Bessel van der Kolk Quotes
Knowing what we feel is the first step to knowing why we feel that way. If we are aware of the constant changes in our inner and outer environment, we can mobilize to manage them. But we can’t do this unless our watchtower, the MPFC, learns to observe what is going on inside us.

Quotes to Explore
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The author may not interpret. But he must tell why and how he wrote his book.
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Every so often when I'm writing, a character might actually be a distinct person in my head - often not an actor or a face, literally a person who just seems to exist in my imagination. Then the challenge is finding somebody who is close enough to that to make me feel like I've ended up where I wanted to be.
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I stuff animals I find; I do roadkill. They're strangely fun to have. They're like easy-to-control pets.
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If gender is on a spectrum, where one finds oneself is completely unique.
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Nothing makes us love a person as much as praying for him.
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You get fifteen democrats in a room, and you get twenty opinions.
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In film, you can't go into analytical explorations because the audience will reject that.
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I believe that the will of the people is resolved by a strong leadership. Even in a democratic society, events depend on a strong leadership with a strong power of persuasion, and not on the opinion of the masses.
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It's very easy to be judgmental until you know someone's truth.
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You lose the speed before the stamina.
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Accuse a person of breaking all Ten Commandments, and you've written the promo blurb for the dust cover of his tell-all memoir.
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Love is a credulous thing.
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Laughter is a strange response. I mean, what is it? It's a spasm of some kind! Is that always joy? It's very often discomfort. It's some sort of explosive reaction. It's very complex.
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If my drug Ragaglitazar had been successful, we would have been getting royalties of thousands of crore rupees every year.
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'The Replacements' is where I met Jon Favreau, and we just clicked like, you know, like kids at a camp.
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Political hypocrisy and racism make me hot under the collar.
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We are at our very best, and we are happiest, when we are fully engaged in work we enjoy on the journey toward the goal we've established for ourselves. It gives meaning to our time off and comfort to our sleep. It makes everything else in life so wonderful, so worthwhile.
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I directed the men in our barque to approach near the savages, and hold their arms in readiness to do their duty in case they notice any movement of these people against us.
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The fact of being an underdog changes people in ways that we often fail to appreciate. It opens doors and creates opportunities and enlightens and permits things that might otherwise have seemed unthinkable.
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Here ends my forever memorable first High Sierra excursion. I have crossed the Range of Light, surely the brightest and best of all the Lord has built. And, rejoicing in its glory, I gladly, gratefully, hopefully pray I may see it again.
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You know how some trees have those ear mushrooms that just grow off, and you could live on one of those mushrooms and not realize that there was stacks and stacks of others? That's how I describe music scenes in New York. That's one of the trippiest things about living here - just how many parallel universes there are that you can be completely unaware of.
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It is in this way that I went forth to teach.
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Knowing what we feel is the first step to knowing why we feel that way. If we are aware of the constant changes in our inner and outer environment, we can mobilize to manage them. But we can’t do this unless our watchtower, the MPFC, learns to observe what is going on inside us.