Quotes & Sayings About Assurance

BOTTOM
There are things in this comedy of Pyramus and Thisby that will never please. First, Pyramus must draw a sword to kill himself; which the ladies
cannot abide. How answer you that?

SNOUT
By'r lakin, a parlous fear.

STARVELING
I believe we must leave the killing out, when all is done.

BOTTOM
Not a whit: I have a device to make all well.
Write me a prologue; and let the prologue seem to
say, we will do no harm with our swords, and that
Pyramus is not killed indeed; and, for the more
better assurance, tell them that I, Pyramus, am not
Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver: this will put them
out of fear.

QUINCE
Well, we will have such a prologue; and it shall be
written in eight and six.

BOTTOM
No, make it two more; let it be written in eight and eight. — William Shakespeare

The word of God is full of assurance. — Lailah Gifty Akita

As a school nurse, she had always modeled herself on Mary Poppins, aiming for an air of good-tempered calm, self-assurance, a tolerance for play, but an expectation that the medicine would go down along with the spoonful of sugar. If the kids thought it was possible she might break into song and shoot fireworks from the tip of her umbrella, that was all right with her. Such — Joe Hill

Faith is a firm assurance. — Lailah Gifty Akita

The Holy Ghost is a comforter and a guide. But it is also a cleansing agent. That is why service in the kingdom is so crucial to enduring. When we are called to serve, we can pray for the Holy Ghost to be our companion with assurance it will come. — Henry B. Eyring

[Ritual] dwells in an invisible reality and gives this reality a vocabulary, props, costume, gesture, scenery. Ritual makes things separate, sets them apart from ordinary affairs and thoughts. Rituals need not be solemn, but they are formalized, stylized, extraordinary, and artificial. In the name of ritual, we can do anything. We can do astonishing acts. In the end, ritual gives us assurance about the unification of things. — Barbara Myerhoff

Commonplace people have an answer for everything and nothing ever surprises them. They try to look as though they knew what you were about to say better than you did yourself, and when it is their turn to speak, they repeat with great assurance something that they have heard other people say, as though it were their own invention. — Eugene Delacroix

He wanted Zane to feel that too, to have that assurance both physically and emotionally. He would do whatever he had to do to make sure that Zane knew he was his. He — Abigail Roux

Seeing the whales off James Price Point, mothers, babies, bull whales, seeing the count, going up into the thousands of these whales, the assurance that they will be ok with a mega port, mega ships and a huge factory ashore, is now clearly proven wrong. — Bob Brown

His eyes burned mine. "You just fight for what you want Katherine. The question is, how much do you want me?" Am I worth the fight? The question was implied and his eyes were begging me for assurance. — Carolina Soto

A person with ubuntu is open and available to others, affirming of others, does not feel threatened that others are able and good, for he or she has a proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that he or she belongs in a greater whole and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed. — Desmond Tutu

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of e things not seen. — Anonymous

We hurt people by being too busy. Too busy to notice their needs. Too busy to drop that note of comfort or encouragement or assurance of love. Too busy to listen when someone needs to talk. Too busy to care. — Billy Graham

What assurance do I have that your parenting isn't screwing me up? — Bill Watterson

But surrender is only possible if we have total assurance that we are safe. We must be convinced that if we let go we will be caught. This assurance only comes when we trust that our heavenly Father desires to be with us and will not let us fall. — Skye Jethani

To evolve out of this position of psychological immaturity to the courage of self-responsibility and assurance requires a death and a resurrection. That's the basic motif of the universal hero's journey - leaving one condition and finding the source of life to bring you forth into a richer or mature condition. — Joseph Campbell

Assuredly it is not without cause our heavenly Father declares that our only safety is in calling upon his name, since by it we invoke the presence of his providence to watch over our interests, of his power to sustain us when weak and almost fainting, of his goodness to receive us into favour, though miserably loaded with sin; in fine, call upon him to manifest himself to us in all his perfections. Hence, admirable peace and tranquillity are given to our consciences; for the straits by which we were pressed being laid before the Lord, we rest fully satisfied with the assurance that none of our evils are unknown to him, and that he is both able and willing to make the best provision for us. 3. — John Calvin

A relationship doesn't define you. You define you. — Tammy-Louise Wilkins

The sanguine assurance that men and nations can be legislated into goodness, that pressure from without is equivalent to a moral change within, needs a strong backing of inexperience. — Agnes Repplier

When you want to do a big thing, get the mental pattern, make it perfect, know just what it means, enlarge your thought, keep it to yourself, pass it over to the creative power behind all things, wait and listen, and when the impression comes, follow it with assurance. Don't talk to anyone about it. Never listen to negative talk or pay attention to it and you will succeed where all others fail. — Ernest Holmes

Yet he hadn't asked for anything that he hadn't been willing to give himself. - Mahri — Kathryne Kennedy

We enjoy some gratification when our good friends die; for though their death leaves us in sorrow, we have the consolatory assurance that they are beyond the ills by which in this life even the best of people are broken down or corrupted. — Saint Augustine

Tshe suffering of adversity does not degrade you but exalts you. Human tribulation teaches you; it does not destroy you. The more we are afflicted in this world, the greater is our assurance for the next. The more we sorrow in the present, ..the greater will be our joy in the future. — Isidore Of Seville

be to the glory of God, in full surrender to His will, in full assurance of faith, in the name of Jesus, and with a perseverance that, if need be, refuses to be denied. — Andrew Murray

Faith is a principle of action. It is our willingness to believe in the Savior that unleashes His power in our lives. Faith is not a bulwark against tribulation, but an assurance that the Lord is overseeing all. — Sheri Dew

In his Word we can never go astray. We can never be deluded or confounded or destroyed in his Word. If you think there can be no assurance or certainty for the soul, listen to the certainty of the Word of God. The soul can be instructed and enlightened ... so that it perceives that its whole salvation and righteousness, or justification, is enclosed in Jesus Christ."8 — Justo L. Gonzalez

The attempt made in recent decades by secularist thinkers to disengage the moral principles of western civilization from their scripturally based religious context, in the assurance that they could live a life of their own as "humanistic" ethics, has resulted in our "cut flower culture." Cut flowers retain their original beauty and fragrance, but only so long as they retain the vitality that they have drawn from their now-severed roots; after that is exhausted, they wither and die. So with freedom, brotherhood, justice, and personal dignity - the values that form the moral foundation of our civilization. Without the life-giving power of the faith out of which they have sprung, they possess neither meaning nor vitality. — Will Herberg

And meanwhile take my assurance that the clouds are lifting and that I have every hope that the light of truth is breaking through — Arthur Conan Doyle

We are giving assurance to the American families that help is on its way. — Edward Kennedy

He would never be any different and now Scarlett realize the truth and accepted it without emotion - that until he died Gerald would always be waiting for Ellen, always listening for her. Her was in some dim borderline country where time was standing still and Ellen was always in the next room. The mainspring of his existence was taken away when she died and with it has gone his bounding assurance, his impudence and his restless vitality. Ellen was the audience before which the blustering drama of Gerald O'Hara had been played Now the curtain had been rung down forever, the footlights dimmed and the audience suddenly vanished, while the stunned old actor remained on his empty stage, waiting for his cues. — Margaret Mitchell

Above all, it's hard learning to live with vivid mental images of scenes I cared for and failed to photograph. It is the edgy existence within me of these unmade images that is the only assurance that the best photographs are yet to be made. — Sam Abell

Men, unlike mockingbirds, have the capacity for systematic self-delusion. We echo each other with equal precision, equal eloquence, equal assurance. — Robert Ardrey

They think you can't feel anything, because they've forgotten how. You're very, very dangerous, I get that, and you're prone to some very theatrical brooding, but don't let yourself mistake that for some kind of inner corruption. They see themselves in you and are blinded. — Holly Black

People with mental illness are very much like people without mental illness only more so. What we lose with a psychotic episode is the comforting assurance that we can't lose our mind. When most people look down they see solid ground. When I look down, I'm not so sure.
Crazy thoughts are not the problem. Everyone has crazy thoughts. Hallucinations and delusions tend to catch the attention but aren't the problem. The problem is that the world becomes discontinuous. We can't attend to the world and take care of ourselves. So others try to take care of us and they do an imperfect job of it. There is no substitute for being well. — Mark Vonnegut

Like a constant assurance Bailey carried with her, God remained. All things might change. Love could come and go and friendships could fade. But God stayed. It was the truth that kept her company on the loneliest nights. — Karen Kingsbury

