There is some debate in professional circles about whether the so-called “midlife crisis” exists. James Hollis More Quotes by James Hollis More Quotes From James Hollis To become a person does not necessarily mean to be well adjusted, well adapted, approved of by others. It means to become who you are. We are meant to become more eccentric, more peculiar, more odd. We are not meant just to fit in. We are here to be different. We are here to be the individual. James Hollis being-yourself differences mean The act of consciousness is central; otherwise we are overrun by the complexes. James Hollis voice knowing hero In the second half of life, the questions become: 'Who, apart from the roles you play, are you? What does the soul ask of you? Do you have the wherewithal to shift course, to deconstruct your painfully achieved identity, risking failure, marginalization and loss of collective approval?' No small task. James Hollis soul play loss What I refuse to face within myself will meet me in the exterior world through you, not as you are, but as I have so construed you. James Hollis refuse faces world The truth about intimate relationships is that they can never be any better than our relationship with ourselves. James Hollis our-relationship intimate intimate-relationships How many of those who are insecure seek power over others as a compensation for inadequacy and wind up bringing consequences down upon their heads and those around them? How many hide out in their lives, resist the summons to show up, or live fugitive lives, jealous, projecting onto others, and then wonder why nothing ever really feels quite right. How many proffer compliance with the other, buying peace at the price of soul, and wind up with neither? James Hollis insecure jealous wind We are not here to fit in...we are here to be eccentric, different, perhaps strange, perhaps merely to add our small piece, our little clunky, chunky selves, to the great mosaic of being...we are here to become more and more ourselves. James Hollis mosaics different self We are all meaning-seeking, meaning creating creatures and when we experience the loss of meaning, we suffer. James Hollis creating suffering loss We serve the world by finding out what feeds us, and, having been fed, then share our gifts with others. James Hollis feds share world In the end, we are only tiny frightened animals, doing our best to survive amid other tiny frightened animals. James Hollis tiny ends animal We best serve intimate relationship by becoming sufficiently developed in ourselves that we do not need to feed off others. James Hollis becoming intimate-relationships needs Today, as we have seen, fascism and communism are discredited, but are replaced by a paraphilic consumer culture driven by fantasy, desperately in search of distractions and escalating sensations, and a fundamentalist culture wherein the rigors of a private journey are shunned in favor of an ideology that, at the expense of the paradoxes and complexities of truth, favors one-sided resolutions, black-and-white values, and a privileging of one's own complexes as the norm for others. James Hollis black-and-white journey today To experience some healing within yourself, and to contribute healing to the world, you are summoned to wade through the muck from time to time. James Hollis wade healing world The purpose of therapy is not to remove suffering but to move through it to an enlarged consciousness that can sustain the polarity of painful opposites. James Hollis opposites inspirational moving The world is more magical, less predictable, more autonomous, less controllable, more varied, less simple, more infinite, less knowable, more wonderfully troubling than we could have imagined being able to tolerate when we were young. James Hollis able simple world A neurosis is wherever we are allied against our true nature. James Hollis true-nature neurosis Learning to live with ambiguity is learning to live with how life really is, full of complexities and strange surprises. James Hollis ambiguity surprise strange The capacity for growth depends on one's ability to internalize and to take personal responsibility. If we forever see our life as a problem caused by others, a problem to be 'solved,' then no change will occur. James Hollis growth responsibility forever Doubt is a profound and effective spiritual motivation. Without doubt, no truism is transcended, no new knowledge found, no expansion of the imagination possible. Doubt is unsettling to the ego and those who are drawn to ideologies that promise the dispelling of doubt by preferring certainties never grow. James Hollis motivation imagination spiritual One of the most powerful shocks of the Middle Passage is the collapse of our tacit contract with the universe-the assumption that if we act correctly, if we are of good heart and good intentions, things will work out. We assume a reciprocity with the universe. If we do our part, the universe will comply. Many ancient stories, including the Book of Job, painfully reveal the fact that there is no such contract, and everyone who goes through the Middle Passage is made aware of it. James Hollis powerful jobs book
