There are some authors who contend that meanings and values are "nothing but defense mechanisms, reaction formations and sublimations." But as for myself, I would not be willing to live merely for the sake of my "defense mechanisms," nor would I be ready to die merely for the sake of my "reaction formations.

Humor was another of the soul's weapons in the fight for self-preservation.

In his creative work the artist is dependent on sources and resources deriving from the spiritual unconscious.

It is here that we encounter the central theme of existentialism: to live is to suffer, to survive is to find meaning in the suffering.

Pain is only bearable if we know it will end, not if we deny it exists.

What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for some goal worthy of him. What he needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost, but the call of a potential meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him.

Sleep [is like] a dove which has landed near one's hand and stays there as long as one does not pay any attention to it.