Quotes & Sayings About Survival Instinct

...most ghosts are a rag and a bone and a hank of hair at best--a memory fragment stuck on continual loop, just dust and PKE and water-vapour with no real "there" there. Leftover fragments of psychic energy deluded into believing in their own personality; an echo cobbled together from memory and pain, with no self-awareness as such 'cept what we give them. Survival instinct, with no survival. — Gemma Files

In World War II, some Japanese soldiers preferred to take their own lives rather become prisoners of war. In Saipan hundreds of civilians jumped to their deaths over cliffs in order to avoid falling into American hands. Even in life-or-death situations cultural ties and duties often outweigh the instinct for survival. This is why people die in the attempt to rescue a dog from drowning, or decide to become suicide bombers. — Harald Welzer

Amazing what humans could do to one another when their survival instinct kicked in. — Jason M. Hough

There was the natural human survival instinct to be optimistic. — Barbara Demick

I'm missing something, aren't I?"
"Brains", he snapped. "And survival instinct. The Hawklord's been waiting for you for three hours."
"Tell him I'm dead. — Michelle Sagara West

You can survive life. Be strong. — Lailah Gifty Akita

People talk about fight or flight? That's nonsense. It's fight and flight. — Amanda Bouchet

Life comes from physical survival; but the good life comes from what we care about. — Rollo May

Human beings are very skilled at pretending they are not what they are, and ignoring what is inside them. This includes ignoring their natural instincts, their primal instincts, because they have this notion that they are evolving faster than other life, have evolved further, and are therefore superior. Take racism for example. As abhorrent as people may consider it, human beings are essentially tribal, and racism is simply a survival instinct embedded deep inside us, born from thousands of years of survival and experience. — Robert Black

Further strengthenings of the self-centered instinct for survival recruit even greater numbers of people into some sort of ring of fellowship (church or gender, red state or blue) by populating the terra incognita outside the ring with enough barbarians to verify the existence of a civilization within
to define the preferred stock by what, as all good people agree, it decidedly is not. — Lewis H. Lapham

After 15 years living in Paris, I felt myself growing old and stagnant - similar to stagnant water sitting in a bowl; cats have a survival instinct not to drink this water. They can sense when it's old and may be carrying air-borne germs. After 15 years in Paris, I no longer felt drinkable. — Roman Payne

It is your organized religions that have made it clear through their most sacred scriptures that cruelty and killing is an acceptable response to human frailty and human differences. This goes against every human instinct, but organized religion has reorganized human thoughts. Some humans have even been turned against their own instinct for survival. And so people go around maiming and killing each other, because they've been told quite directly that this is what God does to them
and what God wants them to do to each other. — Neale Donald Walsch

To recover we must understand and accept impermanence. We must replace the reactive survival instinct of clinging, grasping, and attachment with the wise response of nonclinging, nonattachment, and compassion. In a world where everything is constantly being pulled beyond our grasp, clinging and grasping always result in the rope burns and unnecessary suffering that accompanies it. — Noah Levine

When a depressed person does get out of bed, it's usually not with a sudden insight that life is rich and valuable, but out of some creeping sense of duty or instinct for survival. If collapsing is sometimes vital, so is the brute force of will. To William James we owe the insight that, in the absence of real health, we sometimes must act as if we are healthy. Buoyed by such discipline and habit, we might achieve actual well-being. — Joshua Wolf Shenk

His first instinct was to help me, not sit like a deer in headlights, I now know that Matt isn't one to panic — Joe Teti

In situation, we must adapt, survive and strive. — Lailah Gifty Akita

There is nothing wrong with having competitive instincts. They are survival instincts. — Pat Summitt

Technology has just passed our survival instinct, and the country is spinning on a stationary existential axis of make-believe importance: We text about a Tweet of a YouTube video posted on Facebook with a clip of Glee about not texting that we just texted about. Instead of actual life, we're now living an air-guitar version of life. — Tim Dorsey

That's about when people realized that this wasn't some kind of show, an optical illusion or something to stand around and point at. They might not have understood what they were seeing, but whatever instinct humans possessed that triggered that flight response kicked in.
It became all about survival- about getting away from the big, bad unknown- while trying to snap pictures of the spectacle at the same time.
Got to love the near-innate human response to capture everything on film. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

When your own life is threatened, your sense of empathy is blunted by a terrible, selfish hunger for survival. — Yann Martel

There was something about that man when he was all angry and dangerous that got my blood up. Sometimes my survival instincts are not what they should be. — Patricia Briggs

Of course there are mothers,
squeezing their breasts
dry, pawning their bodies,
shedding teeth for their children,
or that's our fond belief.
But remember - Hansel
and Gretel were dumped in the forest
because their parents were starving. — Margaret Atwood

