Daniel J. Siegel Quotes

• Interpersonal experience shapes the mind as it continues to develop throughout the lifespan... Interactions with the environment, especially relationships with other people, directly shape the development of the brain's structure and function.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  People, Brain, Mind

  Daniel J. Siegel (2015). “The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are”, p.14, Guilford Publications

  61 Copy quote

• Too often we forget that discipline really means to teach, not to punish. A disciple is a student, not a recipient of behavioural consequences.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Mean, Discipline, Students

  Daniel J. Siegel, Tina Payne Bryson (2011). “The Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind”, p.139, Delacorte Press

  73 Copy quote

• We are always in a perpetual state of being created and creating ourselves. (p. 221)

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Change, Creating, People Changing

  74 Copy quote

• When we begin to know ourselves in an open and self-supportive way, we take the first step to encourage our children to know themselves

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Children, Self, Supportive

  Daniel J. Siegel MD, Mary Hartzell (2003). “Parenting From the Inside Out”, p.186, Penguin

  35 Copy quote

• From early infancy, it appears that our ability to regulate emotional states depends upon the experience of feeling that a significant person in our life is simultaneously experiencing a similar state of mind.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Emotional, Feelings, Mind

  48 Copy quote

• We now know that the way to help a child develop optimally is to help create connections in her brain—her whole brain—that develop skills that lead to better relationships, better mental health, and more meaningful lives. You could call it brain sculpting, or brain nourishing, or brain building. Whatever phrase you prefer, the point is crucial, and thrilling: as a result of the words we use and the actions we take, children’s brains will actually change, and be built, as they undergo new experiences.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Meaningful, Children, New Experiences

  53 Copy quote

• Adolescents who are absorbing negative messages about who they are and what is expected of them may sink to that level instead of realizing their true potential. As Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote, “Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them become what they are capable of being."

  Daniel J. Siegel

  People, Negative, Levels

  "Brainstorm: The Power and Purpose of the Teenage Brain". Book by Daniel J. Siegel, 2013.

  57 Copy quote

• Recent studies of mindfulness practices reveal that they can result in profound improvements in a range of physiological, mental, and interpersonal domains in our lives. Cardiac, endocrine, and immune functions are improved with mindfulness practices. Empathy, compassion, and interpersonal sensivity seem to be improved. People who come to develop the capacity to pay attention in the present moment without grasping on to their inevitable judgments also develop a deeper sense of well-being and what can be considered a form of mental coherence.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Philosophy, Compassion, Practice

  48 Copy quote

• Grief allows you to let go of something you have lost only when you begin to accept what you now have in its place. As our mind clings to the familiar, to our established expectations, we can become trapped in feelings of disappointment, confusion, anger, that create our own internal worlds of suffering.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Letting Go, Disappointment, Grief

  Daniel J. Siegel (2010). “Mindsight: The New Science of Personal Transformation”, p.6, Bantam

  42 Copy quote

• We must keep in mind that only a part of memory can be translated into the language-based packets of information people use to tell their life stories to others. Learning to be open to many layers of communication is a fundamental part of getting to know another person's life.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Memories, Communication, People

  Daniel J. Siegel (2015). “The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are”, p.67, Guilford Publications

  51 Copy quote

• While the days of parenting may seem so long, the years are so short.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Years, Long, May

  26 Copy quote

• For "full" emotional communication, one person needs to allow his state of mind to be influenced by that of the other.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Communication, Emotional, Mind

  Daniel J. Siegel (2015). “The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are”, p.94, Guilford Publications

  51 Copy quote

• Mindfulness has never met a cognition it didn't like.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Mindfulness, Cognition, Mets

  Daniel J. Siegel (2007). “The Mindful Brain: Reflection and Attunement in the Cultivation of Well-Being”, p.186, W. W. Norton & Company

  29 Copy quote

• Each of us needs periods in which our minds can focus inwardly. Solitude is an essential experience for the mind to organize its own processes and create an internal state of resonance. In such a state, the self is able to alter its constraints by directly reducing the input from interactions with others. (p. 235)

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Self, Interaction With Others, Focus

  53 Copy quote

• Early experience shapes the structure and function of the brain. This reveals the fundamental way in which gene expression is determined by experience.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Expression, Brain, Fundamentals

  Daniel J. Siegel (2015). “The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are”, p.112, Guilford Publications

  19 Copy quote

• ...not all encounters with the world affect the mind equally. Studies have demonstrated that if the brain appraises an event as "meaningful," it will be more likely to be recalled in the future.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Meaningful, Brain, Mind

  Daniel J. Siegel (2015). “The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are”, p.72, Guilford Publications

  23 Copy quote

• At the most basic level, therefore, secure attachments in both childhood and adulthood are established by two individual's sharing a nonverbal focus on the energy flow (emotional states) and a verbal focus on the information-processing aspects (representational processes of memory and narrative) of mental life. The matter of the mind matters for secure attachments.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Memories, Emotional, Attachment

  26 Copy quote

• The amygdala, along with related areas..., plays a crucial role in coordinating perceptions with memory and behavior. These regions are especially sensitive to social interactions.

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Memories, Play, Perception

  Daniel J. Siegel (2015). “The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are”, p.158, Guilford Publications

  27 Copy quote

• Internal mental experience is not the product of a photographic process. Internal reality is in fact constructed by the brain as it interacts with the environment in the present, in the context of its past experiences and expectancies of the future. At the level of perceptual categorizations, we have reached a land of mental representations quite distant from the layers of the world just inches away from their place inside the skull. This is the reason why each of us experiences a unique way of minding the world. (pp. 166-167)

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Unique, Past, Reality

  Daniel J. Siegel (2015). “The Developing Mind, Second Edition: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are”, p.226, Guilford Publications

  23 Copy quote

• The number of possible "on-off" patterns of neuronal firing is immense, estimated as a staggering ten times ten one million times (ten to the millionth power). The brain is obviously capable of an imponderably huge variety of activity; the fact that it is often organized and functional is quite an accomplishment!

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Numbers, Accomplishment, Brain

  Daniel J. Siegel (2015). “The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are”, p.16, Guilford Publications

  16 Copy quote

• Wonderful!Hold Me Tight blends the best in research findings with practical suggestions from a caring and compassionate clinician. This fabulous book will be of great benefitto couples trying to find their way to better communication and deeper, more fulfilling ways of being with each other. Bravo!

  Daniel J. Siegel

  Couple, Book, Communication

  61 Copy quote

You May Also Like:

Daniel Goleman

Jon Kabat-Zinn

Harvey Karp

Tara Brach

Bessel van der Kolk

David Rock

Peter Senge

Peter A. Levine