Quotes from Sigmund Freud

The ego is, indeed, the organized portion of the id.

First published in 1893 and written in collaboration with Josef Breuer (1842-1925)

The energetic and successful man is the one who succeeds in transforming the fantasies of desire into reality.

We should be quite wrong if we pictured the ego and the id as two opposing camps and if we supposed that, when the ego tries to suppress a part of the id by means of repression, the remainder of the id comes to the rescue of the endangered part and measures its strength with the ego. This may often be what happens, but it is certainly not the initial situation in repression. As a rule the instinctual impulse which is to be repressed remains isolated.

As the neurosis proceeds, we often find that the endeavour to undo a traumatic experience is a motive of first-rate importance in the formation of symptoms.

Îndr?gostitul este foarte nebun.

Nevertheless it may be admitted that the therapeutic efforts of psycho-analysis have chosen a similar line of approach. Its intention is, indeed, to strengthen the ego, to make it more independent of the superego, to widen its field of perception and enlarge its organization, so that it can appropriate fresh portions of the id. Where id was, there ego shall be. [ Wo es war, soll Ich werden. ]

La sugestión, en efecto, no puede producir nada que no se halle ya entre los contenidos de la consciencia o que no haya sido introducido en ella.

Die rührende, im Grunde so kindliche Elternliebe ist nichts anderes als der wiedergeborene Narzißmus der Eltern, der in seiner Umwandlung zur Objektliebe sein einstiges Wesen unverkennbar offenbart.

Não quebro muitas vezes a cabeça a propósito da questão do bem e do mal, mas, em média, descobri muito pouco «bem» entre os homens. Segundo o que deles sei, são na maioria escumalha, quer se reclamem da ética desta ou daquela doutrina, quer de nenhuma.

The aggressive impulse flows mainly from the destructive instinct; and we have always believed that in a neurosis it is against the demands of the libido and not against those of any other instinct that the ego is defending itself.

Mit Sicherheit weiß ich nur das eine, daß die Werturteile der Menschen unbedingt von ihren Glückswünschen geleitet werden, also ein Versuch sind, ihre Illusionen mit Argumenten zu stützen. Die Schicksalsfrage der Menschenart scheint mir zu sein, ob und in welchem Maße es ihrer Kulturentwicklung gelingen wird, der Störung des Zusammenlebens durch den menschlichen Aggressions- und Selbstvernichtungstrieb Herr zu werden.

Life as we find it is too hard for us it entails too much pain too many disappointments impossible tasks. We cannot do without palliative remedies.

Neurosis is the inability to tolerate ambiguity.

[The child receives impressions like] a photographic exposure that can be developed after any interval of time and transformed into a picture.

Love is a state of temporary psychosis.

Dogs love their friends and bite their enemies, quite unlike people, who are incapable of pure love and always have to mix love and hate.

Psychoanalysis is in essence a cure through love.

Where they love they do not desire and where they desire they do not love.

Without love we fall ill.

Whoever loves becomes humble. Those who love have, so to speak, pawned a part of their narcissism.

All giving is asking, and all asking is an asking for love.

It is not attention that the child is seeking, but love.

Instinct of love toward an object demands a mastery to obtain it, and if a person feels they can't control the object or feel threatened by it, they act negatively toward it.