Self Deprecating Quotes

I wish I could be as thin as Jessica Simpson. I think she looks gorgeous! I have had Jessica on my show several times, and I can tell you that girl is genuine and funny with a great self-deprecating sense of humor. ~ Rachael Ray

It is only people who are lacking, or bad, or inferior, who have to be good at things. You have always been full and perfect, so you had nothing to make up for. ~ T.H. White

Here's the thing about Jews in Hollywood. Not to stereotype, but the Jews I know here are the funniest, most self-deprecating people I know. And it's rare to find a Jew that is actually offended by comedy about them. ~ Ben Feldman

I'm self-deprecating - I spend a lot of time telling myself that things are OK, as opposed to having to tell myself to get over things. ~ Courtney Barnett

The French always make our sort happy because, like us, they know how to love, they're just as good at playing the accordion, and they've made a real art of their inability to bake proper bread. ~ Sasa Stanisic

Lizzie is hapless about romance in an ironic, self-deprecating way. ~ Kristen Roupenian

Ah, my dear friend Hassim, seems our paths cross once again, how fortunate for this humble Sheik." As Abdullah spoke in his usual self deprecating manner I realized that a favor was on the tip of his tongue and that I was about to be offered a quid-pro-quo.

We were sitting crossed legged on large fat pillows with gold fringe. The tent was large with partitions dividing living, sleeping and cooking space. It was made from heavy cotton canvas erected on thick poles in the center giving the structure a peaked circus tent appearance. The women serving us were young, wearing harem pants low on their hips with cropped gauze tops made from sheer silk. Their exposed midriffs were flat and toned, their belly buttons were decorated in precious stones that glittered in the torch light as they moved. They were bare footed with stacks of gold ankle bracelets making the only sound we heard as they kept our glasses filled with fresh sweet tea and our communal serving trays piled high with dates and sugar incrusted sweets of undetermined origin.

Abdullah took no notice of these women, his nonchalance intrigued me as I was obviously having trouble keeping my mind focused on the discussion at hand, this was all part of the Arab way, when it came to negotiation they had no peers.

"So my dear friend, tell me, the region is on fire is there a solution?"

I spoke in a deliberate and flat tone, little emotion just concern, one friend to another.

Nick Hahn

Usually, but not always, a story is told mostly for the benefit of the teller. The story (...) demonstrates how the teller has lived a life full of adventure, of meaning; that they're comical, self-deprecating, and brave; that they're ultimately a person worth knowing.
It's as though folks need to remind themselves of their own worth, and they do this by telling and retelling their favourite eleven or twelve stories, the anecdotes that fundamentally define who they are. ~ Penny Reid

Some of my friends and family have tried to challenge me to do jokes that aren't as self-deprecating, where I genuinely express my own opinion in my own voice. ~ Maria Bamford

Apparently our portmanteau is trending on Twitter." He let out a self-deprecating laugh. "I didn't even know what a portmanteau was before Jukebox Hero. It's a mashup of our names, like Brangelina or Robsten. No idea what ours is
what do our names make?" He considered this a for a moment before shaking his head.
"It's probably awful," he decided. "Could be worse, though; I hear the portmanteau for the main characters in The Hunger Games is ... well, their names are Peeta and Katniss. I'll let you guys figure that one out on your own. ~ Andrea D. Smith

Well, fortunately for me, Mouse's windows are tinted far beyond the legal limit. It's like sitting inside a giant pair of sunglasses. I'm wearing the mask as a hat instead."
"You're being courageous," she said. "I think you're noble." She felt her heart fill with the picture of his victory in the sun.
"I feel very noble talking on a pink phone." He gave a self-deprecating chuckle. ~ Debra Anastasia

...sorry is a tool one uses to pander until the word itself becomes currency. It no longer merely apologizes, but insists, reminds: I'm here, right here, beneath you. It is the lowering of oneself so that the client feels right, superior, and charitable... one's definition of sorry is deranged into a new word entirely, one that's charged and reused as both power and defacement at once. Being sorry pays, being sorry even, or especially, when one has no fault, is worth every self-deprecating syllable the mouth allows. Because the mouth must eat. ~ Ocean Vuong

What happened to your face?" Blue asked.
Adam shrugged ruefully. Either he or Ronan smelled like a parking garage. His voice was self-deprecating. "Do you think it makes me look tougher?"
What it did was make him look more fragile and dirty, somehow, like a teacup unearthed from the soil, but Blue didn't say that.
Ronan said, "It makes you look like a loser."
"Ronan," said Gansey.
"I need everyone to sit down!" shouted Maura. ~ Maggie Stiefvater

