Instinct is the way people or animals naturally react or behave, without having to think or learn about it. Profoundly inspirational instinct quotes will get you through anything when the going gets tough and help you succeed in every aspect of life.
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Famous Instinct Quotes
The natural instinct is to join in the chorus of conflict, to make your voice louder, your point bigger, and your position stronger. But we will not solve the significant and real problems our country faces if we cannot bring ourselves to embrace a mindset of grace. — Betsy DeVos
The animals that depend on instinct have an inherent knowledge of the laws of economics and of how to apply them; Man, with his powers of reason, has reduced economics to the level of a farce which is at once funnier and more tragic than Tobacco Road. — James Thurber
It is just as important to set apart time for the development of our aesthetic faculties as for cultivating the money-getting instinct. A man cannot live by bread alone. His higher life demands an impalpable food. — Orison Swett Marden
Everything I do in life is framed through the view of a businessman. That’s my instinct. If I go into a pharmacy to buy shaving cream, then I’m going to look for the best deal on shaving cream. — Donald Trump
Retaliation is related to nature and instinct, not to law. Law, by definition, cannot obey the same rules as nature. — Albert Camus
The need of expansion is as genuine an instinct in man as the need in a plant for the light, or the need in man himself for going upright. The love of liberty is simply the instinct in man for expansion. — Matthew Arnold
Love isn’t an emotion or an instinct – it’s an art. — Mae West
I have no maternal instinct whatsoever. Motherhood holds no interest for me. — Helen Mirren
Art is not the application of a canon of beauty but what the instinct and the brain can conceive beyond any canon. When we love a woman we don’t start measuring her limbs. — Pablo Picasso
I have never been a quitter. To leave office before my term is completed is opposed to every instinct in my body. But as president I must put the interests of America first Therefore, I shall resign the presidency effective at noon tomorrow. — Richard M. Nixon
He had no failings which were not owing to a noble cause; to an ardent, generous, perhaps an immoderate passion for fame; a passion which is the instinct of all great souls. — Edmund Burke
The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect but by the play instinct acting from inner necessity. The creative mind plays with the objects it loves. — Carl Jung
Fashion is a language. Some know it, some learn it, some never will – like an instinct. — Edith Head
The true and the approximately true are apprehended by the same faculty; it may also be noted that men have a sufficient natural instinct for what is true, and usually do arrive at the truth. Hence the man who makes a good guess at truth is likely to make a good guess at probabilities. — Aristotle
If you insist upon fighting to protect me, or ‘our’ country, let it be understood soberly and rationally between us that you are fighting to gratify a sex instinct which I cannot share; to procure benefits where I have not shared and probably will not share. — Virginia Woolf
The human being is a strange mixture of blind instinct, on one hand, and conscience, on the other. — Fidel Castro
With women, there’s a basic female instinct of caring deeply about the way they look; women stars have a narcissist complex. — Edith Head
I decided that it was not wisdom that enabled poets to write their poetry, but a kind of instinct or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets who deliver all their sublime messages without knowing in the least what they mean. — Socrates
First of all, I’ve never once been embarrassed that children have supported Nintendo. I’m proud of it. That’s because children judge products based on instinct. — Satoru Iwata
An insatiable appetite for glory leads to sacrifice and death, but innate instinct leads to self-preservation and life. — Jose Marti
I started a youth center in Houston. The kids would come in and want to learn to box; they wanted to tear up the world, beat up the world. And I’d try to show them they didn’t need anger. They didn’t need all that killing instinct they’d read about. You can be a human being and pursue boxing as a sport. — George Foreman
Telling us to obey instinct is like telling us to obey ‘people.’ People say different things: so do instincts. Our instincts are at war… Each instinct, if you listen to it, will claim to be gratified at the expense of the rest. — C. S. Lewis
