Quite possibly the best book I have ever read, though Mindsight by Daniel Siegel ranks equally high, so I guess there are two best books I have ever read. Excerpts from my favourite chapters: That We Risk Growth Over Security & That We Accept at Last that Our Home Is Our Journey
"Our moral, intellectual, and emotional development embodies a series of deaths, followed by enlargements of soul often painfully acquired.... Through analysis I learned that something in me had to die before the rest of me, the larger part, could live.... In choosing security over growth, we all outrage the soul, and the soul, outraged, manifests in symptoms-depression, anxiety disorders, envy and jealousy of others, dependencies, and so many more.... We all set off expecting the achievement of our goals to bring lasting satisfaction. It is not that the goals are unworthy, as such, but that they so often become tempting stopping places for the soul, places where we decline the invitation to trade still more mystery for security.... Every day the decision comes back to us: Choose growth or security-you cannot have both." (2009:85-93)
"That task that each of us is to address is different, although collectively we may call the task individuation, the summons to individual personhood. Our gift to the world will be that separate piece we bring to the whole, but how difficult that assignment often proves. Tiny, vulnerable as we all are, we adapt, take on the coloration of our environment, and soon lose the linkage to what we think, or feel, or desire, or what wants to come into the world through us. Such tasks pull us out of our comfort zones. Once we leave the protective space one associates with "home," one is alone, even more vulnerable, and desperately in need of consensual validation. It is scary out there alone, on the edge of our being, and we pull back and hang on to the platform before springing into the depths.... Homecoming is the goal, but our "home" is not "out there," a geographic place, the protective "other," or a comforting theology or psychology. "Homecoming" means returning to a relationship with the Self, a relationship that was there in the beginning, but from which we necessarily strayed in our obligatory adaptations to the explicit and implicit demands of family, tribe, and culture. Homecoming means healing, means integration of the split-off parts of the soul, means redeeming the dignity and high purpose of our soul's journey. When we are here to live our soul's journey, we can spontaneously be generous to others, for we have much to give from our inner abundance; we can draw and maintain boundaries, for we have learned the difference between their journey and ours; and we can sort through different value clashes because we have found a personal authority that helps us discern what is authentic for us." (2009:239-242)
"[T]he task is not to find the object (as object only, the thing sought will in the end disappoint, prove partial, prove inadequate to the magnitude of the soul) but to live the journey, with passion, and risk, and commitment, and danger." (2009:247)
"Our moral, intellectual, and emotional development embodies a series of deaths, followed by enlargements of soul often painfully acquired.... Through analysis I learned that something in me had to die before the rest of me, the larger part, could live.... In choosing security over growth, we all outrage the soul, and the soul, outraged, manifests in symptoms-depression, anxiety disorders, envy and jealousy of others, dependencies, and so many more.... We all set off expecting the achievement of our goals to bring lasting satisfaction. It is not that the goals are unworthy, as such, but that they so often become tempting stopping places for the soul, places where we decline the invitation to trade still more mystery for security.... Every day the decision comes back to us: Choose growth or security-you cannot have both." (2009:85-93)
"That task that each of us is to address is different, although collectively we may call the task individuation, the summons to individual personhood. Our gift to the world will be that separate piece we bring to the whole, but how difficult that assignment often proves. Tiny, vulnerable as we all are, we adapt, take on the coloration of our environment, and soon lose the linkage to what we think, or feel, or desire, or what wants to come into the world through us. Such tasks pull us out of our comfort zones. Once we leave the protective space one associates with "home," one is alone, even more vulnerable, and desperately in need of consensual validation. It is scary out there alone, on the edge of our being, and we pull back and hang on to the platform before springing into the depths.... Homecoming is the goal, but our "home" is not "out there," a geographic place, the protective "other," or a comforting theology or psychology. "Homecoming" means returning to a relationship with the Self, a relationship that was there in the beginning, but from which we necessarily strayed in our obligatory adaptations to the explicit and implicit demands of family, tribe, and culture. Homecoming means healing, means integration of the split-off parts of the soul, means redeeming the dignity and high purpose of our soul's journey. When we are here to live our soul's journey, we can spontaneously be generous to others, for we have much to give from our inner abundance; we can draw and maintain boundaries, for we have learned the difference between their journey and ours; and we can sort through different value clashes because we have found a personal authority that helps us discern what is authentic for us." (2009:239-242)
"[T]he task is not to find the object (as object only, the thing sought will in the end disappoint, prove partial, prove inadequate to the magnitude of the soul) but to live the journey, with passion, and risk, and commitment, and danger." (2009:247)
If you are interested, James Hollis also has another fantastic book called
"Why Good People Do Bad Things"
"Why Good People Do Bad Things"
There's a new Quote of the Moment up "What Matters Most" -->
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