Person Centered Quotes

“Remembering that the impulse to control is an indication that we are having a neuroception of danger, perhaps we can be compassionate rather than critical of ourselves when we do step in to overtly manage the process.

Perhaps we can begin to ask inside about the nature of the threat that brings on the need to assert control and fix.

As always, dropping the questions into our right hemisphere and not expecting a particular answer in this moment opens the way for a deeper understanding to emerge bit by bit.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“In these pages, we keep returning to one foundational principle: providing the possibility of emotional/relational safety for our people, be they patients, children, partners, friends or strangers.

We are able to make this offer when they are experiencing their own neuroception of safety, not continuously, but as the baseline to which we return after our system has adaptively moved into sympathetic arousal or dorsal withdrawal in response to inner and outer conditions.

When we neuroceive safety, we humans automatically begin to open into vulnerability, and the movement of our "inherent treatment plan" (Sills, 2010) has a greater probability of coming forward.

When we have a neuroception of threat, we adaptively tighten down at many levels, from physical tension to activation of the protective skills we have learned over a lifetime (Levine, 2010). In that state, our innate healing path will often wisely stay hidden until more favorable conditions arrive.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“we are adaptive rather than disordered”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“Behavior is basically the goal-directed attempt of the organism to satisfy its needs as experienced, in the field as perceived.”
― Carl R. Rogers, Client-Centered Therapy: Its Current Practice, Implications and Theory

“Joshua is one of the people who taught me about respecting pace, particularly when it is very slow.

I do believe we all heal as quickly as we can given the co-integrating nature of our embodied brains, so when the process unfolds very slowly, it often speaks to us of the magnitude of what is coming [emerging to be healed].”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“Depression always brings to mind the possibility that the person's SEEKING system may have been turned off ...

Our mutual trust in his system's wisdom kept us from being swept away by the despair he felt. We began to ask, "what is this depression, this one who is so still, wanting to tell us?" Then we waited.

We stayed with the one who felt dead inside, acknowledging his protective value even when though we had no cognitive awareness of who and what he was sheltering.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“If we trust that our inner world knows what is needed next, one outcome isn't preferable to another.

It is so easy for us to want healing to pursue a more linear path: Something arises and it would be best if we could stay with that.

There can be a sense of disappointment in therapist, patient, or both if the sensation doesn't return. This might be perceived as a lack in our patient's ability to maintain contact, a reflection of our inadequacy of a therapist, or simply discomfort that the therapy feels stuck.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“Each time we offer a reflection, we are also quietly repairing/disconfirming attachment wounds that always contain elements of our parents or others not being able to see us because of their own injuries.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“... we might be drawn into a more left-centric way of hearing ... and experience the promotion of safety as a somewhat mechanical process in which A inevitably leads to B-- [ie: the belief that 'my being in a ventral state will automatically draw you into one, and if it doesn't then there is something wrong with one of us'.]

Viewing it that way encourages us to turn social engagement into a technique, even a manipulation of the other person's nervous system toward what we view as a more desirable state. Ironically, when the left hemisphere is dominant rather than supportive of right-centric attending, we have already moved out of social engagement and thus are in no position to offer safe space to another. When we make an effort to return to it, we have forgotten that neuroception is continually arising automatically and not under the control of our will.

The very pressure to activate ventral makes the space between us unsafe.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“I smiled broadly. " ...This is your body's wisdom speaking to us, sensing when it is safe to go forward, pulling back a bit when it might be too much. You and I are just getting to know one another, so I really respect the caution and protection in your inner world." ...

With visible relaxation in her body and strong eye contact, she said, "All my life people have criticized me for being cautious. It means a lot that you like that I'm that way."
W”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“There are so many valuable techniques for regulation, for exploring and integrating traumatic experience, and so on. Once we get to know these protocols, they may pull on us in ways that invite us to seize control of the therapy.

The other pathway suggests that her system holds the answers and that if I can offer enough safe support, it will likely begin to speak with us.

At least cognitively, I can recognize that this person's inner world contains much more information about the root causes of her upset than I do.

From this perspective, I am less interested in dealing with symptoms than moving towards making room for the implicit origin to emerge so that the protective systems can take care of themselves.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“if our attention is what we're going to do next to accomplish a specific goal (often decrease a symptom) rather than openness to what the other person is bringing to the moment, we have stepped into our left hemispheres and out of relationship- and our patient will feel that as a kind of subtle abandonment. This interchange will likely happen below the level of conscious awareness and yet lead our person to step back a bit internally, awaiting the arrival of true presence, without agenda or judgement, so that safety can arise in the space in between. At that moment, the healing power inherent in this co-organizing/co-regulating relationship arrives. We have been returning to this crucial distinction in these pages, as much as possible with ongoing compassion for the challenge we experience as we open to the right remaining consistently in the lead.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“We may find ourselves in a role similar to that of a gardener as we cultivate a space in which healing can naturally unfold.

In terms of neurobiology, this stance encourages us to lean into the reassuring awareness that our systems already contain seeds awaiting our attention.

For some examples, we humans are always seeking the warmest possible attachments we can imagine (Cozolino, Siegel), our brains are continuously yearning for the arrival of a co-organizing other (Badenoch, Cozolino, Schore), emotional regulation flows naturally from being in the presence of someone we trust (Beckes & Coan) and even our nervous systems have a preference for the social engagement circuitry that sustains connection (Porges).

With this kind of support from the biology inherent in both practitioner and patient, our bodies may begin to open into a welcoming state as others come towards us, with a sense of partnership being established rather than someone doing something to us.

However this also means letting go of the potential certainty that comes from feeling we are in charge.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“If ... we hear ourselves speaking words that convey attunement to the process unfolding in this moment--a felt sense of receiving, cultivating, believing, supporting and trusting--we are more apt to be attending from the right with support from the left.

