The Truth Will Set You Free: Overcoming Emotional Blindness and Finding Your True Adult SelfMore than twenty years ago, a little-known Swiss psychoanalyst wrote a book that changed the way many people viewed themselves and their world. In simple but powerful prose, the deeply moving Drama of the Gifted Child showed how parents unconsciously form and deform the emotional lives of their children. Alice Miller's stories about the roots of suffering in childhood resonated with readers, and her book soon became a backlist best seller. In The Truth Will Set You Free Miller returns to the intensely personal tone and themes of her best-loved work. Only by embracing the truth of our past histories can any of us hope to be free of pain in the present, she argues. Miller uses vivid true stories to reveal the perils of early-childhood mistreatment and the dangers of mindless obedience to parental will. Drawing on the latest research on brain development, she shows how spanking and humiliation produce dangerous levels of denial, which leads in turn to emotional blindness and to mental barriers that cut off awareness and the ability to learn new ways of acting. If this cycle repeats itself, the grown child will perpetrate the same abuse on later generations -- a message vitally important, especially given the increasing popularity of programs like Tough Love and of "child disciplinarians" like James Dobson. The Truth Will Set You Free will provoke and inform all readers who want to know Alice Miller's latest thinking on this important subject. |
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able abuse Adam and Eve adult Alice Miller ANGELA'S ASHES anxieties asked attitude awareness baby barriers beat beaten behavior believe blame body brain Brigitte cause child child abuse childhood reality church confront corporal punishment courage cruelty daughter Dean Ornish denial denied destructive distress doctors early childhood EMIDA emotional blindness empathy enlightened witness evil experience father fear felt Frank McCourt frequently give guilt Guntrip happened Harry Guntrip hatred helping witness Hitler humiliation ignorance infant Isabelle Joseph LeDoux Katya kind knowledge later learned lives Marcellin Champagnat memories mind mother never obedience pain parents patients person poisonous pedagogy prison psychoanalysis psychotherapist psychotherapy questions rage realize refused relationship repressed Romand sadism someone spanking Stalin story suffering talk tell therapist therapy things Thou Shalt tion told traumatic truth unable understand upbringing violence Winnicott's woman young