Quotes & Sayings About Not Being The Center Of Attention

I always had the idea that I wanted to perform. I love being the center of attention - and I always love talking about myself. — Jamie Campbell Bower

I just really don't like being the center of attention that much. It's kind of ironic. — Jimmy Fallon

Mutual Criticism required a member of the group to stand up in front of everybody and listen to the enumeration of his or her faults. The bright side of being that night's subject for criticism was the rare treat at Oneida of being the center of attention. The downside was that everyone you knew and loved was allowed, even encouraged, to look into your eyes and ask, You know what your problem is? — Sarah Vowell

I think it's tough when you're very young and you maybe fall for the celebrity and being the center of attention. — Ali MacGraw

Exclamation points are the most irritating of all. Look! they say, look at what I just said! How amazing is my thought! It is like being forced to watch someone else's small child jumping up and down crazily in the center of the living room shouting to attract attention. If a sentence really has something of importance to say, something quite remarkable, it doesn't need a mark to point it out. And if it is really, after all, a banal sentence needing more zing, the exclamation point simply emphasizes its banality! — Lewis Thomas

I'm used to being the center of attention wherever I go. I've been told I could charm the shoes off a racehorse midstride, and yet you seem impervious. — Leigh Bardugo

I like being the center of attention. I want to be in the limelight, basically. — Nash Grier

We're both accustomed to being the center of attention. We're both accustomed to being spoiled by the people around us. And we don't expect to have to compete with somebody for all of that. — Jim Lampley

I love being the center of attention. — John Mayer

To women, drummers seem like these adorable, sexy Neanderthals, and lead singers seem mysterious and dangerous. So while the lead singers all want to be David Bowie, floating into parties and being the center of attention, it's the drummers who are in the corner doing keg stands and breaking tables. Usually it's the drummers who get the fun-loving ladies and the singers who get the nutcases. — Dave Grohl

A student of color in one of my classes, for example, once told me that she noticed my cutting her off during class, something she didn't think I did with white students. I could have weighed in with my professional authority and said it wasn't true, that she was imagining it, that I treated all my students that way, that she was being too sensitive, that I travel all over the country speaking about issues of inequality and injustice, so certainly I was above such things. But what I said to her was that I was truly sorry she'd had that experience. I wasn't aware of doing that, I told her, and the fact that I didn't consciously mean to was beside the point.

To respond in this way, I had to de-center myself from my privilege and make her experience and not mine the point of the conversation. I ended by telling her I would do everything I could to oay attention to this problem in the future to make sure it didn't happen again. — Allan G. Johnson

I don't like being the center of attention. — Jessica Alba

More than his exterior hit me. I felt warm and safe just being with him. He brought comfort after my terrible day. So often with other people I felt a need to be center of attention, to be funny and always have something clever to say. It was a habit I needed to shake. But with him I never felt like I had to be anything more than what I already was. I didn't have to entertain him or think up jokes or even flirt. It was enough to just be together, to be so completely comfortable in each other's presence - we lost all sense of self-consciousness. — Richelle Mead

A vinal shine turns over shades of cerulean and jasper from her expressive lips, revealing a jewel-like surface beneath a light that remains colorfast in a kiss composed of infinite grace. Being in a state of rest, Nadia still makes me the center of attention, dovetailing in an erotic entwinement that impels me to knead her coiling flex. Her resplendent fullness macerated into my bosom now grants me a restful anodyne, enabling the allay of my inner soul. — Luccini Shurod

Every day I saw others like me in this city - enough of us to populate our own town. But we only acknowledged each other with a furtive glance, fearful of calling attention to ourselves. Being alone in public was painful enough; two could find themselves smack in the center of an unbearable sideshow. We didn't seem to have any of our own places to gather in community, to immerse ourselves in our own ways and our own languages. — Leslie Feinberg

Only once did I perceive a human being, and that was at the intersection of our crossroad with the wide, white turnpike which cuts each cultivated district longitudinally at its exact center. The fellow must have been sleeping beside the road, for, as I came abreast of him, he raised upon one elbow and after a single glance at the approaching caravan leaped shrieking to his feet and fled madly down the road, scaling a nearby wall with the agility of a scared cat. The Tharks paid him not the slightest attention; they were not out upon the warpath, and the only sign that I had that they had seen him was a quickening of the pace of the caravan as we hastened toward the bordering desert which marked our entrance into the realm of Tal Hajus. — Edgar Rice Burroughs

Stay at the center of your being without allowing your attention to become distracted by sensory stimulation. Be still and let your true nature manifest and shine through. — Ilchi Lee

For those, like me, who fastidiously kept track of each time the basketball was being passed among white shirts yet somehow managed to overlook the conspicuous presence of a Halloween gorilla that strutted dead center into the visual field, the study served as a vivid demonstration that the perceptual skills on which we so greatly rely are, to put it mildly, far from flawless.
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There are, however, multiple implications to the invisible gorilla experiment findings. Chabris and Simons point out that their research "reveals two things: that we are missing a lot of what goes on around us, and that we have no idea that we are missing so much." In other words, we cannot see it all and we are affected by the false assumption that we mostly can. — Bob Katz