I have never been an ambitious person, and my participation in this industry is a fluke, but only male writers can afford to be coy and self-deprecating. ~ Diablo Cody

I like girls who are self-deprecating. I like girls who make fun of themselves. If you can't poke fun at yourself, what are you? I just want someone with a good soul. That's about it. The rest I'm really flexible on. ~ Chris Evans

Leonard Cohen can give you "Leonard Cohen" - the self-deprecating wit, the slow, considered speech, the perfectly-honed anecdote - Tom Waits is far more comfortable giving a journalist "Tom Waits" the character, whose conversation is really a series of strange tales, learned or ad-libbed. ~ Sylvie Simmons

I am a little klutzy and self-deprecating. I fit in with the rest of the losers. ~ Kirstie Alley

I love the sad songs with their maudlin, self-deprecating, almost funny lyrics. As an Englishman, they make a lot of sense. ~ Teddy Thompson

I have two moods when I get drunk. The common mood is the lazy, happy-go-lucky guy. The uncommon mood is the frustrated, self-deprecating guy. That night was the latter. ~ S.A. Tawks

Early on when I started talking about my weight, it was self-deprecating; everything was a joke. ~ Gabriel Iglesias

Brummies run themselves down, they're very self-deprecating. Whereas Yorkshire people certainly aren't. ~ Jonathan Meades

I do a lot of public speaking and presentations and I'll always start with a self-deprecating joke to make everybody feel comfortable with my size because there can be hang-ups and anxieties. ~ Warwick Davis

You have to maintain who you are as a person and stay true to yourself - that's my biggest moral as a human being, as well as a very self-deprecating sense of humor. ~ Josh Hutcherson

I realized that you didn't have to make self-deprecating remarks or turn yourself into the butt of some unspoken joke. I also discovered that being big didn't deter possible suitors. ~ Maeve Binchy

I loved to sing. Before the war, I worried that gift would leave me, the way it often does with boys. We grow, we change, our voices break. It doesn't matter how well you sing when you're nine years old, you know. Not when you're a boy. When the change comes you just have to hope for the best…that your voice settles into something you can love again. My voice broke two years after the invasion. Gods, how I squeaked. And when my voice finally settled, it seemed like a cruel joke. It was too good. I hardly knew what to do with it. I felt so grateful to have this gift…and so angry, for it to mean so little. And now…" He shrugged, a self-deprecating gesture. "Well, I know I'm rusty."
"No," Kestrel said. "You're not. Your voice is beautiful."
The silence after that was soft. ~ Marie Rutkoski

I am incredibly self-deprecating. It stems from self-doubt. ~ Charlie Cox

Eccentricities, of which I know I have
many, do not hold universal sexual and romantic lure. I understand that. ~ Jessica Park

It is not proper, you being closeted up here with him
"
"Delphinia, don't be absurd. I am so firmly on the shelf that the maids are tempted to dust me. ~ Meredith Duran

Without rich people who want it done now, who would animate the free world? In theory, you want everyone to live peacefully according to their needs, along the banks of a river. In fact, you worry that you'd die of boredom there. In fact, you get a buzz from someone like Carole Potter, who keeps prize chickens and could teach a graduate course in landscaping; who maintains a staff of four (more in the summers, during High Guest Season); a handsome, slightly ridiculous husband; a beautiful daughter at Harvard and an incorrigible son doing something or other on Bondi Beach; Carole who is charming and self-deprecating and capable, if pushed, of a hostile indifference crueler than any form of rage; who reads novels and goes to movies and theater and yes, yes, bless her, buys art, serious art, about which she actually fucking knows a thing or two. ~ Michael Cunningham

Another example of their hatefulness while my dander's up: in order to get themselves off the hook of sometimes liking uncool things, they refer to them as 'guilty pleasures', which is a ridiculous expression. What? So you like Abba, or Roger Moore as James Bond, but have been led to believe that this taste is somehow infra dig, so you style it a 'guilty pleasure', thus demonstrating you're sufficiently relaxed and self-deprecating to own up to it – when in fact the way you have chosen to express it lays bare your bland and inane obsession with the worthless trappings of the zeitgeist.
'Guilty pleasures'? It's prudish and judgemental and yet it's referring to harmless things people do in their spare time. I mean, I've watched and enjoyed The X Factor and I know that it's not exactly the Proms or The Wire or whatever worthy thing I'm supposed to be watching, but why should I feel the least bit guilty about having taken pleasure from it? Or, for that matter, from eating a Findus crispy pancake, watching a Brittas Empire DVD or reading Country Life in the bath? ~ David Mitchell

