self-help-writers-from-the-united-states

"Parts carry extreme beliefs and emotions in or on their "bodies" that drive the way they feel and act. … [T]his is how parts describe themselves—that they have bodies[,] and that their bodies contain emotions and beliefs that came into them and don't belong to them. Often, they can tell you the exact traumatic moment these emotions and beliefs came into or attached to them[,] and they can tell you where they carry what seem to them to be these foreign objects in or on their bodies."

"When I asked these protective parts what they’d rather do if they trusted they didn’t have to protect, they often wanted to do something opposite of the role they were in. Inner critics wanted to become cheerleaders or sage advisors, extreme caretakers wanted to help set boundaries, rageful parts wanted to help with discerning who was safe. It seemed that not only were parts not what they seemed, but also they each had qualities and resources to bring to the client’s life that were not available while they were tied up in the protective roles."

"Most clients had parts that didn't trust the leadership of their Self in the outside world. These parts jumped in to handle many kinds of external experiences because they believed they had to protect the system. They were like parentified children who don't trust that their parent is capable and, consquently, bravely take on responsibilities for the welfare of the family that are beyond their capacities."

"Your emotions and thoughts … emanate from inner personalities I call parts of you. I’m suggesting that what seems like your explosive temper, for example, is more than a bundle of anger. If you were to focus on it and ask it questions, you might learn that it is a protective part of you that defends other vulnerable parts and is in conflict with the parts of you that want to please everyone. It might reveal to you that it has to stay this angry as long as you are so vulnerable and self-sacrificing. You might also learn that it has other feelings, such as fear and sadness, but that it feels as though it must stay in this role of being the angry one to protect you. If you asked it to, it could show you scenes of the point in your life when it was forced into its protective role. It might even show you an image or representation of itself, such as a dragon, volcano, or tough adolescent kid. Most importantly, it can tell you how you can help to release it so it is no longer stuck in this rageful role. With your help, it can change dramatically into a valuable quality so that you’re no longer plagued with a bad temper; instead, for example, you have an increased ability to assert yourself appropriately."

"My belief is that the truth is a truth until you organize it, and then becomes a lie. I don't think that Jesus was teaching Christianity, Jesus was teaching kindness, love, concern, and peace. What I tell people is don't be Christian be Christ like. Don't be Buddhist be Buddha like."

"In a world of individuals, comparison is a senseless activity."

"You will never win if you have to prove that you are the winner."

"Whatever you've been until today is already over, and while you can almost always learn from it, and sometimes change effects that are continuing into the present, you cannot undo what you have done."

"Your actions reveal how badly you want something. If you keep saying something is a priority but you never act on it, then you don’t really want it. It’s time to have an honest conversation with yourself. Your actions reveal your true motivations."

"Every action you take is a vote for the person you wish to become"

"Habits are the compound interest of self-improvement"

"Many people begin the process of changing their habits by focusing on what they want to achieve. This leads us to outcome-based habits. The alternative is to build identity-based habits. With this approach, we start by focusing on who we wish to become"

"It is so easy to overestimate the importance of one defining moment and underestimate the value of making small improvements on a daily basis."

"Breakthrough moments are often the result of many previous actions, which build up the potential required to unleash a major change"

"I knew that if things were going to improve, I was the one responsible for making it happen"

"Service or giving is the other side of receiving. Giving and receiving is a full circle: a full circle feels more natural than a half circle."

"It’s marvelous when you think of words. If you just think of any one word, not just thinking about how it came about in the expression, but just what your mouth does to pronounce that word (1968)"

"Beauty, well, it's one of the greatest, greatest gifts. I feel sorry sometimes because people are so worried and so involved in something that they don't have even five minutes to look at something beautiful. I find beauty almost everywhere."

"We should train ourselves in the use of imagination when we are well, so that we are ready to use it when we are not."

"You alone can change yourself, and when you do, then circumstances and people will both seem and be changed."

"Like any other faculty, imagination can be starved and suffocated or stimulated and nourished."

"There is danger in everything that we do. We are to eat food otherwise we don’t live and sometimes we eat food that is very damaging...Or addicted to food. Oh, yes, addiction to food is unfortunately really grave, also to alcohol or to anything else. But these drugs can be such an extraordinary gift, really. Some, not all drugs. Again, how can we speak about "drugs"? It is like speaking about the human race—each person is different, each drug is different!"

"Scientific research is the art of asking the right question in the right way."

"Often a question, the first one, is not the real question at all but a substitute which our unconscious self has artfully framed to protect our superficial comfort from being disturbed by a deeper, more troubling doubt."

"creativity is not the monopoly of the Shakespeares and Einsteins of this world. There is a science of intelligent living, an art of being fully human, in which we all can and ought to be creative. To use our imagination is part of the total art of being. To imagine other people's imagination is part of the art of being with others."

"Imagine what life would be like without imagination! There would be no Michelangelo or Da Vinci, no Edison, no delinquents and no saints, no Mozart, no nuclear power."

"Infinity and eternity are the limits of imagination. You can project your imagination into the past or into the future; you can destroy an old image that has troubled you or create a new one that will rejoice you."

