27 Quotes by Terrence Real

Sustaining relationships with others requires a good relationship to ourselves. Healthy self-esteem is an internal sense of worth that pulls one neither into ‘better than’ grandiosity nor ‘less than’ shame.

Good parenting requires three elements: nurturing, limit setting, and guidance.

Men’s willingness to downplay weakness and pain is so great that it has been named as a factor in their shorter life span. The ten years of difference in longevity between men and women turns out to have little to do with genes. Men wait longer to acknowledge that they are sick, take longer to get help, and once they get treatment do not comply with it as well as women do.

Use “and,” never “but.” “But” cancels out whatever came before it. “And” is roomy enough for all of your many feelings.

Women are unhappy in their marriages because they want men to be more related than most men know how to be. And men are unhappy in their marriages because their women seem so unhappy with them.

The romantic vision promises ‘shadowless’ relationships, but it is precisely by wrestling with the relationship’s shadow, with disillusionment, that deep intimacy is sustained.

Healthy self-esteem is an internal sense of worth that pulls one neither into “better than” grandiosity nor “less than” shame. But the essence of psychological patriarchy is the nonexistence of such middle ground.

Self-esteem is your capacity to recognize your worth and value, despite your human flaws and weaknesses. Your value as a person isn’t earned; it isn’t conditional; it can’t be added to or subtracted from. Your essential worth is neither greater nor lesser than that of any other human being. It can’t be. Self-esteem is about being, not doing. You have worth simply because you’re alive.

The flight from shame into grandiosity lies at the heart of male covert depression.