"'Insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting different results.' The biggest existential crime seemed to me not to learn from experience. We all have some old, irrational patterns that don't serve us anymore and that we keep repeating, consciously or unconsciously. We may think of it as repetition compulsion, hard-wiring, bad taste in partners, or as trying to undo and change trauma patterns by finally succeeding in mastering them."
"I also love Gregory Bateson's 'Knowledge that isn't in the body is just rumour', because it illustrates so powerfully the difference between knowing something cognitively and allowing it truly to sink in and change the structure of our feelings, in the form of embodied, somatic wisdom. There is a crucial difference between head knowledge and felt, lived, truly integrated knowledge that shapes how we act and feel."
Many memorable maxims can help create better self-stories and preferences for such sayings change over time. Early impulses included fatalistic or Stoic mottos, but tastes evolved away from literal tattoos. Continuous learning about oneself felt essential, with the adage 'Insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting different results' framing repetition as a moral failure to learn. Embodied knowledge matters: 'Knowledge that isn't in the body is just rumour' distinguishes cognitive knowing from somatic integration that changes feelings and actions. Psychological challenges recur until they teach necessary lessons, and three compassionate mental mantras support self-acceptance and calm.
Read at Psychology Today
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