Alex Mae

“We need to listen carefully to the wisdom of our symptoms and to try to decode their meaning, because some of us have learned to settle, to fall silent; to deny that unfair circumstances exist or matter, and then to call our compromises “life.” But our bodies, our deeper unconscious selves, remain harder to fool.”
― Harriet Lerner, The Dance of Connection: How to Talk to Someone When You're Mad, Hurt, Scared, Frustrated, Insulted, Betrayed, or Desperate

“In the end, institutions and systems respond to the initiatives of individuals and groups of individuals. Systems do not perpetuate themselves: they are perpetuated by the actions of people who act automatically on the basis of their socialization. If we all acted on the basis of values and beliefs of our own choosing, systems and institutions would show greater flexibility and propensity fo change. As it now stands, most of us act on the basis of values and beliefs instilled in us through the socialization process, designed to prepare us to act in ways that insure the perpetuation of existing systems of oppression.

The development of a liberator consciousness would allow us the opportunity to reclaim choice in our values and attitudes and consequently, in our response patters. It would enable us to move from an automatic response system grounded in our socialization, to the capacity to act on a range of responses based on our own awareness, analysis and decision making, and the opportunities we have to learn from our colleagues and others who are themselves embarked on a journey to liberation. ~ Developing a Liberatory Consciousness”
― Barbara J. Love

“Acting out rather than speaking out became a pattern.”
― Harriet Lerner, Ph.D.

“Sometimes I think we would lose ourselves altogether if it were not for our stubborn, irrepressible symptoms, calling us, requiring us, to recollect ourselves, to reorient ourselves to life.”
― Kat Duff