Quotes by Psychologists - Page 28

Love is not primarily a relationship to a specific person; it is an attitude, an orientation of character which determines the relatedness of a person to the world as a whole, not toward one 'object' of love. If a person loves only one other person and is indifferent to the rest of his fellow men, his love is not love but a symbiotic attachment, or an enlarged egotism.
Erich Fromm
Jealousy has less to do with how a person feels towards you and more to do with how he feels about himeself. It is an unhealthy emotion rooted in insecurity.
David Lieberman
When we are dealing with human beings, no truth has reality by itself; it is always dependent upon the reality of the immediate relationship.
Rollo May
Anger repressed can poison a relationship as surely as the crudest words.
Joyce Brothers
I wonder how one can hate to love and love to hate the same person over a period of time in a relationship
Amit Abraham
Complex PTSD consists of of six symptom clusters, which also have been described in terms of dissociation of personality. Of course, people who receive this diagnosis often also suffer from other problems as well, and as noted earlier, diagnostic categories may overlap significantly. The symptom clusters are as follows:Alterations in Regulation of Affect ( Emotion ) and ImpulsesChanges in Relationship with othersSomatic SymptomsChanges in MeaningChanges in the perception of SelfChanges in Attention and Consciousness
Suzette Boon
Changes in Relationship with others:It is especially hard to trust other people if you have been repeatedly abused, abandoned or betrayed as a child. Mistrust makes it very difficult to make friends, and to be able to distinguish between good and bad intentions in other people. Some parts do not seem to trust anyone, while other parts may be so vulnerable and needy that they do not pay attention to clues that perhaps a person is not trustworthy. Some parts like to be close to others or feel a desperate need to be close and taken care of, while other parts fear being close or actively dislike people. Some parts are afraid of being in relationships while others are afraid of being rejected or criticized. This naturally sets up major internal as well as relational conflicts.
Suzette Boon
When trauma involves intentional harm, such as in a crime or abuse, trust can totally collapse.
Dena Rosenbloom
Sacred blessings and divine opportunities appear in your life disguised as unforeseen changes and challenging circumstances.
Miya Yamanouchi
It's important to understand that your no is always subject to you. You own your boundaries. They don't own you. If you set limits with someone, and she responds maturely and lovingly, you can renegotiate the boundary. In addition, you can change the boundary if you are in a safer place.
Henry Cloud
I trust people with my eyes and ears wide open.
Amit Abraham
Don’t Die™ Waiting to Be Brave is about the synchronistic nature of life, love, trust, gratitude, forgiveness and the crooked road of success.
andrea T Goeglein
The belief that we are deficient and unworthy makes it difficult to trust that we are truly loved
Tara Brach
Many people will not be honest because they fear loss of intimacy and togetherness. In reality, honesty brings people closer together, for it will strengthen their identities. The more you realize your separate identities, the closer you can become. Telling loved ones what is really on your mind and telling others what you really think is the foundation of love.
Henry Cloud
Some survivors can be wary of most people, yet blinded by compassion toward fellow survivors or others who suffer — or who pretend to suffer, or exaggerate their sufferings, in order to take advantage of the survivor. Some survivors overidentify with other survivors, not realizing that even if someone was traumatized or suffers in a similar way, it doesn’t necessarily mean that person is honest. Being either overly suspicious or overly trusting can create problems with a partner who is able to judge the sincerity of others more realistically.
Aphrodite Matsakis
Perhaps this is why not one of 800 sexologists attending a conference raised a hand when asked if they would trust a thin rubber sheath to protect them during intercourse with a known HIV-infected person. I don't blame them. They're not crazy, after all. Yet they're perfectly willing to tell your generation that "safe sex" is within reach and you can sleep around with impunity. It is a terrible lie.
James C. Dobson
For those of you out there today who have already been through hard times and are desperate for a word of encouragement, let me assure you that you can trust this Lord of heaven and earth. Remember that Scripture warns us to “lean not on your own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5).
James C. Dobson
Most kids who don't feel enough love and nurturance carry around this kind of inner rage- a rage that often lasts throughout adulthood. The people who should have cared for them didn't. The lesson to take away: All people are shit. This is why troubled youth walk around with chips on their shoulders and why they are so hard to help.Early on they learn that people can't be trusted. They often spend the rest of their lives embracing this damaging belief. Seeing the world through shit-coloured glasses, they are hypersensitive to every possible slight or judgement, and they believe anyone friendly or kind must have an ulterior motive. Despite all this, wounded people desperately want and need love. But, terrified to trust, they constantly do things to test and sabotage their relationships. This push-pull dance is well-known to anyone who's ever been close to a victim of abuse, neglect, or abandonment. Those who suffer from BPD are hypersensitive to perceived slights from others and can grow notoriously hostile when they feel dissed....For survivors of abuse, who you trust is a matter of survival. Its black and white. There can be no apologies. There can be no gray. There are no exceptions.-Scared Selfless
Michelle Stevens
To be passive is to let others decide for you. To be aggressive is to decide for others. To be assertive is to decide for yourself. And to trust that there is enough, that you are enough.
