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Anyone who takes himself too seriously always runs the risk of looking ridiculous; anyone who can consistently laugh at himself does not.


Vaclav Havel

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The man who does not value himself, cannot value anything or anyone.
AYN RAND A man who doesn't trust himself can never really trust anyone else.
CARDINAL RETZ A man who doesn't trust himself can never truly trust anyone else.
CARDINAL DE RETZ A man who doesn't trust himself can never really trust anyone else.
CARDINAL DE RETZ God does not suffer presumption in anyone but himself.
HERODOTUS It is an article of faith in my creed to pick the man who does not take himself seriously, but does ...
MICHAEL C. CAHILL Anyone who attempts to relate his life loses himself in the immediate. One can only speak of another...
AUGUSTO ROA BASTOS Anyone who attempts to relate his life loses himself in the immediate. One can only speak of another...
AUGUSTO BASTOS One of the funny things in life to me is a guy who takes himself very seriously.
DENNIS FARINA A man does not need to do anything to impress anyone. Anyone will be impressed by him being himself
JERIC CABRALES HERNANDEZ I don't take the movies seriously, and anyone who does is in for a headache.
BETTE DAVIS A man who does not think for himself does not think at all.
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW A man who does not think for himself does not think at all.
OSCAR WILDE I don't take the movies seriously, and anyone who does is in for a headache.
BETTE DAVIS Four years ago in speaking of a Jewish nation one ran the risk of being regarded ridiculous. Today h...
THEODOR HERZL He who does not think too much of himself is much more esteemed than he imagines
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE Andy takes the game seriously; he doesn't take himself seriously.
LARRY HAYLOR A leader who confines his role to his people's experience dooms himself to stagnation; a leader ...
HENRY KISSINGER A man who can laugh at himself is truly blessed, for he will never lack for amusement.
JAMES CARLOS BLAKE Fortune always favors the brave, and never helps a man who does not help himself.
P. T. BARNUM Could anyone look into the faces of (the founding fathers) and tell them it really doesn't matter th...
BOB BARR Anyone who has no need of anybody but himself is either a beast or a God."
Aristotle
BRUCE WAYNE SULLIVAN He who stands aloof runs the risk of believing himself better than others and misusing his critique ...
THEODOR ADORNO I don't trust anyone who doesn't laugh.
MAYA ANGELOU He who blackens others does not whiten himself
GERMAN PROVERB He's a good sport. He's a serious guy, but I don't think he takes himself too seriously.
JEFF DUCLOS The person who knows how to laugh at himself will never cease to be amused.
SHIRLEY MACLAINE He makes himself ridiculous who is for ever repeating the same mistake.
UNKNOWN No one can harm the man who does himself no wrong.
SAINT JOHN CHRYSOSTOM He’s [Nixon] like a Spanish horse, who runs faster than anyone for the first nine lengths and then...
LYNDON B. JOHNSON The Holy Father has acted as the Vicar of Christ and acted like Christ himself, who never refused to...
FRANCESCO COSSIGA One runs the risk of weeping a little, if one lets himself be tamed.
ANTOINE DE SAINT-EXUPéRY A person who knows how to laugh at himself will never ceased to be amused.
SHIRLEY MACLAINE Anyone who finds himself incapable of grasping the complexities of a work hides his withdrawal behin...
JULIO CORTáZAR The man with the real sense of humor is the man who can put himself in the spectator's place and lau...
BERT WILLIAMS It's easy to make me laugh, you can make me laugh, anyone can make me laugh, but that certainly does...
C. JOYBELL C. No one is free who does not lord over himself.
CLAUDIUS No man is happy who does not think himself so.
PUBLILIUS SYRUS Anyone who wears black knee socks with Bermuda shorts are not to be taken seriously.
RICHARD JAMES A righteous man does not conceive of himself as righteous; he is "only doing what anyone else would ...
MARTIN BERMAN-GORVINE The great man is the man who can get himself made and who will get himself made out of anything he ...
GERALD STANLEY LEE Authority poisons everybody who takes authority on himself.
LENIN (VLADIMIR ULYANOV) Authority poisons everybody who takes authority on himself.
GOLDA MEIR Laugh at yourself first before anyone else can.
ELSA MAXWELL Laugh at yourself first, before anyone else can.
ELSA MAXWELL Laugh at yourself first, before anyone else can
ELSA MAXWELL Anyone who does not believe in miracles is not a realist.
DAVID BEN GURION Who does not in some sort live to others, does not live much to himself.
MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE The man with the real sense of humor is the man who can put himself in the spectator's place and...
BERT WILLIAMS Every journalist who is not too stupid or too full of himself to notice what is going on knows that ...
CLIVE OWEN Anyone who looks good with a bald head is seriously sexy.
RICHELLE E. GOODRICH He who buys what he does not need steals from himself.
UNKNOWN When one is at peace with himself, with the surroundings, with all beings in the universe, he is no ...
JONATHAN CHEN I live in my own place - have never copied nobody even half, and at any master who lacks the grace -...
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE No one can please a man who is not at peace with himself.
BAMIGBOYE OLUROTIMI He who does not reflect his life back to God in gratitude does not know himself.
ALBERT SCHWEITZER Anyone who has passed through the regular gradations of a classical education, and is not made a foo...
WILLIAM HAZLITT The person who runs away exposes himself to that very danger more than a person who sits quietly.
JAWAHARLAL NEHRU Blessed is he who has learned to laugh at himself for he shall never cease to be entertained.
JOHN BOSWELL Blessed is he who has learned to laugh at himself, for he shall never cease to be entertained
JOHN POWELL A man who does not trust himself will never really trust anybody.
CARDINAL RETZ A man who does not trust himself will never really trust anybody.
CARDINAL DE RETZ Anyone who is pointing to any one person, saying 'It's your fault,' that's ridiculous.
BERT CREWS He who does evil to others, does it to himself.
TURKISH PROVERB He who does not think much of himself is much more esteemed than he imagines.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE He who does not think much of himself is much more esteemed than he imagines.
JOHANN VON GOETHE There is no use whatever trying to help people who do not help themselves. You cannot push anyone up...
ANDREW CARNEGIE Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk.
LUCIUS ANNAEUS SENECA Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk.
JOAQUIN SETANTI Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk.
JOAQUIN SETANTI Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk.
SENECA We should not give away a moment to anyone who does not deserve it.
DEB CALETTI The actual confident man, the man truly sure of himself, is not he who esteems himself higher than o...
CRISS JAMI To anyone who thinks systematic racism does not exist you're perhaps the most dangerous.
THEE AMAZING GRACE When a person can no longer laugh at himself, it is time for others to laugh at him.
GLORIA VANDERBILT When a person can no longer laugh at himself, it is time for others to laugh at him.
THOMAS SZASZ When a person can no longer laugh at himself, it is time for others to laugh at him..
THOMAS SZASZ Anyone who reads a book with a sense of obligation does not understand the art of reading.
LIN YUTANG You will always move toward anyone who increases you and away from anyone who makes you less.
MIKE MURDOCK I admire James Franco. I admire somebody like Jack Nicholson. Anyone who just does movies for the sa...
JACK KILMER When he who hears does not know what he who speaks means, and when he who speaks does not know what ...
VOLTAIRE (FRANçOIS-MARIE AROUET) When he who hears does not know what he who speaks means, and when he who speaks does not know what ...
VOLTAIRE Anyone who takes the sure road is as good as dead. It
C.G. JUNG I'd always admired the intellectuals who had made the transition into politics - Mario Vargas Ll...
MICHAEL IGNATIEFF He who can not support himself, can not take his own decision.
GAMAL ABDEL NASSER He who can not support himself, can not take his own decision
GAMAL ABDEL NASSER Vision is not enough, it must be combined with venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps, we m...
VACLAV HAVEL One who does not take challenge in his stride misses opportunity to rebuild himself.
