Many people feel they are powerless to do anything effective with their lives. It takes courage to break out of the settled mold, but most find conformity more comfortable. This is why the opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice, it’s conformity.
ROLLO MAYThe word courage comes from the same stem as the French word Coeur, meaning “heart.” Thus just as one’s heart, by pumping blood to one’s arms, legs, and brain enables all the other physical organs to function.
More Rollo May Quotes
-
-
Recall how often in human history the saint and the rebel have be the same person. (p. 35)
ROLLO MAY -
Memory is not just the imprint of the past time upon us; it is the keeper of what is meaningful for our deepest hopes and fears.
ROLLO MAY -
One does not become fully human painlessly.
ROLLO MAY -
The hallmark of courage in our age of conformity is the capacity to stand on one’s own convictions – not obstinately or defiantly
ROLLO MAY -
Communication leads to community, that is, to understanding, intimacy and mutual valuing.
ROLLO MAY -
When you are completely absorbed or caught up in something, you become oblivious to things around you, or to the passage of time. It is this absorption in what you are doing that frees your unconscious and releases your creative imagination.
ROLLO MAY -
One central need in life is to fulfill its own potential.
ROLLO MAY -
All people are struggling to be creative in some way, and the artist is the one who has succeeded in this task of life.
ROLLO MAY -
What anxiety means is it’s as though the world is knocking at your door, and you need to create, you need to make something, you need to do something. I think anxiety, for people who have found their own heart and their own souls, for them it is a stimulus toward creativity, toward courage. It’s what makes us human beings.
ROLLO MAY -
Deeds of violence in our society are performed largely by those trying to establish their self-esteem, to defend their self-image, and to demonstrate that they, too, are significant.
ROLLO MAY -
The danger always exists that our technology will serve as a buffer between us and nature, a block between us and the deeper dimensions of our own experience.
ROLLO MAY -
It is an old and ironic habit of human beings to run faster when we have lost our way; and we grasp more fiercely at research, statistics, and technical aids in sex when we have lost the values and meaning of love.
ROLLO MAY -
In order to be open to creativity, one must have the capacity for constructive use of solitude. One must overcome the fear of being alone.
ROLLO MAY -
There is an energy field between humans. And, when we reach out in passion, it is met with an answering passion and changes the relationship forever.
ROLLO MAY -
Courage is not a virtue of value among other personal values like love or fidelity. It is the foundation that underlies and gives reality to all other virtues and personal values. Without courage our love pales into mere dependency. Without courage our fidelity becomes conformism.
ROLLO MAY






