Alfred Adler Quotes

“The repetition of words is a sign of uncertainty and an attempt to win time by hesitating and stammering.”
― Alfred Adler, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“If he has no dreams it is a sign that he is entirely satisfied with his present situation, that he has arrived at his goal of being thoroughly indulged and that the world presents no problems to him.”
― Alfred Adler, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“Sometimes the mother notices him talking to a make-believe child, and answering for him. It is usually a boy with whom he is speaking. Then he talks rough and ready, like a street boy. His face becomes animated and he seems to be fighting.'

Many children play this game of talking to a fictitious child, and it is very interesting that this boy who could not talk for such a long time now trains himself to speak, not only for himself, but also for another child. Robert might even develop into a writer or a dramatist. Left-handed children are often inclined to be artistic.”
― Alfred Adler, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“He evidently has a lively imagination -which is very common in timid children. It is easy to be heroic, gallant, and courageous, in a day-dream. Really, he is a coward, and yet it hurts him to believe this and so in his imagination he makes believe that he is a conqueror.”
― Alfred Adler, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“We can easily see how the suspicion might grow that this boy is feeble-minded, but intelligence tests are not definitive, and must not stop our diagnosis. We know that an over-petted child is so frightened by his defeats in school that he does not concentrate in taking the test and the results are not reliable. The low intelligence quotient fits into the pattern of a spoiled child just as well as it does into that of a feeble-minded child. The psychological tests are valuable only when they coincide with all our other findings, but in this case the boy's failures are due to his wish to be supported by his mother and to his deep discouragement.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“It is very common for disheartened children to play a heroic role in their fantasies. To this boy being a cowboy is an approximation of godlikeness. It should not be too difficult to get this boy to forge ahead. His ambition shows that he would really like to grow up, if it was made easy for him. In other words, he wants to be a hero under the proper conditions.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“He dreams that a man comes and takes the door of his house away.'

We could almost guess this boy's dream. The proper dreams for such a child would point to the danger of growing up, and with them he would deceive himself into justifying his desire to remain a baby. Now the dream that is stated in the case history is rather curious, but I think it can be interpreted. If someone came and took the door of the house away, the house would be open and he would not be protected. The door is a protection and George is very much interested in his defences.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“Lying is a sign of the child's insecurity and weakness. When we hear of a child who lies, it is wise to learn in the very beginning whether he tells boastful lies or whether there is someone in the environment of vhom he is afraid. Perhaps the child wishes to avoid punishment, scolding, and humiliation.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“Untidiness is an unmistakable sign of a spoiled child, but George is also vain and does not want to appear badly dressed.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“We have no justification for beating a child because he is a school failure. He is not able to read, because he has not been properly trained, and spanking would not improve the training. The only result would be that the child would reconcile himself to being spanked for his failures, and would become a truant in order to escape an unpleasant situation. Look at the spanking from the child's point of view and you will see that it only increases the difficulty. In passing, let me say that only those people beat children who do not understand what else to do with them.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“The refusal to greet people is a very common symptom, and an interesting one to explain, because it is linked with the whole origin of greetings between individuals. Many children, whose goal is to dominate the grown-up environment, have difficulty in greeting their teachers or people on the street, because they feel that such a salutation is evidence of submission. In Vienna, for instance, this feeling of submission is not only implied but actually expressed. A common greeting is 'Servus!' This actually means, 'I am your slave.' It is a form of salutation which goes back, i believe, to Roman times when a slave had to lift his hat to his master and say, 'I am your slave.' In America of course, the greeting is more an index of friendliness.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“The refusal to greet people is a very common symptom, and an interesting one to explain, because it is linked with the whole origin of greetings between individuals. Many children, whose goal is to dominate the grown-up environment, have difficulty in greeting their teachers or people on the street, because they feel that such a salutation is evidence of submission. In Vienna, for instance, this feeling of submission is not only implied but actually expressed. A common greeting is 'Servus!' This actually means, 'I am your slave.' It is a form of salutation which goes back, i believe, to Roman times when a slave had to lift his hat to his master and say, 'I am your slave." In America of course, the greeting is more an index of friendliness.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“We can readily understand that children who want to dominate resent prohibitions. Such children cannot be influenced by punishment.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“It seems as if there wvre really a considerable retardation in this case, but sometimes normal children also are slow and timid, especially if they are left-handed. Frequently the left-handed child is not clever with his hands and, having experienced a number of defeats and failures, he expresses his over-cautiouness by slow movement.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“The fact that this boy did not learn to talk until very late is suspicious, because we know that this is a common difficulty with feeble-minded children. Where the mental defect is profound they do not learn to speak at all. On the other hand, there is also a certain type of spoiled child who does not talk until late. We have a special word for this type in German, but there is no such word in English. These children can hear, but do not speak, although they are not deaf and dumb. Under such circumstances it is very hard to determine whether a child is or is not feeble-minded, especially as some of these children prove later to be intelligent, and good talkers.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“It is quite common for boys to have larger heads than girls when they are born.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“Punishment is the best way I know to stunt the social feeling.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“If John obeys only his father, then it is probable that the mother is weak and the child chooses her to attack.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“We know that if a marriage is unhappy it hinders the development of the child's social theory. On the other hand, the child of very congenial parents may be kept too long in the position of a baby and acquire a dangerous feeling of inferiority to them. Parents should not show too much affection for each other in the presence of the child.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“It is usually very difficult to develop social interest in an illegitimate child. In our prevailing civilization illegitimacy is considered a disgrace, and a child with this background is put on the defensive. Carl has been brought up in a difficult situation. A large percentage of illegitimate children develop into criminals, drunkards, sexual perverts, and so on, because they have been badly handicapped and are attracted by illicit modes of behaviour which seem to promise a short cut to happiness.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“It is not unusual to find mismanaged children throwing things out of the window when they feel they are not being sufficiently indulged.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“We know that there are children who really do not object to being beaten. When you beat them, they simply say to themselves 'I must be more cunning and not be discovered'. This is excellent training for a career of crime, which is precisely what we are afraid of in this case.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“Many individuals prefer to be influenced by their defeats rather than by their success, and in the pattern of a timid child, defeat is often valued more highly than success.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“About nicknames: It is true that if a boy has other advantages, nicknames do not trouble him much.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“He has a very strong mother, and i have already spoken of the fact that boys with masterful mothers are frequently afraid of women. Later in life, when this fear or exclusion of women becomes fixed, the individual may become a homosexual. Here we have the process in the making, and in order to prevent it, we must influence the mother not to dominate her son too much.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“Children whose social feeling is not developed do not pay attention or concentrate because they refuse to co-operate, and a defective memory is the result of lack of interest in others.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“That he did not learn to dress himself until he was ten years old is a certain sign that he has been badly spoiled. He is not very much interested in dressing himself, because he wants his mother to help him.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“We can hardly expect a child who is not accustomed to function alone to remember two or more items when he is sent to the store.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“If a pampered child does not make friends easily, he soon gives up trying. So far as his memory is concerned, he does not remember the names of his teachers because he did not like them. This is not so much a lack of memory, as it is a desire to forget.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life

“The surest index of a child's social feeling is to be found in his relation toward servants. We also see that he does not take life seriously. This is quite appropriate to the behaviour pattern of a spoiled child.”
― W. Beran Wolfe, Alfred Adler: The Pattern of Life