“Forgiveness is such a tricky term.” Olivia smoothed her skirt. “What it actually means is an absence of anger or resentment. Somehow we’ve made it more complicated and decided it puts the onus on someone who’s been hurt to make the person who hurt them feel better or condone what that person did.”
Source: This Time Could Be Different
“I am
neither spurred on by excessive optimism nor in love with
high ideals, but am merely concerned with the fate of the
individual human being – that infinitesimal unit on whom a
world depends, and in whom, if we read the meaning of the
Christian message aright, even God seeks his goal.”
“Trauma may be a new subject in psychology, but its repercussions are centuries old.
As society becomes more aware of its impact, we must actively take responsibility and make profound changes in the way we think, treat, and mitigate the consequences of psychological struggles.”
Source: Traumatization and Its Aftermath
“This dynamic, this ‘striving to preserve identity’, however strange the means or effects of such striving, was recognized in psychiatry long ago—and, like so much else, is especially associated with the work of Freud. Thus, the delusions of paranoia were seen by him not as primary but as attempts (however misguided) at restitution, at reconstructing a world reduced by complete chaos.”
Source: The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales
“He faced me as he spoke, was oriented towards me, and yet there was something the matter—it was difficult to formulate. He faced me with his ears, I came to think, but not with his eyes. These, instead of looking, gazing, at me, ‘taking me in’, in the normal way, made sudden strange fixations—on my nose, on my right ear, down to my chin, up to my right eye—as if noting (even studying) these individual features, but not seeing my whole face, its changing expressions, ‘me’, as a whole. I am not sure that I fully realized this at the time—there was just a teasing strangeness, some failure in the normal interplay of gaze and expression. He saw me, he scanned me, and yet...”
Source: The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales
“Ваше минуле - це ваше минуле, подобається вам це чи ні, пам'ятаєте ви його свідомо чи ні, берете за нього відповідальність чи ні. Багато з того, що сталось у минулому, було не вашою провиною (може, там взагалі не було нічиєї провини, а може, у чомусь були винні й ви), але події у вашому житті є вашими і завжди будуть вашими. Ви не можете повернутись у минуле і змінити їх, навіть якщо вони здаються незавершеними чи несправедливими.”
Source: Procrastination: Why You Do It, What To Do About It
“A tea master horrified his pupils by planting a hedge in his garden, blocking the view of the Inland Sea for which his school was famous,' I said, half to myself. 'He left only a gap in the hedge and set a basin before it. Anyone drinking from it would have to bend down and look at the sea through the hole.'
'Why do you think he planted the hedge to block out the famous view?'
'Tominaga explained it to me but I've only just really understood it now - the effect of seeing the view is much more powerful than if the sea has not been obstructed.”
Source: The Garden of Evening Mists
“زمانی که حادثه بدی برای ما رخ می دهد، ما را به ژرفای غم و اندوه می کشاند اما تاب آوردن و تحمل این اندوه است که ما را به شادی می رساند. زمانی که می بینیم هر اتفاقی می تواند تا چه اندازه ناخوشایند باشد، قدردان وضعیت موجود خواهیم بود”
Source: Prisoners of Our Thoughts: Viktor Frankl's Principles for Discovering Meaning in Life and Work
“Our worst behaviors, ones we condemn and punish, are the products of our biology. But don’t forget that the same applies to our best behaviors.”
Source: Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst
“Be dubious about someone who suggests that other types of people are like little crawly, infectious things.”
Source: Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst