Bruce D. Perry Quotes & Sayings

More than 35 percent of the children exposed to a single traumatic event will develop serious mental health problems .. The real crisis of Katrina is the hundreds of thousands of ravaged, displaced and traumatized children. — Bruce D. Perry

We ignore the emotional needs of young children at our peril. — Bruce D. Perry

The truth is, you cannot love yourself unless you have been loved and are loved. The capacity to love cannot be built in isolation. — Bruce D. Perry

Negative emotions often make things even more memorable than positive ones because recalling things that are threatening - and avoiding those situations in the future if possible - is often critical to survival. — Bruce D. Perry

Fire can warm or consume,
water can quench or drown,
wind can caress or cut.
And so it is with human relationshps;
we can both create and destroy,
nurture and terrorize,
traumatize and heal each other — Bruce D. Perry

The more healthy relationships a child has, the more likely he will be to recover from trauma and thrive. Relationships are the agents of change and the most powerful therapy is human love. — Bruce D. Perry

It is the rare and strong person that can carry their trauma without having it spill into the next generation. — Bruce D. Perry

Surprisingly, it is often when wandering through the emotional carnage left by the worst of humankind that we find the best of humanity ad well. — Bruce D. Perry

By understanding and increasing just this one capacity of the human brain, an enormous amount of social change can be fostered. Failure to understand and cultivate empathy, however, could lead to a society in which no one would want to live - a cold, violent, chaotic, and terrifying war of all against all. This destructive type of culture has appeared repeatedly in various times and places in human history and still reigns in some parts of the world. And it's a culture that we could be inadvertently developing throughout America if we do not address current trends in child rearing, education, economic inequality, and our core values. — Bruce D. Perry

Biology isn't just genes playing out some unalterable script. It is sensitive to the world around it, — Bruce D. Perry

Relationships matter: the currency for systemic change was trust, and trust comes through forming healthy working relationships. People, not programs, change people. — Bruce D. Perry