Eric Berne Quotes

Solitary confinement is one of the punishments most dreaded even by prisoners hardened to physical brutality, and is now a notorious procedure for inducing political compliance. (Conversely, the best of the known weapons against compliance is social organization.)

In short, ‘Be careful!’ too often means: ‘Make a mistake so I can tell you I told you to be careful,’ and that is the final display. ‘Be careful, ha ha!’ is even more of a provocation. As a straight Adult instruction ‘Be careful!’ may have some value, but Parental overconcern or a Child Ha Ha gives it a different turn.

The position is, then, that at any given moment each individual in a social aggregation will exhibit a Parental, Adult or Child ego state, and that individuals can shift with varying degrees of readiness from one ego state to another.

The destiny of every human being is decided by what goes on inside his skull when confronted by what goes on outside his skull.

games are integral and dynamic components of the unconscious life-plan, or script, of each individual; they serve to fill in the time while he waits for the final fulfillment, simultaneously advancing the action.

"A variant of "Psychiatry" is "Archaeology" (title by courtesy of Dr. Norman Reider of San Francisco), in which the patient takes the position that if she can only find out who had the button, so to speak, everything will suddenly be all right. This results in a continual rumination over childhood happenings."

If you take away the big words and the solemn face, there is still plenty left, so there is no need to be scared.

The eternal problem of the human being is how to structure his waking hours.

No man is a hero to his wife's psychiatrist.

"It can be shown experimentally that eidetic perception evokes affection, and that candidness mobilizes positive feelings, so that there is even such a thing as "one-sided intimacy" - a phenomenon well known, although not by that name, to professional seducers, who are able to capture their partners without becoming involved themselves. This they do by encouraging the other person to look at them directly and to talk freely, while the male or female seducer makes only a well-guarded pretense of reciprocating."

A healthy person goes "Yes," "No," and "Whoopee!" An unhealthy person goes "Yes, but," "No, but," and "No whoopee."

Freud’s discussions of “psychic energy” and “cathexis” (Besetzungsenergie) are among his most obscure. Some of the difficulties may reside with his translators.{18} Colby{19} has attempted to resolve some of these problems. The simplest course is to accept gratefully the concept of cathexis and attempt to correlate it with one’s own observations.

the past effects people — some let it decide who they are, while others make it part of what they will do.

"Such a woman is called "Mother's FRIEND" always ready to give judicious Parental advice and living vicariously on the experience of others"

Pastimes form the basis for the selection of acquaintances, and may lead to friendship. A party of women who drop in at each other’s houses every morning for coffee to play “Delinquent Husband” are likely to give a cool reception to a new neighbor who wants to play “Sunny Side Up.