Mantle didn't want to stick out, but he did. He didn't wish to be treated as special, but he was. He was uncomfortable being the center of attention, but he was the centerfielder for the most famous franchise in sports. — Jane Leavy

This was all an excuse, I think. I was doing fine. I had a 93 average and I was holding my head above water. I had good friends and a loving family. And because I needed to be the center of attention, because I needed something more, I ended up here, wallowing in myself, trying to convince everybody around me that I have some kind of ... disease. I don't have any disease. I keep pacing. Depression isn't a disease. It's a pretext for being a prima donna. Everybody knows that. My friends know it; my principal knows it. The sweating has started again. I can feel the Cycling roaring up in my brain. I haven't done anything right. What have I done, made a bunch of little pictures? That doesn't count as anything. I'm finished. My principal just called me and I hung up on him and didn't call back. I'm finished. I'm expelled. I'm finished. — Ned Vizzini

Some seek the light and hold the light in place. Erik Fiskare didn't like being the center of attention, but he liked situations where he had to keep the attention centered. — Suanne Laqueur

Be crazy! But learn how to be crazy without being the center of attention. Be brave enough to live different. — Paulo Coelho

Working with Your Budding Adolescent: 16 to 24 Weeks

When you and your puppy reach the budding adolescent stage, you may feel like hiding in the closet. Some days are livable. However, other days you feel like moving. Your puppy doesn't listen or respond to known directions. He bolts, chases, and nips at everything that moves. He demands your attention and barks or mounts you when he doesn't get his way. He insists on being the center of attention every moment of every day.

Keep in mind that this stage is normal. I managed to live through it, and you will too. — Sarah Hodgson

My foot slips on a narrow ledge; in that split second, as needles of fear pierce heart and temples, eternity intersects with present time. Thought and action are not different, and stone, air, ice, sun, fear, and self are one. What is exhilarating is to extend this acute awareness into ordinary moments, in the moment-by-moment experiencing of the lammergeier and the wolf, which, finding themselves at the center of things, have no need for any secret of true being. In this very breath that we take now lies the secret that all great teachers try to tell us ... the present moment. The purpose of mediation practice is not enlightenment' it is to pay attention even at unextraordinary times, to be of the present, nothing-but-the-present, to bear this mindfulness of now into each event of ordinary life. — Peter Matthiessen

He'd spent his life being a perfect gentleman. He'd never been a flirt. He'd never been a rogue. He hated being the center of attention, but by God, he wanted to be the center of her attention. He wanted to do the wrong thing, the bad thing. He wanted to pull her into his arms and carry her to her bed. He wanted to peel every last inch of her clothing from her body, and then he wanted to worship her. He wanted to show her all the things he wasn't sure he knew how to say. — Julia Quinn

Everyone has a different path. I knew no one in the acting industry growing up. I never did a play until college. I was not outspoken when I was younger and I hated being the center of attention. But I had a dream of being an actor. I went to NYU and studied theatre. I learned a craft. And began my career straight out of college. — Peter Facinelli

He [Hern] calls his center the Boulder Abortion Clinic and he said specifically that he didn't want to hide that word. I'm deeply opposed to the politicization of language and try to avoid it when I possibly can - I don't like being manipulated by terms like pro-life or pro-choice. To me, abortionist should be as neutral as podiatrist. But again, maybe it was one battle too many, because it certainly distracted his attention from what I thought was a really sympathetic piece. — John H Richardson

Lennon was not very fond of me. Lennon didn't like to be around somebody else who was likely to be the center of attention and didn't like being on deck with somebody who was intellectually as hot as he was. — Peter Fonda

Keep some of your attention on your navel center when you are in a situation in which you feel your power is being drained. You will find that you will keep your power tighter, you won't lose as much. — Frederick Lenz

I don't mind being the center of attention as a character but in real life it's not for me. — Rachel Bilson

I definitely get nervous about if I'm going to forget the words to the songs or something. And I don't enjoy being the center of attention for an hour straight - I think that's really stressful. — Bridgit Mendler

Stop worrying, Antonia. I know you despise being the center of attention, but as we all know, people attend balls for the sole purpose of quaffing down as much of the host's liquor as possible. It's a completely parasitic relationship, so trust me when I tell you that the crapulous crowd will take scant notice of you. — Jane Carter Barrett

He was not quite sure how to phrase it, so he finally went with,
haltingly, "I don't enjoy being at the center of attention."
Her head tilted to the side, she regarded him for a long moment
before saying, "No. You don't." And then: "You were always a
tree."
"I beg your pardon?"
Her eyes grew sentimental. "When we performed our awful
pantomimes as children. You were always a tree."
"I never had to say anything."
"And you always got to stand at the back."
He felt himself smile, lopsided and true. "I rather liked being a
tree."
"You were a very good tree." She smiled then, too - a radiant,
wondrous thing. "The world needs more trees. — Julia Quinn

I love film sets, but I don't necessarily love being the center of attention. — Mary Stuart Masterson

I actually feel awkward being at the center of attention. — Edwin Catmull