At some stage in your life, you chose “being unhappy.” It is not because you were born into unhappy circumstances or ended up in an unhappy situation. It’s that you judged “being unhappy” to be good for you. — *location: 495* ^ref-64243 --- He wants to live inside that realm of possibilities, where he can say that he could do it if he only had the time, or that he could write if he just had the proper environment, and that he really does have the talent for it. — *location: 597* ^ref-39968 --- Having simple tasks—things that should be done—while continually coming up with various reasons why one can’t do them sounds like a hard way to live, doesn’t it? — *location: 605* ^ref-6771 --- But if you change your lifestyle—the way of giving meaning to the world and yourself—then both your way of interacting with the world and your behavior will have to change as well. Do not forget this point: One will have to change. You, just as you are, have to choose your lifestyle. It might seem hard, but it is really quite simple. — *location: 611* ^ref-4465 --- as Adler’s teleology tells us, “No matter what has occurred in your life up to this point, it should have no bearing at all on how you live from now on.” That you, living in the here and now, are the one who determines your own life. — *location: 617* ^ref-55218 --- You notice only your shortcomings because you’ve resolved to not start liking yourself. In order to not like yourself, you don’t see your strong points and focus only on your shortcomings. — *location: 650* ^ref-34147 --- To you, not liking yourself is a virtue. — *location: 653* ^ref-8364 --- As Adler goes so far as to assert, “All problems are interpersonal relationship problems.” — *location: 750* ^ref-37338 --- You were so afraid of interpersonal relationships that you came to dislike yourself. You’ve avoided interpersonal relationships by disliking yourself. — *location: 772* ^ref-33089 --- Everyone is in this “condition of wanting to improve” that is the pursuit of superiority. One holds up various ideals or goals and heads toward them. However, on not being able to reach one’s ideals, one harbors a sense of being lesser. — *location: 862* ^ref-36428 --- Adler is saying that the pursuit of superiority and the feeling of inferiority are not diseases but stimulants to normal, healthy striving and growth. If it is not used in the wrong way, the feeling of inferiority, too, can promote striving and growth. — *location: 867* ^ref-22603 --- The inferiority complex, on the other hand, refers to a condition of having begun to use one’s feeling of inferiority as a kind of excuse. So one thinks to oneself, I’m not well educated, so I can’t succeed, or I’m not good-looking, so I can’t get married. When someone is insisting on the logic of “A is the situation, so B cannot be done” in such a way in everyday life, that is not something that fits in the feeling of inferiority category. It is an inferiority complex. — *location: 893* ^ref-29776 --- It’s simply that it’s scary to take even one step forward; also, that you don’t want to make realistic efforts. You don’t want to change so much that you’d be willing to sacrifice the pleasures you enjoy now—for instance, the time you spend playing and engaged in hobbies. In other words, you’re not equipped with the courage to change your lifestyle. It’s easier with things just as they are now, even if you have some complaints or limitations. — *location: 912* ^ref-49691 --- those who make themselves look bigger on borrowed power are essentially living according to other people’s value systems—they are living other people’s lives. — *location: 961* ^ref-45310 --- The pursuit of superiority is the mind-set of taking a single step forward on one’s own feet, not the mind-set of competition of the sort that necessitates aiming to be greater than other people. — *location: 1023* ^ref-56982 --- A healthy feeling of inferiority is not something that comes from comparing oneself to others; it comes from one’s comparison with one’s ideal self. — *location: 1030* ^ref-61817 --- When you are able to truly feel that “people are my comrades,” your way of looking at the world will change utterly. No longer will you think of the world as a perilous place, or be plagued by needless doubts; the world will appear before you as a safe and pleasant place. — *location: 1128* ^ref-14051 --- In Adlerian psychology, clear objectives are laid out for human behavior and psychology. — *location: 1258* ^ref-46325 --- First, there are two objectives for behavior: to be self-reliant and to live in harmony with society. Then, the two objectives for the psychology that supports these behaviors are the consciousness that I have the ability and the consciousness that people are my comrades. — *location: 1261* ^ref-46105 --- Adler made three categories of the interpersonal relationships that arise out of these processes. He referred to them as “tasks of work,” “tasks of friendship,” and “tasks of love,” and all together as “life tasks.” — *location: 1276* ^ref-48642 --- Adler called the state of coming up with all manner of pretexts in order to avoid the life tasks the “life-lie.” — *location: 1395* ^ref-14558 --- Freudian etiology is a psychology of possession, and eventually it arrives at determinism. Adlerian psychology, on the other hand, is a psychology of use, and it is you who decides it. — *location: 1423* ^ref-17582 --- Adlerian psychology denies the need to seek recognition from others. — *location: 1509* ^ref-962 --- Actually, one must not seek recognition. This point cannot be overstated. — *location: 1512* ^ref-37204 --- In general, all interpersonal relationship troubles are caused by intruding on other people’s tasks, or having one’s own tasks intruded on. Carrying out the separation of tasks is enough to change one’s interpersonal relationships dramatically. — *location: 1612* ^ref-36105 --- Unless one is unconcerned by other people’s judgments, has no fear of being disliked by other people, and pays the cost that one might never be recognized, one will never be able to follow through in one’s own way of living. That is to say, one will not be able to be free. — *location: 1899* ^ref-22406 --- This sense of others as comrades, this awareness of “having one’s own refuge,” is called “community feeling.” — *location: 2069* ^ref-42343 --- If other people are our comrades, and we live surrounded by them, we should be able to find in that life our own place of “refuge.” Moreover, in doing so, we should begin to have the desire to share with our comrades, to contribute to the community. This sense of others as comrades, this awareness