Hrodnand

“We are a blinded race. We live only on the surface, only in the present, and think only of tomorrow. We deal roughly with the past in that we do not accept the dead. We want to work only with visible success. Above all we want to be paid. We would consider it insane to do hidden work that does not visibly serve men. There is no doubt that the necessity of life forced us to prefer only those fruits one can taste. But who suffers more from the tempting and misleading influence of the dead than those who have gone wholly missing on the surface of the world?”
― C.G. Jung, The Red Book: A Reader's Edition

“I came to my self,352 a giddy and pitiful figure. My I! I didn’t want this fellow as my companion. I found myself with him. I’d prefer a bad woman or a wayward hound, but one’s own I—this horrifies me. 353An opus is needed, that one can squander decades on, and do it out of necessity. I must catch up with a piece of the Middle Ages—within myself. We have only finished the Middle Ages of—others. I must begin early, in that period when the hermits died out.354 Asceticism, inquisition, torture are close at hand and impose themselves. The barbarian requires barbaric means of education. My I, you are a barbarian. I want to live with you, therefore I will carry you through an utterly medieval Hell, until you are capable of making living with you bearable. You should be the vessel and womb of life, therefore I shall purify you. The touchstone is being alone with oneself. This is the way.355”
― C.G. Jung, The Red Book: A Reader's Edition

“191My soul spoke to me in a whisper, urgently and alarmingly: “Words, words, do not make too many words. Be silent and listen: have you recognized your madness and do you admit it? Have you noticed that all your foundations are completely mired in madness? Do you not want to recognize your madness and welcome it in a friendly manner? You wanted to accept everything. So accept madness too. Let the light of your madness shine, and it will suddenly dawn on you. Madness is not to be despised and not to be feared, but instead you should give it life.” I: “Your words sound hard and the task you set me is difficult.” S: “If you want to find paths, you should also not spurn madness, since it makes up such a great part of your nature.” I: “I didn’t know that this is so.” S: “Be glad that you can recognize it, for you will thus avoid becoming its victim. Madness is a special form of the spirit and clings to all teachings and philosophies, but even more to daily life, since life itself is full of craziness and at bottom utterly illogical. Man strives toward reason only so that he can make rules for himself. Life itself has no rules. That is its mystery and its unknown law. What you call knowledge is an attempt to impose something comprehensible on life.” I: “That all sounds very desolate, but nevertheless it prompts me to disagree.” S: “You have nothing to disagree with—you are in the madhouse.”
― C.G. Jung, The Red Book: A Reader's Edition

“After I had spoken these and many more angry words to my I, I noticed that I began to bear being alone with myself. But the touchiness still stirred in me frequently and I had to lash myself just as often. And I did this until even the pleasure in self-torment faded.9 10Then I heard a voice one night; it came from afar and was the voice of my soul. She spoke: “How distant you are!” I: “Is that you my soul, from which height and distance do you speak?” S: “I am above you. I am a world apart. I have become sunlike. I received the seeds of fire. Where are you? I can hardly find you in your mists.” I: “I am down on the murky earth, in the dark smoke that the fire left us, and my gaze does not reach you. But your voice sounds closer.” S: “I feel it. The heaviness of the earth penetrates me, damp cold enshrouds me, gloomy memories of former pain overcome me.” I: “Do not lower yourself into the smoke and the darkness of the earth. I would like that which I am still working on to remain sunlike. Otherwise I will lose the courage to live further down in the darkness of the earth. Let me just hear your voice. I will never want to see you in the flesh again. Say something! Take it from the depths, from which fear perhaps flows to me.” S: “I cannot, since your creative source flows from there.” I: “You see my uncertainty.” S: “The uncertain way is the good way. Upon it lie possibilities. Be unwavering and create.”
― C.G. Jung, The Red Book: A Reader's Edition