Self Protection Quotes

Because often what keeps you from creative living is your self-absorption (your self-doubt, your self-disgust, your self-judgment, your crushing sense of self-protection). ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

Defense mechanisms protect us. Fortresses isolate us. And far too often we begin with the former and end up constructing the latter. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

Joy is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, which is most greatly experienced in the heart of those willing to surrender all self-sufficiency: self-promotion, self-reliance, self-protection, and self-absorption: it is a gift given. ~ Robin M. Bertram

The more clearly we recognize how deep our commitment to self-protection operates in our relational style and the more courageously we face the ugliness of protecting ourselves rather than loving others, the more we'll shift our direction. ~ Larry Crabb

Our nation was built and civilized by men and women who used guns in self-defense and in pursuit of peace. One wonders indeed, if the rising crime rate, isn't due as much as anything to the criminal's instinctive knowledge that the average victim no longer has means of self-protection. ~ Ronald Reagan

While one lives in a foreign country, language's main function is as a means of self-protection and a weapon in one's fight with the world. You can't fight without a weapon. But perhaps its human instinct that makes it even more imperative to somehow express oneself, convey meaning, connect with others. ~ Iwaki Kei

A common excuse for self-preservation through disobedience is offense. There is a false sense of self-protection in harboring an offense. It keeps you from seeing your own character flaws because the blame is deferred to another. You never have to face your role, your immaturity, or your sin because you see only the faults of the offender. Therefore, God's attempt to develop character in you by this opposition is now abandoned. The offended person will avoid the source of the offense and eventually flee, becoming a spiritual vagabond. ~ John Bevere

I have no problem with responsible gun owners who own weapons for self-protection, hunting, or just sport. The ones who believe they have a constitutional right to 100-round magazines to fight off I don't know what - a zombie apocalypse? - try to shut down dialogue with threats and other macho posing because of their flawed beliefs. ~ Kurt Eichenwald

If busyness, workaholism, unforgiveness, strife, child-rearing, careers, separate interests, boredom, or miscommunication has crept in between you and your wife, God can work through your prayers to bring down the wall that separates you, melt the armor that has been put on for self-protection, and mold you together in unity. ~ Stormie O'martian

You have to get beyond the barrier of self-protection before you can really fly. ~ Elizabeth Streb

When you educate yourself about clitoredectomies, infibulation, forced prostitution, rape as a war tactic, patriarchal religions, women painters, filmmakers, poets, writers, activists, politicians, sex-industry workers, historians, archelogoists and musicians, that's self-protection. ~ Inga Muscio

Anger is a legitimate feeling, one often designed for self-protection. ~ Kimberlee Roth

A person like this is a blessing for the world. And there is no reason why you couldn't be that person. Why aren't you that person now? Because of these walls of self-protection you've built, these attitudes of limit and lack. ~ Norman Fischer

Second, not only does the gospel prepare me to face my sin, it also frees me up to do so. Facing our sin causes us to feel guilty. Of course we feel guilty because we are guilty. And if I believe, consciously or unconsciously, that God still counts my guilt against me, my instinctive sense of self-protection forbids me to acknowledge my sin and guilt, or, at the least, I seek to minimize it. But we cannot begin to deal with a particular manifestation of sin, such as anger or self-pity, until we first openly acknowledge its presence and activity in our lives. So I need the assurance that my sin is forgiven before I can even acknowledge it, let alone begin to deal with it. By ~ Jerry Bridges

Lovers are not snails; they don't have to protrude from their shells and meet each other halfway. Meet me within your own self. ~ Jerzy Kosinski

I know a little something about fear, honey. I know what a relief it feels like to give into it at first. It's not hard to persuade yourself that you're doing the right thing - that you're making the smart, safe decision. But fear is insidious. It takes anything you're willing to give it, the parts of your life you don't mind cutting out, but when you're not looking, it takes anything else it damn well pleases, too. ~ Andrea Lochen

Men who as boys felt neglected by their dads often remain distant from their children. The sins of fathers are passed on to children, often through the dynamic of self-protection. It hurts to be neglected, and it creates questions about our value to others. So to avoid feeling the sting of further rejection, we refuse to give that part of ourselves we fear might once again be received with indifference. ~ Larry Crabb

