Quotes about Self-denial

SUFI TEACHINGS

To be resigned means to find satisfaction in self-denial (Self-denial is the denial of one’s lower self.).

Resignation is a quality of the saintly souls.

The highest and greatest goal that every soul has to reach is God. As everything needs renunciation, that highest goal needs the highest renunciation.

… The wise in all ages… have tried to learn one thing only, and that was resignation to the Will of God. By doing this, they have reached a stage at which they could see from God’s point of view.

Faith is the leading grace in all our spiritual warfare and conflict; but all along, while we live, it hath faithful company that adheres to it and helps it. Love works, and hope works, and all other graces - self-denial, readiness to the cross - they all work and help faith. Yet when we come to die, faith is left alone. Now, try what faith will do. Not to be surprised with any thing is the substance of human wisdom; not to be surprised with death is a great part of the substance of our spiritual wisdom.

By these things examine thyself. By whose rules am I acting; in whose name; in whose strength; in whose glory?  What faith, humility, self-denial, and love of God and to man have there been in all my actions?

Those who have attained things worth having in this world have worked while others idled, have persevered when others gave up in despair, have practiced early in life the valuable habits of self-denial, industry, and singleness of purpose. As a result, they enjoy in later life the success so often erroneously attributed to good luck.

Man offers himself to God. He stands before Him like the canvas before the painter or the marble before the sculptor. At the same time he asks for His grace, expresses his needs and those of his brothers in suffering. Such a type of prayer demands complete renovation. The modest, the ignorant, and the poor are more capable of this self-denial than the rich and the intellectual.

"The first and best victory is to conquer self; to be conquered by self is, of all things, the most shameful and vile." [Plato] One secret act of self-denial, one sacrifice of inclination to do is worth all of the good thoughts, warm feelings, and passionate prayers in which idle men indulge themselves.

Integrity is the first step to true greatness. Men love to praise, but are slow to practice it. To maintain it in high places costs self-denial; in all places it is liable to opposition, but its end is glorious, and the universe will yet do it homage.

SELF-denial, n. Indulgence of a propensity to forego.

DELUSION, n. The father of a most respectable family, comprising Enthusiasm, Affection, Self-denial, Faith, Hope, Charity and many other goodly sons and daughters.

A self-made man, if he is made at all, has already won the battle of life. . . . he has learned to resist. He has learned the value of money, and how to refuse to spend it. He has learned the value of time, and how the conversion of it into useful things will make of his life something worthwhile. He has learned to say no, to say no at the right time and then to stand by it. Without resistance, and the self-denial which it often imposes, there is no real happiness. In the quest for happiness man must learn that temptation resisted strengthens the mind and the soul.