DR ANIL KUMAR SINHA I don't pity any man who does hard work worth doing. I admire him. I pity the creature who does not ...
THEODORE ROOSEVELT I am serious, so I laugh a lot. You need to laugh. You don't laugh enough. I don't trust anyone who ...
MAYA ANGELOU The ultimate test of the laughing instinct is that a man should always be ready to laugh at himself
GAMALIEL BRADFORD No one is free who has not obtained the empire of himself. No man is free who cannot command himself...
PYTHAGORAS He cannot be strict in judging, who does not wish others to be strict judges of himself.
MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO When he to whom one speaks does not understand, and he who speaks himself does not understand, that ...
VOLTAIRE Walk away from anything or anyone who takes you away from your joy. Life is too short to put up with...
GUNDO MULAUDZI Satiety comes of too frequent repetition; and he who will not give himself leisure to be thirsty can...
MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE Anyone who takes the craft of songwriting seriously I radiate towards. Spending time with Daryl Hall...
TRAVIE MCCOY Not even a suicide does away with himself out of desperation, he considers the act so long and so de...
SOREN KIERKEGAARD Can the child who is Dell; be the outer emoodiment of man's quest to save himself? To cure himself?....
MILKWEED L. AUGUSTINE People who shut their eyes to reality simply invite their own destruction, and anyone who insists on...
JAMES BALDWIN

More Vaclav Havel

The deeper the experience of an absence of meaning - in other words, of absurdity - the more energet...
VACLAV HAVEL There's always something suspect about an intellectual on the winning side.
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VACLAV HAVEL Hope is a feeling that life and work have meaning. You either have it or you don't, regardless o...
VACLAV HAVEL Lying can never save us from another lie.
VACLAV HAVEL The tragedy of modern man is not that he knows less and less about the meaning of his own life, but ...
VACLAV HAVEL Sometimes I wonder if suicides aren't in fact sad guardians of the meaning of life.
VACLAV HAVEL Isn't it the moment of most profound doubt that gives birth to new certainties? Perhaps hopeless...
VACLAV HAVEL There are times when we must sink to the bottom of our misery to understand truth, just as we must d...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well but the certainty that something makes ...
VACLAV HAVEL Work for something because it is good, not just because it stands a chance to succeed.
VACLAV HAVEL When a truth is not given complete freedom, freedom is not complete.
VACLAV HAVEL A human action becomes genuinely important when it springs from the soil of a clear-sighted awarenes...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well but the certainty that something makes ...
VACLAV HAVEL The role of the writer is not simply to arrange Being according to his own lights; he must also serv...
VACLAV HAVEL The exercise of power is determined by thousands of interactions between the world of the powerful a...
VACLAV HAVEL There's always something suspect about an intellectual on the winning side.
VACLAV HAVEL The law is only one of several imperfect and more or less external ways of defending what is better ...
VACLAV HAVEL This is a confusing and uncertain period, when a thousand wise words can go completely unnoticed, an...
VACLAV HAVEL The attempt to devote oneself to literature alone is a most deceptive thing, and often, paradoxicall...
VACLAV HAVEL I really do inhabit a system in which words are capable of shaking the entire structure of governmen...
VACLAV HAVEL There is only one art, whose sole criterion is the power, the authenticity, the revelatory insight, ...
VACLAV HAVEL The deeper the experience of an absence of meaning -- in other words, of absurdity --the more energe...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same a...
VACLAV HAVEL The salvation of this human world lies nowhere else than in the human heart, in the human power to r...
VACLAV HAVEL Sometimes I wonder if suicides aren't in fact sad guardians of the meaning of life.
VACLAV HAVEL Twenty or thirty years ago, in the army, we had a lot of obscure adventures, and years later we tell...
VACLAV HAVEL If every day a man takes orders in silence from an incompetent superior, if every day he solemnly pe...
VACLAV HAVEL A state that denies its citizens their basic rights becomes a danger to its neighbors as well: inter...
