Self Reliant Quotes & Sayings

As I listened I thought once again how precarious was the existence of the Bedu. Their way of life naturally made them fatalists; so much was beyond their control. It was impossible for them to provide for a morrow when everything depended on a chance fall of rain or when raiders, sickness, or any one of a hundred chance happenings might at any time leave them destitute, or end their lives. They did what they could, and no people were more self-reliant, but if things went wrong they accepted their fate without bitterness, and with dignity as the will of God. — Wilfred Thesiger

The frequent employment of one's will power masters all organs of movement and trains them to perform feats which otherwise would have been difficult,painful and even impossible. The man becomes independent and self-reliant; he will never be a coward,and, when real danger threatens,he is the one who is looked up to by others. The knowledge of one's strength entails a real mastery over oneself; it breeds energy and courage,helps one over the most difficult tasks of life, and procures contentment and true enjoyment of living. — George Hackenschmidt

The combination of a healthy body and a stable relationship with a self-reliant woman who takes zero shit from me or anyone else has made the continuity of my working life possible. — Stephen King

Recipients of transfers set a bad example for others, including their children, other relatives, and friends, who see that one can receive goods, services, or money from the government without earning them. The onlookers easily adopt an attitude that they, too, are entitled to such transfers. They have fewer examples of hardworking, self-reliant people in their families or neighborhoods. — Robert Higgs

The totally alive, totally conscious, and totally aware Universe takes care of itself completely. It is totally self-reliant and totally self- sufficient. it is perfect. — Chris Prentiss

I believe in children praying
well, women, too, but I rather think God expects men to be more self-reliant. I don't hold with a man everlastingly bothering the Almighty with his silly troubles. — Joseph Conrad

My children to enjoy life, to value themselves, to be risk takers, to become self-reliant, to be free from stress and anxiety, to have peaceful lives, to celebrate their present moments, to experience a lifetime of wellness, to — Wayne W. Dyer

I am self-contained and self-reliant; your opinion is nothing to me; I have no interest in you, care nothing for you, and see and hear you with indifference. — Charles Dickens

Americans face a choice: you can rediscover the animating principles of the American idea
of limited government, a self-reliant citizenry, and the opportunities to exploit your talents to the fullest
or you can join most of the rest of the western world in terminal decline. To rekindle the spark of liberty once it dies is very difficult. — Mark Steyn

Not all of the white working class struggles. I knew even as a child that there were two separate sets of mores and social pressures. My grandparents embodied one type: old-fashioned, quietly faithful, self-reliant, hardworking. My mother and, increasingly, the entire neighborhood embodied another: consumerist, isolated, angry, distrustful. There — J.D. Vance

WHEN YOU WORK FOR OTHERS, YOU ARE AT THEIR MERCY. THEY OWN YOUR WORK; THEY OWN YOU. YOUR CREATIVE SPIRIT IS SQUASHED. WHAT KEEPS YOU IN SUCH POSITIONS IS A FEAR OF HAVING TO SINK OR SWIM ON YOUR OWN. INSTEAD YOU SHOULD HAVE A GREATER FEAR OF WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO YOU IF YOU REMAIN DEPENDENT ON OTHERS FOR POWER. YOUR GOAL IN EVERY MANEUVER IN LIFE MUST BE OWNERSHIP, WORKING THE CORNER FOR YOURSELF. WHEN IT IS YOURS TO LOSE-YOU ARE MORE MOTIVATED, MORE CREATIVE, MORE ALIVE. THE ULTIMATE POWER IN LIFE IS TO BE COMPLETELY SELF-RELIANT, COMPLETELY YOURSELF. — 50 Cent

Bathsheba loved Troy in the way that only self-reliant women love when they abandon their self-reliance. When a strong woman recklessly throws away her strength she is worse than a weak woman who has never any strength to throw away. One source of her inadequacy is the novelty of the occasion. She has never had practice in making the best of such a condition. Weakness is doubly weak by being new. — Thomas Hardy

Almost by force of habit, successful people simply do more. As a result, they experience not only greater financial rewards for their extra efforts but also a personal transformation, becoming more self-confident, more self-reliant, and more influential with those around them. — Jack Canfield

