---
title: "1 Growing Plants Quotes By Gabor Maté"
description: "1 Growing Plants quotes by Gabor Maté. Plus more from Gabor Maté and more Growing Plants sayings from other authors."
image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/670/gabor-mat-1410_brain-damage_there-s-a-psychologist-called-mary-diamo_3224964.jpg"
---

> [“There's a psychologist called Mary &amp; Diamond who at Brooklyn in California, in the 80s studied rats. And they took rats at different ages. Newborns, some of whom they deliberately brain damaged, adult, middle-aged, elderly rats. And they exposed these…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/there-s-a-psychologist-called-mary-diamond-who-at-brooklyn-in/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

[Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/670/gabor-mat-1410_brain-damage_there-s-a-psychologist-called-mary-diamo_3224964.jpg)

## More by Gabor Maté

> [“As parents who make every effort we can to raise our children in loving security, we do not need to feel more guilt than…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/as-parents-who-make-every-effort-we-can-to-raise-our-children-in/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“The fact is, we in this society are often quite removed from our own emotional reality.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/the-fact-is-we-in-this-society-are-often-quite-removed-from-our-own/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“Shame is the deepest of the “negative emotions,” a feeling we will do almost anything to avoid. Unfortunately, our abiding fear of shame impairs…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/shame-is-the-deepest-of-the-negative-emotions-a-feeling-we-will-do/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“Many adults have not attained maturity — have not mastered being independent, self-motivated individuals capable of tending their own emotional needs and of respecting…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/many-adults-have-not-attained-maturity-have-not-mastered-being/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [Autonomy is impossible as long as one is driven by anything.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/autonomy-is-impossible-as-long-as-one-is-driven-by-anything/)

[Gabor Mate](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“If a mother has eight children, there are eight mothers. This is not simply because of the fact that the mother was different in…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/if-a-mother-has-eight-children-there-are-eight-mothers-this-is-not/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“Without attachment, the parent succeeds at most in cowing a child into obedience, at the price of grave damage to the relationship and to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/without-attachment-the-parent-succeeds-at-most-in-cowing-a-child-into/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“Attachment is our connection with the world. In the earliest attachment relationships, we gain or lose the ability to stay open, self-nurturing and healthy.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/attachment-is-our-connection-with-the-world-in-the-earliest/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“So what you've actually got is traumatized children. When children are traumatized that affects how they feel about themselves, which is deeply ashamed because…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/so-what-you-ve-actually-got-is-traumatized-children-when-children-are/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“Even without world wars, revolutions and emigration, siblings growing up in the same home almost never share the same environment. More accurately, brothers and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/even-without-world-wars-revolutions-and-emigration-siblings-growing/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“We think that there are people who are normal over here, and then there’s the pathological ones who have depression, anxiety, addiction or schizophrenia…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/we-think-that-there-are-people-who-are-normal-over-here-and-then/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“One cannot get much more vulnerable than to expose oneself psychologically. To share oneself with another and then be misunderstood or rejected is, for…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/one-cannot-get-much-more-vulnerable-than-to-expose-oneself/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“The areas of the cortex responsible for attention and self-regulation develop in response to the emotional interaction with the person whom we may call…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/the-areas-of-the-cortex-responsible-for-attention-and-self-regulation/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“Peer-oriented children live in a universe of severely limited and superficial attachments. The quest for sameness being the least vulnerable way of attaching, it…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/peer-oriented-children-live-in-a-universe-of-severely-limited-and/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

> [“The United States contains less than 5 percent of the world’s population but houses nearly a quarter of the world’s prisoners.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/the-united-states-contains-less-than-5-percent-of-the-world-s/)

