Toxic Environments Quotes

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No matter how valuable you are and your ideas, fools will certainly play both of you down, so exclude yourselves from the inflammatory environs of fools.
Michael Bassey Johnson
Negative people can only infest you with discouragements when they find you around... Just get lost and get saved!
Israelmore Ayivor (The Great Hand Book of Quotes)
There are many good seeds in you. Therefore you must avoid every bad soil in the world.
Israelmore Ayivor
Some people are doomed from birth because their environment is so toxic.
Charlie LeDuff (Detroit: An American Autopsy)
Entangling yourself in any toxic environment will have you constantly second guessing your worth.
Christine E. Szymanski
Most police cars are the equivalent of an electrical room on wheels and it does not surprise me that police officers that spend time in such a biologically toxic environment are displaying aggression.
Steven Magee
Cleanliness is a habit that keeps the body, mind, and environment neat, clean, and delightful and free from dirt and toxic things.
Amit Ray (Peace Bliss Beauty and Truth: Living with Positivity)
Maintaining one’s health in today’s toxic rich environment requires proper rest, hydration, an abundant intake of nutrients, and regular internal cleansing practices
Gary Hopkins
When you fail to tap into your wellsprings of inner strength due to toxic habits, environments or people, you wind up feeling trapped, stranded and unhappy. You end up in soulless jobs, destructive relationships and empty friendships. Most of all, you find yourself unsatisfied with who you are, and you often become your own worst enemy,perpetuating the cycles of pain, anger and fear within you – like I did
Aletheia Luna (Quiet Strength: Embracing, Empowering and Honoring Yourself as an Introvert)
WHAT’S THE ONE thing that most affects how much people enjoy their jobs? First and foremost, people thrive when they feel appreciated by their supervisors and colleagues—and that means they sense the appreciation is heartfelt and authentic.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
Before I went to college I read two books. I read a book “Moral Mazes” by Robert Jackall which is a study of how corporations work, and it’s actually a fascinating book, this sociologist, he just picks a corporation at random and just goes and studies the middle managers, not the people who do any of the grunt work and not the big decision makers, just the people whose job is to make sure that things day to day get done, and he shows how even though they’re all perfectly reasonable people, perfectly nice people you’d be happy to meet any of them, all the things that they were accomplishing were just incredibly evil. So you have these people in this average corporation, they were making decisions to blow out their worker’s eardrums in the factory, to poison the lakes and the lagoons nearby, to make these products that are filled with toxic chemicals that poisoned their customers, not because any of them were bad people and wanted to kill their workers and their neighbourhood and their customers, but just because that was the logic of the situation they were in. Another book I read was a book “Understanding Power” by Noam Chomsky which kind of took the same sort of analysis but applied it to wider society which you know we’re in a situation where it may be filled with perfectly good people but they’re in these structures that cause them to continually do evil, to invade countries, to bomb people, to take money from poor people and give it to rich people, to do all these things that are wrong. These books really opened my eyes about just how bad the society we were living in really is.
Aaron Swartz
Hanging around the small minded eventually makes us small minded. The plant only grows as big as the environment it's in.
Torron-Lee Dewar (Creativity is Everything)
The creative process is lost in a toxic environment. The risk of staying is too great because in it you may never reach your full destiny.
Germany Kent
Change is a fragile thing. It requires time and distance. Survivors of abuse , . . . have to get away from their abusers. