Susanne Michalek

“We need to listen carefully to the wisdom of our symptoms and to try to decode their meaning, because some of us have learned to settle, to fall silent; to deny that unfair circumstances exist or matter, and then to call our compromises “life.” But our bodies, our deeper unconscious selves, remain harder to fool.”
― Harriet Lerner, The Dance of Connection: How to Talk to Someone When You're Mad, Hurt, Scared, Frustrated, Insulted, Betrayed, or Desperate

“Sometimes, the failure of the other person to apologize when they should hits us harder than the deed they should apologize for.”
― Harriet Lerner, Why Won't You Apologize?: Healing Big Betrayals and Everyday Hurts

“At the simplest level, "being a self" means we can be pretty much who we are in relationships rather than what others wish, need, and expect us to be. It also means we can allow others to do the same. It means we do not participate in relationships at the expense of the "I".”
― Harriet Lerner, The Dance of Intimacy: A Woman's Guide to Courageous Acts of Change in Key Relationships

“We can operate from a solid position of self, even when the other person won’t speak to us at all.”
― Harriet Lerner, The Dance of Connection: How to Talk to Someone When You're Mad, Hurt, Scared, Frustrated, Insulted, Betrayed, or Desperate