Quotes from David Richo

anything that crosses swords with our entitled ego is a powerful source of transformation and inner evolution.

we cannot tolerate them, we add stress to our lives by fighting a losing game.

Yes is the brave ally of serenity; no is the scared accomplice of anxiety.

A great hope fell You heard no noise The ruin was within Oh cunning wreck that told no tale And let no witness in…. A not admitting of the wound Until it grew so wide That all my life had entered it And there was room beside…

Submit to being called a neurotic. You belong to that splendid and pitiable family which is the salt of the earth. All the greatest things we know have come to us from neurotics. It is they and they only who have founded religions and created great works of art. Never will the world be conscious of how much it owes to them, nor above all of what they have suffered in order to bestow their gifts on it. —MARCEL PROUST, Guermantes Way, Vol. I

To create a pause between the stimulus and your reaction, add a truth to every defensive answer. For a healthy adult, the truth is the only defense and the best resource.

Beings as complex as ourselves need retreats from others to explore the depths of our character and our destiny. We need regular periods of solitude to replenish ourselves, to locate new sources of creativity and self-knowledge, and to discover possibilities in our souls that are invisible when we are with others.

success in managing fear prevents us from ever facing it fully. Surrender to it ventilates our souls so that fear becomes an old pickpocket who has lost his skill to steal from us. How ironic that our ego lives in dread of such a surrender! Avoiding it annuls its arrival today, but it keeps coming back, subpoena in hand. Here we fear what would free us. So we lose when we win. The same applies to the Void. To avoid is to win but lose. Facing our Void is all that will free us from it. One

It is a sign of health when we acknowledge the legitimacy of our longings.

Safety refers to an inner sense that no harm will come to us for freely being ourselves in feeling, word and deed. Security refers to an inner sense that someone will be there for us.

When you are given attention, your intuitions are treated as if they matter. You are taken seriously. You are given credit when it is due. Your feelings have such high value to those who love you that they are on the lookout for them. They even look for the feelings you are afraid to know and gently inquire whether you want to show them.

In attention, you are heard and noticed. In acceptance, you are embraced as worthy, not compared to your siblings but trusted, empowered, understood, and fully approved of as you are in your uniqueness.

The fact that things do not always go according to plan means that many powers beyond ego are at work in our lives—powers that lead us to our destiny by a path we might have neglected.

For all that has been: Thanks. For all that shall be: Yes.

While certain partners may hurt us, they cannot undo the abiding trust that we continue to carry so steadfastly toward the human world. We become able to hold others with a relaxed grasp, not compulsively or coercively as if we needed to hold on for dear life. Buddhist writer Stephen T. Butterfield wrote, "Since no relationship can be made entirely safe and secure . . . this has to mean trust in one's own ability to use any consequence, including betrayal, as a means for waking up.

No moment is ever trivial, since any moment points to the exit into enlightenment.

The heart of any psychological work is addressing, processing, resolving, and integrating the issue at hand. These words form the acronym APRI, which in Italian means "you open." As we understand this central and necessary four-part plan to complete our unfinished business, transference may not have to kick in so fiercely anymore.

We say an unconditional yes to the given of life that our needs will not always be met and also to the first noble truth of Buddhism, that life includes unsatisfactoriness.

This is the true joy in life: being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one, being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap, being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish, little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. —GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

We sit as a practice for how we will act throughout the day. Mindfulness, however, involves more than sitting. It is moment by moment non-clinging to ego. It is the simplicity that results when we experience reality without the clutter produced by the decorative arts of ego.

We are not alone in our psychological or spiritual evolution. A higher power than ego, wiser than our intellect and more enduring than our will, kicks in to assist us. Even now, as you read this, many bodhisattvas and saints are gathering to become your mighty companions on your heart's path.

If our emotional needs were fulfilled by our parents/caregivers, we emerge from childhood with a trust that others can give us what we need. We can then receive love from others without distress or compulsion. Our needs are moderate. We can trust someone to help fulfill our needs while we help fulfill hers. This provides a foundation for a life of intimacy and equanimity.

Tanr?m, bana de?i?tirebilece?im ?eyleri de?i?tirmek için cesaret, de?i?tiremeyeceklerimi kabul etmek için sab?r ve ikisini birbirinden ay?rmak için ak?l ihsan eyle. Reinhold Niebuhr

The perfect partner is the mirage we see after crossing the desert of insufficient love.