“Ludwig Wittgenstein once greeted me with the question: »Why do people say that it was natural to think that the sun went round the earth rather than that the earth turned on its axis?” I replied: »I suppose, because it looked as if the sun went round the earth.” »Well,« he asked, »what would it have looked like if it had looked as if the earth turned on its axis?«”
― An Introduction to Wittgenstein's Tractatus
― An Introduction to Wittgenstein's Tractatus
“One of the things many diseases have in common is inflammation, acting as kind of a fertilizer for the development of illness. We’ve discovered that when people feel threatened, insecure—especially over an extended period of time—our bodies are programmed to turn on inflammatory genes.”
― The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture
― The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture
“I have led a toothless life, he thought. A toothless life. I have never bitten into anything. I was waiting. I was reserving myself for later on—and I have just noticed that my teeth have gone.”
― The Age of Reason
― The Age of Reason
“Bessel van der Kolk: “Trauma is when we are not seen and known.”
― The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture
― The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture
“Children, especially highly sensitive children, can be wounded in multiple ways: by bad things happening, yes, but also by good things not happening, such as their emotional needs for attunement not being met,”
― The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture
― The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture
Ahmed’s 2025 Year in Books
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