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Sigmund Freud

Sigmund Freud Quotes

Neurologist

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Famous Sigmund Freud Quotes

“The study of dreams may be considered the most trustworthy method of investigating deep mental processes. Now dreams occurring in traumatic neuroses have the characteristic of repeatedly bringing the patient back into the situation of his accident, a situation from which he wakes up in another fright.”

MayDreamProcessSituationStudyWake UpMethodPatientAccidentsCharacteristicsTrustworthyNeurosisFrightInvestigating
Book:Beyond the Pleasure Principle
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“Psycho-analysis has taught us that a boy's earliest choice of objects for his love is incestuous and that those objects are forbidden ones - his mother and his sister. We have learnt, too, the manner in which, as he grows up, he liberates himself from this incestuous attraction. A neurotic, on the other hand, invariably exhibits some degree of psychical infantilism. He has either failed to get free from the psychosexual conditions that prevailed in his childhood or he has returned to them - two possibilities which may be summed up as developmental inhibition and regression.”

MayTwoHandsMotherChoicesGrowsLove IsBoysGrowing UpChildhoodConditionsPossibilityObjectsTaughtDegreesAttractionAnalysisForbiddenHis LoveNeuroticExhibitsTaught UsPsychoInhibitionsDevelopmentalRegression
Book:Totem and Taboo
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“Taboo restrictions are distinct from religious or moral prohibitions. They are not based upon any divine ordinance, but may be said to impose themselves on their own account. They differ from moral prohibitions in that they fall into no system that declares quite generally that certain abstinences must be observed and gives reasons for that necessity.”

GivingMaySaidReasonCertainFallReligiousMoralDivineAccountsRestrictionTabooProhibitionAbstinenceOrdinances
Book:Totem and Taboo
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“Obsessional prohibitions are extremely liable to displacement. They extend from one object to another along whatever paths the context may provide, and this new object then becomes, to use the apt expression of one of my women patients, 'impossible' - till at last the whole world lies under an embargo of 'impossibility'.”

WorldMayWholeUseLastsLyingPathImpossibleObjectsExpressionPatientWhole WorldImpossibilityProhibitionLiableDisplacementEmbargo
Book:Totem and Taboo
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“If all the evidence put forward for the authenticity of religious teachings originates in the past, it is natural to look round and see whether the present, about which it is easier to form judgements, may not also be able to furnish evidence of the sort. If by this means we could succeed in clearing even a single portion of the religious system from doubt, the whole of it would gain enormously in credibility.”

IfsLooksMayMeanWholeAblePastFormNaturalReligiousDoubtTeachingEasierSucceedEvidenceGainsRoundsAuthenticityJudgementPortionsCredibilityClearing
Book:The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud
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“We may insist as often as we like that man's intellect is powerless in comparison to his instinctual life, and we may be right in this. Nevertheless, there is something peculiar about this weakness. The voice of the intellect is a soft one, but it will not rest until it has gained a hearing. Finally, after a countless succession of rebuffs, it succeeds.”

MenMayVoiceSucceedWeaknessHearingIntellectComparisonPeculiarNeverthelessPowerlessSuccessionRebuff
Book:The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud
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“Our possibilities of happiness are already restricted by our constitution. Unhappiness is much less difficult to experience. We are threatened with suffering from three directions: from our own body, which is doomed to decay and dissolution and which cannot even do without pain and anxiety as warning signals; from the external world, which may rage against us with overwhelming and merciless forces of destruction; and finally from our relations to other men. The suffering which comes from this last source is perhaps more painful to us than any other.”

MenWorldMayBodyPainLastsSufferingThreeForceDifficultPossibilitySourceAnxietyDestructionConstitutionRelationPainfulRageUnhappinessOverwhelmingWarningDecayDoomedThreatenedSignalsDissolutionWithout Pain
Book:Civilization and Its Discontents
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“Human beings are funny. They long to be with the person they love but refuse to admit openly. Some are afraid to show even the slightest sign of affection because of fear. Fear that their feelings may not be recognized, or even worst, returned. But one thing about human beings puzzles me the most is their conscious effort to be connected with the object of their affection even if it kills them slowly within.”

IfsHumansMayPersonsLongShowsFeelingsHuman BeingsEffortOne ThingWorstObjectsConsciousAffectionRefuseConnectedPuzzles
Author:Sigmund Freud
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“We find a place for what we lose. Although we know that after such a loss the acute stage of mourning will subside, we also know that we shall remain inconsolable and will never find a substitute. No matter what may fill the gap, even if it be filled completely, it nevertheless remains something else.”

IfsKnowsMayMatterChangeLosesLossGriefStageNo Matter WhatRemainsFilledGrievingMourningGapsSubstitutesNeverthelessGriefingGrief And MourningMourning LossMourning A Loss
Author:Sigmund Freud
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“The expectation that every neurotic phenomenon can be cured may, I suspect, be derived from the layman's belief that the neuroses are something quite unnecessary which have no right whatever to exist. Whereas in fact they are severe, constitutionally fixed illnesses, which rarely restrict themselves to only a few attacks but persist as a rule over long periods throughout life.”

LifeMayLongFactsBeliefPeriodsExpectationsIllnessPsychologicalFixedSuspectsPhenomenonUnnecessaryPersistSevereNeuroticNeurosisLayman
Book:New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis
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“The adoption of the required attitude of mind towards ideas that seem to emerge "of their own free will" and the abandonment of the critical function that is normally in operation against them seem to be hard of achievement for some people. The "involuntary thoughts" are liable to release a most violent resistance, which seeks to prevent their emergence. If we may trust that great poet and philosopher Friedrich Schiller, however, poetic creation must demand an exactly similar attitude.”

PeopleIfsMindMayIdeasHardSeemsAttitudeCreationPoetDemandAchievementFunctionPhilosopherCriticalViolentResistanceCraftsReleaseOperationsFree WillPoeticAdoptionAbandonmentLiableEmergenceGreat PoetInvoluntary
Book:The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud
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“Our knowledge of the historical worth of certain religious doctrines increases our respect for them, but does not invalidate our proposal that they should cease to be put forward as the reasons for the precepts of civilization. On the contrary! Those historical residues have helped us to view religious teachings, as it were, as neurotic relics, and we may now argue that the time has probably come, as it does in an analytic treatment, for replacing the effects of repression by the results of the rational operation of the intellect.”

ShouldMayDoeReasonCertainReligionReligiousResultsViewsAtheismTeachingEffectsCivilizationIncreaseHistoricalIntellectPositive AtheismArguingContraryCeaseDoctrineRationalOperationsTreatmentProposalNeuroticRepressionAnalyticsRelicsSuperego
Author:Sigmund Freud
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“All elongated objects, such as sticks, tree-trunks and umbrellas(the opening of these last being comparable to an erection) may stand for the male organ...Boxes, cases, chests, cupboards, and ovens represent the uterus...Rooms in dreams are usually women...Many landscapes in dreams, especially any containing breidges or wooded hills, may clearly be recognized as descriptions of the genitals.”

MayDreamLastsRoomsCasesTreeObjectsSticksMalesBoxesOpeningHillsLandscapeDescriptionChestsOrgansUmbrellaTrunksContainingOvensCupboardsUterusTree Trunks
Author:Sigmund Freud
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“Against the suffering which may come upon one from human relationships the readiest safeguard is voluntary isolation, keeping oneself aloof from other people. The happiness which can be achieved along this path is, as we see, the happiness of quietness. Against the dreaded external world one can only defend oneself by some kind of turning away from it, if one intends to solve the task by oneself.”

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Book:Civilization and Its Discontents
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