Psychological Safety 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

As long as I was aligned with listening rather than with an intention to receive a particular response or to shift something, we would stay on safe ground. ~ Bonnie Badenoch

we are adaptive rather than disordered ~ Bonnie Badenoch

Since we began with a felt sense of safety this day, several neural streams are initially supporting the renewal of our connection.

In our midbrain, the energies of the SEEKING system are animating the CARE system, which can both foster the good feelings between us and support offers of repair should we have a rupture (Panksepp & Biven, 2012).

Once in connection, our ventral vagal parasympathetic system is affecting the prosody of our voices, our facial mobility, and the attentiveness of our listening, maintaining social engagement (Porges, 2011). Since ventral lateralizes to the right hemisphere, we more easily stay rooted in the right-centric way of attending that keeps us in connection with this moment and with each other (McGilchrist, 2009).

In this intimacy, our brains are coupling in many regions, so there is an experience of social emotional engagement and embodied communication as we become a single system in two bodies (Hasson, 2010).

Because we are trustworthy partners in this healing process, social baseline theory tells us that our amygdalae are calming just because we are together (Beckes & Coan, 2011).

All of this is happening without doing anything, even without saying anything, in microseconds below conscious awareness because of the safe space we have cultivated over time.

We can more clearly understand why Porges says, "Safety IS the treatment". ~ Bonnie Badenoch

We are deeply sensitive to one another's presence ~ Bonnie Badenoch

In one study investigating employee experiences with speaking up, 85% of respondents reported at least one occasion when they felt unable to raise a concern with their bosses, even though they believed the issue was important. ~ Amy C. Edmondson

It wasn't that I gave up on her healing, but, as she continued to struggle to get in the door and actively needed her self-hatred to stay functional, I began to realize more deeply that her patterns had meaning and that it wasn't useful for me to predetermine what recovery might look like for her. ~ Bonnie Badenoch

More important than the words or silence is my inner stance of making room for what is stirring within him, becoming alertly still enough inside that his inner world senses safety, the precursor to him opening into vulnerability. ~ Bonnie Badenoch

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

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

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

... 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

Cognitive therapy seeks to alleviate psychological stresses by correcting faulty conceptions and self-signals. By correcting erroneous beliefs we can lower excessive reactions. ~ Aaron T. Beck

Being here with him is safety; it's a cave, where we huddle together while the storm goes on outside. This is a delusion, of course. This room is one of the most dangerous places I could be. ~ Margaret Atwood

Patients who trust their doctors and have a psychological expectation of getting better could trigger a reaction in their body. ~ Irving Kirsch

Methodological individualism is the doctrine that psychological states are individuated with respect to their causal powers. ~ Jerry Fodor

It is characteristic of poetic language that it gives us not simply the denotation of a word, but a whole cluster of connotations or associated meanings ... [but] if connotation is a kind of free associating, how can a poem ever come to mean anything definite? What if Shakespeare's line 'Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?' reminds me irresistibly of fried bananas? The brief answer to this is that meaning is not a matter of psychological associations. Indeed, there is a sense in which it is not a 'psychological' matter at all. Meaning is not an arbitrary process in our heads, but a rule-governed social practice; and unless that line 'Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?' could plausibly, in principle, suggest fried bananas to other readers as well, it cannot be part of its meaning. ~ Terry Eagleton

This is your commitment. This is the time for it. If you are to be an entity, as you have chosen to be, then this is your opportunity, and this is your last reincarnation upon this earth. You need power, strength, determination, and joyous spontaneity in your working hours. You also need to influence personally those people in the outside world with whom you come in daily contact, and to extend yourself in using your full abilities of understanding and creativeness in your outside contacts. You need also to expand in the direction in which you are going, in terms of these sessions and psychological time. ~ Jane Roberts

Imagine if you can ... a world in which half the inhabitants are larger and stronger than you and are thus able to force you to their will at any time or any place. That unchangeable fact colors everything in your life - from the route you choose when you walk down the street to what you look for when you enter a room, how you dress, how you smile, how you assess people on first meeting? Friend or foe? Is this person a threat? Will that one do me harm? It's all about survival. ... Mock a a woman's desire for jewels and fine clothes and grand houses if you must, but understand that they are simple manifestations of what she truly desires - survival, safety, security - because those baubles are the thing that proclaim to the world that she is of value and, as such, will be protected. ~ Kaki Warner

Muzzle control has to be a religion. You cannot point that weapon at one of your brothers-or yourself. Know where you barrel is at all times, and know the condition of your weapon-loaded or unloaded, bolt forward or to the rear, round in the chamber or not, safety on or off. Keep your finger off the trigger unless you're going to kill something. ~ Dick Couch

Self-esteem is an essential psychological need - no one can live with the conviction that they are fundamentally no good, so people who lack the real thing attempt to fake it. ~ Edwin A. Locke

Emphasis was usually put on the horizontal acceleration factor, for the simple reason that ordinary structures have a built-in safety factor for the vertical component; that is, gravity. ~ Charles Francis Richter

Our ferocious commitment to our children's safety and success, along with our genuine love, drives us to endure the often unhappy experience of disciplining our children. ~ Matt Chandler

Few people would dream of hiring a contractor to build them a house and expect it to be built to a safe standard only 85 percent of the time; similarly, few people would want to eat out in a restaurant where only 85 percent of the meals were safe to eat. Why then do we accept such sloppiness in road safety, where a situation in which 85 percent of drivers going the speed limit is deemed to be good enough? ~ Neil Arason

Put a bridle on thy tongue; set a guard before thy lips, lest the words of thine own mouth destroy thy peace ... on much speaking cometh repentance, but in silence is safety. ~ William Drummond

Many people implicitly believe in the Hydraulic Theory of Violence: that humans harbor an inner drive toward aggression (a death instinct or thirst for blood), which builds up inside us and must periodically be discharged. Nothing could be further from a contemporary scientific understanding of the psychology of violence. Aggression is not a single motive, let alone a mounting urge. It is the output of several psychological systems that differ in their environmental triggers, their internal logic, their neurobiological basis, and their social distribution. ~ Steven Pinker

An efficient militia is authorized and contemplated by the Constitution and required by the spirit and safety of free government. ~ James Madison

Is it wholly fantastic to admit the possibility that Nature herself strove toward what we call beauty? Face to face with any one of the elaborate flowers which man's cultivation has had nothing to do with, it does not seem fantastic to me. We put survival first. But when we have a margin of safety left over, we expend it in the search for the beautiful. Who can say that Nature does not do the same? ~ Joseph Wood Krutch

A psychological explanation of our feelings is not a moral explanation of our conduct. ~ James Rachels

Tyranny is the exercise of some power over a man, which is not warranted by law, or necessary for the public safety. A people can never be deprived of their liberties, while they retain in their own hands, a power sufficient to any other power in the state. ~ Noah Webster

Growing up I was afraid of heights; if I looked down I got instantly queasy. So what did I decide to do a few years ago? Go skydiving with my sisters. I stood on the ground, waiting for my turn, watching them jump out of a small plane strapped to some dude's back. All I could see were these tiny blond dots floating in the air. Then one of the instructors (thankfully he was on his own and not tied to a Hough!) lost control of his chute. It got twisted and he began to spiral toward the ground. Everyone watching below gasped; he was plunging to his death. At the very last second, he pulled his auxiliary chute and glided down to safety.
After landing, he walked right over to me. "Phew, that was a close one. Okay, Derek, you're up next. You're comin' with me."
I felt my stomach leap into my throat. Are you serious? You're a dead man walking and you want me to go up with you? Then reason kicked in: What was the likelihood lightning would strike twice and his chute would fail again? And if it did, clearly the guy knew how to get out of trouble.
"Um, okay…I guess." I read the disclaimer and signed it. In a nutshell, it said, "If you die, we're not responsible." Thanks a lot. ~ Derek Hough

You can never be free of their criticism until you no longer seek their praise. ~ Dennis Ruane

The basic recurring theme in Hindu mythology is the creation of the world by the self-sacrifice of God - "sacrifice" in the original sense of "making sacred" - whereby God becomes the world which, in the end, becomes again God. This creative activity of the Divine is called lila, the play of God, and the world is seen as the stage of the divine play. Like most of Hindu mythology, the myth of lila has a strong magical flavour. Brahman is the great magician who transforms himself into the world and then performs this feat with his "magic creative power", which is the original meaning of maya in the Rig Veda. The word maya - one of the most important terms in Indian philosophy - has changed its meaning over the centuries. From the might, or power, of the divine actor and magician, it came to signify the psychological state of anybody under the spell of the magic play. As long as we confuse the myriad forms of the divine lila with reality, without perceiving the unity of Brahman underlying all these forms, we are under the spell of maya. (...) In the Hindu view of nature, then, all forms are relative, fluid and ever-changing maya, conjured up by the great magician of the divine play. The world of maya changes continuously, because the divine lila is a rhythmic, dynamic play. The dynamic force of the play is karma, important concept of Indian thought. Karma means "action". It is the active principle of the play, the total universe in action, where everything is dynamically connect ~ Fritjof Capra

I do not want to get rid of the safety net, I want to get rid of dependency. ~ Benjamin Carson

Text of bliss: the text that imposes a state of loss, the text that discomforts (perhaps to the point of a certain boredom), unsettles the reader's historical, cultural, psychological assumptions, the consistency of his tastes, values, memories, brings to a crisis his relation with language. ~ Roland Barthes