For all the claims of his detractors that Stewart is the epitome of East Coast elitism, there is more self-deprecating New Jersey grit here than arrogant Manhattan elan. ~ Anonymous

Well, I'm quite a self-deprecating person. ~ PJ Harvey

Then the front doorbell (already too long delayed by my rambling narrative) rang. ~ Iris Murdoch

I think that Americans find the Australian humour and the energy of Australians very refreshing - we are quite self-deprecating, we're light-hearted and can have a laugh. ~ Teresa Palmer

Democrats, if they're smart and they're not brain-dead, are doing two things right now.They're having self-deprecating humor written for them. There was no humor in Cleveland. And they are not making this a Donald Trump. ~ Mark Shields

Gillard is as likeable as Rudd is charmless. She is self-deprecating; he is ludicrously vainglorious. She is a mistress of understatement; he is a ranter. ~ Germaine Greer

He spread his hands in a self-deprecating gesture. 'Well, I'm not a cop. And I'm not a woman.' She couldn't resist. 'I had noticed. ~ Val McDermid

I'm a very open person, very self-deprecating. I accept my flaws. ~ Lynsey Addario

I'd never join a club that would allow a person like me to become a member. ~ Woody Allen

I'm sure a lot of it is my fault," he said. He smiled ruefully. "And by a lot, I mean all."
"Ah, the self-deprecating dude routine," Hannah said. " 'What a lovable fuck-up I am.' The annoying thing is that it makes you look good, but it doesn't get me anything. ~ Adelle Waldman

I have found over the years that the most important way of getting people to relax is self-deprecating humor. ~ Robert Reich

Evie," she asked, "how do you know if you love someone?"
Evie considered the question as they passed a low circular boundary hedge containing an explosion of multi-colored primulas. "I'm sure this is when I'm s-supposed to say something wise and helpful," she said with a self-deprecating shrug. "But my situation was different from yours. St. Vincent and I didn't expect to fall in love. It caught us both unaware."
"Yes, but how did you know?"
"It was the moment I realized he was willing to die for me. I don't think anyone, including St. Vincent, believed he was capable of self-sacrifice. It taught me that you can assume you know a person quite well - but that person can s-surprise you. Everything seemed to change from one moment to the next - suddenly he became the most important thing in the world to me. No, not important ... necessary. ~ Lisa Kleypas

I don't want to come over as some boringly self-deprecating person. But I don't see myself as a groundbreaking writer in the way plays are structured. ~ Tom Stoppard

I thought leaving home would be a liberation. I thought university would be a dance party. I thought I would live in a room vined with fairy lights; hang arabesque tapestries up on the wall. I thought scattered beneath my bed would be a combination of Kafka, coffee grounds, and a lover's old boxer shorts. I thought I would spend my evenings drinking cheap red wine and talking about the Middle East. I thought on weekends we might go to Cassavetes marathons at the independent cinema. I thought I would know all the good Korean places in town. I thought I would know a person who was into healing crystals and another person who could teach me how to sew. I thought I might get into yoga. I thought going for frozen yogurt was something you would just do. I thought there would be red cups at parties. And I thought I would be different. I thought it would be like coming home, circling back to my essential and inevitable self. I imagined myself more relaxed - less hung up on things. I thought I would find it easy to speak to strangers. I thought I would be funny, even, make people laugh with my warm, wry, and only slightly self-deprecating sense of humor. I thought I would develop the easy confidence of a head girl, the light patter of an artist. I imagined myself dancing in a smoky nightclub, spinning slackly while my arms floated like laundry loose on the breeze. I imagined others watching me, thinking, Wow, she is so free. ~ Lara Williams

What surer sign is there that the creative aquifers are dry than a writer creating a writer-character? ~ David Mitchell

My biggest influence is someone I really don't know at all: Tina Fey. Smart, funny, beautiful, self-deprecating, also a mom and a wife. ~ Laura Benanti

Cynical, self-deprecating, affected, indiscriminate, patronizing, immature, as sloppy intellectually as he was with his desk, fickle, vain, virile, brooding, pedantic, philandering...in short, Byronic, Byronic, Byronic, almost to the point of parody. ~ Laura Elizabeth Woollett

Humility is not self deprecating, rather it is the quiet internal confidence allowing you to accept things as they are, especially yourself; that epiphany opens the way to personal greatness. ~ Casar Jacobson

One thing was for sure: Barbara Bush was willing to speak her mind. That was something she did quite frequently in later years. Mother's quick wit and self-deprecating humor endeared her to millions of Americans. Her willingness to speak her mind stood in contrast to some tightly scripted political spouses. As a result of her wide following, she helped many Americans understand and love her husband. ~ George W. Bush

