Embarrassment

Embarrassment is an emotional state of intense discomfort with oneself, experienced upon having a socially unacceptable act or condition witnessed by or revealed to others. Usually some amount of loss of honor or dignity is involved, but how much and the type depends on the embarrassing situation. It is similar to shame, except that shame may be experienced for an act known only to oneself. Also, embarrassment usually carries the connotation of being caused by an act that is merely socially unacceptable, rather than morally wrong.

Arranged alphabetically by author or source:
A · B · C · D · E · F · G · H · I · J · K · L · M · N · O · P · Q · R · S · T · U · V · W · X · Y · Z · Anon · See also · External links

A

• Today self-consciousness no longer means anything but reflection on the ego as embarrassment, as realization of impotence: knowing that one is nothing.
  • Theodor Adorno, in The The Opening of Vision: Nihilism and the Postmodern Situation, p. 144.

• I am not embarrassed to tell you that I believe in miracles.
  • Corazon Aquino, in Borrowed Narratives: Using Biographical and Historical Grief Narratives with ..., p. 193.

B

Jean de la Bruyere: We perceive when love begins and when it declines by our embarrassment when alone together.

• But I learned that there's a certain character that can be built from embarrassing yourself endlessly. If you can sit happy with embarrassment, there's not much else that can really get to ya.
  • Christian Bale, in And You Think Your Job Stinks, p. 29.

• Most things in life are moments of pleasure and a lifetime of embarrassment; photography is a moment of embarrassment and a lifetime of pleasure.
  • Tony Benn, in 99 Things to Do Between Here and Heaven, p. 65.

• What is embarrassment? In general, embarrassment is an emotional response to an innocent mistake. The major reason that some of us are embarrassment-prone is that we’ve been conditioned to set unrealistically high expectations for ourselves and to judge ourselves negatively when we can’t possibly meet those standards. A second reason that makes us susceptible to embarrassment is that we’ve been taught to take our cue in evaluating ourselves from what we assume (often erroneously) to be others’ opinions of us.
  • Toni Bernhard, in Turning Straw Into Gold

• We perceive when love begins and when it declines by our embarrassment when alone together.
  • Jean de la Bruyere, in Brain Snacks: Quotes to Nourish Your Mind, p. 11.

• A wit would often be embarrassed without the company of fools.
  • Jean de la Bruyere, in Moral Reflections, Sentences and Maxims of Francis, Duc de la Rochefoucauld, p. 46.

• He scratched his ear, the infallible resource to which embarrassed people have recourse.
  • Lord Byron,Quotes about Love, p. 51.

C

Winston Churchill:What is a fine person or a beauteous face, Unless deportment give them decent grace; Blessed with all other requisites to please, To want the striking elegance of ease; Awkward, embarrassed, stiff, without the skill Of moving gracefully, or standing.

• Irregular contact with doctors means many men fail to receive any preventive care for potentially life-threatening conditions. In addition, when men do seek care, embarrassment can often prevent them from openly discussing health concerns with their physicians.
  • Michael Crapo, in Out Of Touch:American Men And The Health Care System.

• I have a feeling," says Cavett, "that about 90% of my life has been shaped by my voice, both as an embarrassment and as an advantage. There was always the terrible incongruity of this deep voice barreling out of this little body. Somewhere in the back of my mind I was aware that it was ludicrous, that it took on an importance that wasn't really there. By the time I was in the fourth grade, I sounded exactly like my father on the phone.
  • Dick Cavett, in Words getting along nicely ....

• What is a fine person or a beauteous face, Unless deportment give them decent grace; Blessed with all other requisites to please, To want the striking elegance of ease; Awkward, embarrassed, stiff, without the skill Of moving gracefully, or standing.
  • Winston Churchill, in Department of Deportment", Volume 11, Issue 1,

• Have you ever gotten the feeling that you aren't completely embarassed yet, but you glimpse tomorrow's embarrassment?
  • Tom Cruise, in Reporting for Doodie, p. 5.

D

• It's an embarrassment of riches because you have directors who don't better. You end up with so much stuff going on the screen that you don't know where to look, and that's what I consider self-indulgent.
  • John Dykstra, in Justice for the Stellenbosch Market Day08

E

• But that intimacy of mutual embarrassment, in which each feels that the other is feeling something, having once existed, its effect is not to be done away with.
  • George Eliot, in Literary Theory and Criticism: An Oxford Guide, p. 508.

• The rate at which a person can mature is directly proportional to the embarrassment he can tolerate.
  • Douglas Engelbart, in Computerworld 22 Jun 1992, in p. 42.

H

Bill Hybels: For a marriage relationship to flourish, there must be intimacy. It takes an enormous amount of courage to say to your spouse, "This is me. I'm not proud of it -- in fact, I'm a little embarrassed by it -- but this is who I am.

• I bet when neanderthal kids would make a snowman, someone would always end up saying, 'Don't forget the thick, heavy brows.' Then they would get all embarrassed because they remembered they had the big husky brows too, and they'd get mad and eat the snowman.
  • Jack Handey, in The History of the Snowman, p. 145.

• For a marriage relationship to flourish, there must be intimacy. It takes an enormous amount of courage to say to your spouse, "This is me. I'm not proud of it -- in fact, I'm a little embarrassed by it -- but this is who I am.
  • Bill Hybels, in Who You Are When No One's Looking: Choosing Consistency, Resisting Compromise, p. 23.

J

• Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything - all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.
  • Steve Jobs, in Media/Impact: An Introduction to Mass Media, p. 189.

K

Helen Keller:Literature is my Utopia. Here I am not disenfranchised. No barrier of the senses shuts me out from the sweet, gracious discourses of my book friends. They talk to me without embarrassment or awkwardness.

