Self-sufficiency

“ XLII. Self-sufficiency is more provoking than rudeness or the most unqualified or violent opposition, inasmuch as the latter may be retorted, and implies that we are worth notice; whereas the former strikes at the root of our self-importance, and reminds us that even our good opinion is not worth having. Nothing precludes sympathy so much as a perfect indifference to it. ”

“ Sufficiency for itself, without alien helps, is the thing contemplated. The Greek autarkeia, self-sufficiency, or, because that phrase, in English, has received a deflexion towards a bad meaning, the word self- ufficingness might answer; sufficiency for the exposition of its own most secret meaning, out of fountains within itself ”

“ The feeling of self-sufficiency! it is that which restrains those whose personal value is in itself great riches, from such considerable sacrifices as are demanded by intercourse with the world, let alone, then, from actually practicing self-denial by going out of their way to seek it. Ordinary people are sociable and complaisant just from the very opposite feeling;—to bear others' company is easier for them than to bear their own. ”

“ You can see that under this law of motive, which belongs to the first and second spheres of mind, no action depending upon outward condition is perfect, not being self-sufficient or self-existent. It belongs to the individuality; but when the act is of such a character that it can not receive outward influence arising from a sort of divine spontaneity, it is self-existent and self-sufficient, and the person capable of such an act may be said to be a personality; that is, he is becoming independent—attaining to a self-sufficiency and self-existence. ”

“ This makes them interesting as a race; while, at the same time, as individuals, the remarkable degree of self-sufficiency they possess gives them an air of independence rather apt to repel a stranger. I use this expression, "self-sufficiency" in the largest sense. Conscious of the strong sagacity and the dogged power of will which seem almost the birthright of the natives of the West Riding, each man relies upon himself, and seeks no help at the hands of his neighbour. ”

“ We may congratulate ourselves on having escaped the cat-o'-nine-tails and the gallows. Well, we have, most of us, so much self-sufficiency, that to deprive us of all ground for it might be a fault on the right side. ”

“ Perfect health in all respects he has intact. Self-control and self-sufficiency, both in amusing himself and in enduring lesser ills, such as bumps and mild degrees of hunger, he is getting as fast as growth permits. ”

“ Nothing is more nauseous than apparent self-sufficiency. For it shows the company two things, which are extremely disagreeable: that you have a high opinion of yourself, and that you have comparatively a mean opinion of them. ”

“ An obstinate, ungovernable self-sufficiency plainly points out to us that state of imperfect maturity at which the graceful levity of youth is lost, and the solidity of experience not yet acquired. ”

“ The greater our sense of responsibility—the more we emphasize personal control over our inner and outer affairs, the more we see ourselves as individualists whose individualism is based on strength of will, discipline, guts—the more we are trapped by the myth of self-sufficiency. ”

“ We reckon an event to be important in proportion to its effectiveness, so far as its being, that is, spreads in influence beyond the area of its private limits. It is obvious that here the two features, of self-sufficiency and self-transcendence, are already discrepant. ”

“ The two things go together—claim to possess others and you lose possession of yourself: Give to all with whom you come in contact their full right of self-possession and self-development, and you, from that social discipline and service, will in your own body and mind become self-possessed. ”

“ In the realized idea which, superior to me, and yet here and now in and by me, affirms itself in a continuous process, we have found the end, we have found self-realization, duty, and happiness in one;—yes, we have found ourselves, when we have found our station and its duties, our function as an organ in the social organism. ”

“ Turning again to ordinary duty, I know no precept more wide or more valuable than this: cultivate self-help; do not seek nor like to be dependent upon others for what you can yourself supply; and keep down as much as you can the standard of your wants, for in this lies a great secret of manliness, true wealth, and happiness; as, on the other hand, the multiplication of our wants makes us effeminate and slavish, as well as selfish. ”

“ Though it may be right to care more for the benefit of the many than for the indulgence of your own single self, when you consider that the many, and duty to them, only exist to you through your own existence, what can be said? ”

“ And if we seriously desire that, we must first of all extricate ourselves from the old yoke, and rise manfully to our full height. We must first of all desire to help ourselves and then the help of others is sure to follow.
But the time in which we live is adapted for decisive action not merely because of our own inner experience, not merely in consequence of our newly-aroused self-consciousness. ”

“ Each of them is the whole character in a special aspect, or as reacting upon a special system of suggestions, but some of them contain the whole in a more developed and explicit form than others. I am in one sense myself wherever I may be and whatever I may be doing, and yet I am “more myself” in health than in sickness, in the free pursuit of self-chosen studies than in the forced discharge of uncongenial tasks imposed on me by the necessity of earning an income. ”

“ In these considerations we have throughout laid the Autonomy should come about gradually principal emphasis upon the desirability and necessity of the acquirement of self help and self guidance on the part of the individual. ”

“ If you expand yourself, grow yourself, then you can accommodate others in your concept of self. Individual’s own bodily pain, pleasure, remorse, profit, loss, is least important from the perspective of the society. ”

“ But it is that we should take possession of and treat as our own life and being that which otherwise remains outside as something half alien to us; that the work should acquire the power and fervour of self-preservation; and that in this unification the necessity of the object becomes a definite demand of our life, and the gain of the object an advance of our life. ”

“ When you look forward and consider that you must depend on your own efforts for subsistence, that you have a gift of mind [Pg 392] for the use of which you are accountable to your Maker, and that the person with one talent is equally responsible with him who has ten, you will see that nothing short of physical inability can excuse you from beginning at once the work of self-education. All that can be done for you is nothing, all the advantages with which you may be surrounded are as nothing, if you do not set yourself to a conscientious improvement of all. ”

