Michael E. Kerr > Quotes

“People who have good levels of solid self are as interested in the welfare of others as much as in their own welfare. They are not competing with one another and are trying to change one another. They are present and accounted for even when system anxiety is high. They do not have to distance to calm themselves and do not have to get others to be calm for themselves to be calm. They truly understand that calming themselves helps to calm others.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“Psychosis is a place to withdraw to in face of an anxious environment. Psychosis solves a problem, but it also creates a problem.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“Peace at any price is part of the problem, not part of the solution.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“It is all too easy to blame parents than exercise the discipline to comprehend the many variables that go into the explanation of a human emotional problem.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“Flexibility prevails.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“Part of the problem is that people want to believe that they are more autonomous than they really are.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“Given the powerful human need for emotional closeness, a real or imagined threat to a relationship on which a person is extremely dependent constitutes a threat to survival.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“Once established, the level of “self” rarely changes unless a person makes a structured and long-term effort to change it.”
― Michael E. Kerr, One Family's Story: A Primer on Bowen Theory

“When anxiety is internalized and expressed as a physical symptom, the person feels bad “physically”, when anxiety is internalized and expressed as an emotional symptom, the person feels bad “mentally.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Family Evaluation

“At the restrictive end, people adamantly believe that, if they can exert more control, they can make others function better; at the permissive end, people passionately believe that being more loving and understanding of others is what can fix them.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“I often refer to the calming effect of seeing and accepting one's part in a relationship problem as 'the systems miracle'.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“People were playing the hands they were dealt to the best of their ability.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families

“I made the error of assuming it should change and that I could somehow make it change...It was arrogant of me to think I knew what was best for them.”
― Michael E. Kerr, Bowen Theory's Secrets: Revealing the Hidden Life of Families