking down our sense of self-importance, all we lose is a parasite that has long infected our minds. What we gain in return is freedom, openness of mind, spontaneity, simplicity, altruism: all qualities inherent in happiness.

The selfish man suffers more from his selfishness than he from whom that selfishness withholds some important benefit.

The howl of self-interest is loud ... but the heart is black which throbs solely to its note.

You will never find a truly happy self-centered person. They simply don't exist.

Successful people are always looking for opportunities to help others. Unsuccessful people are always asking, 'What's in it for me?'

What each man feared would happen to himself, did not trouble him when he saw that it would ruin another.

Our world is drowning in a sea of self-centeredness. You can make yourself quite unique right away by leaving this ocean of selfishness and choosing to be curious about other people.

I was taught in school that I have to look out for number one. That was against everything that I intuitively felt.

Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live.

Seek a common good beyond your comfort.

The natural life in each of us is something self-centred, something that wants to be petted and admired, to take advantage of other lives, to exploit the whole universe.

We're selfish to some degree, that's not a criticism and it doesn't mean that we are all narcissists. But in any situation our minds naturally evolve to what's in it for me? How does this affect me? Can this benefit me? Can this harm me? Then we might move on from that and have a more altruistic point of view about things but that's almost always our initial response.

We fail to reckon with the reality of human nature. By nature,we are egocentric. Our world revolves around us. None of us is totally altruistic.

So in every individual the two trends, one towards personal happiness and the other unity with the rest of humanity, must contend with each other.

Selfishness is the making a man's self his own centre, the beginning and end of all he doeth.

We must be for ourselves in the long run; the mild and generous are only more justly selfish than the domineering.

The self-bound individual always forgets that his self would be safeguarded better and automatically the more he prepares himself for the welfare of mankind, and that in this respect no limits are set for him.

All our acts, reasoned and unreasoned, are selfish

It took cancer to realize that being self-centered is not the way to live. The answer is to try and help others.

Learning to love unselfishly is not an easy task. It runs counter to our self-centered nature.

As frost to the bud, and blight to the blossom, even such is self-interest to friendship; for confidence cannot dwell where selfishness is porter at the gate.