“The past has meaning as it lights up the present, and the future as it makes the present richer and more profound.”

— Rollo May, Man's Search for Himself, 1953

About Rollo May

1909 – 1994

American existential psychologist, author of "Love and Will" and "The Courage to Create".

“Courage is the capacity to meet the anxiety which arises as one achieves freedom.”

“One cannot fight what one does not know.”

“We are more apt to feel depressed by the perpetually smiling individual than the one who is honestly sad.”

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”

“It is unlikely that the good of a snail should reside in its shell: so is it likely that the good of a man should?”

“In theory there is nothing to hinder our following what we are taught; but in life there are many things to draw us aside.”

“If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men's cottages princes' palaces.”

“That which makes the man no worse than he was makes his life no worse: it has no power to harm, without or within.”

“Always take the short cut; and that is the rational one. Therefore say and do everything according to soundest reason.”