Our unconscious, then, does not believe in its own death; it behaves as if it were immortal. It knows nothing that is negative; in it contradictories coincide. This may be the secret of heroism.

Life, as we find it, is too hard for us; it brings us too many pains, disappointments and impossible tasks. In order to bear it we cannot dispense with palliative measures... There are perhaps three such measures: powerful deflections, which cause us to make light of our misery; substitutive satisfactions, which diminish it; and intoxicating substances, which make us insensible to it.

When making a decision of minor importance, I have always found it advantageous to consider all the pros and cons. In vital matters, however, such as the choice of a mate or a profession, the decision should come from the unconscious, from somewhere within ourselves. In the important decisions of personal life, we should be governed, I think, by the deep inner needs of our nature.

Love in the form of longing and deprivation lowers the self regard.

In mourning it is the world which has become poor and empty; in melancholia it is the ego itself.

It almost looks like analysis were the third of those 'impossible' professions in which one can be quite sure of unsatisfying results. The other two, much older-established, are the bringing up of children and the government of nations.

I consider it a good rule for letter-writing to leave unmentioned what the recipient already knows, and instead tell him something new.