[Gabor Maté](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/gabor-mat/)

```json
{
    "@context": "https://schema.org",
    "@graph": [
        {
            "@type": "ItemList",
            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/growing-plants/gabor-mat/#itemlist",
            "name": "1 Growing Plants Quotes By Gabor Maté",
            "numberOfItems": 1,
            "itemListElement": [
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 1,
                    "item": {
                        "@type": "Quotation",
                        "text": "“There's a psychologist called Mary & Diamond who at Brooklyn in California, in the 80s studied rats. And they took rats at different ages. Newborns, some of whom they deliberately brain damaged, adult, middle-aged, elderly rats. And they exposed these rats to different levels of environmental stimulation, better food, more playmates, toys to play with and so on. They found out a couple of months later that the rats, at any age, including the brain-damaged rats, who had the better stimulation, they were smarter. But in the autopsy then they also found that in the front part of their brain they had larger nerve-cells with more connections with other nerve-cells and richer blood supply. In other words that environmental stimulation actually caused a change in the state of the brain, even in the older rats. And that's called neuroplasticity. The capacity of the brain to develop new circuits. So whether it comes to ADHD, addiction, depression or other childhood disorders or any other issue with adults as well, if we recognize them not as ingrained, genetically-determined diseases, but as problems of development, then the question becomes very different. Then the question becomes not just \"how do we treat the symptoms?\" (and addiction itself is a symptom, depression is a symptom), but \"how do we help people develop out of these conditions?\" In other words, it is not a medical question, purely, but a developmental question. And development always requires the right environment. Now, if you're a gardener you know that. If you are growing plants in your backyard and you want them to grow into healthy, functioning beings, botanical beings, you want to provide them with the right nurturing, the right nutrition, minerals, water, sunlight and so on. So the real question is how do we provide the conditions for further development for people whose development was impaired in the first place? Now we know how to do that. We are just not doing it.”",
                        "creator": {
                            "@type": "Person",
                            "name": "Gabor Maté"
                        },
                        "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/gabor-mat/there-s-a-psychologist-called-mary-diamond-who-at-brooklyn-in/",
                        "image": {
                            "@type": "ImageObject",
                            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/670/gabor-mat-1410_brain-damage_there-s-a-psychologist-called-mary-diamo_3224964.jpg",
                            "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/670/gabor-mat-1410_brain-damage_there-s-a-psychologist-called-mary-diamo_3224964.jpg",
                            "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/670/gabor-mat-1410_brain-damage_there-s-a-psychologist-called-mary-diamo_3224964.jpg",
                            "width": 1080,
                            "height": 1080,
                            "caption": "“There's a psychologist called Mary & Diamond who at Brooklyn in California, in the 80s studied rats. And…” — Gabor Maté",
                            "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes",
                            "creator": {
                                "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization"
                            }
                        }
                    }
                }
            ]
        },
        {
            "@type": "CollectionPage",
            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/growing-plants/gabor-mat/#webpage",
            "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/growing-plants/gabor-mat/",
            "name": "Growing Plants Quotes by Gabor Maté",
            "isPartOf": {
                "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website"
            },
            "mainEntity": {
                "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/growing-plants/gabor-mat/#itemlist"
            },
            "primaryImageOfPage": {
                "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/670/gabor-mat-1410_brain-damage_there-s-a-psychologist-called-mary-diamo_3224964.jpg"
            },
            "description": "1 Growing Plants quotes by Gabor Maté. Plus more from Gabor Maté and more Growing Plants sayings from other authors.",
            "breadcrumb": {
                "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/growing-plants/gabor-mat/#breadcrumb"
            }
        },
        {
            "@type": "BreadcrumbList",
            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/growing-plants/gabor-mat/#breadcrumb",
            "itemListElement": [
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 1,
                    "name": "Home",
                    "item": "https://sms4smile.com/"
                },
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 2,
                    "name": "Quotes",
                    "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/"
                },
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 3,
                    "name": "Topics",
                    "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/categories/"
                },
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 4,
                    "name": "Growing Plants",
                    "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/growing-plants/"
                },
                {
                    "@type": "ListItem",
                    "position": 5,
                    "name": "Gabor Maté",
                    "item": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/growing-plants/gabor-mat/"
                }
            ]
        },
        {
            "@type": "WebSite",
            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website",
            "name": "SMS4Smile Quotes",
            "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/",
            "publisher": {
                "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization"
            }
        },
        {
            "@type": "Organization",
            "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization",
            "name": "SMS4Smile Quotes",
            "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/",
            "logo": {
                "@type": "ImageObject",
                "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/themes/sq/assets/icons/icon-512.png",
                "width": 512,
                "height": 512
            }
        }
    ]
}
```
