Instinct Quotes

In solitude, you listen to sacred voice.

Do you know, Sandy dear, all my ambitions are for you and Rose. You have got insight, perhaps not quite spiritual, but you're a deep one, and Rose has got instinct.' 'Perhaps not quite spiritual' said Sandy.'Yes,' said Miss Brodie, 'you're right. Rose has got a future by virtue of her instinct.'...'I ought to know because my prime has brought me instinct and insight, both.

Muriel Spark

Beneath the instinct to fight there lurks a diviner instinct to love.

Inazo Nitobe

What we call patriotism, in other words, is a calculable force which, released by a predictable situation, will animate man in a manner no different from other territorial species.

Robert Ardrey

One thus gets an impression that civilization is something which was imposed on a resisting majority by a minority which understood how to obtain possession of the means to power and coercion. It is, of course, natural to assume that these difficulties are not inherent in the nature or civilization itself but are determined by the imperfections of the cultural forms which have so far been developed. And in fact it is not difficult to indicate those defects. While mankind has made continual advances in its control over nature and may expect to make still greater ones, it is not possible to establish with certainty that a similar advance has been made in the management of human affairs; and probably at all periods, just as now once again, many people have asked themselves whether what little civilization has thus acquired is indeed worth defending at all. One would think that a re-ordering of human relations should be possible, which would remove the sources of dissatisfaction with civilization by renouncing coercion and the suppression of the instincts, so that, undisturbed by internal discord, men might devote themselves to the acquisition of wealth and its enjoyment. That would be a golden age, but it is questionable if such a state of affairs can be realized. It seems rather that every civilization must be built upon coercion and renunciation of instinct; it does not even seem certain that if coercion were to cease the majority of human beings would be prepared to undertake to perform the work necessary for acquiring new wealth. One has, I think, to reckon with the fact that there are present in all men destructive, and therefore anti-social and anti-cultural, trends and that in a great number of people these are strong enough to determine their behavior in human society.

Sigmund Freud

It is impossible to overlook the extent to which civilization is built up upon a renunciation of instinct....

Sigmund Freud

You think because you are born of light that you're somehow better and kinder than those who aren't, but you're not. It merely makes you feel entitled in your wrongful actions against others. But, you're no better than my mother. If anything you're worse because you think your viciousness is justified...

Sherrilyn Kenyon

All my instincts are one way, and all the facts are the other, and I much fear that British juries have not yet attained that pitch of intelligence when they will give the preference to my theories over Lestrade's facts.

Arthur Conan Doyle

And human instinct is ancient and reliable, utterly mysterious and possibly capable of great genius. I believe that refined, fluent instincts are a person's most valuable asset. My own instincts have repeatedly guided me against the grain of logic and probability. When I have trusted and followed their direction, they have never been wrong. I don't know how or why. But I know that every significant experience-positive or negative-sharpens them and makes them more accurate.

Augusten Burroughs

It wasn't like she was lonely and in fact – she had understood it all in every way except with her brain. Now she knew that she knew.

Carson McCullers

Insanity is intuition.

Lailah Gifty Akita

You can have tons of talent, but it won't necessarily keep you fed. If you have sharp instincts, through, you'll never go hungry.

Haruki Murakami

Nimrod began to understand that what he was experiencing was, in spite of its appearance of novelty, something which had existed before–many times before. His body began to recognize situations, impressions, and objects. In reality, none of there astonished him very much. Faced with new circumstances, he would dip into the fount of his memory, the deep-seated memory of the body, would search blindky and feverishly, and often find ready made within himself a suitable reaction: the wisdom of generations, deposited in his plasma, in his nerves. He found actions and decisions of which he had not been aware but which had been lying in wait, ready to emerge.

Bruno Schulz

A dog can’t think that much about what he’s doing, he just does what feels right.

Barbara Kingsolver

It may be that the strongest instinct of the human race, stronger than sex or hunger, is curiosity: the absolute need to know. It can and often does motivate a lifetime, it kills more than cats, and the prospect of satisfying it can be the most exciting of emotions.

Jack Finney

Whatever you call me, my parents encouraged me to go to college and become a book lover, and to trust that I could do nearly anything if I could find the right book at the library.It was true; books had saved me in my home remodeling projects, but they fell short in teaching me how to trust my instincts, and how to stop thinking with my educated brain and more with my kneecaps and butt cheeks.