Edith Eva Eger
But with trust we can strive to accept even what we cannot understand.
Christopher Ryan
To trust someone is to take the greatest risk of all. (180)
Jonathan Kellerman
The validity of Solomon's message has not changed in the three thousand years since he penned it. It comes down through the corridors of time and echoes today with the authority of God Himself. Solomon tells us that the divine commandments are a "light" that will show us "the way to life." But those who would disregard them, both male and female, will suffer the painful consequences.
James C. Dobson
Feelings and stories of unworthiness and shame are perhaps the most binding element in the trance of fear. When we believe something is wrong with us, we are convinced we are in danger. Our shame fuels ongoing fear, and our fear fuels more shame. The very fact that we feel fear seems to prove that we are broken or incapable. When we are trapped in trance, being fearful and bad seem to define who we are. The anxiety in our body, the stories, the ways we make excuses, withdraw or lash out—these become to us the self that is most real.
Tara Brach
While the bodies of young children are usually relaxed and flexible, if experiences of fear are continuous over the years, chronic tightening happens. Our shoulders may become permanently knotted and raised, our head thrust forward, our back hunched, our chest sunken. Rather than a temporary reaction to danger, we develop a permanent suit of armor. We become, as Chogyam Trungpa puts it, “a bundle of tense muscles defending our existence.” We often don’t even recognize this armor because it feels like such a familiar part of who we are. But we can see it in others. And when we are meditating, we can feel it in ourselves—the tightness, the areas where we feel nothing.
Tara Brach
Each time you meet an old emotional pattern with presence, your awakening to truth can deepen. There’s less identification with the self in the story and more ability to rest in the awareness that is witnessing what’s happening. You become more able to abide in compassion, to remember and trust your true home. Rather than cycling repetitively through old conditioning, you are actually spiraling toward freedom.
Tara Brach
You have a unique body and mind, with a particular history and conditioning. No one can offer you a formula for navigating all situations and all states of mind. Only by listening inwardly in a fresh and open way will you discern at any given time what most serves your healing and freedom.
Tara Brach
I was manipulating my inner experience rather than being with what was actually happening.
Tara Brach
Stepping out of the busyness, stopping our endless pursuit of getting somewhere else, is perhaps the most beautiful offering we can make to our spirit.
Tara Brach
Through the experience of meditation itself, the meditator becomes conscious that the practice of meditation is an end in itself rather than a means towards an end.
David Fontana
Within your mind, there are hardly any lines at all. All its contents flow into each other, sensations becoming thoughts, feelings, desires, actions, and more sensations. This stream of consciousness correlates with a cascade of fleeting neural assemblies, each assembly dispersing into the next one[.]
Rick Hanson
The apparent wall between your body and the world is more like a picket fence. And between your mind and the world, it's like a line painted on the sidewalk.
Rick Hanson
Theoretically, I wanted to meditate, but I found actually doing it extraordinarily difficult. As a therapist, I knew that we all want progress, but we resist change. I was a vivid example of this maxim. Figuring out my taxes and going to the dentist were easier than meditating. Even as I told myself meditation was a top priority, I worked to avoid that forty-five minutes alone with my mind.
Mary Pipher
With meditation I found a ledge above the waterfall of my thoughts.
Mary Pipher
The most important attitude that can be formed is that of desire to go on learning.
John Dewey
When scientific conversations cease, then dogma rather than knowledge begins to rule the day.
Jaak Panksepp
Those who make compassion an essential part of their lives find the joy of life. Kindness deepens the spirit and produces rewards that cannot be completely explained in words. It is an experience more powerful than words. To become acquainted with kindness one must be prepared to learn new things and feel new feelings. Kindness is more than a philosophy of the mind. It is a philosophy of the spirit.
Robert J. Furey
Collateral learning in the way of formation of enduring attitudes, of likes and dislikes, may be and often is much more important than the spelling lesson or lesson in geography or history that is learned.
John Dewey
We can all make the world a better place through the moment-to-moment decisions we make as we interact with people.
Morton Shaevitz
Wisdom is learning what to overlook.
William James
By giving our students practice in talking with others, we give them frames for thinking on their own.
Lev S. Vygotsky
We rarely recognize the extent in which our conscious estimates of what is worth while and what is not, are due to standards of which we are not conscious at all. But in general it may be said that the things which we take for granted without inquiry or reflection are just the things which determine our conscious thinking and decide our conclusions.
John Dewey
One never knows when one is going to get ambushed into learning something.
