Quote

Many of our problems with anger occur when we choose between having a relationship and having a self.

Harriet Lerner

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Harriet Lerner
Problems
Relationship
Problem
Self
Many
Occur
Anger
Choose

More quotes by Harriet Lerner

Image
Differences don’t just threaten and divide us. They also inform, enrich, and enliven us.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Although it's not useful to drown in despair, it's also not useful to keep a 'positive attitude' when this means concealing or denying real emotions.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Anger is a signal, and one worth listening to.
Harriet Lerner
Image
I'm a good example of wanting to apologize only for my precise share of a problem--as I calculate it, of course--and I expect my husband Steve to apologize for his share, also as I calculate it. Since we're not always of one mind on the math, it can lead to the theater of the absurd.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Believing that all women should want to be mothers makes about as much sense as believing that all men should want to be engineers.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Anger is a tool for change when it challenges us to become more of an expert on the self and less of an expert on others.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Men are often (though not always) the pursuers for sex, just like women are often (though not always) the pursuers for conversation.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Silence can pose a greater threat than the difficult truth.
Harriet Lerner
Image
As many have observed, it is easy to tell a lie, but it is almost impossible to tell only one.
Harriet Lerner
Image
The first world we find ourselves in is a family that is not of our choosing.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Nothing you say can ensure that the other person will get it, or respond the way you want. You may never exceed his threshold of deafness.
Harriet Lerner
Image
What initially attracts us and what later becomes 'the problem' are usually one and the same.
Harriet Lerner
Image
The term girl not only serves to avoid certain anxiety-arousing connotations inherent in the word woman regarding aggression, sexuality, and reproduction, it also serves to impart a tone of frivolousness and lack of seriousness to ambitious, intellectual, and competitive striving that women may pursue.
Harriet Lerner
Image
If you pursue a distancer, he or she will distance more. Consider it a fundamental law of physics.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Women ... have long been discouraged from the awareness and forthright expression of anger. Sugar and spice are the ingredients from which we are made. We are the nurturers, the soothers, the peacemakers, and the steadiers of rocked boats.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Often when someone apologizes - like a parent who says to a child, I'm very sorry I neglected you when you were a kid - they also ask, Do you forgive me?, because they want the other person to be over it. However, healing can take a great deal of time. And if we forgive too quickly, we cut the process short.
Harriet Lerner
Image
There are some things for which there is no apology, and on the question of slavery, there is no adequate apology for ripping people out of their homeland and bringing them here in chains. There is no adequate apology for the ongoing horrific legacy of racism.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Self-help books for women are part of a multibillion-dollar industry, sensitively attuned to our insecurities and our purses.
Harriet Lerner
Image
We all fear change, even as we seek it.
Harriet Lerner
Image
Sometimes the most helpful thing you can do is to stop trying to be helpful.
Harriet Lerner