Creativity Quote by Alice Miller

““As I see it, the point is that people who cannot estimate and respect themselves, who cannot allow themselves the free expression of their creativity, do not do so voluntarily. These barriers are the result of each person's individual story. They want to understand how they have become that way, then they need to know that story as precisely as possible and need to engage with it emotionally. Once they have understood this fact, and are actually able to feel the implications of the story (not just grasp them intellectually), then they will need no more advice. What these adults need then is an enlightened witness who can accompany them on the road to their own truth, help them embark on a process in the course of which they will finally permit themselves the always-wanted but always-denied things: trust, respect, and love for themselves. We must abandon the expectation that someday the parents will give us what they withheld in childhood. This is the reason so few people have actually taken that road, why so many content themselves with the advice of their therapists or let religious notions prevent them from discovering their own truth. Earlier on, I suggested that fear is the decisive factor in all this. But I also believe that this fear will be be reduced when the facts of childhood abuse are no longer treated as a taboo in our society. So far, the victims of such abused have denied it existence because of the infant fear that lives on inside them. In this way they have contributed to the all-pervasive denial of the truth. But once the former victims begin to reveal what happened to them, then therapists too will be forced to acknowledge these realities.””

— Alice Miller