After 20 years of writing in basically a vacuum, I love being part of a community. I've vetted other writers' contracts for them and do publicity for free just because I like a book. Some people think of it as hubris or careerism, but I love to champion books. You can't use your whole sphere of influence just to help yourself.
We're all victims of our own hubris at times.
The three chief virtues of a programmer are: Laziness, Impatience and Hubris.
Hubris itself will not let you be an artist.
The idea that a story has to be 'exceptional' in order to be worth telling is curious to me. What if we looked at every single person's story as a site of possibly infinite meaning? What if we came to believe that there isn't hubris or narcissism in thinking your story might be worth sharing - only a sense of curiosity and offering?
Every time I get accustomed to low volatility, like we were towards the end of the Greenspan era, and we think we have all the levers under the control... something erupts to remind us that the idea that anybody is in control of everything is hubris.
Hubris is interesting, because you get people who are often very clever, very powerful, have achieved great things, and then something goes wrong - they just don't know when to stop.
Empires always have the hubris to think they are indestructible, when in fact they are always unsustainable.
Air travelers, of course, are famous for their hubris. They carry on too many bags and use the restroom when the seat-belt sign is on.
As a kid, I watched 'Bugs Bunny' cartoons, and for some reason Pepe Le Pew, the indomitable French skunk pursuing his would-be kitty paramour, left his mark on me: became an instant emblem of odoriferous hubris, hedonistic bad behavior. He was an entry-level Dominique Strauss-Kahn, a rookie Marquis de Sade.