If thou wouldest enjoy the eminent grace of the full assurance of faith, under the blessed Spirit's influence, and assistance, do what the Scripture tells thee, "Give diligence." Take care that thy faith is of the right kind--that it is not a mere belief of doctrine, but a simple faith, depending on Christ, and on Christ alone. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Laboratories can reduce risk by implementing a proven and internationally accepted quality assurance technology that is applicable across the globe. — Richard Curtis

Let no one presume to give the feelings of a young woman on receiving the assurance of that affection of which she has scarcely allowed herself to entertain a hope. — Jane Austen

It is good to renew ourselves, from time to time, by closely examining the state of our souls, as if we had never done it before; for nothing tends more to the full assurance of faith, than to keep ourselves by this means in humility, and the exercise of all good works. — John Wesley

How could a Christian live happily, or live at all, if he had not the assurance that his life is in Christ, and his support, the Lord's undertaking? — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Meekness is calm confidence, settled assurance, and rest of the soul. It is the tranquil stillness of a soul that is at rest in Christ. It is the place of peace. Meekness springs from a heart of humility, radiating the fragrance of Christ. — Matthew Henry

This sense of insecurity was falling about the entire planet and though people went on doing the things they usually did, they had none of the assurance, the happy-go-lucky "all-right" feeling, that had hitherto sustained normal men. They went on doing their customary things because they could not think of anything else to do. They tried to believe, and many did succeed in believing, that there would presently be a turn for the better. They did nothing to bring about that turn for the better; they just hoped it would occur. — H.G.Wells

In the darkest of nights cling to the assurance that God loves you, that He always has advice for you, a path that you can tread and a solution to your problem. — Basilea Schlink

In the rosy glow it diffused her companions seemed full of amiable qualities. She liked their elegance; their lightness, their lack of emphasis: even the self-assurance which at times was so like obtuseness now seemed the natural sign of social ascendency. They were lords of the only world she cared for, and they were ready to admit her to their ranks and let her lord it with them. Already she felt within her a stealing allegiance to their standards, an acceptance of their limitations, a disbelief in the things they did not believe in, a contemptuous pity for the people who were not able to live as they lived. — Edith Wharton

Nowhere in this country, from sea to sea, does nature comfort us with such assurance of plenty, such rich and tranquil beauty as in those unsung, unpainted hills of Pennsylvania. — Rebecca Harding Davis

The white Aylesbury duck is, and deservedly, a universal favourite. Its snowy plumage and comfortable comportment make it a credit to the poultry-yard, while its broad and deep breast, and its ample back, convey the assurance that your satisfaction will not cease at its death. — Isabella Beeton

I think we need to grow in our self-assurance that is not scared of being challenged, that the truth we uphold can stand up to the closest possible scrutiny. — Desmond Tutu

When we begin to understand the magnitude of [the Messiah's] sacrifice and service to us individually and collectively, we then cannot consider anything else to be of more importance or to approach His significance in our lives. For most of us, this understanding does not come all at once and likely will not be fully complete during our mortal sojourn. We do know, however, that as we learn line upon line, our appreciation for the Savior's contributions will increase and our knowledge and assurance of their truthfulness will grow. — Cecil O. Samuelson

Casual?" Elam halted and crossed his arms. "My good horse, there's a big difference between casual and confident. I am aware of the danger, but ... I want to maintain a confident mind-set in full assurance of faith, otherwise my heart might melt within me." ... "Take care that your confidence does not swell into arrogance, for that is the downfall of every man of pride. — Bryan Davis

Comfort me by a solemn Assurance, that when the little Parlour in which I sit at this Instant, shall be reduced to a worse furnished Box, I shall be read, with Honour, by those who never knew nor saw me, and whom I shall neither know nor see. — Henry Fielding

Be courteous to all, but personal with number of, and allow those couple be perfectly attempted ahead of you provide them with your self-assurance. — George Washington

In order to improve the condition of mankind all men must be given the certainty of security through the exchange of safeguards, the assurance of prosperity through an exchange of resources, the reality of freedom through the free movement of information, persons and ideas. — Antoine Pinay

Valuation is vague and arbitrary, when there is no assurance that it will be generally acquiesced in by others. — Jean-Baptiste Say