To live is like to love – all reason is against it, and all healthy instinct for it. — Samuel Butler
Trust your gut instinct over spreadsheets. There are too many variables in the real world that you simply can’t put into a spreadsheet. Spreadsheets spit out results from your inexact assumptions and give you a false sense of security. In most cases, your heart and gut are still your best guide. — Naveen Jain
Acting is just a process of relaxation, actually. Knowing the text so well and trusting that the instinct and the subconscious mind, whatever you want to call it, is going to take over. — Anthony Hopkins
There is no instinct like that of the heart. — Lord Byron
The wise are instructed by reason, average minds by experience, the stupid by necessity and the brute by instinct. — Marcus Tullius Cicero
Music is this divine thing, the closest that we can get to something divine. It’s like this instinct we all own, and some of us have found a way to hear that music and write it down and share it with people. — Aurora
Literature… is the union of suffering with the instinct for form. — Thomas Mann
I don’t like formal gardens. I like wild nature. It’s just the wilderness instinct in me, I guess. — Walt Disney
The homing instinct in birds and animals is one of their most remarkable traits: their strong local attachments and their skill in finding their way back when removed to a distance. It seems at times as if they possessed some extra sense – the home sense – which operates unerringly. — John Burroughs
A general loathing of a gang or sect usually has some sound basis in instinct. — Ezra Pound
I have long enjoyed the friendship and companionship of Republicans because I am by instinct a teacher, and I would like to teach them something. — Woodrow Wilson
I’m a mathematician by education, but I have this other thing. A gut instinct. — Glen Taylor
I would say I’m more traditional than I am superstitious. I don’t, for example, have to do things ritually before the game in order to feel comfortable going to the game. But I don’t think I’m naturally a football player. I don’t have that grit and that killer instinct. — Troy Polamalu
The very essence of instinct is that it’s followed independently of reason. — Charles Darwin
Common sense is instinct, and enough of it is genius. — Josh Billings
Human beings want to be free and however long they may agree to stay locked up, to stay oppressed, there will come a time when they say ‘That’s it.’ Suddenly they find themselves doing something that they never would have thought they would be doing, simply because of the human instinct that makes them turn their face towards freedom. — Aung San Suu Kyi
I admit that when challenging times first surface, it’s not first instinct to do a happy dance. But when you take time to pause and add insight to injury, you will immediately start to feel empowered to make those majorly needed life shifts. — Karen Salmansohn
I’ve always wanted to fight for people who didn’t have arms. I’ve always wanted to speak up for people who don’t have a voice. I’ve always wanted to protect people who couldn’t protect themselves. It’s my nature. It’s my instinct. — Sophia Bush
There can be no doubt that the average man blames much more than he praises. His instinct is to blame. If he is satisfied he says nothing; if he is not, he most illogically kicks up a row. — Golda Meir
Instinct taught me 20 years ago to pace a song or a concert performance. That translates into pacing a story, pleasing a reading audience. — Jimmy Buffett
Boxing brings out my aggressive instinct, not necessarily a killer instinct. — Sugar Ray Leonard
If you’re actually allowing your creative part to control your writing rather than a more commercial instinct or motive, then you’ll find that all sorts of interesting things will bubble up to the surface. — Emma Thompson
I like to play cards. I’m not very good, because I don’t want to calculate, I just play by instinct. But I’ve learned a lot of business philosophy by playing poker. — Jack Ma
What is now reason was formerly impulse or instinct. — Ovid
She had a womanly instinct that clothes possess an influence more powerful over many than the worth of character or the magic of manners. — Louisa May Alcott
I choose totally by instinct. And the only time I’ve ever gone against my instincts, I’ve regretted it. — Julia Roberts
Yeah, but if you’re not doing what everyone else is doing then you’re going to be misunderstood. People are going to wonder why you’re trying to be different; it’s just a natural instinct. — Kid Cudi
Reasoning at every step he treads, Man yet mistakes his way, Whilst meaner things, whom instinct leads, Are rarely known to stray. — William Cowper