Since the attachment to the cult of Islam is psychological, the solution must also be psychological. We have all the logical proof that Islam is false. But logic has its limitation. Brainwashed people dismiss logic and pride themselves in their blind faith. Psychological warfare is extremely powerful. The Muslim bravado must be destroyed by humiliations and ridicule. ~ Ali Sina

If you are still thinking of yourself as two parts - soul and body, then you will inevitably confuse your psychological reactions with your spiritual life, and this is not only confusing to the understanding, but it can actually, in this very psychological age, lead you into real false teaching. ~ Dennis J. Bennett

All the housemaid hopes is, happiness for 'em - but marriage is a lottery, and the more she thinks about it, the more she feels the independence and the safety of a single life. ~ Charles Dickens

But my lazy lack of faith, my in-vogue atheism, has taken away the safety net hanging beneath our children's lives. ~ Rosamund Lupton

You cannot play for safety and make art. ~ Lucille Clifton

Fear breeds repression; that repression breeds hate; that hate menaces stable government; that the path of safety lies in the opportunity to discuss freely supposed grievances and proposed remedies; and that the fitting remedy for evil counsels is good ones. ~ Louis D. Brandeis

I think it's vital that we do not sleep together. You know, for the safety of the world." His eyes sparkled and there was just a hint of a smile at the corners of his mouth.
"Okay," I said, and smiled back at him. "But kissing is allowed, right?"
"Oh, definitely," he said, pulling me close. "After all, the warrior always wins the heart of the fair young ... man. ~ Diana Peterfreund

While different states and cities might look to different strategies for protecting public safety, we all can agree on this: we lose too many American lives to gun violence. ~ Martin O'Malley

I'm very impressed and the next movie I do I'm definitely going to use a lot of drones in it, because they're very light and flexible and fast, and there are things that you can do with them that you can't possibly do with a helicopter for safety reasons. ~ Paul W. S. Anderson

ref·u·gee noun: a person who flees for refuge or safety

We are, each of us, refugees
when we flee from burning buildings
into the arms of loving families.
When we flee from floods and earthquakes
to sleep on blue mats in community centres.
We are, each of us, refugees
when we flee from abusive relationships,
and shooters in cinemas
and shopping centres.

Sometimes it takes only a day
for our countries to persecute us
because of our creed, race, or sexual orientation.
Sometimes it takes only a minute
for the missiles to rain down
and leave our towns in ruin and destitution.

We are, each of us, refugees
longing for that amniotic tranquillity
dreaming of freedom and safety
when fences and barbed wires spring into walled gardens.

Lebanese, Sudanese, Libyan and Syrian,
Yemeni, Somali, Palestinian, and Ethiopian,
like our brothers and sisters,
we are, each of us, refugees.
The bombs fell in their cafés and squares
where once poetry, dancing, and laughter prevailed.
Only their olive trees remember music and merriment now
as their cities wail for departed children without a funeral.

We are, each of us, refugees.
Don't let stamped paper tell you differently.
We've been fleeing for centuries
because to stay means getting bullets in our heads
because to stay means being ~ Kamand Kojouri

EARTH DAY reminds the people of the world of the need for continuing care which is vital to Earth's safety. ~ Margaret Mead

You're safe here. Perfectly safe. That phrase still haunts me. Haunts me because it's always been a lie. It was a lie before they came and it's still a lie. You're never perfectly safe. No human being on Earth ever is or ever was. To live is to risk your life, your heart, everything. Otherwise, you're just a walking corpse. You're a zombie. ~ Rick Yancey

But the reality is that it is impossible to explain, to verbalize, to articulate the fear that they instill in you. The people who judge, the people who criticize, who don't get it - you have to understand, they're coming at the situation from a position of safety, of security, of self-esteem. You cannot imagine, when you're well and safe and contented, that you could ever feel otherwise. When you're in it... it's like a vortex, a dark, whirling whirlpool that swallows up everything that you ever thought was you, your thoughts, your values, your beliefs, and leaves you with an empty, shattered shell. And that shell, you realize painfully, gradually, is you. ~ Jeannette De Beauvoir

If the idea that my safety can only be enhanced by putting other people's privacy and safety in danger, then I don't want to be more safe. ~ Shepard Fairey

What I had done was nothing so extraordinary. I had simply taken [the prisoners] as human beings and not mistaken them for mechanisms to repair. I had interpreted them in the same way they had interpreted themselves all along, that is to say, as free and responsible. I had not offered them a cheap escape from guilt feelings by conceiving of them as victims of biological, psychological, or sociological conditioning processes. Nor had I taken them as helpless pawns on the battleground of id, ego, and superego. ~ Viktor E. Frankl

There isn't a safety net I haven't fallen through, so feel my back on the Earth and know I can stand longer than you. ~ Adrianna Stepiano