But not now. Now it was gentle, and the sun was kissing him, like Joe ... like Joe ... . Joe swallowed. His chest swelled in that faintly familiar breath-stopping, overwhelming way, and he made a faint sound, a gasp really, as he remembered the last time he'd felt that, and knew with total assurance what it was. It was when Jeannie had held his hand in church, when he was six and love was so simple, and so uncomplicated, and God was the reason you loved until you cried. For the first time in twenty-seven years, Joe felt the existence of God. He was in Casey's smile, his eyes, the way he looked at his lover, the way he greeted the dogs. God was there, in the sunshine brushing Casey's hair, and warming his skin, and Joe ... . Joe wanted to touch him. — Amy Lane

Some pretences daunt and discourage us, while others raise us to a brisk assurance. — Joseph Glanvill

Undertake this journey for the remission of your sins, with the assurance of the imperishable glory of the Kingdom of Heaven! — Pope Urban II

American democracy is supposed to be the paradigm for the rest of the world, and it no longer is. Citizens cannot be guaranteed that they can walk into a voting booth with any assurance that their vote will be counted. — Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Like the Baron, Mathilde developed a formula for acting out life as a series of roles - that is, by saying to herself in the morning while brushing her blond hair, "Today I want to become this or that person," and then proceeding to be that person.
One day she decided she would like to be an elegant representative of a well-known Parisian modiste and go to Peru. All she had to do was to act the role. So she dressed with care, presented herself with extraordinary assurance at the house of the modiste, was engaged to be her representative and given a boat ticket to Lima.
Aboard ship, she behaved like a French missionary of elegance. Her innate talent for recognizing good wines, good perfumes, good dressmaking, marked her as a lady of refinement. — Anais Nin

We should not leave our "house of bread", because it is our assurance of eternity. — Sunday Adelaja

For WAR, consisteth not in Battle only, or the act of fighting; but in a tract of time, wherein the Will to content by Battle is sufficiently known ... So the nature of War, consisteth not in actual fighting; but in the known disposition thereto, during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary. All other time is PEACE. — Thomas Hobbes

The motives behind scientism are culturally significant. They have been mixed, as usual: genuine curiosity in search of truth; the rage for certainty and for unity; and the snobbish desire to earn the label scientist when that became a high social and intellectual rank. But these efforts, even though vain, have not been without harm, to the inventors and to the world at large. The "findings" have inspired policies affecting daily life that were enforced with the same absolute assurance as earlier ones based on religion. At the same time, the workers in the realm of intuition, the gifted finessers - artists, moralists, philosophers, historians, political theorists, and theologians - were either diverted from their proper task, while others were looking on them with disdain as dabblers in the suburbs of Truth. — Jacques Barzun

Therefore, when we find our heart inflamed with love to God, we may know that God hath shined upon our souls in the pardon of sin; and proportionally to our measure of love is our assurance of pardon. Therefore we should labour for a greater measure thereof, that our hearts may be the more inflamed in the love of God. — Richard Sibbes

A good pay-master starts not at assurances. — George Herbert

Space is still filled with the noise of destruction and annihilation, the shouts of self-assurance and arrogance, the weeping of despair and helplessness. But round about the horizon the eternal realities stand silent in their age-old longing. There shines on them already the first mild light of the radiant fulfillment to come. From afar sound the first notes as of pipes and voices, not yet discernable as a song or melody. It is all far off still, and only just announced and foretold. But it is happening, today. — Alfred Delp

Great literature has always been written in a like spirit, and is, indeed, the Forgiveness of Sin, and when we find it becoming the Accusation of Sin, as in George Eliot, who plucks her Tito in pieces with as much assurance as if he had been clockwork, literature has begun to change into something else. — William Butler Yeats

By liberty I mean the assurance that every man shall be protected in doing what he believes is his duty against the influence of authority and majorities, custom and opinion. — John Acton

Every man hath greater assurance that God is good and just than he can have of any subtle speculations about predestination and the decrees of God. — John Tillotson

Serve God, and God will take care of you. Submit to His will, trust in His grace, and resign yourself into His hands with the assurance that the Lord is well pleased with those that hope in His mercy. — Gardiner Spring

