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David Richo

David Richo Quotes

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Famous David Richo Quotes

“People who have an extreme fear of abandonment become angry at the slightest form of distance. They may then react by becoming controlling, demanding, angry, or critical. We can be triggered and then react in indignation. Healthy adults, of course, will not stay long in such a relationship without seeking professional help, each for individualized issues. We can only stay when we don't need to walk on eggshells anymore because we are getting help in changing things. Sometimes a relationship can only work with work.”

“Romance is the best way to begin a relationship and is a bridge to a more mature commitment. But we should not be surprised that it does not last. It is a phase that builds a bond, but it is not a mature bond in itself. Nature designed romance to bring people together to mate, to propagate the species, and to support one another. In this phase the sexual energy is high, and so is the adrenaline. However, continued high adrenaline levels lower our immune response and eventually undermine our health. Thus, in the best interests of our health, romance lasts only as long as is needed for sex and procreation to occur.”

“On first glance, relationship addiction looks exactly like the romance phase of any relationship. The difference is that romance is phase appropriate, whereas addiction defies flux and attaches itself to the crest of excitement and drama. Romance moves on; addiction halts and paralyzes us. Addiction is unsatisfiable because, ultimately, satisfaction flows from moving over the curve of exhilaration to repose while addiction tarries at the crest of excitement.”

“In healthy relating, we connect but do not attach. We can only really possess what does not possess us. This leads us to the great irony of addictive relating: We attach and thereby do not have. The second irony is that the more we rely on someone for security, the less secure we feel. It is sometimes frightening to realize how much impact a partner has come to have on our life and thoughts. We may react in counter-phobic ways like getting even closer!”

“If closeness was associated with danger in the past, it may remain so as a post-traumatic stress reaction. The fear of closeness and engulfment is subtle and long-lived; we are only released from it when we work through it and practice overriding it again and again. We do this when we allow the other person to direct our love rather than controlling how much or in what way we show it. To let go of control that way is terrifying to someone who fears closeness.”

“You may be unable to get the other person or the betrayal out of your mind. The ego prefers to choose one side of a polarity and ignore the other, which helps explain the origin and longevity of obsessive thoughts in which we can focus on only one option. You are not in the control tower. Rather you are challenged to become the landing strip. Simply allow any feelings and thoughts that may safely land or crash on you. They are normal and usually fade with time.”

“Acceptance is approval, a word with a bad name in some psychologies. Yet it is perfectly normal to seek approval in childhood and throughout life. We require approval from those we respect. The kinship it creates lifts us to their level, a process referred to in self-psychology as transmuting internalization. Approval is a necessary component of self-esteem. It becomes a problem only when we give up our true self to find it. Then approval-seeking works against us.”

“The most exciting part of finding out who we are is discovering our own uniqueness, who we are outside the box, beyond the categories in a Psychology 101 textbook. In our inimitable singularity, there is an infinite range of possibility that cannot be tied to any one description of what it means to be human or healthy.”