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William Glasser Quotes

William Glasser was an American psychiatrist.

Glasser was the developer of W. Edwards Deming's workplace ideas, reality therapy and choice theory. His innovations for individual counseling, work environments and school, highlight personal choice, personal responsibility and personal transformation. Glasser positioned himself in opposition to conventional mainstream psychiatrists, who focus instead on classifying psychiatric syndromes as "illnesses" and prescribe psychotropic medications to treat mental disorders.

Based on his wide-ranging and consulting clinical experience, Glasser applied his theories to broader social issues, such as education, management, and marriage, to name a few. As a public advocate, Glasser warned the general public of potential detriments caused by older generations of psychiatry, wedded to traditional diagnosing of patients as having mental illnesses and prescribing medications. In his view, patients simply act out their unhappiness and lack of meaningful personal connection with important people in their life. Glasser advocated educating the general public about mental health issues; offering, post-modern frameworks for finding and following healthy therapeutic direction. Wikipedia  

✵ 11. May 1925 – 23. August 2013
William Glasser photo
William Glasser: 14   quotes 3   likes

Famous William Glasser Quotes

“Drugs provide pleasure; they cannot provide happiness. For happiness, you need people.”

William Glasser

Source: Choice Theory (1997), p. 88

“To be depressed or neurotic is passive. It happened to us; we are its victim, and we have no control over it. This use of nouns and adjectives makes it logical for us to believe that we can do nothing for ourselves…but you are capable of choosing something better. If it is a choice, it follows that you are responsible for making it. With verbs, you are not a victim of mental illness; you are either the beneficiary of your own good choices or the victim of your own bad choices. You are not ill in the usual sense of having the flu or food poisoning. A choice theory world is a tough responsible world; you cannot use grammar to escape responsibility for what you are doing.”

William Glasser

Source: Choice Theory (1997), p. 75

“When a client says, It's hard to say, he usually knows what's really going on but doesn't want to talk about it…. I break through that reluctance by acting as if it wasn't there. 'Well, say it anyway. This is the place to say hard-to-say-things.”

William Glasser

Source: Choice Theory (1997), p. 65

“The most destructive habit [to relationships] is criticizing; next comes blaming, but any of the habits are more than capable of disconnecting you from a person you want to be close with.”

William Glasser

Source: Unhappy Teenagers A Way for Parents and Teachers to Reach Them (2002), p.14

“The Seven Deadly Habits of External Control: Blaming, Criticizing, Complaining, Nagging, Threatening, Punishing, and Bribing”

William Glasser

Rewarding to Control
Unhappy Teenagers A Way for Parents and Teachers to Reach Them (2002)

“We almost always have choices, and the better the choice, the more we will be in control of our lives.”

William Glasser

Choice Theory (1997)

William Glasser Quotes about feelings

“When we depress, we believe we are the victims of a feeling over which we have no control.”

William Glasser

[p.70]
Choice Theory (1997)

“We would be much better off getting rid of the psychology that is causing so much misery than looking for chemicals that make us feel better but do nothing to solve our loneliness.”

William Glasser

Source: Choice Theory (1997), p. 88

“Brain drugs may make us feel better, but they do not solve the problems that led us to feel miserable”

William Glasser

Source: Choice Theory (1997), p. 4

“Beware of getting involved with people who seem to be able to feel good but have no close friends. They may be witty and fun to be around, but their humor is all put-downs and hostility. If you marry such a person, you will soon be the recipient of that hostile humor and may regret it for the rest of your marriage…. Someone who does not have good friends does not know how to love.”

William Glasser

Source: Choice Theory (1997), p. 30

William Glasser Quotes

“Such people who choose to depress are not mentally ill; their brain chemistry is not abnormal. It is changed from what it is when they are happy, but that change is perfectly normal for the total behavior, depressing, they are choosing…. The brain chemistry no more causes his depressing than sweating causes running. It is the choice to depress or to run that results in both.”

William Glasser

Source: Choice Theory (1997), p. 85

People , Behavior , Change , Happiness

“Your teen may be weaker, but he is not without the ability to do himself and others a lot of harm by showing you that you can't control him at school or anywhere else when he is out of your sight…. [W]hen he is on his own, your only control over him is the strength of your relationship.”

William Glasser

Source: Unhappy Teenagers A Way for Parents and Teachers to Reach Them (2002), p.9

School

“If you depend on the widespread lover's delusion, 'With my love he or she will change,' you have little chance to help yourself. This delusion is external control to the maximum. If things are not good from the beginning, they are very likely to change, but not for the better.”

William Glasser

Source: Choice Theory (1997), p. 105

Love , Lovers , Change , Chance

“[Reality Therapy] is based on choice theory and focuses on improving present relationships, almost always disregards past relationships, and depends for its success on creating a good relationship between the client and the counselor.”

William Glasser

Source: Choice Theory (1997), p. 62

Reality , Success , Past , Dependency

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