We can’t understand what is happening to us, and if we are in the habit of always wanting to know what is going on, this aspect of the dark night will be maddening. We can find meaning in these times of change, but we have to think differently about our lives, be less psychological in our approach, and more philosophical and spiritual.

A society is like an individual: in the face of a dark night it can either become defensive and avoid the challenge of new life, or it can reform itself and discover in the darkness where it has gone wrong.

You can trust them [emotions and fantasies], not to arrange life the way you want it, but to arrange the elements of your soul in a way that will offer rich life in the future.

We have to love our own complexities and contradictions, encouraging an interior marriage and eroticism of the soul.

James Hillman has observed that depression may be a special problem in a society hell-bent on happiness. But let’s examine this connection more closely. It is possible to imagine that the situations life offers may not be happy ones and yet may be the most desirable of all.