Well, today people have to be self-reliant if they want a secure retirement income. — Scott Cook

We can believe we are being self-reliant and independent, and yet there is still clearly an overarching destiny, a Great Maker. So when we say we have faith in ourselves, we cannot really separate the small self from the large self. — Julia Cameron

Where there is a sufficient social movement of self-reliant communities, there can be political change. There must be political change. — Jerry Brown

No left wing parties have any respect for liberal economic values; and most centre and right wing parties merely promote a paternalistic stateism. Does it thus fall to the self-reliant students of the ruggedly individualist philosophy of magick to champion a certain measured libertarianism ? — Peter J. Carroll

Americans, both politicians and voters, may have become corrupted by big government beyond redemption. A virtuous government requires a virtuous people. A frugal government requires a self-reliant people. A free country requires people who value liberty more than money. — Charley Reese

We feel free ... Now we are really self-reliant. This is the great advantage of teaching ourselves to become a free people, no longer one that always asks, 'Aid, aid, please.' — Sukarno

You have to be self-reliant and strong to survive in this town. Otherwise you will be destroyed. — Joan Crawford

the despair displayed by young children on loss of their mother is a normal response to frustration of their absolute need for her presence ... children usually manage to survive, it is true, but at the cost of developing a defensive attitude to emotional detachment, and by becoming self-absorbed and self-reliant to an unusual degree. Typically, they are left with lasting doubts about their capacity to elicit care and affection. — Anthony Stevens

You have to find out who you are aside from what the media say you are. If you've become reliant on them for kind of a sense of self, then you're really screwed. — Daniel Radcliffe

I came to office with one deliberate intent: to change Britain from a dependent to a self-reliant society
from a give-it-to-me, to a do-it-yourself nation. A get-up-and-go, instead of a sit-back-and-wait-for-it Britain. — Margaret Thatcher

It's harder to end a war than begin one. Indeed, everything that American troops have done in Iraq
all the fighting and all the dying, the bleeding and the building, and the training and the partnering
all of it has led to this moment of success. Now, Iraq is not a perfect place. It has many challenges ahead. But we're leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq, with a representative government that was elected by its people. We're building a new partnership between our nations. — Barack Obama

MY FATHER was a brilliant man, a true iconoclast, fiercely self-reliant, a dark genius, cruel, selfish, and eternally optimistic. Early in his sales career, a boss called him an "independent son of a bitch," which Dad took as the highest compliment he'd ever received. He wanted me to be the same way. Dad had no hobbies, no distractive activities. He didn't do household chores, wash the car, — Chris Offutt

Increased coalition presence feeds the notion of occupation. It contributes to the dependency of Iraqi security forces on the coalition, ... It extends the amount of time that it will take for Iraqi security forces to become self-reliant. And it exposes more coalition forces to attacks. — George W. Casey Jr.

PAPA'S NAME, UZO, meant "door," or "the way." It was a solid kind of name, strong-like and self-reliant, unlike mine, Ijeoma (which was just a wish: "safe journey"), or Mama's, Adaora (which was just saying that she was the daughter of all, daughter of the community, which was really what all daughters were, when you thought about it). — Chinelo Okparanta

Is the economy going to collapse if we continue down this road? Yes. Should Americans be self-reliant? Yes. Absolutely ... I think loving our neighbors is being prepared to give them food. Loving our neighbors is being prepared to protect them. — Matt Shea

I'll be honest with you. I'm a little bit of a loner. It's been a big part of my maturing process to learn to allow people to support me. I tend to be very self-reliant and private. And I have this history of wanting to work things out on my own and protect people from what's going on with me. — Kerry Washington

No, it's cool," Mills replied. "I don't have a boyfriend. I'm single." It was the first time he had ever defined himself as single, which felt like defining himself as American in a foreign country. It sounded advanced and self-reliant and lonely. — Christopher Bollen

Better to remain always self-reliant. Self-reliance means you're in control. Don't ever think you need a man for happiness. — Bella Forrest