"this transformation is really the key now, isn’t it, to our living: to be able to transform. (1968)"

"focus your mind and respect your body. But mostly love your heart. I think that is where to begin, from there and then it goes out...Love your heart. It really is to love yourself to begin with and help everybody else in doing the same. But the heart being the center. You can focus your mind. You can respect your body. All of that is important. Then if you love your heart, this can be transmitted to other people. I mean you can help anybody that wants to do the same."

"our society can improve only if the next generation is given the chance, through loving and intelligent education, to be better developed than the present one."

"Choose to see beauty. Watch a puppy's antics. Do not think of how he will look or behave when he is a grown dog. Look at him now, look at him fully, look at him so completely that there is no room in your mind for anything except this puppy, this moment. (16: "AS IF FOR THE FIRST TIME, or Five Minutes of Beauty a Day")"

"It is harmful to reject a human being; it is harmful to be rejected. When we do not respect or love ourselves we commit both offenses. ("Love Yourself as You Love Your Neighbor")"

"It is against our ethical principles as human beings to harm others. But aside from ethics, it is against our self-interest. The neurosis we cultivate in others inevitably rebounds against ourselves. From heavy-handed authority resentment and rebellion will develop. From sexual repression or dissatisfaction, anger, nervous tension and its consequences will arise."

"How often does pleasure pass us by because we are not ready to accept it! When we are preoccupied or in pain it is hard even to see, let alone pluck, the flowers of pleasure on our way. We may even walk blindly over them. ("Open the Door to Pleasure")"

"For this purpose it is necessary to keep in sharp focus a fact of which often we are not aware: we are at all times a connecting link, one of many links, in a chain reaction of related events. Each of us is the product of many chains: the evolutionary chain, the racial chain, the genetic chain, the environmental chain, and many others. The immense mass of events of which we are alternately the cause and the effect surpasses the human imagination."

"True pleasure is inextricably linked with feelings of gratitude, generosity, well-being. So inseparable is pleasure from this climate of good feeling that it is hard to know which comes first, the enjoyment or the good feeling. ("Open the Door to Pleasure")"

"This is a part of living, part of the interrelatedness of human beings. We cannot live in a world of people and avoid the storms of their disagreeable and painful emotions any more than we can avoid the weather. But we can avoid this feeling of being the target for them. We can even turn the unpleasant encounters to our own good use."

"Our creative potential has many aspects, but undoubtedly the most important one is to make good use of ourselves and what we are here and now, at each successive moment."

"In all its manifestations and however it is produced, not-love tends to beget not-love. The energy of love is needed to reconvert not-love into love."

"War is the most terrifying example of energy directed against ourselves, and yet it was a great relief for many people throughout history. War provided them with a legitimate outlet for their aggressive feelings and an escape from their boredom. Even the humblest factory job acquired a glow of righteousness and patriotism. It is sadly significant that the number of suicides always declines during a war. A nuclear war would provide none of the satisfactions of past wars-no marching, no brass bands, no heroism. Like termites fumigated in their nests, we would all be exterminated, on any side of any curtain, by a stupendous gadget paid for by our hard-earned money and of which we were supposed to be proud. This gadget is the most powerful of all man-made transformers of energy."

"Our task is to find ways in which the energy evoked by negative emotions can be transformed, in a manner compatible with civilized living, into harmless-or better-into positively useful energy. Our purpose, then, is to become expert and voluntary energy transformers instead of involuntary energy victims. Like everything else, this takes practice."

"It is feeling the energy, becoming conscious of it, that permits us to redirect it according to the best of our physical, intellectual, and ethical knowledge."

"Whether you are nineteen or ninety, whether you weigh one hundred or three hundred pounds, whether you move with ease or difficulty, whether your joints are supple or stiff-no matter. Dance. ("Dance Naked With Music")"

"It is almost as destructive not to respect and love oneself as it is to respect and love only oneself. ("Love Yourself as You Love Your Neighbor")"

"Energy is neither good nor evil. It is a neutral power which can be used well or badly. The art of living is simply the art of using energy in an intelligent and creative way...By daily practice, you can become a CONSCIOUS AND INTELLIGENT DIRECTOR OF ENERGY. (8: "THE ART OF CONVERTING ENERGY")"

"Beauty starvation is almost as widespread as love starvation. Often we do not realize that this is what we are hungry for. In our world of traffic jams and artificial flowers we are so far removed from the pure experiences of our senses that we do not even realize our deprivation. (16: "AS IF FOR THE FIRST TIME, or Five Minutes of Beauty a Day")"

"we must want not to be the target. There is a widespread though subterranean feeling that to be made to suffer to be a victim- is somehow an admirable position on earth and a good ticket to a special place in heaven...If you know that you carry this belief in your own mind, ask yourself this question: When do I do the most good for myself and for others: When I am suffering-Or when I am happy?"

"Although we would not consider ourselves the target of a hurricane or a tidal wave, we often feel we are the victims of meteorological disturbances in the minds of other people. Sometimes it is true; people are trying to hurt us. But most of the time they are merely exploding, and we happen to be nearby-a conveniant substitute for their real target."

"Self-questioning is a first step on the path to self-awareness. And this awareness is a precondition for making the most of our lives. It is our protection against unnecessary mental suffering and physical illness, and our aid in coping with these when they cannot be avoided. Being aware is the way toward finding fulfillment in our relationships with others, of bringing all our store of healthy energy to living and working."

"There are almost as many ways of helping people to feel better as there are human beings."