VACLAV HAVEL If you want to see your plays performed the way you wrote them, become President.
VACLAV HAVEL None of us know all the potentialities that slumber in the spirit of the population, or all the ways...
VACLAV HAVEL True enough, the country is calm. Calm as a morgue or a grave, would you not say?
VACLAV HAVEL My dear fellow citizens: For forty years you have heard from my predecessors on this day different v...
VACLAV HAVEL You do not become a dissident just because you decide one day to take up this most unusual career. Y...
VACLAV HAVEL Even a purely moral act that has no hope of any immediate and visible political effect can gradually...
VACLAV HAVEL Without free, self-respecting, and autonomous citizens there can be no free and independent nations....
VACLAV HAVEL The tragedy of modern man is not that he knows less and less about the meaning of his own life but t...
VACLAV HAVEL Human beings are compelled to live within a lie, but they can be compelled to do so only because the...
VACLAV HAVEL Modern man must descend the spiral of his own absurdity to the lowest point; only then can he look b...
VACLAV HAVEL It cannot suffice to invent new machines, new regulations, new institutions. It is necessary to chan...
VACLAV HAVEL As soon as man began considering himself the source of the highest meaning in the world and the meas...
VACLAV HAVEL Isn't it the moment of most profound doubt that gives birth to new certainties? Perhaps hopelessness...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as...
VACLAV HAVEL Drama assumes an order. If only so that it might have - by disrupting that order - a way of surprisi...
VACLAV HAVEL The salvation of this human world lies nowhere else than in the human heart, in the human power to r...
VACLAV HAVEL But if I were to say who influenced me most, then I'd say Franz Kafka. And his works were always...
VACLAV HAVEL Vision is not enough, it must be combined with venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps, we m...
VACLAV HAVEL Drama assumes an order. If only so that it might have -- by disrupting that order -- a way of surpri...
VACLAV HAVEL I think theatre should always be somewhat suspect.
VACLAV HAVEL The dissident does not operate in the realm of genuine power at all. He is not seeking power. He has...
VACLAV HAVEL The only salvation of the world today... is the rapid dissemination of the basic values of the West,...
VACLAV HAVEL People who live in the post-totalitarian system know only too well that the question of whether one ...
VACLAV HAVEL Because the regime is captive to its own lies, it must falsify everything. It falsifies the past. It...
VACLAV HAVEL Just as the constant increase of entropy is the basic law of the universe, so it is the basic law of...
VACLAV HAVEL The truth is not simply what you think it is; it is also the circumstances in which it is said, and ...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as...
VACLAV HAVEL There can be no doubt that distrust of words is less harmful than unwarranted trust in them. Besides...
VACLAV HAVEL The role of the writer is not simply to arrange Being according to his own lights; he must also serv...
VACLAV HAVEL Poles are able to reflect their history, they respect it. Who knows if anybody will remember when we...
VACLAV HAVEL against its sense, its spirit.
VACLAV HAVEL I still very well remember the moment in 1978 when me and my friends learned that Karol Wojtyla was ...
VACLAV HAVEL They deserve our admiration, not because they suffered in prison for 25 days, but because they assum...
VACLAV HAVEL That is very dangerous, ... in an absolutely legal way and in accordance with the wording of the law...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is a feeling that life and work have meaning. You either have it or you don't, regardless of th...
VACLAV HAVEL For 15 years the Government of Burma has refused to implement recommendations made by the UN and the...
VACLAV HAVEL He tries to explain why man behaves most improbably, strangely, at variance with his nature, how it ...
VACLAV HAVEL When the internal crisis of the totalitarian system grows so deep that it becomes clear to everyone,...
VACLAV HAVEL There can be no doubt that distrust of words is less harmful than unwarranted trust in them. Besides...
VACLAV HAVEL Without a global revolution in the sphere of human consciousness a more humane society will not emer...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is an orientation of spirit, an orientation of the heart. It is not the conviction that somethi...
