A Little Book on the Human Shadow Quotes

“I am proud only of those days that pass in
undivided tenderness.”
― Robert Bly, A Little Book on the Human Shadow: A Poetic Journey into the Dark Side of the Human Personality, Shadow Work, and the Importance of Confronting Our Hidden Self

“If any help was going to arrive to lift me out of my misery, it would come from the dark side of my personality.”
― Robert Bly, A Little Book on the Human Shadow: A Poetic Journey into the Dark Side of the Human Personality, Shadow Work, and the Importance of Confronting Our Hidden Self

“Every part of our personality that we do not love will become hostile to us.”
― Robert Bly, A Little Book on the Human Shadow: A Poetic Journey into the Dark Side of the Human Personality, Shadow Work, and the Importance of Confronting Our Hidden Self

“The imperfect is our paradise. Note that, in this bitterness, delight, Since the imperfect is so hot in us,”
― Robert Bly, A Little Book on the Human Shadow: A Poetic Journey into the Dark Side of the Human Personality, Shadow Work, and the Importance of Confronting Our Hidden Self

“The drama is this. We came as infants “trailing clouds of glory,” arriving from the farthest reaches of the universe, bringing with us appetites well preserved from our mammal inheritance, spontaneities wonderfully preserved from our 150,000 years of tree life, angers well preserved from our 5,000 years of tribal life—in short, with our 360-degree radiance—and we offered this gift to our parents. They didn’t want it. They wanted a nice girl or a nice boy. That’s the first act of the drama. It doesn’t mean our parents were wicked; they needed us for something. My mother, as a second generation immigrant, needed my brother and me to help the family look more classy. We do the same thing to our children; it’s a part of life on this planet. Our parents rejected who we were before we could talk, so the pain of the rejection is probably stored in some pre-verbal place.”
― Robert Bly, A Little Book on the Human Shadow: A Poetic Journey into the Dark Side of the Human Personality, Shadow Work, and the Importance of Confronting Our Hidden Self

“Our culture teaches us from early infancy to split and polarize dark and light, which I call here “mother” and “father.” So some people admire the right-thinking, well-lit side of the personality, and that group one can associate with the father, if one wants to; and some admire the left-thinking, poorly-lit side, and that group one can associate with the mother, if one wants to, and mythologically with the Great Mother. Most artists, poets, and musicians belong to the second group and love intuition, music, the feminine, owls, and the ocean. The right-thinking group loves action, commerce, and Empire.”
― Robert Bly, A Little Book on the Human Shadow: A Poetic Journey into the Dark Side of the Human Personality, Shadow Work, and the Importance of Confronting Our Hidden Self