David N. Perkins
Assessment in this spirit does not concern assignment of grades or evaluation of whether instruction was effective. It's assessment designed squarely to feed into the learning process and make the learning stronger.
David N. Perkins
When people recover from depression via psychotherapy, their attributions about recovery are likely to be different than those of people who have been treated with medication. Psychotherapy is a learning experience. Improvement is not produced by an external substance, but by changes within the person. It is like learning to read, write or ride a bicycle. Once you have learned, the skills stays with you. People no not become illiterate after they graduate from school, and if they get rusty at riding a bicycle, the skill can be acquired with relatively little practice. Furthermore, part of what a person might learn in therapy is to expect downturns in mood and to interpret them as a normal part of their life, rather than as an indication of an underlying disorder. This understanding, along with the skills that the person has learned for coping with negative moods and situations, can help to prevent a depressive relapse.
Irving Kirsch
Being famous is not all that one should want in life...there is much more to life than name and fame...
Amit Abraham
I don't want to die while I still have beautiful reasons to die for.
Amit Abraham
...[T]here are days when emptiness is spacious, and non-existence elevating.
Florida Scott-Maxwell
I admire a contented mind. I revere enjoyment of the simple things. I can imagine that contentment has a high degree of truth. But the human tendency is to take good as normal, and one's natural right, and so no cause for satisfaction and pleasure. This is accompanied by the habit of regarding bad as abnormal and a personal outrage.
Florida Scott-Maxwell
I say to life, "You are very hard", and I also say: "We are blind, we prefer to be blind. It is easier...". Life has to be hard to have any affect on us; even now we hardly notice it. Beyond that can one go? I must. I add, "We are also blind to the miracles of good that come to us. We hardly heed them, we even protest against them". Then I am left where I was, appalled by the hardness of life, knowing we are forced to be unwilling heroes. Suddenly I wonder--is all hardness justified because we are so slow in realizing that life was meant to be heroic? Greatness is required of us. That is life's aim and justification, and we poor fools have for centuries been trying to make it convenient, manageable, pliant to our will. It is also peaceful and tender and funny and dull. Yes, all that.
Florida Scott-Maxwell
You need only claim the events of your life to make yourself yours. When you truly possess all you have been and done, which may take some time, you are fierce with reality. When at last age has assembled you together, will it not be easy to let it all go, lived, balanced, over?
Florida Scott-Maxwell
I highly recommend running through grassy trails in the rain. There is a haven of serenity out in nature, the sound of raindrops and the scent of flowers, the feeling of the water along my skin. Even in the middle of a busy city and an insane world, there is beauty everywhere. All we have to do is pause long enough to notice.
Jacqueline Simon Gunn
I long ago abandoned the notion of a life without storms, or a world without dry and killing seasons. Life is too complicated, too constantly changing, to be anything but what it is. And I am, by nature, too mercurial to be anything but deeply wary of the grave unnaturalness involved in any attempt to exert too much control over essentially uncontrollable forces. There will always be propelling, disturbing elements, and they will be there until, as Lowell put it, the watch is taken from the wrist. It is, at the end of the day, the individual moments of restlessness, of bleakness, of strong persuasions and maddened enthusiasms, that inform one’s life, change the nature and direction of one’s work, and give final meaning and color to one’s loves and friendships.
Kay Redfield Jamison
Be still, and lay aside all thoughts of what you are and what God is; all concepts you have learned about the world; all images you hold about yourself. Empty your mind of everything it thinks is either true or false, or good or bad, of every thought it judges worthy, and all the ideas of which it is ashamed. Hold onto nothing Do not bring with you one thought the past has taught, nor one belief you ever learned before from anything. Forget this world, forget this course, and come with wholly empty hands unto your God.
Helen Shucman
In anguish and desperation, I reached out as I had many times before to the presence I call the Beloved. This unconditionally loving and wakeful awareness had always been a refuge for me.
Tara Brach
I found myself praying: "May I love and accept myself just as I am.
Tara Brach
Through prayer, religion insists, things which cannot be realized in any other manner come about: energy which but for prayer would be bound is by prayer set free and operates in some part, be it objective or subjective, of the world of facts.
William James
One of the highest emotions is that of Gratitude… Wherever you are, offer the expression of your awareness of your blessings and how grateful you are for them.
Susan Barbara Apollon
Prayer is energy. Try to come from a higher, lighter vibration of gratitude and expectation, in place of worry and fear.
Susan Barbara Apollon
Healing is about making the choice to focus your thoughts on what feels energetically better at the level of your heart.
Susan Barbara Apollon
Your heart, mind and body—and all your sixty trillion cells—work as a team. When you carefully choose your thoughts and mental images, and focus on what feels comfortable and good for your heart, you shift to a higher level of vibration, which, in turn, bolsters your immune system.
Susan Barbara Apollon