I go by instinct – I don’t worry about experience. — Barbra Streisand
Reverse every natural instinct and do the opposite of what you are inclined to do, and you will probably come very close to having a perfect golf swing. — Ben Hogan
Instinct must be thwarted just as one prunes the branches of a tree so that it will grow better. — Henri Matisse
I think there is an instinct out there to rid us of our masters. — Gore Vidal
It is no compliment to be the stupidly idolised master of a dog whose instinct it is to idolise, but it is a very distinct tribute to be chosen as the friend and confidant of a philosophic cat who is wholly his own master and could easily choose another companion if he found such an one more agreeable and interesting. — H. P. Lovecraft
You have got to act on instinct; you’ve got to ride from your heart and let that performer come out. You can’t over-think it too much because if you’re thinking, the race is already over. — Caroline Buchanan
It may be an instinct, it is with me anyway, when you’re presenting something to the world, to make it as beautiful as you can. — Alice Paul
I, with a deeper instinct, choose a man who compels my strength, who makes enormous demands on me, who does not doubt my courage or my toughness, who does not believe me naive or innocent, who has the courage to treat me like a woman. — Anais Nin
The instinct of nearly all societies is to lock up anybody who is truly free. First, society begins by trying to beat you up. If this fails, they try to poison you. If this fails too, the finish by loading honors on your head. — Jean Cocteau
My primary instinct as an actor is not the big transformation. It’s thrilling if a performer can do that well, but that’s not me. Often with actors, it’s a case of witnessing a big party piece but wondering afterwards, where’s the substance? — Colin Firth
Instinct perfected is a faculty of using and even constructing organized instruments; intelligence perfected is the faculty of making and using unorganized instruments. — Henri Bergson
Not eating meat is a decision, eating meat is an instinct. — Denis Leary
Developing the muscles of the soul demands no competitive spirit, no killer instinct, although it may erect pain barriers that the spiritual athlete must crash through. — Germaine Greer
I think there’s only eight songs on ‘Born to Run’ – I don’t think it’s much more than 35 minutes long. But as you move into it, where every song comes up in the sequence makes a lot of sense – though we weren’t thinking about it; we were going on instinct at the time. — Bruce Springsteen
Passion for fame: A passion which is the instinct of all great souls. — Edmund Burke
Politicians have an acutely honed instinct for self-preservation. — Steve Schmidt
Freud’s view is that all love is sexual in its origin or its basis. Even those loves which do not appear to be sexual or erotic have a sexual root or core. They are all sublimations of the sexual instinct. — Mortimer Adler
In a period of economic downturn, the overwhelming instinct is to pare back, cut costs, and lay off. If you do that, do so with your strategy in mind. The worst mistake is to cut across the board. Instead, reconnect and recommit to a clear strategy that will distinguish yourself from others. — Michael Porter
Love is – OK, it’s 20 things, but it isn’t 19. And I think that love reaches for something which is very, very deep in us and is very easily obscured, and is also very easily denied, which is the instinct towards the other person, other than toward the self. — Tom Stoppard
Madonna is her own Hollywood studio – a popelike mogul and divine superstar in one. She has a laserlike instinct for publicity, aided by her visual genius for still photography (which none of her legion of imitators has). Unfortunately, her public life has dissolved into a series of staged photo ops. — Camille Paglia
And so you touch this limit, something happens and you suddenly can go a little bit further. With your mind power, your determination, your instinct, and the experience as well, you can fly very high. — Ayrton Senna
There’s a lot of research behind the scenes that you don’t get to see, but I have an instinct that my dad nurtured from when I was born. I was very lucky then. — Steve Irwin
Collective fear stimulates herd instinct, and tends to produce ferocity toward those who are not regarded as members of the herd. — Bertrand Russell
All men have an instinct for conflict: at least, all healthy men. — Hilaire Belloc
I rely on myself very much. I just think that you have an instinct and you go with it. Especially when it comes to deal-making and buying things. — Donald Trump
