By self realisation (we) return to the eternal stream in which birth and death are only stations of passage and the meaning of life no longer rests in the ego. Towards others it raises up within (us) the tolerance and kindness that is only possible in those who have explored and consciously experienced their own darkest depths. Toward the collectivity its special value is that it can offer society a fully responsible individual who knows the obligations of the particular to the general from (our) own personal experience, the experience of (our) own psychic brutality.
J. Jacobi
Emerging From The Dark Night 