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The cruelest affront is treating the person as exactly the person he is. We all long to be understood, but not for what we are. We long to be understood for what we might have been had all been for the best in the best of all possible worlds and, at the same time, to be forgiven for what we are.

Jo Coudert

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Jo Coudert
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More quotes by Jo Coudert

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The unlived life is not worth examining. ... Self-awareness, self-examination, self-consciousness are for the quiet moments. In the arena they are paralyzing. The self must not be held out of the arena until living skills have been learned.
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The more deeply the path is etched, the more it is used, and the more it is used, the more deeply it etched.
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You do not need to be loved, not at the cost of yourself. Of all the people you will know in the lifetime, you are the only one you will never leave or lose.
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If you defy the system long enough you'll be rewarded. At first life takes revenge and reduces you to a sniveling mess. But keep sniveling, have the madness, the audacity, to do what interests you, forget about your pension, and eventually life will say all right, we'll let you do it.
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Affection may be abiding and love may be abiding, but the state of being in love is transitory.
Jo Coudert
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It is one of those quirks of human nature that you love the person whom you treat well, not necessarily the person who treats you well.
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Men fear being used women fear being used up.
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It is characteristic to believe that those in need are given to, that the squeaky hinge is the one that gets the oil, but in the realm of emotions this is not so. It is the person who does not solicit liking and love, admiration and respect, sympathy and empathy to whom they are freely given.
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While it is necessary to eat and therefore it is pleasantest to eat food that looks handsome and tastes good, on the other hand there are things I would far rather do than spend time in a kitchen.
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One does not marry to become a judge of the spouse's behavior. If a marriage license is mistaken for a hunting license and disapproval, punishment, and threat of withdrawal of love are employed as weapons, all one bags is one's own unhappiness.
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Operating in an unlit world, the unconscious mind is a brilliant detective.
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We find what we expect to find. We do not see the world as it is but as we are.
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At what age should one marry? As a rule of thumb, perhaps not until you are past the age of feeling strongly that you must marry.
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We can win the struggle to avoid responsibility for our personal lives, but if we do, what we lose is our lives.
Jo Coudert
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It takes an enormous amount of energy, creative energy withdrawn from the total economy of the person, to hold a trait underground, and, unfortunately, needs and drives do not go underground alone they carry with them useful parts of the personality, depriving it of richness and the possibility of a variety of response.
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There is no way of steering successfully between a failed situation and a failed self except by stopping and taking our bearings.
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The divorced person is like a man with a black patch over one eye: he looks rather dashing but the fact is that he has been through a maiming experience.
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People who are good to each other make each other good.
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Most people ask of their friends that they understand them, but, on balance, I think I prefer a friend who understands himself.
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You do not need to be loved, not at the cost of yourself. The single relationship that is truly central and crucial in a life is the relationship to the self.
Jo Coudert