Carl Jung Quotes

On feeling lost at the start of a midlife reinvention:

Thoroughly unprepared, we take the step into the afternoon of life.

On how a serious relationship changes both people whether they like it or not:

The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.

On ignoring advice that worked for a friend but does not fit your life:

The shoe that fits one person pinches another; there is no recipe for living that suits all cases.

Weighing whether to commit to a partner for the long haul:

Marriage is a psychological relationship.

Deciding whether to keep fighting a conflict that will not resolve:

The greatest and most important problems of life are all fundamentally insoluble. They can never be solved, but only outgrown.

On staying compassionate toward someone who wronged you:

Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.

On making peace with a decision that felt right and wrong at once:

The pendulum of the mind oscillates between sense and nonsense, not between right and wrong.

On choosing meaningful work over merely lucrative work:

As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being.

On feeling isolated inside a crowded social life:

Loneliness does not come from having no people about one, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself.

On making room for a creative hobby you keep deprioritizing:

The debt we owe to the play of imagination is incalculable.

On recognizing a compulsive habit that looks virtuous from the outside:

Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol or morphine or idealism.

On whether suppressing a temptation counts as overcoming it:

A man who has not passed through the inferno of his passions has never overcome them.

Choosing between controlling a relationship and trusting it:

Where love rules, there is no will to power; and where power predominates, there love is lacking.

Facing the parts of yourself you have been avoiding:

The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.

Choosing whether to sit with a painful truth or numb it:

There is no coming to consciousness without pain.

Deciding how to respond to a person who keeps getting under your skin:

Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.

Weighing whether to finally pursue the life you deferred for your family:

Nothing has a stronger influence psychologically on their environment and especially on their children than the unlived life of the parent.