• The reason to retire is to try to avoid embarrassment; you ought to do it before people are dropping big hints. You want to be the first to come up with the idea. You don't want to wait until you trip and fall off the stage.
  • Garrison Keillor, in Garrison Keillor says he's looking to retire in 2013

• Literature is my Utopia. Here I am not disenfranchised. No barrier of the senses shuts me out from the sweet, gracious discourses of my book friends. They talk to me without embarrassment or awkwardness.
  • Helen Keller, in Quotes and Words of Inspiration, p. 135.

• A simple compliment goes a really long way - for a guy to just come over and say, 'You have great hair' or 'I really like your dress,' and then just smile and walk away. That's a great move, because he's sort of putting himself out there by doing that, but it won't lead to any embarrassment if the girl isn't interested.
  • Stacy Keibler, in Clooney's girl Stacy Keibler offers next man secrets on how to woo her

L

• All parents are an embarrassment to their kids. Often, grandparents are the relief. Kids don't have to resist you.
  • Anne Lamott, in Anne Lamott's directions for grandparents: 'Some Assembly Required'

• There they were, and there was the rest of this wicked world, too – intact, unchanged, unjudged, unsaved, unended. There was nothing for it then but they may flee Harmony. There was not one thing left for them to stay here for, except maybe extreme embarrassment and profound shame.
  • Frances Ann Lebowitz, in Harmony, p. 7.

• When an acquaintance goes by I often step back from my window, not so much to spare him the effort of acknowledging me as to spare myself the embarrassment of seeing that he has not done so.
  • Georg C. Lichtenberg, in Memorable Quotations: Philosophers of Western Civilization, p. 140.

M

• The best work that anybody ever writes is the work that is on the verge of embarrassing him, always.
  • Arthur Miller, in The Courage to Write: How Writers Transcend Fear,, p. 20.

N

• The embarrassment after the anger is biggest humiliation a person can experience.
  • Friedrich Nietzsche, I Chewing the Cud: Anticipations of Nietzschean Thought, p. 98.

P

• Sotomayor's vainglorious lecture bromide about herself as 'a wise Latina' trumping white men is a vulgar embarrassment - a vestige of the bad old days of male-bashing feminism.
  • Camille Paglia, in Latina Quotes

• Right now, my daughter's just rolling her eyes at everything I do; I'm just an embarrassment.
  • Elizabeth Perkins, in Chicken Soup for the Soul: Family Matters: 101 Unforgettable Stories about, p. 323.

• Embarrassment isn't a just cause of action.
  • Jodi Picoult, in Handle with Care: A Novel, p. 48.

R

• Hell hath no fury like a man embarrassed by a woman.
  • J.R. Rain, in Samantha Moon: The First Four Vampire for Hire Novels, Plus the Christmas .., p. 86.

• Have you ever noticed how parents can go from the most wonderful people in the world to totally embarrassing in three seconds?
  • in The red pyramid, p. 502.

S

• If you are never scared, embarrassed or hurt, it means you never take chances.
  • Julia Soul, in Wisdom for the Soul: Five Millennia of Prescriptions for Spiritual Healing,, p. 192.

T

Lewis Thomas:Ants are so much like human beings as to be an embarrassment. They farm fungi, raise aphids as livestock, launch armies into war, use chemical sprays to alarm and confuse enemies, capture slaves, engage in child labour, exchange information ceaselessly. They do everything but watch television.

• One begins to mistrust very clever people when they become embarrassed.
  • John Taylor, in Chewing the Cud: Anticipations of Nietzschean Thought, p. 97.

• Ants are so much like human beings as to be an embarrassment. They farm fungi, raise aphids as livestock, launch armies into war, use chemical sprays to alarm and confuse enemies, capture slaves, engage in child labour, exchange information ceaselessly. They do everything but watch television.
  • , in Marching with the Mighty Mermecolion: Inevitable World Domination by Gold-Digging Ants

• I hope for the day when everyone can speak again of God without embarrassment.
  • Paul Tillich, in Christianity and Crisis, Volumes 19-20, p. 55.

• Asteroids have us in our sight. The dinosaurs didn't have a space program, so they're not here to talk about this problem. We are, and we have the power to do something about it. I don't want to be the embarrassment of the galaxy, to have had the power to deflect an asteroid, and then not, and end up going extinct.
  • Neil deGrasse Tyson, in 'Space Chronicles': Why Exploring Space Still Matters

V

• Writing in other voices is almost Japanese in the sense that there's a certain formality there which allows me to sidestep the embarrassment of directly expressing to complete strangers the most intimate details of my life.
  • Suzanne Vega, in Solo: women singer-songwriters in their own words, p. 162.

W

• It does kids no favors, and sets them up for a potential lifetime of poor health and social embarrassment, to excuse them from family meals of real food. Everyone benefits from healthy eating, but it is particularly crucial at the beginning of life. Providing your children with a variety of healthy foods -- and gently but persistently continuing to offer them exclusively during a child's "picky" phase -- are among a parent's most important obligations.
  • Andrew Weil, in 10 Ways to Have a Happier Life.

• I became obsessed with making more and more tiny things. I think I was trying to find a way of compensating for my embarrassment at having learning difficulties: people had made me feel small so I wanted to show them how significant 'small' could be.
  • Willard Wigan, in tiny world of Willard Wigan, nano sculptor

Anonymous

• Women aren't embarrassed when they buy men's pajamas, but a man buying a nightgown acts as though he were dealing with a dope peddler.
  • In 20,000 Quips & Quotes, p. 480.

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