Survival Mode Quotes

“Self-mutilation is a very different issue to suicide. It is a controlled pain personal to you, allowing you to live/exist to some degree.”
― Richy Edwards, A Version of Reason: In Search of Richey Edwards

“With his release imminent, Knight seems more unsettled than ever. He scratches furiously at his knees. Jail, he's realized, might not be all bad. There's routine and order in jail, and he's able to click into a survival mode that is not too dissimilar, in terms of steeliness of mental state, to the one he'd perfected during winters in the woods. "I'm surrounded in here by less than desirable people," he says, "but at least I wasn't thrown into the waters of society and expected to swim.”
― Michael Finkel, The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit

“We all have buttons that, when pressed, send us into survival mode.
”
― J.S. Wolfe, The Unfolding: A Journey of Involution

“We don’t learn things that help us to thrive when we are in survival mode. It’s only when we are in sensual mode that we do.”
― Lebo Grand

“I’d trade every last dollar, every shred of dignity, for one damn Klonopin—just to silence the nerves screaming that I’m still alive. High, drunk, broken—whatever it takes to fake peace in a body that won’t stop lying.”
― Jonathan Harnisch, Sex, Drugs, and Schizophrenia

“Nassun can't see his face, and must gauge his mood by his broad shoulders. (It bothers her that she does this, watching him constantly for shifts of mood or warnings of tension. It is another thing she learned from Jija. She cannot seem to shed it with Schaffa, or anyone else.)”
― N.K. Jemisin, The Stone Sky

“We don’t learn things that help us to thrive when we are in survival mode. It’s only when we are in sensual (safety) mode that we do.”
― Lebo Grand

“Everyone has a unique sensual template to thriving in life.”
― Lebo Grand

“Switch from Survival mode to Sensual mode.”
― Lebo Grand

“You cannot be sensual when you’re operating in survival mode.”
― Lebo Grand

“The biggest part of my work is also to help women shift from survival mode to sensual mode. When you are in sensual mode, ladies, you can FULLY own your power as a woman and still not be a feminist.”
― Lebo Grand

“One way of grounding how we should identify refugees in a changing world is through the concept of force majeure - the absence of a reasonable choice but to leave. More specifically, the threshold for refuge would be: fear of serious physical harm. And the test would be: when would a reasonable person not see her- or himself as having a choice but to flee? In other words, if you were in the same situation, what would you do?”
― Alexander Betts, Refuge: Transforming a Broken Refugee System

“Survival mode becomes our default when we inhabit it for months or years, and it begins to exact a significant toll. Physiologically, it manifests as chronic fatigue, disrupted sleep, weakened immunity, and increased susceptibility to illness. Psychologically, it presents as numbness, lack of joy, and disconnection from oneself and the world”
― Dr. Lucas D. Shallua, The New Me: A Step-by-Step Guide to Personal Reinvention