Monday, October 15, 2018

Hypersimplified morality stops you from tapping into deeper recesses of your psyche. It's partly because they're primal forces; it's not surprising that you don't want to have anything to do with them, that you stay away from situations where they might make themselves manifest. But the problem is, by denying the worst in yourself in that manner, suppressing it, you preclude the possibility of the best. Because no one can be a good person without integrating their capacity for aggression. Because without that capacity for aggression you cannot say 'no'. Because 'no' means there is nothing you can do to me that will make me change my mind. Or conversely, I will play for higher stakes than you will. And unless you've got your aggression integrated, there isn't a chance you can say that, and if you said it, no one will take you seriously. They'd know it was just a show.

-- Jordan Peterson talking about Jung's idea of integrating one's shadow




You should be able to do things that you wouldn't do; 
that's the definition of a genuinely moral person.

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