It is the fine souls who serve us, and not what is called fine society. Fine society is only a self-protection against the vulgarities of the street and the tavern. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Prudery is a form of selfishness, a means of self-protection made necessary by the strength of one's own desires. ~ Yukio Mishima

Appropriate boundaries don't control, attack or hurt anyone. They simply prevent your treasures from being taken at the wrong time. Saying no to adults, who are responsible for getting their own needs met, may cause some discomfort. But it doesn't cause injury. ~ Henry Cloud

Finally, in regard to those who possess the largest shares in the stock of worldly goods, could there, in your opinion, be any police so vigilant and effetive, for the protections of all the rights of person, property and character, as such a sound and comprehensive education and training, as our system of Common Schools could be made to impart; and would not the payment of a sufficient tax to make such education and training universal, be the cheapest means of self-protection and insurance? ~ Horace Mann

We learned not to waste ammo even on warriors except in self-protection ~ Robert A. Heinlein

All children are born to grow, to develop, to live, to love, and to articulate their needs and feelings for their self-protection. ~ Alice Miller

As a child, a teen, a young adult, I developed a firm belief in my solitude, the not-novel concept that we are each alone in the world. Some parts self-reliance, some parts self-protection, this belief offers a binary perspective - powerhouse or victim, complete responsibility or total divorcement, all in or out the door. Carried to its extreme, the idea gives license to the belief that one's own actions do not matter much; we traverse the world in our own bubbles, occasionally breaking through to one another but largely and ultimately alone. ~ Piper Kerman

Putting words onto paper - when it is done as an honest act of search or connection, rather than as an act of manipulation, performance, self-aggrandizement or self-protection - is a holy act. ~ Pat Schneider

Everyone struggles to guard their heart from breaking, when they should desire to have a heart that breaks ... ~ John Geddes

It wasn't you're fault," I whisper. And then out of self-protection more than anything else, I bring the glory. I don't warn him or anything. I don't damp it down. I bring it. The room fills with light.
"This is what I am," I say, my hair ablaze around my head.
He squints at me. his jaw juts out a little in pure stubbornness. He stands his ground
"I know," he says.
I take a step towards him, close the space between us, put my glowing hand against his cheek. He starts to tremble. "This is what I am," I say again and my wings are out now.
His knees wobble, but he fights it. He puts his hand at my waist, turns me, pulls me closer, which surprises me.
"I can accept that," he whispers, and holds his breath, and leans in to kiss me
His lips brush mine for an instant, and an emotion like victory tears through him, but he pulls away and glances at the front door. Groans.
Christian is standing in the doorway.
"Wow," Tucker says, trying to grin. "You really know how to cramp a guy's style."
His legs give out. He falls to his knees.
My light blinks off. ~ Cynthia Hand

We can imagine the two of them having this conversation: Consciousness: "Hey, watcha doing over there?" Subconsciousness: "Trust me, you're better off not knowing." Self-protection ~ Hugh Howey

To live in denial of caring deeply, to hold oneself back from speaking from the heart as a means of self protection, to speak in whispers, to describe what you have together as "this." Oh the sweet sadness of forbidden love. ~ Cheryld

The object of this Essay is to assert one very simple principle, as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual in the way of compulsion and control, whether the means used be physical force in the form of legal penalties, or the moral coercion of public opinion. That principle is, that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant. He cannot rightfully be compelled to do or forbear because it will be better for him to do so, because it will make him happier, because, in the opinions of others, to do so would be wise, or even right. These are good reasons for remonstrating with him, or reasoning with him, or persuading him, or entreating him, but not for compelling him, or visiting him with any evil, in case he do otherwise. To justify that, the conduct from which it is desired to deter him must be calculated to produce evil to someone else. The only part of the conduct of any one, for which he is amenable to society, is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign. ~ John Stuart Mill

Many survivors have such profound deficiencies in self-protection that they can barely imagine themselves in a position of agency or choice. The idea of saying no to the emotional demands of a parent, spouse, lover or authority figure may be practically inconceivable. Thus, it is not uncommon to find adult survivors who continue to minister to the needs of those who once abused them and who continue to permit major intrusions without boundaries or limits. Adult survivors may nurse their abusers in illness, defend them in adversity, and even, in extreme cases, continue to submit to their sexual demands. ~ Judith Lewis Herman