This way of experiencing may also be coupled with attention to felt sense, comfort with being rather than pressure to do, and a respect for the undulating rise and fall of healing that unfolds naturally in the space between.

When we are in this mode, we have a tendency to speak more tentatively and to check in with our relational partner about how he or she is receiving what we are offering.

This past part is particularly important because it reflects our growing felt-sense awareness that the system of the person we are helping knows more about what needs to happen next than we do.

In addition to the humility and respect this engenders, we may also notice that instead of wanting to get rid of some state, we are more apt to acknowledge its meaningfulness and be present to it just as it is.

Listening in this way, the so-called negative state may reveal itself as telling an important truth and become an opening toward healing.

We may also be aware of the limitation and incompleteness of words, leading us to honor silence as well.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“So many of us who choose this work come from backgrounds of pain and fear that have been instrumental in calling us to now co-suffer with others as they find the courage to approach their wounds.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“Our culture tells us to set goals and make treatment plans. Because we are so dedicated to relieving suffering, we can feel capitulated into efforts to change what is hurting our people. We develop agendas and then often generate expectations of what should come next, leaving us vulnerable to disappointment in ourselves or our patients when the uniqueness of the situation brings a different outcome.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“Gentleness, humor and abundant support are wonderful resources on this ever-unfolding, stubbornly non-linear journey from control to receptivity.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“It sometimes surprises me that people don't find questions addressed to their bodies silly, especially in therapy, but they rarely do”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“If we focus on the means to change a person's state in the direction of what we believe is greater health, we are also stepping out of empathic connection. This is a violation of our innate expectation, at every biological level, that we are meant to be embedded in a nest of warm relationships.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“We stayed with the one who felt dead inside, acknowledging his protective value, even though we had no cognitive awareness of who and what he was sheltering ...

'What is this depression, this one who is so still, wanting to tell us?”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“My multifaceted canary in the coal mine signaling the impulse to control is my belly tightening, my posture changing slightly to lean forward, tension increasing in my upper arms. It feels as though I am preparing to thrust myself into the middle of the problem with everything I know. It comes from a good-hearted place of wanting to relieve suffering and also diminishes interpersonal safety as my system enters mild to medium sympathetic arousal.

If we take a step back, we might become curious about how the neuroception of danger arose in the first place, because that is what initiates this chain of events. If we were to explore this, many answers might come: We have been trained to intervene; we don't have any experience that tells us our patient's systems are trustworthy guides to healing; the upset in our patient is severe enough that we fear for her safety; if we can't heal this person, there's something wrong with us; strong emotions are uncomfortable for us and we need to regulate them before they overwhelm us.

The list is endless, individual and likely changes with each new circumstance. It is always a most valuable inquiry, especially if we can begin it with compassionate curiousity, which makes it less likely that we will feel shamed by the answer that presents itself.

When we remember that neuroception is an automatic adaptive process, it may take character condemnation out of the equation when we invite awareness of what frightens us.

If our fear feels heard and acknowledged, there is some likelihood that our bodies will be able to find their way back toward receptivity. As we feel our own openness returning, we can be certain that this embodied change is also influencing our patient and the quality of the connection.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“The clinical stories that make up a good deal of this part of the book are drawn from my experiences with the courageous people who have come to our clinic over the years.

Most have them have felt so broken that they thought they would never heal, but somehow we made our way together through the uncertain territory of their inner world toward their own version of what healing can look like for them.

I have been struck by the uniqueness and creativity of their systems when they have been given support to unfold along their natural path. Often the results have been unexpected, and certainly not in conformity with any list of outcomes. Sometimes, from a certain viewpoint, we could say that therapy failed, and yet something has happened that has been meaningful and transformative in its own way.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“Following is about linking with another and keeping that one in the center of flowing awareness, which is exactly what the right hemisphere has the potential to do beautifully. In fact, we may best begin by following our own internal movement as it arises in the presence of the other person.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“Anything we determine to do in advance has already separated us from being in this emerging moment with ourselves as well as the other person.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“This process of letting go of being in charge often unfolds over time as we develop greater trust in the wisdom of our patient's system as it awakens within the embrace of the relationship, so that we gradually need less and less to find our own security by taking the lead.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“On reflection now, it seems to me she was already telling me what she needed most--a place to settle in proximity, safety, warmth and quiet because she had none of that as a child.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“This wasn't a cognitive idea, but an embodied anticipation and certainty about how things work that required her body to behave in a particular way.”
― Bonnie Badenoch

“This was the unexpected ... unforeseeable resolution of the paradox ... her personal goodness was no longer the issue because it had been replaced by the sweetness of relationship.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“I notice that when the other person has been in despair for a prolonged period, I begin to feel myself crumbling into discouragement internally. One of the ways my system seeks to protect both me and the other person is to activate into helpful doing. Even though it is a psuedo-engagement, the intent is to shelter both of us from being engulfed in despair.”
― Bonnie Badenoch, The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Context of Relationships

“These two viewpoints offer us different ways of orienting to the world that lead to strikingly different values, ways of relating, and behaviors ...

The essence of the right-hemisphere perspective involves attending to relationship, embodiment, and what is unfolding in the unique moment in the space between. We could say that from this viewpoint, the central metaphor here is living beings in relationship with each other in this moment.

In contrast, the left-hemisphere viewpoint steps out of the relational moment to focus on division, fixity, disembodiment, and the creation of algorithms (standardized step-by-step solutions to problems that do not take individuality and context into account). The central metaphor here is the machine, with our bodies, our brains and our very selves viewed as mechanisms to be analyzed and shaped.

We might immediately sense that the perspective of each hemisphere has substantial consequences for how we are able to be present with one another.”
― Bonnie Badenoch