“ We read in his Essay, "Self-Reliance ": "This is the ultimate fact which we so quickly reach on this, as on every topic, the resolution of all into the ever-blessed ONE. Self-existence is the attribute of the Supreme Cause, and it constitutes the measure of good by the degree in which it enters into all lower forms." ”

“ Self-preservation, we all admit, is the first law of nature. Now I consider myself, and the class I represent, as beings much more valuable to the world than, let's say, your factory-hands, your mill-workers, your hewers of wood and drawers of water. ”

“ By the self-life, however, as a term thus used, is to be understood, not our individuality, nor the distinctive recognition of our free agency as rational beings, nor the necessity of self protection, support and effort, but life for the sake of self. ”

“ Though all of them together were put within me, I should still be cold, and fail to exhibit anything worthy of the name of selfishness or of devotion to 'Number One.' To have a self that I can care for, nature must first present me with some object interesting enough to make me instinctively wish to appropriate it for its own sake, and out of it to manufacture one of those material, social, or spiritual selves, which we have already passed in review. ”

“ A quickened conscience, a moral uplift, a desire to do right, a noble ideal, mark the beginning; but self-study, a rigid and persistent self-analysis, taking account of stock of all our resources and capacities, all our real possessions and opportunities, is the scientific process by which man may become master of his own life and evolve to higher and still higher planes of being, even here in the present life. ”

“ But the voice of my conscience cries to me: "Whatever these beings may be in and for themselves, thou shalt treat them as subsisting for themselves, as free, self-existing beings, entirely independent of thyself. ”

“ Self-respect, self-help, application, industry, integrity—all are of the nature of habits, not beliefs. Principles, in fact, are but the names which we assign to habits; for the principles are words, but the habits are the things themselves: benefactors or tyrants, according as they are good or evil. It thus happens that as we grow older, a portion of our free activity and individuality becomes suspended in habit; our actions become of the nature of fate; and we are bound by the chains which we have woven around ourselves. ”

“ Oh, the rebellious pride of choosing our own self-will, and our own way, when the privilege may be ours of becoming the obedient and loving children of God—of receiving from Him the willing and the obedient heart which we may offer up to Him again, and which He will accept! ”

“ Well, this Instinct, with a capital I, is the teacher, this love of life, this idea of self-preservation which exists in all organic nature. And from instinctives we reasonables may take a useful lesson. ”

“ Let me be furnished in myself with health, safety, strength, the perfection of physical existence; let my mind be furnished with highest thoughts of soul-life. Let me be in myself myself fully. The pageantry of power, the still more foolish pageantry of wealth, the senseless precedence of place; words fail me to express my utter contempt for such pleasure or such ambitions. Let me be in myself myself fully, and those I love equally so. ”

“ For the self-perfect, the self-sufficient, and that which is established in itself, will much more subsist in superior than in subordinate natures. If therefore, these are in the latter, they will also be in the former. I mean the subsistence of a thing by itself, and essentialized in itself; and such are essence and life, intellect, soul, and body. For body, though it does not subsist from, yet subsists by itself; and through this belongs to the genus of substance, and is contra-distinguished from accident, which cannot exist independent of a subject. ”

“ The arrangement with which we habitually identify ourselves—what we call the normal or primary self—consists, in my view, of elements selected for us in the struggle for existence with special reference to the maintenance of ordinary physical needs, and is not necessarily superior in any other respect to the latent personalities which lie alongside of it—the fresh combinations of our personal elements which may be evoked by accident or design, in a variety to which we at present can assign no limit. ”

“ Let us take this for granted then; but is this what we mean by self-realization? Is the conclusion that, in trying to realize, we try to realize some state of ourself, all that we are driving at? No, the self we try to realize is for us a whole, it is not a mere collection of states. ”

“ In moral self-assertion the materials used may be drawn from any source, and they may belong to any world. They may, and they must, largely realize ends which visibly transcend my life. But it is self-assertion when, in applying these elements, I am guided by the idea of the greatest system in myself. If the standard used in measuring and selecting my material is, in other words, the development of my individual perfection, then my conduct is palpably not self-sacrifice, and may be opposed to it. It is self-sacrifice when I pursue an end by which my individuality suffers loss. ”

“ Hold the thought: "I-will-live-for-my-best. I-seek-wisdom, self-knowledge, happiness-and-power-to-help-others. I-act-from-the-higher-self, therefore-only-the-best-can-come-to-me. The more we become conscious of the presence of the higher self the more we should try to become a true representative of the human soul in all its wholeness and holiness, instead of wasting our time dwelling on some trifling external quality or defect. We should try to secure a true conception of what we really are so as not to over value the external furnishings. ”

“ It is a confession of failure in the highest function of being, which involves a perpetual self-determination, in full view of all existing circumstances. But habit, you see, is an action in present circumstances from past motives. It is substituting a vis a tergo for the evolution of living force. ”

“ Be thy own rival, comparing thyself with thyself, and striving day by day to be self-surpassed. If thy own little room is well lighted the whole world is less dark. If thou art busy seeking intellectual and moral illumination and strength, thou shalt easily be contented. Higher place would mean for thee less liberty, less opportunity to become thyself. The secret of progress lies in knowing how to make use, not of what we have chosen, but of what is forced upon us. To occupy one's self with trifles weans from the habit of work more effectually than idleness. ”

“ Circumstances may afford a standing-place, but self-reliance alone can give the leverage power. We must learn that character and worth consists in doing, not in possessing. Not resting, not having, not being simply, but growing and becoming, is the true character of self-culture. ”