If you listen to music daily, you find strength of survival. — Lailah Gifty Akita

His red eyes swung in my direction. Without a second glance, he released the dead man's body. It hit the ground with a loud thump, but I couldn't bring myself to look at him. He was already dead, but even if he wasn't, there wasn't a thing in this world I could do for him. My death was waiting in those red eyes as well, if I didn't figure out how to save myself in the next few seconds. — Rose Wynters

Your soul is strong to survive the situation. — Lailah Gifty Akita

When walking alone in a jungle of true darkness,
there are three things that can show you the way:
instinct to survive, the knowledge of navigation,
creative imagination. Without them, you are lost. — Toba Beta

Never doubt your existence. — Lailah Gifty Akita

I've heard that most drowning victims can't calm down. They have to impose their will against every survival instinct to stop flailing and let themselves feel like they're drowning. It takes an infinite amount of trust to count on someone else to save you. Raffe must have enormous willpower because he immediately stops splashing. He — Susan Ee

Faith gives us strength.
Grace gives us power.
Hope gives us anchor. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Karate is action, survival, living; hesitation is paralysis, reaction, mortality — Soke Behzad Ahmadi

Humanity as such, we might say, is a large collective drifting into the future with survival as its shared interest. This law differs from the "laws" that we have written down, and that have such an inorganic connotation. This law exists hardly to reign in outpourings of human instinct, but rather, is aligned with the incohate impulses toward life esconced in our hearts; it is an unspoken agreement among human beings where there are more than one. In short, this naked law, fundamental to survival,was altered and institutionalized over many thousands of years of history before our laws came to be. — Koji Suzuki

But we were all young once. It passes, like innocence and a sense of fair play. The only thing left in the end is a good instinct for survival. — Laurell K. Hamilton

She was alone and destitute in a world of pointless carnage. By an eight-hundred-year-old Sepahrdic tradition she ad been since the age of twelve and a half "bogeret l'reshut nafsha"
an adult wit authority over her own soul. The Torah taught, Choose life. And so, rather than die of pride, Sofia Mendes sold what she had to sell, and she survived. — Mary Doria Russell

But in reality, when faced with death and the great unknown that came after, my survival instinct snatched wildly at whatever lifeline was offered. I didn't want to die. Even if it meant becoming something I loathed, my nature was, first and always, to survive. — Julie Kagawa

We are built to desire free will and to choose our own destiny. It's not about being right or wrong; it's about the celebration of life, your free will. The human spirit must constantly be fed. It is what makes us survive. — DeiAmor Verus

In any situation, there is hope. Don't give! Be strong! — Lailah Gifty Akita

People have a need for certainty - and that need for certainty is in every human being, certainty that you can avoid pain, certainty that you can at least be comfortable. It's a survival instinct. — Tony Robbins

The greatest miracle of my life is a second chance to live life. — Lailah Gifty Akita

should I respect the work of the creator, of the gardener, or should I accept the survival instinct with which nature endowed this plant, which I now call a 'weed'? — Paulo Coelho

It's hard to think when someone's trying to kill you. We human beings aren't wired to be rational and creative when we know our lives are in danger of a swift and violent end. The body has definite ideas of which survival strategies it prefers to embrace, and those are generally limited to "rip threat to pieces" or "run like hell." No thinking need be involved, as far as our instincts are concerned.
Our instincts were a long time in the making, though, and the threats that can come after us now have outpaced them. You can't outrun a bullet, and you don't go hand-to-hand with a gunman unless you're certain you are about to die anyway. Speed and mindless aggression weren't going to keep me alive. — Jim Butcher

I graciously survived depression, mental-illness and attempt of suicide. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Because you have no survival instinct, Grace. You're like a tank, you just chug along< thinking nothing can stop you, until you meet up with a bigger tank. Are you sure you want to go out with someone with that kind of history?" mom seemed to warm her theory. " he couldhave a psychotic break. I read that people get those when they're twenty-eight. he could be almost normal and then suddenly go slasher. I mean, you know I've never told you what to do with your life before now. But what if-I told you not to see him?"
I hadn't been expecting that. My voice was brittle. "I would say that by virtue of your not acting parental up to this point, you've relinquished your abiblity to wield any power now. Sam and I are together. It's not an option."
Mom threw her hands up as if trying to stop the Grace-tank from running over her. "Okay. Fine. Just be careful, okay? Whatever. I'm going to get a drink."
And just like that her parental engergies were expendede. — Maggie Stiefvater

Our most basic instinct is not for survival but for family. Most of us would give our own life for the survival of a family member, yet we lead our daily life too often as if we take our family for granted. — Paul Pearsall

