“I have discovered the value of psychology and psychiatry, that their teachings can undo knots in us and permit life to flow again and aid us in becoming more truly human.”
Source: Becoming Human
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Jean Vanier 36
Canadian humanitarian 1928–2019Related quotes

Press statement on the Zero Discrimination Day, Message from the UNAIDS Executive Director on Zero Discrimination Day and International Women’s Day https://www.unaids.org/en/resources/presscentre/pressreleaseandstatementarchive/2020/march/2020-zdd-exd-message, UNAIDS

Psychiatry, Psychoanalysis, and the New Biology of Mind (2008)

Excerpt from the foreword in Girl Boss: Running the Show Like the Big Chicks, by Stacy Kravetz (1999)
1990s
Context: Another miraculous result of playing Scully has been all the incredible young women I have been blessed to meet along the way--women who have shared that they have received strength from Scully, that because of Scully's strength they have been afraid but done it anyway. These have been women from all walks of life: women from low-income neighborhoods who have persevered despite all odds to study hard and pursue their dreams, enabling them to enter into better schools and work environments; women who have illness and physical challenges who have gotten better and stronger because they believe they can. I truly believe that we can overcome any hurdle that lies before us and create the life we want to live. I have seen it happen time and time again.

LSD psychotherapy (1980), MAPS 2001 edition, Epilogue, p. 299.

Mailer's Introduction to the 50th Anniversary Edition (1998)
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Context: For that is the genius of the old man — Tolstoy teaches us that compassion is of value and enriches our life only when compassion is severe, which is to say when we can perceive everything that is good and bad about a character but are still able to feel that the sum of us as human beings is probably a little more good than awful … That fine edge in Tolstoy, the knowledge that compassion is valueless without severity (for otherwise it cannot defend itself against sentimentality), gave The Naked and the Dead whatever enduring virtue it may possess and catapulted the amateur who wrote it into the grim ranks of those successful literary men and women who are obliged to become professional in order to survive …

“It is the enemy who can truly teach us to practice the virtues of compassion and tolerance.”
Ocean of Wisdom: Guidelines for Living (1989) ISBN 094066609X
Unsourced variant: In the practice of tolerance, one's enemy is the best teacher.
“It does not undo harm to acknowledge that we have done it; but it undoes us not to acknowledge it.”
The Complete Neurotic's Notebook (1981), Unclassified