Despina

“لأنتِ مني قلبي وغاية بغيتي
وأقصى مرادي واختياري وخيرتي”
― ابن الفارض, ديوان ابن الفارض

“THE darkness of which the soul here speaks relates, as I have said,1 to the desires and powers of sense, interior and spiritual, all of which are deprived of their natural light in this night, that, being purified as to this, they may be supernaturally enlightened. The desires of sense and spirit are lulled to sleep and mortified, unable to relish anything either human or divine; the affections of the soul are thwarted and brought low, become helpless, and have nothing to rest upon; the imagination is fettered, and unable to make any profitable reflections, the memory is gone, and the will, too, is dry and afflicted, and all the faculties are empty and useless,2 and, moreover, a dense and heavy cloud overshadows the soul, distresses it and holds it as if it were far away from God. This is the darkness in which the soul says that it travels in safety. 2. The reason of this”
― St. John of the Cross, Dark Night of the Soul

“Woe betide those who live by way of examples! Life is not with them. If you live according to an example, you thus live the life of that example, but who should live your own life if not yourself? So live yourselves.”
― C.G. Jung, The Red Book: Liber Novus

“How to Win Against an Abuser? I get this question all the time, and my answer is always the same: Don’t try to win. As soon as we engage in this win/lose mentality, we abandon our hearts and forget what’s really important: vulnerability and love. Yes, absolutely you should remove toxic people from your life, but it should be from the perspective of self-love, not “winning.” As long as we maintain this false illusion of control, we’re still connected to the person in our psyches. A hallmark of C-PTSD is fantasizing about gaining some power over an otherwise powerless situation.”
― Jackson MacKenzie, Whole Again: Healing Your Heart and Rediscovering Your True Self After Toxic Relationships and Emotional Abuse