Quotes from Carl Jung

All the works of man have their origin in creative fantasy.

Sacrifice always means the renunciation of a valuable part of oneself, and through it the sacrificer escapes being devoured.

He could find his soul in desire itself, but not in the objects of desire.

Man's estrangement from the mythical realm and the subsequent shrinking of his existence to the mere factual—that is the major cause of mental illness.

A dream is nothing but a lucky idea that comes to us from the dark, all-unifying world of the psyche. What would be more natural, when we have lost ourselves amid the endless particulars and isolated details of the world's surface, than to knock at the door of dreams and inquire of them the bearings which would bring us closer to the basic facts of human existence?

No one should deny the danger of the descent, but it can be risked. No one need to risk it, but it is certain that someone will. And let those who go down the sunset way do so with open eyes, for it is a sacrifice which daunts even the gods. Yet every descent is followed by an ascent; the vanishing shapes are shaped anew, and a truth is valid in the end only if it suffers change and bears new witness in new images, in new tongues, like a new wine that is put into new bottles.

Nothing worse could happen to one than to be completely understood.

Among the so-called neurotics of our day there are a good many who in other ages would not have been neurotic - that is, divided against themselves. If they had lived in a period and in a milieu in which man was still linked by myth with the world of the ancestors, and thus with nature truly experienced and not merely seen from the outside, they would have been spared this division with themselves.

I find that all my thoughts circle around God like the planets around the sun, and are irresistibly attracted to him. I would feel like to be the grossest sin if I were to oppose any resistance to this force

No culture of the mind is enough to make a garden out of your soul.

You should be he himself--not Christians, but Christ.

The psychology of the individual is reflected in the psychology of the nation…Only a change in the attitude of the individual can initiate a change in the psychology of the nation. The great problems of humanity were never yet solved by general laws, but only through regeneration of the attitudes of individuals.

Dreams are the guiding words of the soul.

It is no more possible to make life easy than it is to grow a herb of immortality.

We have come back from Jerusalem where we found not what we sought!

An evil person lurks inside all of us, and only if we recognize that fact can we hope to tame them [sic].

I shall not commit the fashionable stupidity of regarding everything that I can not explain as a fraud.

so intimate is the intermingling of bodily and psychic traits" wrote Carl Jung "that not only can we draw far-reaching inferences as to the constitution of the psyche from the constitution of the body, but we can also infer from psychic peculiarities the corresponding bodily characteristics.

We cannot change anything unless we accept it.

We cannot change anything unless we accept it. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses.

There is no coming to consciousness without pain.

Nothing has a stronger influence psychologically on their environment, and especially on their children, than the unlived lives of the parents.

One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings. The curriculum is so much necessary raw material, but warmth is a vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child.

The psychotherapist learns little or nothing from his successes. They mainly confirm him in his mistakes, while his failures, on the other hand, are priceless experiences in that they not only open up the way to a deeper truth, but force him to change his views and methods.