Social Games Quotes

“[Man] literally drives himself into a blind obliviousness with social games, psychological tricks, personal preoccupations so far removed from the reality of his situation that they are forms of madness, but madness all the same.”
― Ernest Becker, The Denial of Death

“Parents, deliberately or unaware, teach their children from birth how to behave, drink, feel and perceive. Liberation from these influences is no easy matter.”
― Eric Berne, Games People Play

“At the end of the party, each person will have selected certain players he would like to see more of, while others he will discard, regardless of how skillfully or pleasantly they each engaged in the pastime. The ones he selects are those who seem the most likely candidates for more complex relationships—that is, games. This sorting system, however well rationalized, is actually largely unconscious and intuitive.”
― Eric Berne, Games People Play

“It can be shown experimentally that eidetic perception evokes affection, and that candidness mobilizes positive feelings, so that there is even such a thing as "one-sided intimacy" - a phenomenon well known, although not by that name, to professional seducers, who are able to capture their partners without becoming involved themselves. This they do by encouraging the other person to look at them directly and to talk freely, while the male or female seducer makes only a well-guarded pretense of reciprocating.”
― Eric Berne, Games People Play

“A variant of "Psychiatry" is "Archaeology" (title by courtesy of Dr. Norman Reider of San Francisco), in which the patient takes the position that if she can only find out who had the button, so to speak, everything will suddenly be all right. This results in a continual rumination over childhood happenings.”
― Eric Berne, Games People Play