Quotes About Denial

Professionals and the public were largely unaware of abuse, and no one knew exactly how to deal with the problem when it was identified. Denial is not a defense used only by abused children. Society at large has had a hard time believing that children are abused by parents and that they need protection. You are not alone behind a wall. Your parents, teachers, doctors, and others may have had the same desire to hide and avoid the truth.

He spoke only of what he had seen. But people not only refused to believe his tales, they refused to listen. Some even insinuated that he only wanted their pity, that he was imagining things. Others flatly said that he had gone mad.

Apartheid is, in my view, as abhorrent as anti-Semitism. To me, Andrei Sakharov's isolation is as much a disgrace as Joseph Begun's imprisonment and Ida Nudel's exile. As is the denial of Solidarity and its leader Lech Walesa's right to dissent. And Nelson Mandela's interminable imprisonment.

It was like we had known all along that the sky was going to fall and then it fell and we pretended to be surprised.

Our vision is so limited we can hardly imagine a love that does not show itself in protection from suffering. The love of God is of a different nature altogether. It does not hate tragedy. It never denies reality. It stands in the very teeth of suffering.

In order to be a disciple we must deny ourselves—this is to exercise authority over our own spirit. We must take up the cross—this is to submit to Christ's authority. And we must follow—this is continued obedience. This is the road not to confinement, to bondage, to a stunted or arrested development, but to total personal freedom. It means not death but life, not a narrowly circumscribed life but "abundant" life.

The five stages - denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance - are a part of the framework that makes up our learning to live with the one we lost. They are tools to help us frame and identify what we may be feeling. But they are not stops on some linear timeline in grief.

When it comes to yourself, follow God's formula- deny yourself of overindulgence (Proverbs 23:2 and 30:8), examine yourself for any sinful habits (1 Corinthians 11:28), % exercise yourself to godliness (1 Timothy 4:7), and IK- develop self-control (Galatians 5:23).

This matter must never be spoken of again. We WASPs can apply that rule to anything—from a moment of awkwardness at the dinner table to a relative's suicide.

Repression and denial set up elaborate games to pretend that negative thoughts and feelings are not occurring.

We all know that we'll die someday, but believing it is another thing entirely.

grounds. I said no, that there'd been a watchman at the house

Nay!" he shouted out loud

Claims such as I'm not a racist or so-and-so is not a racist may sound harmless to some, but to many they cut deep. Familiar denials like these so often seem to be the justification for a second, unspoken part to that sentence: and therefore I don't have to do anything about racism. And that's the part that is just plain wrong.

She wanted the pain to be over really quickly in this case too, but she seemed to think that ignoring it would make it go away (Band-Aids sometimes do fall of by themselves).

So often survivors have had their experiences denied, trivialized, or distorted. Writing is an important avenue for healing because it gives you the opportunity to define your own reality. You can say: This did happen to me. It was that bad. It was the fault & responsibility of the adult. I was—and am—innocent." The Courage to Heal by Ellen Bass & Laura Davis

To heal from child sexual abuse you must believe that you were a victim, that the abuse really did take place. This is often difficult for survivors. When you've spent your life denying the reality of your abuse, when you don't want it to be true, or when your family repeatedly calls you crazy or a liar, it can be hard to remain firm in the knowledge that you were abused.

In its use of this method natural science has shown a curious mixture of rationalism and irrationalism. Its prevalent tone of thought has been ardently rationalistic within its own borders, and dogmatically irrational beyond those borders. In practice such an attitude tends to become a dog- matic denial that there are any factors in the world not fully expressible in terms of its own primary notions devoid of further generalization. Such a denial is the self-denial of thought.

This feeble attempt at self-deception only makes the truth harder when you're forced to meet it

Depression as Denial of the Self Depression consists of a denial of one's own emotional reactions. This denial begins in the service of an absolutely essential adaptation during childhood and indicates a very early injury. There are many children who have not been free, right from the beginning, to experience the very simplest of feelings, such as discontent, anger, rage, pain, even hunger—and, of course, enjoyment of their own bodies.

And it isn't doing a thing to them. You get that, don't you? They're going on with their night, drinking champagne, toasting their award-winner. They don't think they've done anything wrong, and they never will. They see themselves as the victims. They see him as the victim.

Openness used to be the virtue that permitted us to seek the good by using reason. It now means accepting everything and denying reason's power.

The public response to feminism has been ferociously defensive precisely because feminism touches such a deep nerve of truth and the denial that keeps us from it. If feminism were truly ridiculous, it would be ignored. But it isn't ridiculous, and so provokes a vigorous backlash.

Nothing guarantees our freedom. Deny it often enough and one day it will be gone, and we'll not know how or when.