Music was the one thing I could control. It was the one world that offered me freedom. When I played music, my nightmares ended. My family problems disappeared. I didnt have to search for answers. The answers lay no further than the bell of my trumpet and my scrawled, pencilled scores. Music made me full, strong, popular, self-reliant and cool. — Quincy Jones

Most happy is he who is entirely self-reliant, and who centers all his requirements in himself alone. — Marcus Tullius Cicero

dependency harms culture. People thrive the more they can be self-reliant. — Wesley J. Smith

A lover is never a completely self-reliant person viewing the world through his own eyes, but a hostage to a certain delusion. — Alexander Theroux

We allow folks to divide us. I don't like this Republican/Democrat, left/right, radical/not radical division that is created by folks, particularly and unfortunately in the media. What happened to being a self-reliant, God-fearing American, that loved freedom and the constitution? That's the way I want to be labeled. — Matt Shea

Freedom to learn is the first necessity of guaranteeing that man himself shall be self reliant enough to be free. — Franklin D. Roosevelt

Don't be disquieted in time of adversity. Be firm with dignity and self-reliant with vigor. — Chiang Kai-shek

It was almost as if a 3 a.m. religion existed, one that was self-reliant and relished how the world can be lived upside-down but still lived to its fullest potential. — James Altucher

If we expected self-reliance of family groups, if we expected hardiness and resilience and initiative on the part of individuals, and if we rewarded initiative instead of dependence on government, we would not only ameliorate many of the family-related social problems we see at present, but we would also reduce our vulnerability to terrorism. People who are hardy, resilient, and self reliant are a lot harder to terrorize. — Bernard Levin

Our sense of self, formulated in large part by the untold number of cross-related connections that we make with our physical, social, and family environments, is reliant upon fitting into our social fabric. The educational environment, family relationships, peer groups, books, television, films, music, along with an assortment of other cultural events shape our emergent persona. Our successes and failures interacting in the world leave their collective imprint upon the wet clay of our forming brains. We are sentimental creatures who cling to past memories. We are inquisitive critters who venture forth from our protective dens to explore new territory. We are perceptive organisms equipped with five basic senses. We are sentient beings who can consciously organize our sense impressions into guiding ideas and useful principles. Our survival responses form a central cord of our emotions. We are receptive, compassionate beings that respond with both body and mind to global stimuli. — Kilroy J. Oldster

I think if I were to express my wish, it would be that we are more regionally self-reliant. And I don't mean people being survivalists, I mean regionally self-reliant. So that you have these individual cells. The idea of having different solutions in different areas, so that we have a very robust, durable civilization. — Daniel Suarez

To a great extent the achievements of invention, of mechanical and of artistic creation, must of necessity, and rightly, be individual rather than governmental. It is the self-reliant pioneer in every enterprise who beats the path along which American civilization has marched. Such individual effort is the glory of America. — Franklin D. Roosevelt

The dichotomy is delicious. Inside the fantasy genre, I try to present women who need to solve real problems like having no voice in community, or no right to work; no access to capital to start a business. No reinforcement for talent. — Stella Atrium

Recipients of transfers tend to become less self-reliant and more dependent on government payments. When people can get support without exercising their own abilities to discover and respond to opportunities for earning income, those abilities atrophy. People forget - or never learn in the first place - how to help themselves, and eventually some of them simply accept their helplessness. — Robert Higgs

Healthy parenting is nothing if not a process of empowerment. As we help to raise our children's self-esteem, we also increase their personal power. When we encourage them to be confident, self-reliant, self-directed, and responsible individuals, we are giving them power. — Louise Hart

I don't see,' I said, 'how people stand being old. Your insides all dry up. When you're young you're so self-reliant. You don't even need much religion. — Sylvia Plath

He (the Shaman) is a self-reliant explorer of the endless mansions of a magnificent hidden universe. — Michael Harner

Our fathers and grandfathers who poured over the Midwest were self-reliant, rugged, God-fearing people of indomitable courage ... They asked only for freedom of opportunity and equal chance. In these conceptions lies the real basis of American democracy. They and their fathers give a genius to American institutions that distinguished our people from any other in the world. — Herbert Hoover