For octopi, ink is a defense mechanism, a means of escape. It is for me as well. Octopi surround themselves with clouds of ink in order to disappear before the clouds dissipate. Sometimes they also create hovering blots of ink that mimic their own shape, so predators will attack the ink and not them. Every time I write about my family, I instinctively obscure the truth with a cloud of self-protection, and invent versions of my life that give me a chance to evade the attacks I dread. The only way I know to get past the sense of threat is to go ahead and release the ink and then slowly wait for the cloud to clear. That might be revision. It might mean time. It might mean a lifetime of time. ~ Briallen Hopper

Much of what we call our 'personalities' is actually the mosaic of our choices for self-protection plus our plan to get something out of the love we were created for. ~ Stasi Eldredge

Clearly, it is not simply exegesis that determines how we read the Bible; rather, it is our vested interests, our hopes, and our fears that largely determine our reading. And because the reach of the gracious God of the Bible is toward the other, we ought rightly to be skeptical and suspicious of any reading of the Bible that excludes the other, because it is likely to be informed by vested interest, fears, and hopes that serve self-protection and end in self-destruction. Palestinians' and Israelis' fear of the other, said to be grounded in the Bible, has been transposed into a military apparatus that is aimed at the elimination of the other. It is wholly illusionary to imagine that such an agenda is congruent with the God of the Bible who is commonly confessed by Jews and Christians. ~ Walter Brueggemann

It is possible to think of fragrance existing before a flower was created to contain it, and so it is that God created the world to reveal Himself, to reveal Mercy.
Once or twice a year, perhaps three times, a woman visits the garden, her face ancient, the eyes calm but not passive as she approaches the rosewood tree and begins to pick and examine each fallen leaf. Whether she is in possession of her full mental faculties, no one is sure. Perhaps she is sane and just pretending madness for self-protection. Many decades ago - long before the house was built, when this place was just an expanse of wild growth - she had discovered the name of God on a rosewood leaf, the green veins curving into sacred calligraphy. She picks each small leaf now, hoping for a repetition of the miracle, holding it in her palms in a gesture identical to prayer. The life of the house continues around her and occasionally she watches them, following the most ordinary human acts with an attention reserved by others for much greater events. If it is autumn, she has to remain in the garden for hours, following the surge and pull of the wind as it takes the dropped foliage to all corners. Afterwards, as the dusk begins to darken the air, they sit together, she and the tree, until only the tree remains.
What need her search fulfils in her is not known. Perhaps healing had existed before wounds and bodies were created to be its recipient. ~ Nadeem Aslam

Talent is useful, but always keep your dagger sharp. ~ Amanda Quick

If a friend had a coronary scare and finally started exercising three days a week, who would hound him about the other four days? It's the worst of bad manners - and self-protection, I think, in a nervously cynical society - to ridicule the small gesture. ~ Barbara Kingsolver

Most of your healing journey will be about unlearning the patterns of self-protection that once kept you safe. ~ Vironika Tugaleva

When we don't practice gratitude,
the world around us seems alien and unwelcoming,
and we shut down in self-protection.

Gratitude opens us to reality. ~ Ivan M. Granger

Our deep irrational feelings of death anxiety have been attributed to multiple sources. In part, they may arise from evolved self-protection mechanisms or survival responses of being a victim of predators. They might, conversely, stem from unconscious fear (or guilt) of retribution resulting from our own acts of harming or predation. According to existential psychologists, the most powerful form of death anxiety comes from our general ability to anticipate the future, coupled with conscious anticipation of inevitable personal demise. ~ Richard J. Borden

Fawn types seek safety by merging with the wishes, needs and demands of others. They act as if they unconsciously believe that the price of admission to any relationship is the forfeiture of all their needs, rights, preferences and boundaries. They often begin life like the precocious children described in Alice Miler's 'The Drama Of The Gifted Child', who learn that a modicum of safety and attachment can be gained by becoming the helpful and compliant servants of their parents. They are usually the children of at least one narcissistic parent who uses contempt to press them into service- scaring and shaming them out of developing a healthy sense of self: an egoic locus of self-protection, self-care and self-compassion. ~ Pete Walker

