The dynamics and structures found in those groups called families in our society may not be evident in those groups called families in other places and times. R. D. Laing More Quotes by R. D. Laing More Quotes From R. D. Laing We are all in a post-hypnotic trance induced in early infancy. R. D. Laing tranceinfancy-isposts Creative people who can't help but explore other mental territories are at greater risk, just as someone who climbs a mountain is more at risk than someone who just walks along a village lane. R. D. Laing creativityinspirationalpeople If I hazard a guess as to the most endemic, prevalent anxiety among human beings-including fear of death, abandonment, loneliness-nothing is more prevalent than the fear of one another. R. D. Laing anxietylonelinessspiritual From the alienated starting point of our pseudo-sanity, everything is equivocal. Our sanity is not "true" sanity. Their madness is not "true" madness. The madness of our patients is an artifact of the destruction wreaked on them by us, and by them on themselves. R. D. Laing pseudomadnesspatient Doctors have throughout time made fortunes on killing their patients with their cures. The difference in psychiatry is that it is the death of the soul. R. D. Laing doctorsmedicinedifferences Perfection is something we should all strive for. It's a duty and a joy to perfect one's nature... The most difficult thing is love. A loveless, driving person that just competes in the rat race is far from perfection in my book. R. D. Laing perfect-oneracebook We are effectively destroying ourselves by violence masquerading as love. I am a specialist, God help me, in events in inner space and time, in experiences called thoughts, images, reveries, dreams, visions, hallucinations, dreams of memories, memories of dreams, memories of visions, dreams of hallucinations, refractions of refractions of refractions of that original Alpha and Omega of experience and reality, that Reality on whose repression, denial, splitting, projection, falsification, and general desecration and profanation our civilisation as much as anything is based. R. D. Laing dreammemoriesreality There is no such condition as 'schizophrenia,' but the label is a social fact and the social fact a political event. R. D. Laing diversitypoliticalfacts We live in a moment of history where change is so speeded up that we begin to see the present only when it is already disappearing. R. D. Laing aginghistoricalchange There are good reasons for being obedient, but being unable to be disobedient is not one of the best reasons. R. D. Laing obedientreason Man as seen as an organism or man as seen as a person discloses different aspects of the human reality to the investigator. Both are quite possible methodologically but one must be alert to the possible occasion for confusion. (...) Seen as an organism, man cannot be anything else but a complex of things, of its, and the processes that ultimately comprise an organism are it-processes. R. D. Laing confusionmenreality Rule A: Don't. Rule A1: Rule A doesn't exist. Rule A2: Do not discuss the existence or non-existence of Rules A, A1 or A2. R. D. Laing non-existenceexistence Here we have the paradox, the potentially tragic paradox, that our relatedness to others is an essential aspect of our being, as is our separateness, but any particular person is not a necessary part of our being. R. D. Laing aspectparadoxessentials In the society of men the truth resides now less in what things are than in what they are not. Our social realities are so ugly if seen in the light of exiled truth, and beauty is no longer possible if it is not a lie. R. D. Laing beautylyingreality The brotherhood of man is evoked by particular men according to their circumstances. But it seldom extends to all men. In the name of our freedom and our brotherhood we are prepared to blow up the other half of mankind and to be blown up in our turn. R. D. Laing freedomblowmen Schizophrenia cannot be understood without understanding despair. R. D. Laing schizophreniadespairunderstanding We must remember that we are living in an age in which the ground is shifting and the foundations are shaking. I cannot answer for other times and places. Perhaps it has always been so. We know it is true today. R. D. Laing foundationageanswers Children do not give up their innate imagination, curiosity, dreaminess easily. You have to love them to get them to do that. R. D. Laing giving-upimaginationchildren The universe was a vast machine yesterday, it is a hologram today. Who knows what intellectual rattle we'll be shaking tomorrow. R. D. Laing machinesintellectualyesterday I am quite sure that a good number of "cures" of psychotics consist in the fact that the patient has decided, for one reason or other, once more to play at being sane. R. D. Laing playnumbersinsanity
