Quotes from Sigmund Freud

Happiness is a child's dream fulfilled in maturity.

T]he theory of Empedocles which especially deserves our interest is one which approximates so closely to the psychoanalytic theory of the instincts that we should be tempted to maintain that the two are identical, if it were not for the difference that the Greek philosopher's theory is a cosmic phantasy while ours is content to claim biological validity.

la civilización todavía no ha sido capaz de difundirse en las almas de la mayoría de los hombres sin una acumulación explosiva de energías destructoras.

I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand,as in what direction we are moving.To reach the port of heaven, we must sail sometimes with the windand sometimes against it—but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor

Gustavo Solivellas dice: La humanidad progresa. La gente hoy solamente quema mis libros; siglos atrás me hubieran quemado a mí (Sigmund Freud)

Was man nicht erfliegen kann, muß man erhinken. . . . . . . Die Schrift sagt, es ist keine Sünde zu hinken.

filozoflar?n tan?d??? ruhsal,psikanalizin tan?d??? ruhsaldan ayr? bir ÅŸeydi.filozoflar?n büyük çoÄŸunluÄŸu salt bilinçli olaylara ruhsal ad?n? vermekteydi.bilinçli dünyayla ruhsal?n kapsam? birbiriyle çak??maktayd? filozoflara göre....filozoflara göre ruhun bilinçli fenomenlerden baÅŸka bir içeriÄŸi yoktu.

Schubert, for instance, claims: "The dream is the liberation of the spirit from the pressure of external nature, a detachment of the soul from the fetters of matter.

The chief task during the latency period seems to be the fending-off of the temptation to masturbate. This struggle produces a series of symptoms which appear in a typical fashion in the most different individuals and which in general have the character of a ceremonial. It is a great pity that no one has as yet collected them and systematically analysed them.

It is therefore reasonable to expect of an analyst, as a part of his qualifications, a considerable degree of mental normality and correctness. In addition, he must possess some kind of superiority, so that in certain analytic situations he can act as a model for his patient and in others as a teacher. And finally we must not forget that the analytic relationship is based on a love of truth — that is, on a recognition of reality — and that it precludes any kind of sham or deceit.

But besides having this special feature which is difficult to isolate, we notice that anxiety is accompanied by fairly definite physical sensations which can be referred to particular organs of the body. [...] The clearest and most frequent ones are those connected with the respiratory organs and with the heart. They provide evidence that motor innervations—that is, processes of discharge—play a part in the general phenomenon of anxiety.

It almost looks as if analysis were the third of those 'impossible' professions in which one can be sure beforehand of achieving unsatisfying results. The other two, which have been known much longer, are education and government.

bisogna svelarsi come il solo malvagio fra tutte le nobili persone con le quali si spartisce la vita

We assume, in other words, that an anxiety-state is the reproduction of some experience which contained the necessary conditions for such an increase of excitation and a discharge along particular paths, and that from this circumstance the unpleasure of anxiety receives its specific character. In man, birth provides a prototypic experience of this kind, and we are therefore inclined to regard anxiety-states as a reproduction of the trauma of birth.

Barátom így szólt hozzám akkor az Andrássy-úton: Semmi emberi nem idegen tÅ'lem, mire én - pszichoanalitikus tapasztalatokra célozva - megjegyeztem: Messzebb is mehetnél ennél, és beismerhetnéd, hogy semmi állati nem idegen tÅ'led.

Just as the ego controls the path to action in regard to the external world, so it controls access to consciousness.

Our aim will not be to rub off every peculiarity of human character for the sake of a schematic 'normality', nor yet to demand that the person who has been 'thoroughly analysed' shall feel no passions and develop no internal conflicts. The business of the analysis is to secure the best possible psychological conditions for the functions of the ego; with that it has discharged its task

We have decided to consider pleasure and 'pain' in relation to the quantity of excitation present in the psychic life—and not confined in any way—along such lines that 'pain' corresponds with an increase and pleasure with a decrease in this quantity.

In my opinion the other affects are also reproductions of very early, perhaps even pre-individual, experiences of vital importance; and I should be inclined to regard them as universal, typical and innate hysterical attacks, as compared to the recently and individually acquired attacks which occur in hysterical neuroses and whose origin and significance as mnemic symbols have been revealed by analysis.

Implacable, though not always on that account successful, severity is shown in condemning the temptation to continue early infantile masturbation, which now attaches itself to regressive (sadistic-anal) ideas but which nevertheless represents the unsubjugated part of the phallic organization.

In order to understand a hysterical attack, all one has to do is to look for the situation in which the movements in question formed part of an appropriate and expedient action.

Many writers have laid much stress on the weakness of the ego in relation to the id and of our rational elements in the face of the daemonic forces within us; and they display a strong tendency to make what I have said into a corner-stone of a psycho-analytic Weltanschauung . Yet surely the psycho-analyst, with his knowledge of the way in which repression works, should, of all people, be restrained from adopting such an extreme and one-sided view.

pleasure or pain may be thought of in psycho-physical relationship to conditions of stability and instability

Die Strenge der ethischen Forderungen würde nicht viel schaden, wenn die Erziehung sagte: So sollten die Menschen sein, um glücklich zu werden und andere glücklich zu machen; aber man muß damit rechnen, daß sie nicht so sind. Anstatt dessen läßt man den Jugendlichen glauben, daß alle anderen die ethischen Vorschriften erfüllen, also tugendhaft sind. Damit begründet man die Forderung, daß er auch so werde.