Dee-Williams

The boulder is the truth that the great men know by instinct, and the mountain is the stupidity of mankind.

Doris Lessing

WHAT ARE THE CONSEQUENCES when we go against our instincts? What are the consequences of not speaking out? What are the consequences of guilt, shame, and doubt?

Terry Tempest Williams

Instinct of love toward an object demands a mastery to obtain it, and if a person feels they can't control the object or feel threatened by it, they act negatively toward it.

Sigmund Freud

Whats the difference between a king and his horse?I dont mean some kiddy shit like one has 4 legs and the other has 2, or ones a person and ones an animal. If their form, ability, and power is exactly the same, then why is it one becomes the king and controls the battle and the other one becomes the horse and carries the king? There's only one answer...INSTINCT!!!

Tite Kubo

When Mother had told me that animals found quiet, unexposed places to die, I had always imagined they knew they were dying, and accepted it, almost gracefully. Now I saw that this wasn't so at all: they crept into corners in the hope of surviving, they only knew they were weakened and exposed, easy prey, and their instinct was to find a hidden place and try to outlive whatever it was they were suffering. It had been a mistake to imagine they wanted to be alone, to die in peace. Animals have no knowledge of death; for them, death is the unexpected end of life, something they resist by instinct, for no good reason. In that sense, their existence has an almost mechanical quality.

John Burnside

When instinct speaks, listen to it. It might be the next push you need to reach greater heights.

Innocent Mwatsikesimbe

This was the first time I had not just rushed in and followed my instincts, and it wasn't working out. I was beginning to actively regret it.

Gwenda Bond

The first reaction is surely the most natural one, but not always the most correct one; thereupon, the invention of apologies.

Criss Jami

As you consider your next move, practice this definition of trust: the willingness to take steps while simultaneously waiting for “instructions.

Gina Greenlee

Religion teaches us to fight against our natural instincts but it thrives on them

Bangambiki Habyarimana

There are no laws set in stones, follow your basic instincts, they contain the laws that guide you existence.

Bangambiki Habyarimana

When teaching children with autism we must be quick to adapt, follow our instinct and go off plan.

Adele Devine

Survival requires guts and instinct.

Toba Beta

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

Mokokoma Mokhonoana

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

Manel Loureiro

I don't think there are any true heroes. Just people who ignore their survival instincts long enough to do something incredibly foolhardy.

Lauren James

In solitude, you listen to the sacred voice.

Lailah Gifty Akita

Art works to satisfy the instinct and the science works to satisfy the reason.

Thiruman Archunan

What saves us from succumbing to utter meaninglessness is not reason but instinct.

Marty Rubin

I believe instinct's the iron skeleton under all our ideas of free will. Unless you're willing to take the pipe or eat the gun or take a long walk off a short dock, you can't say no to some things. You can't refuse to pick up your option because there is no option.

Stephen King

Instinct's aware of reflex when mind ain't yet.

Toba Beta

My temperament and my instinct had told me alike that the author, who writes at his own emergency, remains and needs to remain at his private remove. I wished to be, not effaced, but invisible - actually a profound position. Perspective, the line of vision, the frame of vision - these set a distance.

Eudora Welty

Every time I've done something that doesn't feel right, it's ended up not being right.

Mario Cuomo

That lack of value sense would deprive a person from a protective instinct.

Sunday Adelaja

The Church being what she is cannot have the instincts of a gentleman.

George Everett Macdonald

All interpretation or observation of reality is necessarily fiction. In this case, the problem is that man is a moral animal abandoned in an amoral universe and condemned to a finite existence with no other purpose than to perpetuate the natural cycle of the species. It is impossible to survive in a prolonged state of reality, at least for a human being. We spend a good part of our lives dreaming, especially when we're awake. As I said, pure biology.

Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Exactly what the powers of hell feed on: the best instincts in man.

Philip K Dick

He tried to decide if he was really ashamed of being afraid, and decided that he was not. Fear was there for a purpose. It was wired into any creature that had not completely turned its back on its evolutionary inheritance and so remade itself in whatever image it coveted. The more sophisticated you became, the less you relied on fear and pain to keep you alive; you could afford to ignore them because you had other means of coping with the consequences if things went badly.

Iain M. Banks

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

Lailah Gifty Akita

Your instinct is your divine being.

