Ayn Rand Quotes About Desire

• Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark in the hopeless swamps of the not-quite, the not-yet, and the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish in lonely frustration for the life you deserved and have never been able to reach. The world you desire can be won. It exists.. it is real.. it is possible.. it's yours.

  Ayn Rand

  Inspirational, Life, Motivational

• A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.

  Ayn Rand

  Motivational, Dance, Teamwork

  Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.99, Penguin

• A desire presupposes the possibility of action to achieve it; action presupposes a goal which is worth achieving.

  Ayn Rand

  Inspirational, Witty, Goal

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.286, Hamilton Books

• 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

  Peace, War, Stupid

• Capitalism has created the highest standard of living ever known on earth. The evidence is incontrovertible. The contrast between West and East Berlin is the latest demonstration, like a laboratory experiment for all to see. Yet those who are loudest in proclaiming their desire to eliminate poverty are loudest in denouncing capitalism. Man's well-being is not their goal.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, East Berlin, Goal

  Ayn Rand, Nathaniel Branden, Alan Greenspan, Robert Hessen (1986). “Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal”, p.126, Penguin

• I shall choose friends among men, but neither slaves nor masters. And I shall choose only such as please me, and them I shall love and respect, but neither command nor obey. And we shall join our hands when we wish, or walk alone when we so desire.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Hands, Please Me

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Anthem”, p.47, Xist Publishing

• Any refusal to recognize reality, for any reason whatever, has disastrous consequences. There are no evil thoughts except one: the refusal to think. Don't ignore your own desires.... Don't sacrifice them. Examine their cause. There is a limit to how much you should have to bear.

  Ayn Rand

  Sacrifice, Thinking, Reality

  Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.1454, Penguin

• The world you desire can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it is yours.

  Ayn Rand

  Travel, Women, Real

• Do not consider Collectivists as "sincere but deluded idealists". The proposal to enslave some men for the sake of others is not an ideal; brutality is not "idealistic," no matter what its purpose. 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

  Men, Stupidity, Lust

• The desire not to be anything is the desire not to be.

  Ayn Rand

  Inspirational, Addiction, Desire

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.792, Hamilton Books

• Whatever may be open to disagreement, there is one act of evil that may not, the act that no man may commit against others and no man may sanction or forgive. So long as men desire to live together, no man may initiate—do you hear me? no man may start—the use of physical force against others.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Long, Evil

  Ayn Rand (1963). “For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (50th Anniversary Edition)”, p.108, Penguin

• Why is it immoral for you to desire, but moral for others to do so? Why is it immoral to produce a value and keep it, but moral to give it away? And if it is not moral for you to keep a value, why is it moral for others to accept it? If you are selfless and virtuous when you give it, are they not selfish and vicious when they take it?

  Ayn Rand

  Selfish, Giving, Desire

  Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.31, Penguin

• Only the man who extols the purity of love devoid of desire, is capable of the depravity of a desire devoid of love.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Desire, Purity

  Ayn Rand (1963). “For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (50th Anniversary Edition)”, p.80, Penguin

• Then no rightful cause was left, and the pain of anger was turning into the shameful pain of submission. He had no right to condemn anyone - he thought - to denounce anything, to fight and die joyously, claiming the sanctity of virtue. The broken promises, the unconfessed desires, the betrayal, the deceit, the lies, the fraud - he was guilty of them all. What form of corruption could he scorn? Degrees do not matter, he thought; one does not bargain about inches of evil.

  Ayn Rand

  Betrayal, Pain, Lying

• Did it ever occur to you, that there is no conflict of interests among men, neither in business nor in trade nor in their most personal desires - if they omit the irrational from their view of the possible and destruction from their view of the practical?

  Ayn Rand

  Business, Men, Views

  Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.1928, Penguin

• So long as men desire to live together, no man may initiate the use of physical force against others. . . . When a man attempts to deal with me by force, I answer him by force. It is only as retaliation that force may be used and only against the man who starts its use. No, I do not share his evil or sink to his concept of morality: I merely grant him his choice, destruction, the only destruction he had the right to choose: his own.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Long, Evil

• Did it ever occur to you, that there is no conflict of interests among men, neither in business nor in trade nor in their most personal desires if they omit the irrational from their view of the possible and destruction from their view of the practical? There is no conflict, and no call for sacrifice, and no man is a threat to the aims of another if men understand that reality is an absolute not to be faked, that lies do not work, that the unearned cannot be had, that the undeserved cannot be given, that the destruction of a value which is, will not bring value to that which isn't.

  Ayn Rand

  Business, Lying, Sacrifice

  "Atlas Shrugged".

• If you want to know the one reason that's taking me back, I'll tell you: I cannot bring myself to abandon to destruction all the greatness of the world, all that which was mine and yours, which was made by us and is still ours by right - because I cannot believe that men refuse to see, that they can remain blind and deaf to us forever, when the truth is ours and their lives depend on accepting it.

  Ayn Rand

  Life, Believe, Greatness

  "Atlas Shrugged".

• You'll come back, because yours is an error of knowledge, not a moral failure, not an act of surrender to evil, but only the last act of being victim to your own virtue. We'll wait for you and when you come back, you will have discovered that there need never be any conflict among your desires, nor so tragic a clash of values as the one you've borne so well.

  Ayn Rand

  Knowledge, Errors, Evil

• Don't consider our interests or desires. You have no duty to anyone but yourself.

  Ayn Rand

  Desire, Duty, Interest

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.613, Hamilton Books

• Why had we let it go? Why had we both been condemned...to an exile among dreary strangers who had made us give up all desire for rest, for friendship, for the sound of human voices? Could I now reclaim a single hour spent talking to my brother, Philip, and give it to Ken Daggart? Who made it our duty to accept, as the only reward for our work, the gray torture of pretending love for those who roused nothing but contempt?

  Ayn Rand

  Brother, Giving Up, Talking

• Every form of happiness if one, every desire is driven by the same motor--by our love for a single value, for the highest potentiality of our own existence--and every achievement is an expression of it.

  Ayn Rand

  Expression, Achievement, Desire

  Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.1891, Penguin

• Everything has strings leading to everything else. We're all so tied together. We're all in a net, the net is waiting, and we're pushed into it by one single desire. You want a thing and it's precious to you. Do you know who is standing ready to tear it out of your hands? You can't know, it may be so involved and so far away, but someone is ready, and you're afraid of them all. And you cringe and you crawl and you beg and you accept them--just so they'll let you keep it. And look at whom you come to accept.

  Ayn Rand

  Hands, Waiting, Tears

  Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.138, Penguin

• You have no choice about your capacity to feel that something is good for you or evil, but what you will consider good or evil, what will give you joy or pain, what you will love or hate, desire or fear, depends on your standard of value.

  Ayn Rand

  Pain, Hate, Evil

  Ayn Rand (2005). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.964, Penguin

• Did I feel a physical desire for him? I did. Was I moved by a passion of my body? I was. Have I experienced the most violent form of sensual pleasure? I have.

  Ayn Rand

  Passion, Sensual, Desire

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.651, Hamilton Books

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