You can become much more independent, much more courageous with a bank account. And also, much more independent and self-reliant when you know you have money behind you. — Rod Serling

I feel ashamed that so many of us cannot imagine a better way to do things than locking children up all day in cells instead of letting them grow up knowing their families, mingling with the world, assuming real obligations, striving to be independent and self-reliant and free. — John Taylor Gatto

One thing I hate about the New Deal is that it is killing what, to me, is the American pioneering spirit. I simply do not know what to tell my own boys, leaving school and confronting this new world whose ideal is Security and whose practice is dependence upon government instead of upon one's self ... All the old character-values seem simply insane from a practical point of view; the self-reliant, the independent, the courageous man is penalized from every direction. — Rose Wilder Lane

It was me, only me. Self-contained, self-reliant, and always, unquestionably self-assured. — Max Brooks

You can achieve better health by replacing passive "fix me" behaviors with self-reliant ones - new habits that keep you actively involved in your own
care. — Archelle Georgiou

Meredith was not so secure in her maturity that she did not suffer those periods of despondency and doubt which seemed to weave through the lives of self-reliant women. — Don DeLillo

There was a time when I was way too reliant upon other people's opinions and perspective of me. And I guess over time came to see how unhealthy that was. I mean it's almost like a sign of mental illness to base your self-worth on the opinions of complete strangers. — Moby

The Chinese mom is not the helicopter mom. I would never do their homework for them. It's all about: Take responsibility, don't blame others. Be self-reliant. Never blame the teacher. — Amy Chua

The mere animal pleasure of travelling in a wild unexplored country is also great. The effect of travel on a man whose heart is in the right place is that the mind is made more self-reliant: it becomes more confident of its own resources, there is greater presence of mind. — David Livingstone

We're leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq with a representative government that was elected by its people. We're building a new partnership between our nations and we are ending a war not with a final battle but with a final march toward home. This is an extraordinary achievement — Barack Obama

Totally self-reliant, he is a master negotiator. He believes no one, expects the worst of people, distrusts his allies and adversaries alike and makes no pretense at intimacy. — Mark Stevens

Food exemplifies the difficulty of withdrawing from the modern economy, because you can't live without it and because not many people produce all of their own. And if its uncommon for a modern person to be food self-reliant, it is almost unheard of for a community to supply all of its own food. — Derrick Jensen

The world teaches us to be self-sufficient, self-reliant, self-motivating. But anytime we put self before Savior, we're in trouble — Toni Sorenson

Most kids who grow up in Alaska and spend a fair degree of time in the wilderness, grow up being pretty self-reliant. You have to be, in order to survive all the animals and cliffs and crevasses and rapids - at some point, your brain has to kick [out of] that childish daydream world and start making I-want-to-live decisions. — Leigh Newman

You bring up your children to be self-reliant and independent and they double-cross you and become self-reliant and independent. — Robert Cormier

Let it be ours to be self-reliant amidst hosts of the vacillating - real in a generation of triflers - true amongst a multitude of shams; when tempted to swerve from principle, sturdy as an oak in its maintenance; when solicited by the enticement of sinners, firm as a rock in our denial. — William Morley Punshon

With acting I am being led by the script, other actors, the director, etc. But with songwriting I feel it is much more self reliant and allows me to be in the creative experience without being as dependent on others. — Helen Slater

Education makes life self-reliant. It inspires man to live with dignity in the society. It is the foremost requisite of a teacher to identify his own virtues. He needs to live supported by his inherent virtues-and must continue to uphold them. — Narendra Modi

Is our rational and self-reliant generation really supposed to accept the idea that God the Almighty not only created the universe but, interestingly enough, also has a stake in our lives? — Gudjon Bergmann

For over forty years, in a spirit of love, members of the Church have been counseled to be thrifty and self-reliant; to avoid debt; pay tithes and a generous fast offering; be industrious; and have sufficient food, clothing, and fuel on hand to last at least one year. Today there are compelling reasons to reemphasize this counsel. — Ezra Taft Benson

