Alfred Adler Quote

“He (Alfred Adler) also believed from his studies of children, that our beliefs about ourselves and our belongingness become firmly established by the time we turn five years old. This can be a problem for human beings because, as Adler pointed out, children are very good observers, but they are very poor interpreters.”

What this means is that a caretaker can easily teach a child that they are unloved without ever saying the words. When caretakers routinely ignore a child’s needs or treats them as though they are a burden, this clearly sends a message to a child about their needs and their value.

Children tend to interpret harmful or painful experiences with others as their fault. This is what Adler meant by children being poor interpreters.

This is why it can be really hard for people coming into therapy with developmental trauma to be able to point to a specific reason for their symptoms of complex traumatization.

It’s our job as therapists to help them excavate and identify the memories that seem like ‘evidence’ for their negative beliefs. Then as EMDR therapist we help them to desensitize these memories and come to new, healthier and more adaptive conclusions from those memories.

If you feel like you don’t know how to help clients identify traumatic memories and then organize a treatment plan based on those memories then you may benefit from training through Precision EMDR Academy. Our focus is on preparing EMDR therapist to work with complex and developmental trauma in a strategic and efficient manner. Click HERE for more info on our next up-coming EMDR training.

I apologize for not citing my source, as I am not sure where I found this quote, if you know please feel free to share it with me!