of “having one’s own refuge,” is called “community feeling.” — *location: 2067* ^ref-23968 --- When Adler refers to community, he goes beyond the household, school, workplace, and local society, and treats it as all-inclusive, covering not only nations and all of humanity but also the entire axis of time from the past to the future—and he includes plants and animals and even inanimate objects. — *location: 2075* ^ref-26895 --- People who are incapable of carrying out the separation of tasks and who are obsessed with the desire for recognition are also extremely self-centered. — *location: 2116* ^ref-1095 --- One needs to think not, What will this person give me? but rather, What can I give to this person? That is commitment to the community. — *location: 2185* ^ref-60415 --- One must not praise. And one must not rebuke, either. All words that are used to judge other people are words that come out of vertical relationships, and we need to build horizontal relationships. And it is only when one is able to feel that one is of use to someone that one can have a true awareness of one’s worth. — *location: 2445* ^ref-62218 --- Accept “this me” just as it is. And have the courage to change what one can change. That is self-acceptance. — *location: 2688* ^ref-24221 --- Labor is not a means of earning money. It is through labor that one makes contributions to others and commits to one’s community, and that one truly feels “I am of use to someone” and even comes to accept one’s existential worth. — *location: 2825* ^ref-44434 --- Does one accept oneself on the level of acts, or on the level of being? This is truly a question that relates to the courage to be happy. — *location: 2962* ^ref-20030 --- For a human being, the greatest unhappiness is not being able to like oneself. Adler came up with an extremely simple answer to address this reality. Namely, that the feeling of “I am beneficial to the community” or “I am of use to someone” is the only thing that can give one a true awareness that one has worth. — *location: 2986* ^ref-63477 --- People can be truly aware of their worth only when they are able to feel “I am of use to someone.” However, it doesn’t matter if the contribution one makes at such a time is without any visible form. It is enough to have the subjective sense of being of use to someone, that is to say, a feeling of contribution. — *location: 3037* ^ref-40608 --- The kind of life that you speak of, which tries to reach a destination, may be termed a “kinetic (dynamic) life.” By contrast, the kind of dancing life I am talking about could be called an “energeial (actual-active-state) life.” — *location: 3181* ^ref-29161 --- If the goal of climbing a mountain were to get to the top, that would be a kinetic act. To take it to the extreme, it wouldn’t matter if you went to the mountaintop in a helicopter, stayed there for five minutes or so, and then headed back in the helicopter again. Of course, if you didn’t make it to the mountaintop, that would mean the mountain-climbing expedition was a failure. However, if the goal is mountain climbing itself, and not just getting to the top, one could say it is energeial. In this case, in the end it doesn’t matter whether one makes it to the mountaintop or not. — *location: 3204* ^ref-59207 --- It’s because we cast a dim light on our entire lives that we are able to see the past and the future. Or at least we imagine we can. But if one is shining a bright spotlight on here and now, one cannot see the past or the future anymore. — *location: 3224* ^ref-30492 --- The life of the past that looks like a straight line appears that way to you only as a result of your making ceaseless resolutions to not change. — *location: 3241* ^ref-54871 --- You set objectives for the distant future, and think of now as your preparatory period. You think, I really want to do this, and I’ll do it when the time comes. This is a way of living that postpones life. As long as we postpone life, we can never go anywhere and will pass our days only one after the next in dull monotony, because we think of here and now as just a preparatory period, as a time for patience. But a “here and now” in which one is studying for an entrance examination in the distant future, for example, is the real thing. — *location: 3260* ^ref-60588 >Minsky life lines --- The greatest life-lie of all is to not live here and now. It is to look at the past and the future, cast a dim light on one’s entire life, and believe that one has been able to see something. Until now, you have turned away from the here and now and shone a light only on invented pasts and futures. You have told a great lie to your life, to these irreplaceable moments. — *location: 3280* ^ref-64860 --- What is the meaning of life? What are people living for? When someone posed these questions to Adler, this was his answer: “Life in general has no meaning.” — *location: 3298* ^ref-30694 --- And Adler, having stated that “life in general has no meaning,” then continues, “Whatever meaning life has must be assigned to it by the individual.” — *location: 3310* ^ref-41902 --- PHILOSOPHER: Just like the traveler who relies on the North Star, in our lives we need a guiding star. That is the Adlerian psychology way of thinking. It is an expansive ideal that says, as long as we do not lose sight of this compass and keep on moving in this direction, there is happiness. YOUTH: Where is that star? PHILOSOPHER: It is contribution to others. — *location: 3328* ^ref-18032 --- No matter what moments you are living, or if there are people who dislike you, as long as you do not lose sight of the guiding star of “I contribute to others,” you will not lose your way, and you can do whatever you like. Whether you’re disliked or not, you pay it no mind and live free. — *location: 3333* ^ref-58833 --- One more time, I give you the words of Adler: “Someone has to start. Other people might not be cooperative, but that is not connected to you. My advice is this: You should start. With no regard to whether others are cooperative or not.” — *location: 3364* ^ref-37883 --- The young man slowly tied his shoelaces and left the philosopher’s house. On opening the door, he found a snowy scene spread out before him. The full moon, its floating form obscured, illuminated the shimmering whiteness at his feet. What clear air. What dazzling light. I am going to tread on this fresh snow, and take my first step. The young man drew a deep breath, rubbed the slight stubble on his face, and murmured emphatically, “The world is simple, and life is too.” — *location: 3376* ^ref-45706 >Fresh snow represents new beginnings ---