India is an Old country but a young nation ... I am young and I too have a dream, I dream of India Strong, Independent, Self-Reliant and in the front rank of the nations of the world, in the service of mankind. — Rajiv Gandhi

But I can tell you what your folly and injustice will compel us to do. It will compel us to be free from your domination, and more self-reliant than we have been. — John H. Reagan

Peggy had not forgotten the intellectual and social ambitions she had started life with only a decade before. Years so weary and routine laden, they seemed like a single year that had repeated itself. She wanted to be creative and self-reliant. — Nell Zink

we must believe that we can bend reality to our own preferences, crafting the lives we desire through disciplined learning and initiative. We mustn't wait for permission or perfect timing any longer. Instead we must be courageous and self-reliant, moving forward at a moment's notice. We must see struggle as positive and necessary for our growth and ability to innovate and serve. And we must know all that we need is accessible in the Now - there is abundance in this world to be had, and everything we need to begin the great quest toward a free and fulfilling life is already within us. Should we live from these beliefs, then we shall reach levels of motivation and happiness undreamed of by the timid masses. — Brendon Burchard

He had acquired all the composed and self-reliant look which is so remarkable in a good non-commissioned officer. — Thomas Hughes

Far from helping students to develop into mature, self-reliant, self-motivated individuals, schools seem to do everything they can to keep youngsters in a state of chronic, almost infantile, dependency. The pervasive atmosphere of distrust, together with rules covering the most minute aspects of existence, teach students every day that they are not people of worth, and certainly not individuals capable of regulating their own behavior. — Alfie Kohn

America is a new kind of society that produces a new kind of human being. That human being - confident, self-reliant, tolerant, generous, future-oriented - is a vast improvement over the wretched, servile, fatalistic and intolerant human being that traditional societies have always produced. — Dinesh D'Souza

To join the makers of the world is always to feel at least a little more self reliant, a little more omnicompetent. For everyone to bake his own bread or brew his own beer is, we're told, inefficient, and by the usual measures it probably is ... But though it is certainly cheaper and easier to rely on untold, unseen others to provide for our everyday needs, to live that way comes at a price, not least to our sense of competence and independence. We prize these virtues, and yet they have absolutely nothing to do with the efficiencies of modern consumer capitalism. Except perhaps to suggest that there might be some problems with modern consumer capitalism. — Michael Pollan

People don't place their trust in government or company pension plans; they have to be self-reliant. — Scott Cook

Faith, spirituality, and obedience produce a prepared and self-reliant people. — Keith B. McMullin

We feel the need to emphasize with greater clarity the obligation for members of the Church to become more independent and self reliant. — Gordon B. Hinckley

In the struggle to remain a complete person and to love from her fullness instead of her inadequacy a woman may appear hard. She may feel her early conditioning tugging her in the direction of surrender, but she ought to remember that she was originally loved for herself; she ought to hang on to herself and not find herself nagging, helpless, irritable and trapped. Perhaps I am not old enough yet to promise that the self-reliant woman is always loved, but she cannot be lonely as long as there are people in the world who need her joy and her strength, but certainly in my experience it has always been so. Lovers who are free to go when they are restless always come back; lovers who are free to change remain interesting. The bitter animosity and obscenity of divorce is unknown where individuals have not become Siamese twins. A lover who comes to your bed of his own accord is more likely to sleep with his arms around you all night than a lover who has nowhere else to sleep. — Germaine Greer

Priesthood quorums teach and assist their members to attain good health, financial stability, and a year's supply of food and clothing. They also teach their members to be self-reliant and to give their time, talents, and means in behalf of the Church, community, and needy. — Joseph B. Wirthlin

Fame is damaging when people become reliant on it for their sense of self, and their identity, when fame is linked to how you see yourself. — Daniel Radcliffe

The cat of the slums and alleys, starved, outcast, harried, still keeps amid the prowlings of its adversity the bold, free, panther-tread with which it paced of yore the temple courts of Thebes, still displays the self-reliant watchfulness which man has never taught it to lay aside. — Hector Hugh Munro

