Carson McCullers Quotes

I often long to . . . give up my life to love of my neighbour. This is really a temptation.

Sacrifice is a part of life. It's supposed to be. It's not something to regret. It's something to aspire to.

The one thing about being a parent is the ability to be selfless: To give up the things you want and need for the benefit of someone else.

I fight for other people better than I fight for myself.

Hell is yourself and the only redemption is when a person puts himself aside to feel deeply for another person.

I think everything I've tried to do, whether or not it's come off that way immediately, is for the greater good. I'll take the jabs I need to in order to help us all in the long run.

It's always easier to sacrifice when you're not the one who has to do it.

I've always put everybody else's child first before my own health, before my own outfit, before my own time frame.

There are things that are more important than my personal happiness.

A life of sacrifice is the pinnacle of art, and is full of true joy.

There is no hell like that of a selfish heart, and there is no misfortune so great as that of not being able to make a sacrifice. These two thoughts come to me strongly this morning. It is something to have learned these truths so that we can never again doubt them.

Sometimes the most difficult decision is to not martyr yourself for someone, but instead to choose to live for them. Because of them.

Sometimes you have to put your own dreams on hold temporarily so you can help release a dream in somebody else. What you make happen for others, God will make happen for you.

I tried self-sacrifice a couple of times in my youth.

When I was in grade school and we had to write papers about what we wanted to be when we grew up, I wanted to be a social worker or a missionary or a teacher... Then I got involved with tennis, and everything was just me, me, me. I was totally selfish and thought about myself and nobody else, because if you let up for one minute, someone was going to come along and beat you. I really wouldn't let anyone or any slice of happiness enter... I didn't like the characteristics that it took to become a champion.

Shall I, to please another wine-sprung minde, Lose all mine own? God hath giv'n me a measure Short of His can and body; must I find A pain in that, wherein he finds a pleasure?

Every man is a hero if he strives more for others than for himself alone.

God, I want what you want more than I want what I want.

Our needs are our greatest asset. It turns out I've learned to give all the things that I need.

I'd been willing to kill for the people I loved for a very long time; now I had to start living for them.

The only care That I shall share Shall be the care of others, And on the road I'll halve the load Of overburdened brothers. I rather guess It's selfishness That drives me to such actions, For in this plan I find I can Forget my own distractions.

It was selfish what I asked her to do, even if it wound up being the most unselfish thing I've ever done.

The amazing thing about becoming a parent is that you will never again be your own first priority. The gift of motherhood is the selflessness that it introduces you to, and I think that's really freeing... I think it allows you to put yourself in other people's shoes...the empathy that it slugs you with, being a mother. And I think it makes you a better storyteller.

The decision to give ourselves to others is a daily taking up of the cross.

You can't just sit there and put everyone's lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love. You just can't. You have to do things.