Marija > Marija's Quotes

“The mirror was often used as a symbol of the vanity of woman. The moralizing, however, was mostly hypocritical.

You painted a naked woman because you enjoyed looking at her, you put a mirror in her hand and you called the painting "Vanity", thus morally condemning the woman whose nakedness you had depicted for your own pleasure.”
― John Berger, Ways of Seeing

“History always constitutes the relation between a present and its past. Consequently fear of the present leads to mystification of the past”
― John Berger, Ways of Seeing

“Oil painting did to appearances what capital did to social relations. It reduced everything to the equality of objects. Everything became exchangeable because everything became a commodity.”
― John Berger, Ways of Seeing

“We are a package deal, however. Our trait of sensitivity means we will also be cautious, inward, needing extra time alone. Because people without the trait (the majority) do not understand that, they see us as timid, shy, weak, or that greatest sin of all, unsociable. Fearing these labels, we try to be like others. But that leads to our becoming overaroused and distressed. Then that gets us labeled neurotic or crazy, first by others and then by ourselves.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“All virtues have a shadow.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“You were born to be among the advisors and thinkers, the spiritual and moral leaders for your society. There is every reason for pride.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“The point is best made by Aristotle, who supposedly asked, “Would you rather be a happy pig or an unhappy human?” HSPs prefer the good feeling of being very conscious, very human, even if what we are conscious of is not always cause for rejoicing.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“HSPs probably make their greatest communication errors by avoiding the overarousal caused by unpleasantries. I think most people, but HSPs especially, dread anger, confrontation, tears, anxiety, "scenes," facing change (it always means the loss of something), being asked to change, being judged or shamed by our mistakes, or judging or shaming anyone else.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“HSPs do more of that which makes humans different from other animals: We imagine possibilities. We humans, and HSPs especially, are acutely aware of the past and future.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“Everything alive is important; there’s something greater, I know.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“D is for depth of processing. Our fundamental characteristic is that we observe and reflect before we act. We process everything more, whether we are conscious of it or not. O is for being easily overstimulated, because if you are going to pay more attention to everything, you are bound to tire sooner. E is for giving emphasis to our emotional reactions and having strong empathy which among other things helps us notice and learn. S is for being sensitive to all the subtleties around us.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“the fear that now your “fatal flaw” will reveal itself fully as you fail to make the”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“just know” how things got to be the way they are or how they are going to turn out. This is that “sixth sense” people talk about. It can be wrong, of course, just as your eyes and ears can be wrong, but your intuition is right often enough that HSPs tend to be visionaries, highly intuitive artists, or inventors, as well as more conscientious, cautious, and wise people.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“Being so eager to please, we’re not easy to liberate. We’re too aware of what others need.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“Individuation is, above all, about being able to hear your inner voice or voices through all the inner and outer noise. Some of us get caught up in demands from others. These may be real responsibilities or may be the common ideas of what makes for success—money, prestige, security. Then there are the pressures others can bring to bear on us because we are so unwilling to displease anyone. Eventually, many, if not most, HSPs are probably forced into what I call “liberation,” even if it doesn’t happen until the second half of life. They tune in to the inner question and the inner voices rather than the questions others are asking them to answer.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“The ideal personality is embodied, in Mead's words, in "every thread of the social fabric–in the care of the young child, the games the children play, the songs the people sing, the political organization, the religious observance, the art and the philosophy." Other traits are ignored, discouraged, or if all else fails, ridiculed.

What is the ideal in our culture?”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“In short, somewhere inside you there is a Machiavelli. Yes, he is a ruthless manipulator; but no prince, especially a kind one, would stay in power long without at least one advisor with as remorseless a point of view as that of the enemies a prince will surely have. The trick is to listen well but keep Machiavelli in his place.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“Carl Jung held that the habitually introverted (most HSPs) turn their energy inward to protect their treasured inner life from being overwhelmed by the outer world. But Jung pointed out that the more successfully introverted you are, the more pressure builds in the unconscious to compensate for the inward turning. It is as if the house becomes filled with bored (but probably gifted) kids who eventually find their way out the back door. This pent-up energy often lands on one person (or place or thing), which becomes all-important to the poor upended introvert. You have fallen intensely in love, and it really has less to do with the other person and more to do with how long you have delayed reaching out.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“Others knew they were different, but hid it and adapted, acting like the non-sensitive majority.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“It is not surprising that highly sensitive children, and adults, too, have a hard time with sleep and report more vivid, alarming, “archetypal” dreams. With the coming of darkness, subtle sounds and shapes begin to rule the imagination, and HSPs sense them more. There are also the unfamiliar experiences of the day—some only half-noticed, some totally repressed. All of them swirl in the mind just as we are relaxing the conscious mind so that we can fall asleep. Falling asleep, staying asleep, and going back to sleep when awakened require an ability to soothe oneself, to feel safe in the world.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“The local newspaper got wind of it and published an article titled “Born to Be Mild” in the Sunday Lifestyle section, with a big photo of us.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“The negative side of this permission to be emotional, however, can be that a sensitive girl is never forced to put on the armor that sensitive boys have to don to survive. Girls may have little practice in emotional control and feel helpless in the face of emotional overarousal. Or they may use their emotions to manipulate others, including to protect themselves from overarousal. “If we have to play that game again, I’m going to cry.” The straightforward self-assertion needed in adulthood is not expected or wanted from them.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“To her, such sensitivity was hardly a sign of a mental flaw or disorder. At least she hoped not, for she was highly sensitive herself. I recall her grin. “As are most of the people who strike me as really worth knowing.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“Watch for the phrase that was almost your “middle name”—the one they would put on your gravestone if given half a chance.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“The bottom line is that in those first years you either learned to trust the other, and the outer world generally, or you didn’t.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“It is true that even when exhausted you still are providing something to those you serve. But you are out of touch with your deepest strengths, role-modeling self-destructive behavior, martyring yourself, and giving others cause for guilt.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“Overaroused HSPs tend to substitute “freeze” for the “fight or flight” response.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“Perhaps the greatest maturity is our ability to conceive the whole universe as our container, our body as a microcosm of that universe, with no boundaries. That is more or less enlightenment. But most of us will need more finite containers for a while, even if we are beginning to learn to make do with intangible ones in a pinch. Indeed, as long as we are in bodies, enlightened or not, we need some bit of tangible safety, or at least a sense of sameness.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You

“(My favorite line from Captain Picard of Star Trek: The Next Generation is, “I have made some fine mistakes in my life.” It is so humble, wise, and self-confident, all at once.)”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person

“We do not just have an idea of how someone else feels; we actually feel that way ourselves to some extent.”
― Elaine N. Aron, The Highly Sensitive Person: How to Thrive When the World Overwhelms You