Arms in the hands of the Negro aroused fear both North and South. Not that the Negroes could not and would not fight, for these same blacks, largely under their own officers, had beaten back Louisiana whites at Port Hudson and Milliken's Bend. But, it was the silent verdict of all America that Negroes must not be allowed to fight for themselves. They were, therefore, dissuaded from every attempt at self-protection or aggression by their friends as well as their enemies. ~ W.E.B. Du Bois

Self-protection keeps you from love, Mr. Knightley-all love. I am so sad at how I've kept them at a distance-the Muirs, Alex, Father John, Kyle, Hannah ... Anyone and everyone who has ever stood by me. I played God in our relationships. I determined their value by how much I let them in, by how much I let them determine my worth. I'm not God. And I don't need to work so hard anymore ... ~ Katherine Reay

There is still a kind of unique loneliness to child rearing for women. We so often do it in isolation. Add to the fact that in our competitive, perfectionist culture, in which the price woman are required to pay for freedom still seems to be martyrdom, almost everyone lies about motherhood. Part of that lying is loyalty - I can't let on that my kid is the only one on the playground who can't read or play the piano - and part of it is self-protection, since we've made hyper-motherhood a measure of female success. The preferred answer to the question "How are you?" is always "Fine," and the answer to the question "How are the kids?" is supposed to be "Great!" That's true even if the accurate answers would be "terrible" and "a mess." I think it produces its own kind of desperation, especially for women, who yearn to be emotionally open. ~ Anna Quindlen

Hiding. Covering up. Self-protection. Feeling exposed. They are telltale signs of shame. ~ Edward T. Welch

I do not for a moment suggest that Japan should be unmindful of acquiring modern weapons of self-protection. But this should never be allowed to go beyond her instinct of self-preservation. She must know that the real power is not in the weapons themselves, but in the man who wields those weapons ~ Rabindranath Tagore

Carlene thought for a minute. "I guess just that we don't always have to get on our knees and compose some intentional kind of prayer. God sees beyond the walls we erect around our souls, walls of self-protection or self-sufficiency."

"You mean that God hears when our hearts call out, even if the cry is too faint for human ears?" Deidre asked.

"Exactly," Carlene nodded. "It's the universal, quintessential prayer. Help. ~ Penelope J. Stokes

Nature knows two fundamentally different ways of adaptation, which determine the further existence of the living organism the one is by increased fertility, accompanied by a relatively small degree of defensive power and individual conservation; the other is by individual equipment of manifold means of self-protection, coupled with a relatively insignificant fertility. ~ C. G. Jung

We are not supposed to run after miracles but we are supposed to run after self-perfection, self-growth, self - improvements. ~ Sunday Adelaja

Raising Black children - female and male - in the mouth of a racist, sexist, suicidal dragon is perilous and chancy. If they cannot love and resist at the same time, they will probably not survive. ~ Audre Lorde

The anger response, like the fear response, is a frequent target for repression. Imagine a 6-year-old girl who is angry at her 10-year-old brother for teasing her. In response, she might make an angry face, yell at her brother, and strike out at him with her fists. It's an instinctual, energizing reaction designed to protect her from danger. Someone is violating her sense of well-being, and she's afraid that if she doesn't stop the intruder, she'll get hurt.

"A wise parent would validate the girl's anger  -  it's infuriating to be teased  -  and help her find a verbal rather than a physical way to express it. 'You are very mad at your brother for teasing you,' says this model parent, 'I would be, too. Tell him in words how angry you feel. He needs to know.' This way, the girl can protect herself from her brother and purge herself of her anger without having to resort to physical violence. Her self-protective anger remains intact. It has simply been given a ore 'civilized' form of expression. ~ Patricia Love

Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. ~ Holy Bible Proverbs 4 23

He said cynicism's self-protection, a defense mechanism used by cowards who give up on love because they're afraid love's given up on them. ~ Linda Yellin

The human mind is a fearful instrument of adaptation, and in nothing is this more clearly shown than in its mysterious powers of resilience, self-protection, and self-healing. Unless an event completely shatters the order of one's life, the mind, if it has youth and health and time enough, accepts the inevitable and gets itself ready for the next happening like a grimly dutiful American tourist who, on arriving at a new town, looks around him, takes his bearings, and says, Well, where do I go from here? ~ Thomas Wolfe

Some days you'll just get the robot me.
I'm on autopilot.
It's a form of self protection. ~ TinaJ. Richardson

These times are hard, but I won't walk away jaded, darker, different. I feel. I cry to heal. If you saw me in those moments, maybe you'd think I was a mess. But I don't call it a mess. I call it strength.

