in order to know who we are—to have an identity—we must know (or at least feel that we know) what is and what was "real." we must observe what we see around us and label it correctly; we must also be able to trust our memories and be able to tell them apart from our imagination. losing the ability to make these distinctions is one sign of what psychoanalyst william niederland called "soul murder." erasing awareness and cultivating denial are often essential to survival, but the price is that you lose track of who you are, of what you are feeling, and of what and whom you can trust.


bessel van der kolk,
the body keeps the score