There is no way of steering successfully between a failed situation and a failed self except by stopping and taking our bearings.

Most people ask of their friends that they understand them, but, on balance, I think I prefer a friend who understands himself.

The cruelest affront is treating the person as exactly the person he is. We all long to be understood, but not for what we are. We long to be understood for what we might have been had all been for the best in the best of all possible worlds and, at the same time, to be forgiven for what we are.

What nonsense it is, this desire to be without limitations, this wish always to be seen in the most flattering light. We are anxious, not because we think so little of ourselves, but because we think so much of ourselves. We are anxious, not that we may appear in the worst light, but that we may not appear in the best light. Anxiety is born of self-consciousness, and it is alleviated to the exact extent that we can drop consciousness of the self.

If life is envisioned as a continuously running motion picture, the keeping of a notebook stops the action and allows a meaningful scene to be explored frame by frame.

We can win the struggle to avoid responsibility for our personal lives, but if we do, what we lose is our lives.

Self-affirmation cannot be found in love; it is a prior condition of genuine love.