Quote

Beneath the seemingly rational exterior of our lives is a fear of insanity. We dare not question the values by which we live or rebel against the roles we play for fear of putting our sanity in doubt.

Alexander Lowen

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Alexander Lowen
Age: 97 †
Born: 1910
Born: December 23
Died: 2008
Died: October 28
Psychotherapist
New York City
New York
Values
Depression
Lives
Illness
Fear
Rational
Exterior
Live
Dare
Seemingly
Play
Putting
Sanity
Roles
Rebel
Question
Insanity
Doubt
Beneath

More quotes by Alexander Lowen

Image
I would describe a hero as a person who has no fear of life, who can face life squarely.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Bioenergetics is an adventure in self-discovery. It differs from similar explorations into the nature of the self by attempting to understand the human personality in terms of the human body. Most previous explorations focused their investigations on the mind.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Power seems to confer on its possessor a mantle of superiority, specialness, and sexual potency, which the envious person desperately wants because he feels himself on some level to be inferior, unimportant, and impotent.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Death is the fate no one can escape. The question, then, is, How does one die? A person can die like a hero or like a coward. The difference is that the hero can face death without fear, whereas the coward can't.
Alexander Lowen
Image
It is only by making the past alive again for a person that a true growth in the present is facilitated. If the past is cut off, the future does not exist.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Above all, faith is grounded in one's body, in one's humanity, and in one's animal nature. It is an biological phenomenon and not a psychic creation
Alexander Lowen
Image
The single factor most responsible for the disruption of the family is the automobile. Its full effect cannot be assessed. Modern life, as we know, would be impossible without the ubiquitous motorcar. It broke up the old family and community.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Sustenance for the infant and child is more than alimentary nourishment. The child needs love, security, narcissistic supplies -- however one may describe it.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Everyone who becomes a psychotherapist eventually adopts a theory that suits his needs.
Alexander Lowen
Image
A person who doesn't breathe deeply reduces the life of his body. If he doesn't move freely, he restricts the life of his body. If he doesn't feel fully, he narrows the life of his body. And if his self-expression is constricted, he limits the life of his body.
Alexander Lowen
Image
The ego exists as a powerful force in Western man that cannot be dismissed or denied. The therapeutic goal is to integrate the ego with the body and its striving for pleasure and sexual fulfilment.
Alexander Lowen
Image
We live in an ocean of air like fish in a body of water. By our breathing we are attuned to our atmosphere. If we inhibit our breathing we isolate ourselves from the medium in which we exist. In all Oriental and mystic philosophies, the breath holds the secret to the highest bliss.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Fear is another emotion that is strongly suppressed. We cannot afford to be afraid, and so we don't allow ourselves to sense and feel the fear within us. We lower our brows to deny it, set our jaws to defy it, and smile to deceive ourselves. But inwardly we remain scared to death.
Alexander Lowen
Image
No one is exempt from the rule that learning occurs through recognition of error.
Alexander Lowen
Image
A person does not choose his or her fate he or she only fulfills it. We are bound by our fate as long as we accept the values that determine it.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Because we are afraid of life, we seek to control or master it.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Without awareness of bodily feeling and attitude, a person becomes split into a disembodied spirit and a disenchanted body.
Alexander Lowen
Image
The feeling of love is a rich feeling, but the expression of love in word or deed is a joy.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Sexuality is not a leisure or part-time activity. It is a way of being.
Alexander Lowen
Image
Life is not a mixture of matter and energy but energy in matter, bound in such a way that dissociation is impossible so long as the living process continues.
Alexander Lowen