You are strong, self-reliant, entirely able to take care of yourself and of me ... You are fearless, courageous; you saved my life, nursed me back to health, hunted for my food, provided for my comfort. You don't need me. Yet you make me want to protect you, watch over you, make sure no harm comes to you. I could live with you all my life and never really know you; you have depths it would take many lifetimes to explore. You are wise and ancient ... and as fresh and young as a woman as ... And you are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. I love you more than life itself. — Jean M. Auel

When you go back and look at American history, it's not terribly different from Canadian history. If you weren't self-reliant on the prairie, you wouldn't survive. — Alan Greenspan

You've been hurt by every person you ever cared for, except Abby. You raised yourself, and in doing so became self-reliant and independent. You don't need the firm. You can leave it. You're hardened and calloused beyond your years. And you're smart enough to pull it off, Mitch. You won't get caught. That's why we picked you. — John Grisham

If America could be, once again, a nation of self-reliant farmers, craftsmen, hunters, ranchers, and artists, then the rich would have little power to dominate others. Neither to serve nor to rule: That was the American dream. — Edward Abbey

I listened to a Republican colleague work himself into a lather over a proposed plan to provide school breakfasts to preschoolers. Such a plan, he insisted, would crush their spirit of self-reliance. I had to point out that not too many five-year-olds I knew were self-reliant, but children who spent their formative years to hungry to learn could very well end up being charges of the state. — Barack Obama

Independent self-reliant people would be a counterproductive anachronism in the collective society of the future where people will be defined by their associations. — John Dewey

We dream of a day when India is completely self-reliant in defence production & exports defence equipment worldwide. — Narendra Modi

My beauty and independence were new for me. They brought me pride and satisfaction; they changed my sense of possibility. I felt awake in my body. Living in the woods, building my little shelter each night, a silent shadow, drifting in and out of mountain towns, a ghost, I was entirely self-reliant. On the trail I had persisted despite fear, and walking the Pacific Crest had led me deeply into happiness. I felt amazing now. In this body that brought me twelve hundred miles, I felt I could do anything. — Aspen Matis

What you are beginning to understand is that these decisions are all directly connected to the way in which we picture how you will be equipped to deal with the world around you when you are finally free of us. I smile as I write these words. Believe me, we want you to be free and self-reliant. We — Omar Saif Ghobash

I truly believe that the death of my mother has made me the way I am today. I am a survivor, mentally strong, determined, stronwilled, self-reliant, and independent. I also keep most of my pain, anger and feelings inside. I refuse to be vulnerable to anyone, especially my husband. The only people who see that more emotional or softer side are my children. That too because of my mother. — Hope Edelman

More time she'd spent with him, the more convinced she became that he was by far the sexiest guy she'd ever met. Who else did she know who could work with his hands the way he did? Who could make her laugh? Who was smart and charming, self-reliant and tender? — Nicholas Sparks

Wendre had appealed to Horn as no woman ever had. She had a man's mind and a woman's heart. She was self-reliant, proud, courageous. She grasped the situation quickly, accepted the odds, and did what had to be done without complaining. This was no spoiled child of empire, no sheltered darling of an all-powerful father; this was a woman fit to stand and fight beside any barbarian from the restless marches, made for love and ready to battle for it. — Jack Williamson

We must learn to be self-reliant and independent of schools, courts, protection and patronage of a Government we seek to end, if it will not mend. — Mahatma Gandhi

The rich are thus not just more powerful than the poor, they also have moral authority over the poor and with it the moral responsibility to tell the poor how to live: build self-discipline, work hard, climb the economic ladder, and so become self-reliant. M — George Lakoff

He's quite a bit of a snob, you know, and when he hears I'm going to marry the daughter of an earl - "
"I say, old man," I couldn't help saying, "aren't you looking ahead rather far?"
"Oh, that's all right. It's true nothing's actually settled yet, but she practically told me the other day she was fond of me."
"What!"
"Well, she said that the sort of man she liked was the self-reliant, manly man with strength, good looks, character, ambition, and initiative."
"Leave me, laddie," I said. "Leave me to my fried egg. — P.G. Wodehouse

Ive them your faith, and they become confident, energized, and self-reliant. — John C. Maxwell