Susan Sontag Quotes

I don't really have a lot of appropriate feelings for people on an individual basis, but I've always wanted to make people happy.

The human capacity for compassion is not a reflex that is triggered automatically by the presence of another living thing.

Compassion doesn't, of course, mean feeling sorry for people, or pity, which is how the word has become emasculated in a way.

A tear dries quickly when it is shed for troubles of others.

People see a hungry face, and they want to feed it; that's a natural response.

It is selfish to concern oneself with tragedies.

I'm a bleeding heart. I see lots of things to bleed about.

No man limps because another is hurt.

Compassion and empathy are anathema to sports.

I feel like there is a real lack of empathy - not just in American society, it's definitely happening in Britain as well - and it's heartbreaking that people can see something and not feel it.

Pity is easy, but it is difficult to care.

It's hard to pull apart empathy from compassion. What is really clear is that we innately care for other people at least to some extent.

Everybody has a heart. Except some people.

For a tear is quickly dried, especially when shed for the misfortunes of others.

Altruism is innate, but it's not instinctual. Everybody's wired for it, but a switch has to be flipped.

But most people don't come up to me and express a lot of emotion.

The American people have not become heartless.

Compassion automatically invites you to relate with people because you no longer regard people as a drain on your energy.

Don't tell your problems to people: eighty percent don't care; and the other twenty percent are glad you have them.

Compassion may be defined as the capacity to be attentive to the experience of others, to wish the best for others, and to sense what will truly serve others.

Developing our capacity for compassion makes it possible for us to help others in a more skillful and effective way. And compassion helps us as well.

Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive.

Compassion is a call, a demand of nature, to relieve the unhappy as hunger is a natural call for food.

To love with the spirit is to pity, and he who pities most loves most.

The more sympathy you give, the less you need.