Real strength isn't about building walls. Real strength is about staying open, no matter what. It's about taking life - with all the pleasures that fade and all the pain that sticks around for too long - and not shutting down, not closing down, not building up those walls.

Resilience isn't hard, impenetrable, iron. Resilience is flexible, soft, warm.

Stay strong. The real kind of strong. Don't let your automatic mind reflexes make you jump away from pain and towards pleasure. Make choices. See clearly. And never, ever, stop feeling.

Don't go numb. The world, even with all its horror, is too beautiful to miss. ~ Vironika Tugaleva

It is better to have the power of self-protection than to depend on any man, whether he be the Governor in his chair of State, orthe hunted outlaw wandering through the night, hungry and cold and with murder in his heart. ~ Lillie Devereux Blake

Buddhism holds that everything is in constant flux. Thus the question is whether we are to accept change passively and be swept away by it or whether we are to take the lead and create positive changes on our own initiative. While conservatism and self-protection might be likened to winter, night, and death, the spirit of pioneering and attempting to realize ideals evokes images of spring, morning, and birth. ~ Daisaku Ikeda

My only defense is the acquisition of vocabulary. ~ Margaret Edson

Blame doesn't empower you. It keeps you stuck in a place you don't want to be because you don't want to make the temporary, but painful decision, to be responsible for the outcome of your own life's happiness. ~ Shannon L. Alder

The de-eroticization of the world, a companion to its disenchantment ... seems to result from a combination of causes our democratic regime and its tendencies toward leveling and self-protection, a reductionist-materialist science that inevitably interprets eros as sex, and the atmosphere generated by "the death of God" and of the subordinate god, Eros. ~ Allan Bloom

War presents itself as necessary for self-protection, when in fact it is necessary for self-identification. ~ James P. Carse

And so, because he won't let himself be hurt, he does wrong to those he loves best. And then he sees that, and after all, it hurts him. ~ Ursula K. Le Guin

Carrying a concealed weapon is a sign of self-defense, self-protection, and I think it lowers crime. ~ John Barrasso

For when everything is classified, then nothing is classified, and the system becomes one to be disregarded by the cynical or the careless, and to be manipulated by those intent on self-protection or self-promotion."

[New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S. 713 (1971) (concurring)] ~ Potter Stewart

You know that feeling at the end of the day, when the anxiety of that-which-I-must-do falls away and, for maybe the first time that day, you see, with some clarity, the people you love and the ways you have, during that day, slightly ignored them, turned away from them to get back to what you were doing, blurted out some mildly hurtful thing, projected, instead of the deep love you really feel, a surge of defensiveness or self-protection or suspicion? That moment when you think, Oh God, what have I done with this day? And what am I doing with my life? And how must I change to avoid catastrophic end-of-life regrets?

I feel like that now: tired of the Me I've always been, tired of making the same mistakes, repetitively stumbling after the same small ego strokes, being caught in the same loops of anxiety and defensiveness. At the end of my life, I know I won't be wishing I'd held more back, been less effusive, more often stood on ceremony, forgiven less, spent more days oblivious to the secret wishes and fears of the people around me...

--"Buddha Boy ~ George Saunders

You don't need a weapon to protect yourself. ~ Bill Maher

Toddlers ask many questions, and so do school children - until about grade three. By that time, many of them have learned an unfortunate fact, that in school, it can be more important for self-protection to hide one's ignorance about a subject than to learn more about it, regardless of one's curiosity. ~ Jan Hunt

What's wrong with us isn't a rap sheet of bad deeds, but a damaged heart, a soul-sickness, that plunges us into fearful self-protection, alienation from God and others. ~ Frederica Mathewes-Green

