But behavior in the human being is sometimes a defense, a way of concealing motives and thoughts, as language can be a way of hiding your thoughts and preventing communication.
Abraham Maslow
Successful givers secure their oxygen masks before coming to the assistance of others. Although their motives may be less purely altruistic, their actions prove more altruistic, because they give more.
Adam Grant
I kind of stumbled into acting, even though I've always been fascinated by people and kind of their motives, and it's been amazing to me, everything I read before about psychology, philosophy, just to put it into practice somehow.
Adan Canto
Many Americans have a romanticized view of trains, rooted in a bygone era of elaborately adorned rail cars lit by flickering gas lamps and pulled by smoke-belching steam locomotives.
Alan Huffman
Any actor who judges his character is a fool - for every role you play you've got to absorb that character's motives and justifications.
Alan Rickman
People have motives and thoughts of which they are unaware.
Albert Ellis
No period of history has ever been great or ever can be that does not act on some sort of high, idealistic motives, and idealism in our time has been shoved aside, and we are paying the penalty for it.
Alfred North Whitehead
I'm sorry, you leftists: you're not the only people whose motives are pure.
Andrew Breitbart
Every diminution of the public burdens arising from taxation gives to individual enterprise increased power and furnishes to all the members of our happy confederacy new motives for patriotic affection and support.
Andrew Jackson
I just couldn't handle people coming on to me with motives other than music.
Anita Morris
Men are more accountable for their motives, than for anything else; and primarily, morality consists in the motives, that is in the affections.
Archibald Alexander
The things that converge in the writing of a play come from a complex of motives, a genesis shrouded in a certain kind of mystery.
Athol Fugard
Do not ever say that the desire to 'do good' by force is a good motive. Neither power-lust nor stupidity are good motives.
Ayn Rand
For months, Obama administration officials attacked Snowden's motives and said the work of the NSA was distorted by selective leaks and misinterpretations.
Barton Gellman
Honest error in the face of complex and possibly intractable problems is a far more important source of bad results than are bad motives.
Ben Bernanke
I know how easy it is for some minds to glide along with the current of popular opinion, where influence, respectability, and all those motives which tend to seduce the human heart are brought to bear.
Benjamin F. Wade
There are many causes why a people politically ignorant cannot be roused to action. Perfect political ignorance must be accompanied by indifference to the general interests of society, and thus one of the most powerful motives which can act on the human mind is totally destroyed.
Benjamin Robbins Curtis
My nature is to try and look past apparent truths, to pull back layers and understand the psychological motives behind phenomena.
Bennett Miller
I really believe that 'Saw' makes us stop and think and question our motives and what we're doing here on Earth.
Betsy Russell
I was incredibly angry to see Mr. Trump question a judge's motives because of his ethnicity.
Bill Flores
If President Obama has his way, you won't recognize the government, the free market system, or, frankly, America as you once knew it. His admonitions and his audacious policy goals demonstrate very clear motives: equalize, discourage dissent, and become a nation of apologists.
The beauty and riddle in studying the motives of any politician is in trying to decide what is idealism and what is self-interest, and often we are left to conclude that the answer is a mixture of the two.
When I consider what it was that moved me to join the Communist Party, I have to cast my mind back for more than a quarter of a century to try and ascertain what precisely my motives at that time were.
I was vaguely aware that people used to hijack planes to Cuba. But I didn't know much about how often it happened and what the motives were. I started looking into what was going on back then, and I was blown away by how common hijacking once was.
All governments in all wars have used all the means at their disposal to put their own motives, decisions and actions, and the actions of their military forces, in the best possible light.
There's no way to know the motives of another person totally, even a person that you know very well.
A boardroom is a collection of individuals, and individuals have varying motives, egos, agendas and qualifications. Sometimes the dynamics can go off track.
A moral being is one who is capable of reflecting on his past actions and their motives - of approving of some and disapproving of others.
I am convinced that the majority of people would be generous from selfish motives, if they had the opportunity.
The automobile is technologically more sophisticated than the bundling board, but the human motives in their uses are sometimes the same.
The pains of disconcerted or frustrated habits, and the inherent pleasure there is in following them, are motives which nature has put into our wills without generally caring to inform us why; and she sometimes decrees, indeed, that her reasons shall not be ours.
And then there's Israel - a lot of people support Israel, and it's important to Israel to take out Iraq. So it's all mixed together. It's a combination of motives.
Since women ask me about male motives all the time, I can offer a bit of advice. If you feel like you're going to get hurt then you shouldn't be there in the first place. That's the way I look at relationships.
I have been accused of acting out of partisan political motives.
In 'Diary,' the motto really is: 'Where Do You Get Your Inspiration?' It coaches us to be aware of our motives and not just be a reaction to the circumstances around us.
Look at the means which a man employs, consider his motives, observe his pleasures. A man simply cannot conceal himself!
I always thought it hadn't influenced me very much, but I heard from many people from England that many motives from German fairytales are to be found in my books.
In order to raise money from somebody, you have to understand who is this person, not to deceive them but to understand them. What would be their motives for contributing money? Why do these people contribute money to some places, but not to others? That's attunement - treating everybody well, but not treating everybody the same.
A novel makes it possible to understand not just events, but the people who control the events; not only their choices, but also their motives.
One of the things I believe strongly in is developing institutions - legal, press, bureaucracies, academies - that are rooted in the pursuit of impartial truth. That aren't simply just bent to partisan ends or are corrupted for the powerful or for other ulterior motives.
There is an institutional cynicism that causes reporters to question everything the President says, and the motives of everything the President and his Administration try to accomplish.
This unusual and highly successful species spends a great deal of time examining his higher motives and an equal amount of time ignoring his fundamental ones.
I have no doubt that those who campaigned for and voted leave in 2016 did so with honourable motives.
You should be careful what you wish for, as the reasons for war get confused. One person can be very clear in their motives, but others can have different agendas.
There is no music that can't be used politically, but the motives behind the creation of that music can be non-political.
We can only write well about our sins because it is too difficult to recall a virtuous act or even whether it was the result of good or evil motives.
It is the easiest thing in the world to become a Christian - ten thousand times easier than it is to hold out unrepenting against the motives which God presents to the mind, to induce it to forsake its evil thoughts and turn unto Him.
The moment we begin to fear the opinions of others and hesitate to tell the truth that is in us, and from motives of policy are silent when we should speak, the divine floods of light and life no longer flow into our souls.
Humanity is made up of an infinity of different individuals. Each of us travels for motives exclusively his own.
You've just got to be wary around people. You don't know what they want from you. Just in L.A., people have questionable motives. Everybody's kind of got an angle. You've got to be aware of that.