VACLAV HAVEL Hope is an orientation of the spirit, an orientation of the heart. It is not the conviction that som...
VACLAV HAVEL Genuine politics -- even politics worthy of the name -- the only politics I am willing to devote mys...
VACLAV HAVEL Just as many showed their solidarity with us when we were striving for freedom, so now we must show ...
VACLAV HAVEL All respected domestic and international organizations agree that your demands are justified. Theref...
VACLAV HAVEL For by this very fact, individuals confirm the system, fulfill the system, make the system, are the ...
VáCLAV HAVEL What else but a profound feeling of being excluded can enable a person better to see the absurdity o...
VáCLAV HAVEL The salvation of this human world lies nowhere else than in the human heart, in the human power to r...
VáCLAV HAVEL Even a purely moral act that has no hope of any immediate and visible political effect can gradually...
VáCLAV HAVEL It is obvious that the monetary union among 17 very different European countries does not work. As a...
VACLAV KLAUS I live in Europe and care about democracy and sovereignty of nation states there.
VACLAV KLAUS To talk about planning an economic system is to talk in old terms, and I find myself sometimes havin...
VACLAV KLAUS We will also allow state companies to sell shares to their workers and will pass a law allowing citi...
VACLAV KLAUS I was paid to read Western economic texts. In a way, the regime paid for their own undermining.
VACLAV KLAUS I never intended to be a politician or office-seeker.
VACLAV KLAUS I do not consider the Lisbon Treaty to be a good thing for Europe, for the freedom of Europe, or for...
VACLAV KLAUS We served on the editorial board of a literary monthly called Face in 1968 and 1969. He was a young ...
VACLAV KLAUS The events in the square, of course, made a deep impression on me and many other parents.
VACLAV KLAUS By the time I returned to Czechoslovakia, I had an understanding of the principles of the market.
VACLAV KLAUS Privatization of the state-owned economy is not yet on the agenda. We cannot do it immediately; my c...
VACLAV KLAUS It is what makes the reform process an art, not just a science. You have to develop a strategy that ...
VACLAV KLAUS I'm absolutely convinced that the very small global warming we are experiencing is the result of...
VACLAV KLAUS That means following a very restrictive fiscal and monetary policy which will squeeze the monopolies...
VACLAV KLAUS What we want is to establish the rules of a market economy - not to plan its outcome.
VACLAV KLAUS Then in 1969, I spent the spring term at Cornell University in New York. The invasion of August 1968...
VACLAV KLAUS I also helped write the five-page statement of principles that Civic Forum issued in late November. ...
VACLAV KLAUS Those of us who lived under communism for most of our lives were looking toward the Western world be...
VACLAV KLAUS People like me who were engaging in brinkmanship with the party economic bosses and the open disside...
VACLAV KLAUS The attempts to command the climate and decide about the temperature on our planet are wrong and arr...
VACLAV KLAUS To pursue a so-called Third Way is foolish. We had our experience with this in the 1960s when we loo...
VACLAV KLAUS The farther we go, the more the ultimate explanation recedes from us, and all we have left is faith.
VACLAV HLAVATY Nevertheless, there is another threat on the horizon. I see this threat in environmentalism which is...
VACLAV KLAUS We must have the time to create strict rules so that property is not sold by Communist managers for ...
VACLAV KLAUS I explained to the prime minister [Asgrimsson] that for the Czech Republic it was no choice, but nec...
VACLAV KLAUS For the Czech Republic, EU entry was necessary for historical and geographical reasons. But I would ...
VACLAV KLAUS a political farce which the leftists are playing against the right.
VACLAV KLAUS In my opinion, this gives Icelanders all the benefits ensuing from it, but they have no costs connec...
VACLAV KLAUS We would definitely vote for it [Iceland's EU entry],
VACLAV KLAUS Nonsense. I would like to say, quite formally and clearly, that my government would never allow some...
VACLAV KLAUS It's probably the craziest place to grow rice. Look at the evaporation in the summer -- it's 40 degr...
VACLAV SMIL