Lailah Gifty Akita

Goats' refusal of young blackbrush shoots, furthermore, is outright. They want nothing to do with it. Provenza pointed at his hand, then his arm and body, and said, "Every organ and every cell has receptors similar to what's in your nose and on your tongue." Creatures communicate within their environment the same way they communicate within their own bodies -- through chemical trigger substances that bind to receptors and produce responses. "It's all part of a feedback system," Provenza said, "that tells the body what's good and what isn't."Goats are not stupid after all. They don't bumble through the world eating what they were born to like. They experience need states, satisfaction, and delight along with aversions to strong a mere hint of something can make them turn away in disgust. Flavor is what nutrition feels like to a goat. If goats had a word for delicious, it would have two meanings. The first would be: I like this. The second would be: This is what my body needs. For goats, they are the same thing.

Mark Schatzker

Think of instinct as an unscientific, unquantifiable tool that can be used along with more concrete evaluations to make a well-rounded decision.

Charisse Montgomery

Listen to your instinct. It is your greatest treasure. Your beauty in the outside reflects your inner beauty.

Lailah Gifty Akita

Telling us to obey instinct is like telling us to obey 'people.' People say different things: so do instincts. Our instincts are at war. If it is held that the instinct for preserving the species should always be obeyed at the expense of other instincts, whence do we derive this rule of precedence? To listen to that instinct speaking in its own case and deciding in its own favour would be rather simple minded. Each instinct, if you listen to it, will claim to be gratified at the expense of all the rest. By the very act of listening to one rather than to others we have already prejudged the case. If we did not bring to the examination of our instincts a knowledge of their comparative dignity we could never learn it from them. And that knowledge cannot itself be instinctive: the judge cannot be one of the parties judged: or, if he is, the decision is worthless and there is no ground for placing preservation of the species above self-preservation or sexual appetite.

C.S. Lewis

Tabini was at least canny enough in the differences between atevi and human to know that, gut level, he might think he understood - but chances were very good that he wouldn't, couldn't, and never would, unaided by the paidhi, come up with the right forecast of human behavior because he didn't come with the right hardwiring. Average people didn't analyze what they thought: they thought they thought, and half of it was gut reaction.

C.J. Cherryh

Some people look for the obvious and make decisions based on that. However, sensitive people look for the subtle things in life. They observe what is missed, overlooked and rarely observed by others. They dwell at a deeper level of perception that clings to signs, body language and what is left unspoken. They are observers that will trust their instinct first over any fact or well delivered speech.

Shannon L. Alder

The conscience is a right mix of instinct, reason and culture. The conscience itself is not a truth but it has an ability to access the truth. But the very conscience is assembled only by the reason.

Thiruman Archunan

Data can bear on policy issues, but many of our opinions about policy are grounded in premises about the nature of human life and human society that are beyond the reach of data.

Charles Murray

Humans are so innately hardwired for language that they can no more suppress their ability to learn and use language than they can suppress the instinct to pull a hand back from a hot surface.

Steven Pinker

Ideas pull the trigger, but instinct loads the gun.

Don Marquis

Despite the horror, we survivors were endowed with a will to survive. Or instinct. Or maybe it was faith.

Manel Loureiro

The creative process is a cocktail of instinct, skill, culture and a highly creative feverishness. It is not like a drug; it is a particular state when everything happens very quickly, a mixture of consciousness and unconsciousness, of fear and pleasure, it's a little like making love, the physical act of love.

Francis Bacon

When your safety is in question follow your intuition. It will help you balance along the precipice between vulnerability and adventure.

Gina Greenlee

There seemed no answer. He wasn't resigned to anything, he hadn't accepted or adjusted to the life he'd been forced into. Yet here he was, eight months after the plague's last victim, nine since he's spoken to another human being, ten since Virginia had died. Here he was with no future and a virtually hopeless present. Still plodding on.Instinct? Or was he just stupid? Too unimaginative to destroy himself? Why hadn't he done it in the beginning when he was in the very depths? What had impelled him to enclose the house, install a freezer, a generator, an electric stove, a water tank, build a hothouse, a workbench, burn down the houses on each side of his, collect records and books and mountains of canned supplies, even - it was fantastic when you thought about it - even put a fancy mural on the wall?Was the life force something more than words, a tangible, mind-controlling potency? Was nature somehow, in him, maintaining its spark against its own encroachments?He closed his eyes. Why think, why reason? There was no answer. His continuance was an accident and an attendant bovinity. He was just too dumb to end it all, and that was about the size of it.

Richard Matheson

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Instinct Quotes

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