I never used to want rehearsals, because I was like, ‘Oh, no. I’m more spontaneous. I’m a natural. I’m a one-take person.’ But that was because I didn’t have any training. I was going off instinct. — Robin Wright
Surely we have always acted; it is an instinct inherent in all of us. Some of us are better at it than others, but we all do it. — Laurence Olivier
I think that Poe is so resonant because he represents that part of us that is in misery or sorrowful or wants to explore the darkness. He wrote a great story called ‘The Imp of the Perverse’ about the instinct towards self-destruction. Poe is the godfather of Goth literature and that whole movement. — John Cusack
Sometimes a faint voice based on instinct resonates far more strongly than overpowering logic. — Naveen Jain
In art as in love, instinct is enough. — Anatole France
I don’t like this instinct of reality television to wear your lifestyle in public. I’ve really always loved the anonymity of things. — Bill Pullman
It’s very important to take risks. I think that research is very important, but in the end you have to work from your instinct and feeling and take those risks and be fearless. When I hear a company is being run by a team, my heart sinks, because you need to have that leader with a vision and heart that can move things forward. — Anna Wintour
Deep down, I know I have this intuition or instinct that a lot of creative people have, that their demons are also what make them create. — David Byrne
Life is like music, it must be composed by ear, feeling and instinct, not by rule. Nevertheless one had better know the rules, for they sometimes guide in doubtful cases, though not often. — Paracelsus
When I make a movie, I don’t break it down and analyze it. I could but it would get in the way of doing a job – on instinct based on all the research we did going in. you want to trust yourself and your director and your acting partners in the circumstances you’re shooting. I don’t like to have any kind of overview. — Viggo Mortensen
Love has its own instinct, finding the way to the heart, as the feeblest insect finds the way to its flower, with a will which nothing can dismay nor turn aside. — Honore de Balzac
Ideas pull the trigger, but instinct loads the gun. — Don Marquis
Man is primarily governed by passion and instinct. — Muhammad Iqbal
Corruption is a cancer: a cancer that eats away at a citizen’s faith in democracy, diminishes the instinct for innovation and creativity; already-tight national budgets, crowding out important national investments. It wastes the talent of entire generations. It scares away investments and jobs. — Joe Biden
Trust your instinct to the end, though you can render no reason. — Ralph Waldo Emerson
I never think about the play or visualize anything. I do what comes to me at that moment. Instinct. It has always been that way. — Lionel Messi
The instinct to worship is hardly less strong than the instinct to eat. — Dorothy Thompson
The repression of virtuous instinct in the modern world is an incremental tragedy. Repress one instinct, and you repress many; other parts of consciousness go down, also. — Michael Leunig
I guess if you have an original take on life, or something about you is original, you don’t have to study people who came before you. You don’t have to mimic anybody. You just have a gut feeling inside, an instinct that tells you what’s right for you, and you can’t do it in any other way. — Barbra Streisand
Two things control men’s nature, instinct and experience. — Blaise Pascal
And suddenly I realised that I was no longer driving the car consciously. I was driving it by a kind of instinct, only I was in a different dimension. — Ayrton Senna
Both me and my wife’s extended family all live within a 50-mile radius. Like me, a lot of them did time in London then started drifting back to the countryside and the sea. Perhaps it’s a homing instinct. — Robert Smith
I remember that, although I was full of fervour, I didn’t have the slightest inkling, even at forty, of the deeper side to the movement we were pursuing by instinct. It was in the air! — Camille Pissarro
Working hard to fulfill a dream or instinct and learning over time it doesn’t work, doesn’t mean a career is over and a reputation killed. When a reputation is killed, it’s when failure comes as a result of loss of integrity or judgement… breaking of laws. — Bob Iger
A woman knows by intuition, or instinct, what is best for herself. — Marilyn Monroe
It is impossible to overlook the extent to which civilization is built upon a renunciation of instinct. — Sigmund Freud
In each verse, a decision awaits us, and we can’t choose to close our eyes and let instinct work on its own. Poetic instinct consists of an alert tension. — Octavio Paz