He's changing. Every day more remote, protected, distant. He builds fests now for the soulmate he hasn't found, bricking wall and maze and mountain fortress, dares her to find him at the hidden center of them all Here's an A in self-protection from the one in the world he might love and who might someday love him. ~ Richard Bach

Pema calls these activities "the six ways of compassionate living": generosity, patience, discipline, exertion, meditation, and prajna, or wisdom. The basis for all these practices is the cultivation of maitri, an unconditional loving-kindness with ourselves that says, "Start where you are." In Buddhist terms, this path is known as bodhisattva activity. Simply put, a bodhisattva is one who aspires to act from an awakened heart. In terms of the Shambhala teachings, it is the path of warriorship. To join these two streams, Pema likes to use the term warrior-bodhisattva, which implies a fresh and forward-moving energy that is willing to enter into suffering for others' benefit. Such action relates to overcoming the self-deception, self-protection, and other habitual reactions that we use to keep ourselves secure - in a prison of concepts. By gently and precisely cutting through these barriers of ego, we develop a direct experience of bodhichitta. ~ Pema Chodron

How in the world are we supposed to engage life when we spend all of our life building walls to protect ourselves from the very thing that we say we want to engage? The answer is, I think, understanding that God doesn't need walls but we need Him. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

Max had a book with her and began leafing through it, looking for something. "There's a passage our conversation reminds me of ..."
"What?"
"In the Upanishads -- a series of Sanskrit works which are part of the Veda. Here it is Pol, listen: In this body, in this town of Spirit, there is a little house shaped like a lotus, and in that house there is a little space. There is as much in that little space within the heart as there is in the whole world outside. Maybe that little space is the realty of your you and my me?"
"Could I copy that?" I asked.
"Of course. I've been watching that little space within your heart enlarging all year as more and more ideas are absorbed into it. Some people close their doors and lock them so that nothing can come in, and the space cannot hold anything as long as the heart clutches in self-protection or lust or greed. But if we're not afraid, that little space can be so large that one could put a whole universe in it and still have room for more. ~ Madeleine L'Engle

The arrogance of belonging is not about egotism or self-absorption. In a strange way, it's the opposite; it is a divine force that will actually take you out of yourself and allow you to engage more fully with life. Because often what keeps you from creative living is your self-absorption (your self-doubt, your self-disgust, your self-judgment, your crushing sense of self-protection). The arrogance of belonging pulls you out of the darkest depths of self-hatred - not by saying "I am the greatest!" but merely by saying "I am here! ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

Heaven is the natural spaciousness of our mind before we make it small with self-protection. ~ Sakyong Mipham

We cannot repeat too often the great lesson of freudian psychology: that repression is normal self-protection and creative self-restriction-in a real sense, man's natural substitute for instinct. Rank has a perfect, key term for this natural human talent: he calls it "partialization" and very rightly sees that life is impossible without it. What we call the well-adjusted man has just this capacity to partialize the world for comfortable action. I have used the term "fetishization," which is exactly the same idea: the "normal" man bites off what he can chew and digest of life, and no more. In other words, men aren't built to be gods, to take in the whole world; they are built like other creatures, to take in the piece of ground in front of their noses. Gods can take in the whole of creation because they alone can make sense of it, know what it is all about and for. But as soon as a man lifts his nose from the ground and starts sniffing at eternal problems like life and death, the meaning of a rose or a star cluster-then he is in trouble. Most men spare themselves this trouble by keeping their minds on the small problems of their lives just as their society maps these problems out for them. These are what Kierkegaard called the "immediate" men and the "Philistines." They "tranquilize themselves with the trivial"- and so they can lead normal lives. ~ Ernest Becker

I'm not obstinate, I'm highly strung: I don't know how to let myself go. I must always think of what is happening to me - it's a form of self-protection. ~ Jean-Paul Sartre

The great lesson that nature seems to teach us at all ages is self-dependence, self-protection, self-support. In the hours of our keenest sufferings all are thrown wholly on themselves for consolation. ~ Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Therefore, to teach them [women] at least an outline of economics and law is the first requirement after giving them a general education. Figuratively speaking, it will be like providing the women of civilized society with a pocket dagger for self-protection. ~ Fukuzawa Yukichi

I seem to be failing in my intention to be as boring as I possibly can be for self-protection. ~ Tom Stoppard

Rose was patently a degenerate. Nature, in scheduling his characteristics, had pruned all superlatives. The rude armour of the flesh, under which the spiritual, like a hide-bound chrysalis, should develop secret and self-contained, was perished in his case, as it were, to a semi-opaque suit, through which his soul gazed dimly and fearfully on its monstrous arbitrary surroundings. Not the mantle of the poet, philosopher, or artist fallen upon such, can still its shiverings, or give the comfort that Nature denies.

