199 Quotes About Psychotherapy

There is no human deed or thought that lies fully outside the experience of other people.

An incurably psychotic individual may lose his usefulness but yet retain the dignity of a human being. This is my psychiatric credo. Without it I should not think it worthwhile to be a psychiatrist.

I agree with Viktor Frankl that a sense of life meaning ensues but cannot be deliberately pursued: life meaning is always a derivative phenomenon that materializes when we have transcended ourselves, when we have forgotten ourselves and become absorbed in someone (or something) outside ourselves.

Switching is the term in dissociation theory used to refer to the change of state, or moving from one part or alter to another. Some writers use the word splitting when referring to switching, creating a further confusion.

How can it be good practice to select a ready-made formulation before the therapist lays eyes on a new client?

The most common secret is a deep conviction of basic inadequacy - a feeling that one is basically incompetent, that one bluffs one's way through life. Next in frequency is a deep sense of interpersonal alienation - that, despite appearances, one really does not, or cannot care for or love another person. The third most frequent category is some variety of sexual secret.

[E]xplanation and clarification function as effective therapeutic agents in their own right. Human beings have always abhorred uncertainty and through the ages have sought to order the universe by providing explanations, primarily religious or scientific. The explanation of a phenomenon is the first step toward its control. If a volcanic eruption is caused by a displeased god, then at least there is hope of pleasing the god.

John has been working with individuals and families since 1998. The majority of his work has been with adolescents and adults who struggle with a variety of psychiatric, emotional and behavioral issues in individual and group settings.

In 1949, Claude Lévi-Strauss stated in a key essay that the shaman, far from being mentally ill, was in fact a kind of psychotherapist—the difference being that the psychoanalyst listens, whereas the shaman speaks.