Carl Jung is considered to be one of the most important psychologists to ever exist. His work on understanding the unconscious and its relationship to our actions and thoughts is unparalleled and laid the foundation for a new field of study. But more than that, he believed that spirituality was an innate part of human existence; something that comes naturally to us, irrespective of religion, culture, or geography. He gave evidence of this by presenting the many similar symbols that societies developed across oceans and time. Here are 20 quotes from Jung that I feel not only serve as an accurate representation of his work, but also provide much to reflect on.
“I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.”
“Everything about other people that doesn’t satisfy us helps us to better understand ourselves.”
“Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.”
”One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light but by making the darkness conscious.”
“A dream is a small hidden door in the deepest and most intimate sanctum of the soul, which opens up to that primeval cosmic night that was the soul, long before there was the conscious ego.”
“Don’t hold on to someone who’s leaving, otherwise you won’t meet the one who’s coming.”
“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”
“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.”
“If you are a gifted person, it doesn’t mean that you gained something. It means you have something to give back.”
“People will do anything, no matter how absurd, to avoid facing their own souls.”
“Mistakes are, after all, the foundations of truth, and if a man does not know what a thing is, it is at least an increase in knowledge if he knows what it is not.”
“I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.”
“The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.”
“Your perception will become clear only when you can look into your soul.”
“Your visions will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.”
“Loneliness does not come from having no people around, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself, or from holding certain views which others find inadmissible.”
“A man who has not passed through the inferno of his passions has never overcome them.”
“We may think that we fully control ourselves. However, a friend can easily reveal something about us that we have absolutely no idea about.”
“Depression is like a woman in black. If she turns up, don’t shoo her away. Invite her in, offer her a seat, treat her like a guest and listen to what she wants to say.”
“What you resist, persists.”