I always think incipent miracles surround us, waiting only to see if our faith is strong enough. We won't have to understand it; it will just work, like a beating heart, like love. Really, no matter how frightened and discouraged I may become about the future, I look forward to it. In spite of everything I see all around me every day, I have a shaky assurance that everything will turn out fine. I don't think I'm the only one. Why else would the phrase "everything's all right" ease a deep and troubled place in so many of us? We just don't know, we never know so much, yet we have such faith. We hold our hands over our hurts and lean forward, full of yearning and forgiveness. It is how we keep on, this kind of hope. — Elizabeth Berg

Once you lose everything, what's the worst that's going to happen to you? You develop a self-assurance. — Roberto Goizueta

So, Nietzsche said, "Life is meaningless, but have courage anyway." Jesus also called His people to be courageous in the face of difficulty, adversity, and hostility, but He did not call them to a groundless courage. As we know, Jesus told His disciples, "Take heart" (John 16:33), or, as some translations put it, "Be of good cheer." However, He did not simply tell them to take heart for the sake of taking heart. He gave them a reason why they ought to have a sense of confidence and assurance for the Christian life. He said, "Take heart; I have overcome the world. — R.C. Sproul

Sometimes you just know ... And then it doesn't even seem scary. Just certain and joyful. Like a deep stream, flowing steady and strong, jumping and splashing and churning as it passes around and over the land in which it is grounded. And for this knowing, and flowing, I am grateful. — Vashti Lsc

The reputation of a Don Juan gives to a man the most dangerous power. Wise virgins resist it, but foolish virgins frequently yield to the desire to take a celebrated lover from a rival - even from a friend. This emotion is a complex one, mad up of vanity, respect for another woman's taste, and the need to establish self-assurance by winning a difficult victory. Don Juan chose his first mistresses; later he was chosen. — Andre Maurois

The family is both the fundamental unit of society as well as the root of culture. It ... is a perpetual source of encouragement, advocacy, assurance, and emotional refueling that empowers a child to venture with confidence into the greater world and to become all that he can be. Marianne E. Neifert Dr. Mom's Parenting Guide — Nigel Lane

If it were not for the assurance that I have that the Lord is near to us, guiding, directing, the burden would be almost beyond my strength, but because I know that He is there, and that He can be appealed to, and if we have ears to hear attuned to Him, we will never be left alone — Harold B. Lee

I dream of a day when governments and societies no longer value blood and race over children, and the millions of unwanted children are freed at birth for adoption by people of every race. Aside from all its other benefits, massive adoption is the best assurance that people will never again slaughter the "other." When members of every family are one of those "others," such hatreds will become, finally, impossible. — Dennis Prager

Humans crave the comfort of company when in the darkness. Not darkness of vision, which they have trained themselves over long centuries and millennia to endure and overcome. But the darkness of soul. The darkness of spirit which cries out for help, for assurance that there is brightness in the dark, even if that brightness is only the spark of another human life. For where there is life there is always a small measure of hope. — Michaelbrent Collings

Yes, as we travel through this topsy-turvy, sinful world, filled with temptations and problems, we are humbled by the expectancy of death, the uncertainty of life, and the power and love of God. Sadness comes to all of us in the loss of loved ones.
But there is gratitude also. Gratitude for the assurance we have that life is eternal. Gratitude for the great gospel plan, given freely to all of us. Gratitude for the life, teachings, and sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, whose resurrection we will commemorate in the immediate days ahead — Ezra Taft Benson

Her smile wasn't just a physical thing, a curve of our lips. It was a warmth at the edge of my mind, where I felt her presence with the same assurance I felt out heartbeat. I remember. — Kat Zhang

One cannot run from a challenge without losing. To flee is signing a death warrant to dignity and character, and, having run, there is no return; one is a weakling forever. Meeting a challenge, though one may be defeated, gives strength, character, and a certain assurance that regardless of outcome, one will survive or go down fighting. — Sigurd F. Olson

In the almost film-like flitting-by of modern life, a man needs something to tell him, from time to time, that he is still himself, and nothing can give him this assurance in so comforting a manner as the "four feet trotting behind". — Konrad Lorenz

Why fear? The stuff of my being is matter, ever changing, ever moving, but never lost; so what need of denominations and creeds to deny myself the comfort of all my fellow men? The wide belt of the universe has no need for finger-rings. I am one with the infinite and need no other assurance. — Zora Neale Hurston

