Freud's Most Famous & Influential Books, Vol 1 Quotes

“The injured person’s reaction to the trauma only exercises a completely ‘cathartic’ effect if it is an adequate reaction - as, for instance, revenge. But language serves as a substitute for action; by its help, an affect can be ‘abreacted’ almost as effectively. In other cases speaking is itself the adequate reflex, when, for instance, it is a lamentation or giving utterance to a tormenting secret, e.g. a confession. If there is no such reaction, whether in deeds or words, or in the mildest cases in tears, any recollection of the event retains its affective tone to begin with.”
― Sigmund Freud, Freud's Most Famous & Influential Books, Vol 1: The Interpretations of Dreams/On Dreams/On Psychotherapy/Jokes & Their Relation to the Unconscious

“The fading of a memory or the losing of its affect depends on various factors. The most important of these is whether there has been an energetic reaction to the event that provokes the affect. By ‘reaction’ we here understand the whole class of voluntary and involuntary reflexes - from tears to acts of revenge - in which, as experience shows us, the affects are discharged. If this reaction takes place to a sufficient amount a large part of the affect disappears as a result.”
― Sigmund Freud, Freud's Most Famous & Influential Books, Vol 1: The Interpretations of Dreams/On Dreams/On Psychotherapy/Jokes & Their Relation to the Unconscious

“often has no suspicion of the causal connection between the precipitating event and the pathological phenomenon.”
― Sigmund Freud, Freud's Most Famous & Influential Books, Vol 1: The Interpretations of Dreams/On Dreams/On Psychotherapy/Jokes & Their Relation to the Unconscious

“Nor have I any reason for wishing to eliminate this evidence of my initial views. Even to-day I regard them not as errors but as valuable first approximations to knowledge which could only be fully acquired after long and continuous efforts.”
― Sigmund Freud, Freud's Most Famous & Influential Books, Vol 1: The Interpretations of Dreams/On Dreams/On Psychotherapy/Jokes & Their Relation to the Unconscious