“The ability to overcome obsessive discipline didn’t happen in one day; it took me years. In therapy and in my minimal spiritual practice I learned to tell my superego to back off and leave me alone; I want to enjoy my freedom.”

Superego is not the same as consciousness; the former punishes us and the latter guides us.

“I stopped listening to the overseer inside me who demands compliance and performance with the voice of my grandfather. The race uphill is over; now I stroll calmly in the land of intuition, which has turned out to be the best environment for writing.” —Isabel Allende, The Soul of a Woman