Style comes from knowing who you are and who you want to be in the world; it does not come from wanting to be somebody else, or wanting to be thinner, shorter, taller, prettier. — Nina Garcia

How thankful we ought to be ... how thankful we are, for a prophet to counsel us in words of divine wisdom as we walk our paths in these complex and difficult times. The solid assurance we carry in our hearts, the conviction that God will make his will known to his children through his recognized servant is the real basis of our faith and activity. We either have a prophet or we have nothing: and having a prophet, we have everything — Gordon B. Hinckley

We can enjoy a self-assurance that doesn't depend on the state of things outside ourselves, be it downturns or booms or whatever. — Desmond Tutu

No matter what I feel, I hold the assurance that God never leaves me. — Craig Groeschel

It is near thirty years since He made it sure; and since that time, though there has fallen out much sin, yet I was never out of an assurance of mine interest, nor long out of sight of His presence. — Donald Cargill

When you looked up to the sky and cried 'Why?' sometimes the sky shrugged, yet other times it answered with warm assurance of linked hands. — Libba Bray

Zaphod marched quickly down the passageway, nervous as hell, but trying to hide it by striding purposefully. — Douglas Adams

The answer is that their confidence was actuallh in God, not in their limited understanding of what they thought he would do. They had inner assurance that God would rescue them. However, they were not so arrogant as to be sure they were "reading God right." They knew that God was under no obligation to operate according to their limited wisdom. — Timothy Keller

How are you feeling, man?" he asks me.
"Great," I tell him, and it is purely the truth. Doves clatter up out of a bare tree and turn at the same instant, transforming themselves from steel to silver in the snow-blown light. I know at that moment that the drug is working. Everything before me has become suddenly, radiantly itself. How could Carlton have known this was about to happen? "Oh," I whisper. His hand settles on my shoulder.
"Stay loose, Frisco," he says. "There's not a thing in this pretty world to be afraid of. I'm here."
I am not afraid. I am astonished. I had not realized until this moment how real everything is. A twig lies on the marble at my feet, bearing a cluster of hard brown berries. The broken-off end is raw, white, fleshly. Trees are alive.
"I'm here," Carlton says again, and he is. — Michael Cunningham

Here I stand, so help me God, I can do no other. With the greater consciousness of the issues involved comes a lesser assurance that an alternative is possible. — Gordon H. Clark

In the assurance of strength there is strength; and they are the weakest, however strong, who have no faith in themselves or their powers. — Christian Nestell Bovee

[The error in the teaching of mathematics is that] mathematics is expected either to be immediately attractive to students on its own merits or to be accepted by students solely on the basis of the teacher's assurance that it will be helpful in later life. [And yet,] mathematlcs is the key to understanding and mastering our physical, social and biological worlds. — Morris Kline

Likewise, while the men and women were no more naturally attractive than their English counterparts, they dressed with an assurance and attention to detail that would have been considered the height of arrogance in England. Here, maintaining a certain chic was apparently nothing less than a civic duty. — Kathleen Tessaro

All those before us have gone into the darkness without assurance of logic or fact or persuasive theory, with only a slender thread of hope or all too shakable convention of faith. And they have been able to sustain that slim hope in the face of darkness, then so must I. — Dan Simmons

I have never had any great esteem for the generality of the fair sex, and my only consolation for being of that gender has been the assurance it gave me of never being married to any one among them. — Mary Wortley Montagu

The absolute basic belief that every child of God must come to is that if he or she lives in obedience to God's Word and in joyous harmony with our Father, nothing can impinge on his life except by His permission. To live in close communion with Christ is to experience daily the calm assurance of God's complete care and management of every detail in our walk with Him.
No matter if trials or turmoil come. No matter if there is trouble. No matter if there is pain or poverty. Each is for a supreme purpose understood best by my Father, but allowed to impact me for my ultimate benefit, and for His honor. — W. Phillip Keller

The air of inaccessibility which her beauty and her manner gave her, tormented me in the midst of my delight, and at the height of the assurance I felt that our patroness had chosen us for one another. — Charles Dickens

When he had first met her, Royal had taken for granted her absolute self-confidence, but in fact the reverse was true - far from being sure of herself, Anne needed constantly to re-establish her position on the top rung of the ladder. By comparison, the professional people around her, who had achieved everything as a result of their own talents, were models of self-assurance — J.G. Ballard