Joy

“How easily the life we didn't live becomes the only life we prize. How easily we are seduced by the fantasy that we are in control, that we were ever in control, that the things we could or should have done or said have the power, if only we had done or said them, to cure pain, to erase suffering, to vanish loss. How easily we can cling to- worship- the choices we think we could or should have made.”
― Edith Eger, The Choice: Embrace the Possible

“Anger, however consuming, is never the most important emotion. It is only the very outer edge, the thinly exposed top layer of a much deeper feeling. And the real feeling that's disguised by the mask of anger is usually fear. And you can't love and fear at the same time.”
― Edith Eger, The Choice: Embrace the Possible

“We can help patients find peace, but maybe a different kind than they imagined they'd find when they started treatment. ... I know that therapy won't make all my problems disappear, prevent new ones from developing, or ensure that I'll always act from a place of enlightenment. Therapists don't perform personality transplants; they just help to take the sharp edges off. A patient may become less reactive or critical, more open and able to let people in. In other words, therapy is about understanding the self that you are. But part of getting to know yourself is to unknow yourself- to let go of the limiting stories you've told yourself about who you are so that you aren't trapped by them, so you can live your life and not the story you've been telling yourself about your life.”
― Lori Gottlieb, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, Her Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed

“You can't heal what you can't feel.”
― Edith Eger, The Choice: Embrace the Possible