Yet he was a little bit of each - poet, philosopher, and artist; a nerveless and self-deprecatory stalker of ideals, in the pursuit of which he would wear patent leather shoes and all the apologetic graces. The grandson of a 'three-bottle' J.P., who had upheld the dignity of the State constitution while abusing his own in the best spirit of squirearchy; the son of a petulant dyspeptic, who alternated seizures of long moroseness with fits of abject moral helplessnes, Amos found his inheritance in the reversion of a dissipated constitution, and an imagination as sensitive as an exposed nerve. Before he was thirty he was a neurasthenic so practised, as to have learned a sense of luxury in the very consciousness of his own suffering. It was a negative evolution from the instinct of self-protection - self-protection, as designed in this case, against the attacks of the unspeakable.

("The Accursed Cordonnier") ~ Bernard Capes

Fear is a self-protection we use to insulate ourselves from hurt by pulling back. Anger is self-protection we use to insulate ourselves from hurt by striking out. In both instances the answer is to face and forgive (more on forgiveness ahead) the hurt that expresses itself in fear or anger or both. How much good is left undone by failing to act like a quality man and conquer your fears? How much damage is suffered by those you love when you fail to act like a quality man and conquer your anger? ~ James MacDonald

Justice and equity are twin Guardians that watch over men. From them are revealed such blessed and perspicuous words as are the cause of the well-being of the world and the protection of the nations. ~ Bahaullah

As he got to know her better, he learned more of her childhood; and he came to realize that it was typical of that of most girls of her time and circumstance. She was educated upon the premise that she would be protected from the gross events that life might thrust in her way, and upon the premise that she had no other duty than to be a graceful and accomplished accessory to that protection, since she belonged to a social and economic class to which protection was an almost sacred obligation. She ~ John Williams

Blue must be worn for protection. Moonstones were useful in connecting with the living, topaz to contact the dead. Copper, sacred to Venus, will call a man to you, and black tourmaline will eliminate jealousy. When it came to love, you must always be careful. If you dropped something belonging to the man you loved into a candle flame, then added pine needles and marigold flowers, he would arrive on your doorstep by morning, so you would do well to be certain you wanted him there. The most basic and reliable love potion was made from anise, rosemary, honey, and cloves boiled for nine hours on the back burner of the old stove. It had always cost $9.99 and was therefore called Love Potion Number Nine, which worked best on the ninth hour of the ninth day of the ninth month. ~ Alice Hoffman

The point is that everyone needs some exposure to the various ways of life. People buy things out of catalogues too much. They see in Time magazine that they're suppose to be feeling in such and such a way, and they dash off a check and buy that life-style sight unseen. A pig in a poke if there ever was one, for once you've bought the thing there's no refund. We ought to be able to try things before we sign up for them. Used to be you could listen to the records in a record store before you bought them. Now they're sealed, for your protection, they say. Bullshit! It's for their goddamned protection, not ours. We don't need to be protected. We need to be allowed to get a taste of something before we accept it. ~ Arthur Alexander

Body went tense, forcing goose bumps to rise over my bare arms. My tough demeanor had been ripped apart and was replaced by a frightened little girl in need of her father's protection. But he wasn't here, and all I had was Jeremy. It wasn't his responsibility to protect me. He shouldn't have to worry about me.
And I shouldn't be falling apart like this. ~ Nicole Sobon

The girl is not yours, or mine, or anyone's. But for now, she travels under my protection, and let him who lays a hand on her answer to me. ~ Juliet Marillier

We in the United States believe in the protection of minorities; we recognize the contributions that they can make and the leadership that they can provide; and we do not believe that any people - whether majority or minority, or individual human beings - are 'expendable' in the cause of theory or of policy. ~ Robert Kennedy