I don't say I'm not magnetic to try and sound self-deprecating. I'm just not. Though I actually love people. I would like to meet more people. I know no one. ~ Kristen Stewart

When I say I love you and you don't believe me, you're being a jerk. Basically what you're saying is I only love conditionally. You think you're being self-deprecating and funny, but you're really saying I'm not a good enough person to love you if you have a few flaws. It gets old. ~ Donald Miller

My philosophy is, it's always very rewarding when you can make an audience laugh. I don't mind making fun of myself. I like self-deprecating comedy. But I'd like you to laugh with me occasionally, too. ~ Dwayne Johnson

All I meant to say is that a rake's humor has its basis in cruelty. He needs a victim, for he cannot imagine ever laughing at himself. You, your grace, are rather clever with the self-deprecating remark. ~ Julia Quinn

I like a man with a nice, self-deprecating sense of humour. ~ Christina Hendricks

I like to introduce myself, because THEN I can get in all the facts." The usually self-deprecating John Hay on the ironic formality of signing his own commission as Secretary of State. ~ John Taliaferro

Nowadays, the truth is, I think a lot of the newer generation of action stars usually are pretty self-deprecating and cool. I mean, Dwayne Johnson is a great example. ~ Adam McKay

Even after all these years, she still said the word "gig" self-consciously, in the same way that she always said "croissant" with the proper French pronunciation, but with an apologetic, self-deprecating look to make up for her pretentiousness. ~ Liane Moriarty

It's bloody annoying being shy. I'll spend a whole evening at a party asking everyone else about themselves. I'm not being self-deprecating; it's because I'm too shy to talk about myself. So people come away from the evening actually having learnt nothing about me. ~ Richard C. Armitage

Local fog in Venice has a name: nebbia. It obliterates all reflections ... and everything that has a shape: buildings, people, colonnades, bridges, statues. Boat services are canceled, airplanes neither arrive, nor take off for weeks, stores are closed and mail ceases to litter one's threshold. The effect is as though some raw hand had turned all those enfilades inside out and wrapped the lining around the city... the fog is thick, blinding, and immobile... this is a time for reading, for burning electricity all day long, for going easy on self-deprecating thoughts of coffee, for listening to the BBC World Service, for going to bed early. In short, a time for self-oblivion, induced by a city that has ceased to be seen. Unwittingly, you take your cue from it, especially if, like it, you've got company. Having failed to be born here, you at least can take some pride in sharing its invisibility... ~ Joseph Brodsky

Well, I did my best,' said Amlis, in a self-deprecating purr. 'But I can tell when a challenge is hopeless. Anyway, it's not your minds I need to change.' And he glanced round at the contents of the ship's hull, acknowledging the scale of the slaughter and its commercial purpose. ~ Michel Faber

I thought I had the world by the tail. It took me a few years to realize the closest I was to having the world by the tail was being a dingle berry on one of its ass hairs. ~ Joe R. Lansdale

Anya Hindmarch is indeed a handbag designer; she has the requisite fabulous life, tasteful home, and loving husband. She is also beautiful and self-deprecating, and has five children aged 5 to 20 and a philanthropic bent which spans causes from cancer care to Britain's Conservative Party. ~ Kate Reardon

At this, the duke stopped mid-step and nearly choked with laughter. "Beg your pardon, Sheffield." He cast a speaking glance at his sister then turned his merry gaze back to Benedict. "Did you try to get your way?"
Benedict lifted a shoulder with a self-deprecating smile.
The duke clapped him on the shoulder, unabashed. "You'll learn soon enough."
Benedict gazed down at Lady Amelia. "I believe I already have. ~ Erica Ridley

Why do you do this?" she asked.

"Do what?"

"Follow me around. Look at me as if you find me fascinating. Touch me, and say nice things to me. And then, you pull away as if you did nothing at all." She gave him a self-deprecating smile. "I've already agreed to tell you everything I know. There's no need for these games. ~ Paula Altenburg

I'm self-deprecating, but I'm an artist, too. I have to write new songs to chronicle stuff for myself. I write a song like 'Middle Age' or 'Responsibility' or 'I Just Work Here,' and it's about how bleak life can be. But it's real. ~ Steve Forbert

Why'd you do it, anyway?' He wore a self-deprecating look, hands stuffed in his pockets while he kicked at the gravel.
'Do what?'
'Why waste your time saving someone who can't be fixed?'
I folded my arms over my chest, tucking my hands under them as I backed away, wishing I could kiss him without caring how he felt. 'Maybe you're not the only one who's broken. ~ Elle Cosimano