You only have to view life in a positive way. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Since the days of Descartes it has been a conception familiar to philosophers that every visible event in nature might be explained by previous visible events, and that all the motions, for instance, of the tongue in speech, or of the hand in painting, might have merely physical causes. If consciousness is thus accessory to life and not essential to it, the race of man might have existed upon the earth and acquired all the arts necessary for its subsistence without possessing a single sensation, idea, or emotion. Natural selection might have secured the survival of those automata which made useful reactions upon their environment. An instinct would have been developed, dangers would have been shunned without being feared, and injuries avenged without being felt. — George Santayana

When I felt ill and was on the way to becoming a burden to the other men, I noticed a growing chill in their attitude toward me. For people like us, living day and night on the brink of danger, the normal instinct of survival seems to strike inward, like a disease, distorting the personality and removing all motives other than those of sheer self-interest. That is why this afternoon I did not wait to go and tell my former comrades-in-arms what had happened to me. For one thing, they probably already knew; besides, it seemed unfair to risk awakening their dormant sense of humanity. — Shohei Ooka

Don't cry for them to be happy. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Choices, Choices, Choices!
Listen to your instincts; you will make the best-choices. — Lailah Gifty Akita

To run with the wolf was to run in the shadows, the dark ray of life, survival and instinct. A fierceness that was both proud and lonely, a tearing, a howling, a hunger and thirst. Blessed are they who hunger and thirst. A strength that would die fighting, kicking, screaming, that wouldn't stop until the last breath had been wrung from its body. The will to take one's place in the world. To say 'I am here.' To say 'I am. — O.R. Melling

Your soul may be trampled in times of troubles. But if your spirit is strong, you will survive. — Lailah Gifty Akita

You will face many troubles. But the Lord will deliver you each time. — Lailah Gifty Akita

I don't know if cats understand what their owners say, but they do have a strong survival instinct. — Manel Loureiro

There is an art to living that is far above the base human instinct of survival. I want to live beautifully. — Jennie Allen

The power of patient is the greatest survival skills. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Every creature has a survival instinct. It looks like fear but it's not the same thing. Fear isn't the desire to avoid death or pain. Fear is rooted in the knowledge that what you recognize as yourself can cease to exist. Fear is existential. — John Scalzi

May you discover your sacred-self. — Lailah Gifty Akita

The suit came up, and Holston thought that maybe people went along with it because they couldn't believe it was happening. None of it was real enough to rebel against. The animal part of his mind wasn't made for this, to be calmly ushered to a death it was perfectly aware of. — Hugh Howey

Hunger, love, pain, fear are some of those inner forces which rule the individual's instinct for self preservation. — Albert Einstein

Human activity is destroying the natural systems that we depend upon for our survival. Our most basic instinct as humans is to survive; yet we continue to destroy our life-support machine. Connected humans understand this terrible contradiction; disconnected humans are not able to.

Not all humans are responsible: just those who are part of Industrial Civilization. Industrial Civilization depends on economic growth and the unsustainable use of natural resources, so it has developed a complex set of tools for keeping people disconnected from the real world and living a life that keeps civilization running. Humans have been manipulated in order to be part of a destructive system.

The only way to prevent global ecological collapse and thus ensure the survival of humanity is to rid the world of Industrial Civilization. — Keith Farnish

Madness is deep distress. — Lailah Gifty Akita

I have experienced deep despair, mental-ill health and attempt of suicide. — Lailah Gifty Akita

I don't even want to win, but I think there's this survival instinct inside all of us that clicks on when we see other people failing. It makes me feel gross and incredibly human. — Julie Murphy

The spirit of a man can survive a sick body. — Lailah Gifty Akita

You ought to find the joy, hope and love of existence. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Every challenge, I have faced, dares me to seek a higher power. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Like every living thing its prime characteristic is a blind, unreasoned instinct to survive. — Robert A. Heinlein

A scientifically verifiable theory of morals must be rooted in the individual's instinct to survive - and nowhere else! - and must correctly describe the hierarchy of survival, note the motivations at each level, and resolve all conflicts. — Robert A. Heinlein

There is grace for survival in any situation. — Lailah Gifty Akita

There is hope in any circumstance. Be strong! — Lailah Gifty Akita

The nobility of Teresa Leo's poems is that they are not disposed to hide from the dark-rather, they display a mind that tends toward obsession and brooding, that works against fatality like fingers at a knot. The firm, attentive mind on display and the lucid unfolding of the poems are the life instinct seeking and finding its way through again and again. Love and beauty are the argument, but they don't win easily. Bloom in Reverse works through elegy toward survival with moving persistence, both driven and compelling. — Tony Hoagland

Despite our instinct to polarize ourselves in the name of survival, an indescribable connection - call it love or compassion - pervades and dissolves our apparent separation. This oneness transcends physical and emotional relationships; it's a deep connection that surfaces only when the ego-laden barriers are lifted. — Rajeev Kurapati

The anchor of my life is the grace of God. — Lailah Gifty Akita

For many years eagerly thought by your enemy to destroying your life, it's all one second of mastery for you to save your life from his deadly plans, for you to survive. — Auliq Ice

Show me a man who has no interest in his own good, and I'll show you a man who is not in touch with his own humanity."

