Trauma and Beyond Quotes

“The way to sacrifice our victimhood in the aftermath of trauma is to respond to the shattering effect of the trauma with imagination and symbolism and to reassemble the fragments into a new whole.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“Anything that splits or destroys meaning can be accounted as evil.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“Trauma research has shown that what is primarily responsible for the consequences of trauma ... is ... the meaning that the victim ascribes to it in the context of his or her entire life.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“A process of remembering, imagining, ordering, and revaluing ... leads to the creation of meaning and a consciousness of solidarity and new relationships in the social network.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“Survivors who have mastered their trauma often exhibit a special capacity for love, an embodied concern for others, a deep kindness and caring for humanity as a whole.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“Nothing is ever completely worked through.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“The abused child has no choice but to depend on his or her caregivers. So in order to ensure that they will continue to be present and available, he or she takes their guilt upon himself or herself—much as Christ archetypally took upon himself the sins of the world and died in its stead. Abused children willingly take on the role of scapegoat and sacrifice themselves and their developmental potential in the interests of survival.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“Repairing the damage to self-processes and reintegrating and transfiguring the ego identity are lifelong endeavors.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“Trauma healers make it their mission to reform structural relationships by removing abuse and violence and to work actively for a more humane society.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“I consider love to be the matrix for this transformation, which calls new being into existence. Love has the power to reawaken and bring to the fire what has been entombed or distorted by traumatic forces or has retreated out of defensiveness and self-protection. Without love and compassion for the fragility of human identity in the face of death and the reality of evil, the madness found in these barren spaces of the soul might not be meaningfully encountered. For the stripping away of the constricting cocoon of traumatic fixations and the untangling of what has become distorted and convoluted during painful traumatization, love is needed.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation

“What is important is not to remain stuck in the past but to pay attention to the power of human creativity and with this in mind to work with others to make the world a better place.”
― Ursula Wirtz, Trauma and Beyond: The Mystery of Transformation