I think at its best the American sense of humor is the same as the British sense of humor at its best, which is to be wry and ironic and self deprecating. ~ Simon Pegg

We make a messed-up pair, don't we?"
"The soldier and the junkie," Daniel said with a self deprecating chuckle.
"Ex-soldier and ex-junkie," Sam corrected him. "We're getting there. ~ Isabelle Rowan

Charm of the most insidious kind: humorous, self-deprecating, and disarmingly frank and confiding. ~ Loretta Chase

We decided that humility was defined not by self-deprecating behavior or attitudes but by the esteem with which you regard others ... Generally, you can be humble only if you feel really good about yourself - and you want to help those around you feel really good about themselves, too. ~ Clayton Christensen

Sometimes, Johan ... " He offered a self-deprecating grin. "It would be easier to forget the past." I understood, although I didn't know that he knew that. "Sometimes ... but without the past we wouldn't be who we are. ~ L.E. Modesitt Jr.

Mr. Severin smiled, tiny constellations of reflected chandelier lights glinting in his eyes. "Since I've told you about my tastes... what are yours?"
Cassandra looked down at her folded hands in her lap. "I like trivial things, mostly," she said with a self-deprecating laugh. "Handiwork, such as embroidery, knitting, and needlepoint. I sketch and paint a little. I like naps and teatime, and taking a lazy stroll on a sunny day, and reading books on a rainy afternoon. But I would like two have my own family someday, and... I want to help other people far more than I'm able to now. I take baskets of food and medicine to tenants and acquaintances in the village, but that's not enough. I want to provide real help to people who need it." She sighed shortly. "I suppose that's not very interesting. Pandora's the exciting, amusing twin, the one people remember. I've always been... well, the one who's not Pandora. ~ Lisa Kleypas

Unlike the rest of you, I cheerfully admit to my own utter selfishness. I am self-made, self-absorbed, self-serving, self-referential, even self-deprecating, in a charming sort of way. In short, I am all the selfs except selfless. Yet every so often I run across a force of nature that shakes my sublime self-centeredness to its very roots. Something that tears through the landscape like a tornado, leaving nothing but ruin and reexamination in its wake. ~ William Lashner

It was amusing, in such lightness of air, that the Prince should again present himself only to speak for the Princess, so unfortunately unable again to leave home; and that Mrs Verver should as regularly figure as an embodied, a beautifully deprecating apology for her husband, who was all geniality and humility among his own treasures, but as to whom the legend had grown up that he couldn't bear, with the height of his standards and the tone of the company, in the way of sofas and cabinets, habitually kept by him, the irritation and depression to which promiscuous visiting, even at pompous houses, had been found to expose him. ~ Henry James

Christians must deplore unfair and deprecating barbs regularly aimed our way. ~ David R. Mains

she does not suspect how much reason I have for deprecating all sympathy. ~ Soren Kierkegaard

That the deprecating attitude of a mass movement toward the present seconds the inclinations of the frustrated is obvious. What surprises one, when listening to the frustrated as they decry the present and all its works, is the enormous joy they derive from doing so. Such delight cannot come from the mere venting of a grievance. There must be something more -- and there is. By expatiating upon the incurable baseness and vileness of the times, the frustrated soften their feeling of failure and isolation. It is as if they said: 'Not only our blemished selves, but the lives of all our contemporaries, even the most happy and successful, are worthless and wasted.' Thus by deprecating the present they acquire a vague sense of equality. ~ Eric Hoffer

What did you want to achieve?" "Liberty, of course!" The answer was swift, but followed immediately by a deprecating smile. "Except I've learned there's no such thing." "There isn't?" "You can't have freedom and lawyers, Sharpe, ~ Bernard Cornwell

Courage?" I gave a very soft laugh. "I find courage is just another of life's illusions. In the end, we all do what we must. ~ Anthony Ryan

The historian should be fearless and incorruptible; a man of independence, loving frankness and truth; one who, as the poets says, calls a fig a fig and a spade a spade. He should yield to neither hatred nor affection, not should be unsparing and unpitying. He should be neither shy nor deprecating, but an impartial judge, giving each side all it deserves but no more. He should know in his writing no country and no city; he should bow to no authority and acknowledge no king. He should never consider what this or that man will think, but should state the facts as they really occurred. ~ Lucian

I must have opened it, for instantly there issued, like a guardian angel barring the way with a flutter of black gown instead of white wings, a deprecating, silvery, kindly gentleman, who regretted in a low voice as he waved me back that ladies are only admitted to the library if accompanied by a Fellow of the College or furnished with a letter of introduction. ~ Virginia Woolf