Knowledge that can make miracles happen needs to be guarded carefully. If it falls into the wrong hands, miracles become disasters in no time. ~ Pawan Mishra

The Child Custody Protection Act makes it a federal crime to transport a minor across state lines for the purpose of obtaining an abortion. ~ Ken Calvert

When Anu the Sublime, King of the Anunnaki, and Bel, the lord of Heaven and earth, who decreed the fate of the land assigned to Marduk, the over-ruling son of Ea, God of righteousness, dominion over earthly man, and made him great among the Igigi, they called Babylon by his illustrious name, made it great on earth, and founded an everlasting kingdom in it, whose foundations are laid so solidly as those of heaven and earth; then Anu and Bel called by name me, Hammurabi, the exalted prince, who feared God, to bring about the rule of righteousness in the land, to destroy the wicked and the evil-doers; so that the strong should not harm the weak, so that I should rule over the black-headed people like Shamash and enlighten the land, to further the well-being of mankind.

...When Marduk sent me to rule over men, to give the protection of right to the land, I did right and righteousness in . . . , and brought about the well-being of the oppressed.

[The oldest known written code of laws from around 1772 BCE] ~ Hammurabi

I have started looking into the mirror more often. I have pigmentation, a few blemishes. My body never looked like this, never felt like this- heavy, tired, exhausted, swollen, achy, weak. There are a million reasons to not like myself right now. But one reason that outgrows all these emotions- I am the first home to my baby. A woman can dislike her body, can she really dislike her baby's abode? Therefore, I love the way it's swelling- it gives my baby's tiny arms and legs more space. I love the way it's pigmenting, it gives my baby better protection from the sun. I love the way it's exhausted, it prioritises baby's nutritional requirements over mine. And I would love all the stretch marks in the end too. That's my baby's name plate at his first home. ~ Jasleen Kaur Gumber

Well, he would share her, but only for a little while. When the ball was over, he would make sure she slept inside the castle tonight, with his sister Margaretha. In fact, he might just make sure she never left the castle. He didn't intend for her to ever be without protection again. ~ Melanie Dickerson

To set the stage for this discussion, it is necessary to explain that what is at work is an Orwellian strategy of rhetorical deception to represent finance and other rentier sectors as being part of the economy, not external to it. This is precisely the strategy that parasites in nature use to deceive their hosts that they are not free riders but part of the host's own body, deserving careful protection. ~ Michael Hudson

And you think that's it? All is forgiven and he'll just be cool with me having Storm King's grandchildren because we're all united in some super team? That's naive."
Dorian's face suddenly hardened. "Equally naive is the thought that I would carelessly allow him to do anything to you or your children. How many times do I have to convince you of my protection? Do you really think that if he comes back here and attempts to harm one hair on your head, I'll allow it? Eugenie, if he so much as looks at you in a way I don't like, Rurik and his conspirators over there won't have a chance to act because I'll have long since run that bastard kitsune through myself." Dorian's tone astonishingly became light and easy again. "Now then. I wonder where we'll be making camp tonight. ~ Richelle Mead

When I save, I lay something aside for future need. If I sense God's leading, I will give it away to meet greater needs. When I hoard, I'm unwilling to part with what I've saved to meet others' needs, because my possible future needs outweigh their actual present needs. I fail to love my neighbor as myself. ~ Randy Alcorn

A writer's life is a highly vulnerable, almost naked activity. We don't have to weep about that. The writer makes his choice and is stuck with it. But it is true to say that you are open to all the winds, some of them icy indeed. You are out on your own, out on a limb. You find no shelter, no protection - unless you lie - in which case of course you have constructed your own protection and, it could be argued, become a politician. ~ Harold Pinter

Anarchists are opposed to violence; everyone knows that. The main plank of anarchism is the removal of violence from human relations. It is life based on freedom of the individual, without the intervention of the gendarme. For this reason we are the enemies of capitalism which depends on the protection of the gendarme to oblige workers to allow themselves to be exploited
or even to remain idle and go hungry when it is not in the interest of the bosses to exploit them. We are therefore enemies of the State which is the coercive violent organization of society. ~ Errico Malatesta

Innocence does not find near so much protection as guilt. ~ Francois De La Rochefoucauld