~R. Alan Woods [2013] — R. Alan Woods

Surely no rational or realistic person will discount the possibility that [during wartime] the United States might suddenly resort to nuclear weapons. Those who retain the instinct for survival, not to speak of minimal concern for their fellow man, will seek ways to act before rather than after the event. — Noam Chomsky

The greatest souls have survived deep distress and mental-ill health. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Fear is a survival instinct; fear in its way is a comfort for it means that somewhere hope is alive. — Theodore Sturgeon

You can overcome any situation with positive attitude. — Lailah Gifty Akita

You cannot sensibly expect a starving 'God-fearing' man to honor the 8th commandment. — Mokokoma Mokhonoana

Amazingly, we take for granted that instinct for survival, fear of death, must separate us from the happiness of pure and uninterpreted experience, in which body, mind, and nature are the same. This retreat from wonder, the backing away like lobsters into safe crannies, the desperate instinct that our life passes unlived, is reflected in proliferation without joy, corrosive money rot, the gross befouling of the earth and air and water from which we came. — Peter Matthiessen

The beauty of existence is my joy. — Lailah Gifty Akita

The Great stories give us the hope and the courage to survive life. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Dare to conquer your soul. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Perhaps it was simple reflex, her own instinct for survival. Or perhaps it had been his
words, bringing back the horror of her mother's death. But when he reached for the
satchel, Adrianne ignored the knife and brought her foot up hard between his legs. The
knife clattered to the ground only seconds before he did.
"Bastard," she muttered as she sent the knife careening into the dark. "Now your pride's
as small as your brain and just as useless."
"Well put," Philip said as he came up behind her. — Nora Roberts

The instinct to survive will never change, neither will the human body's amazing ability to endure. — Lofty Wiseman

I felt so much more than horror. I was so afraid, shocked by what I saw. There were hundreds of men, women and children hanging from the trees ... there was blood everywhere! We all saw that every person had been gutted, like a fish. My instinct was to run, but where to ... I was on a train. As I watched those around me on the train, so many others also looked like they had explosions in their eyes and they too wanted to flee. — Alfred Nestor

You go into this survival instinct mode, when you feel like your life is in jeopardy. I found myself in the bathroom with my taser, which I have 10 of, my panic button and my cell phone. It was the most terrifying experience I've ever had in my life — Emma Roberts

Morals - all correct moral laws - derive from the instinct to survive. Moral behavior is survival behavior above the individual level. — Robert A. Heinlein

False reasons trapped in your old bean. Failure isn't your nemesis, denial of truth is. — Ymatruz

We need to develop new strategies overcome every challenge. — Lailah Gifty Akita

You have to be mentally prepared to handle any challenge. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Hope is a happy spirit. — Lailah Gifty Akita

God hates us," I said.
"Don't blame God for what ants have to do. We all get hungry. Congolese people are not so different from Congolese ants."
"They have to swarm over a village and eat other people alive?"
"When they are pushed down long enough they will rise up. If they bite you, they are trying to fix things in the only way they know. — Barbara Kingsolver

Some enemies are part and parcel of our lives, we cannot destroy them without risking our own survival — Bangambiki Habyarimana

In the greater part of humankind there resides an instinct for survival. It is this which can clutch at straws and effect a rescue from them. It is this which can, now and then, outwit fate. — Tanith Lee

Hope is the anchor of life. — Lailah Gifty Akita

You can endure all things by grace. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Everyone judges constantly: positively judging one person is the same as negatively judging everyone else; it is to say that that person is superior in some sense. — Criss Jami

The instinct to survive is human nature itself, and every aspect of our personalities derives from it. Anything that conflicts with the survival instinct acts sooner or later to eliminate the individual and thereby fails to show up in future generations ... A scientifically verifiable theory of morals must be rooted in the individual's instinct to survive
and nowhere else!
and must correctly describe the hierarchy of survival, note the motivations at each level, and resolve all conflicts.
We have such a theory now; we can solve any moral problem, on any level. Self-interest, love of family, duty to country, responsibility toward the human race ...
The basis of all morality is duty, a concept with the same relation to group that self-interest has to individual. — Robert A. Heinlein

My favorite part about Mare Barrow is her almost selfish survival instinct, as well as her increasingly gray morality. Her character arc in 'Glass Sword' is a lot deeper and more emotional than before, so I'm glad I got to write this sequel and that people want to read it. — Victoria Aveyard