Suppression of Emotions Quotes

The more often a man feels without acting, the less he is able to act and in the long run the less he is able to feel.

My reason, it's true, controls my feelings, but whatever its authority, it doesn't rule them so much as tyrannize them.

'Dad, Dad, I'm getting married.' 'Sh-sh, don't say it. Nothing, nothing. Don't do anything.' So he honestly - 'cause he was taught don't celebrate - they'll take it away from you. And his parents were taught that, and his parents and parents' parents. Because if you did celebrate, and you were visible, it could be very, very dangerous.

There are some who live by every rule and cling tightly to their rectitude because they fear being swept away by a tempest of passion, and there are others who cling to the rules because they fear that there is no passion there at all, and that if they let go they would simply remain where they are, foolish and unmoved; and they could bear that least of all. Living a life of iron control lets them pretend to themselves that only by the mightiest effort of will can they hold great passions at bay.

My folks were raised pure prohibitionist. They were very good people, with high moral standards - but very repressed. There was no hugging and kissing in my home.

We are always doing something to cover up our basic existential anxiety. Some people live that way until the day they die.

I was raised Catholic in the Midwest, so I can't enjoy anything.

To spare oneself from grief at all cost can be achieved only at the price of total detachment, which excludes the ability to experience happiness

I have a very ostrich mentality. I feel like I have my head in the sand so no one can see me.

American culture is not about experiencing our shame, it's about denying it. It's been that way our whole history.

There is in most passions a shrinking away from ourselves. The passionate pursuer has all the earmarks of a fugitive.

The thing about terror and why it's so interesting is that terror is there to keep us safe. But then the issue comes in: Well, how do you ever grow if you can't get past this fear? That's called suppression.

I tend to want to put my fingers over my ears and not hear all of that, not hear that there are so many fans.

I came from a good, repressed Catholic background.

When the bird of the heart begins to sing, too often will reason stop up her ears.

In black Africa, one does not strike, one does not express, one walks right.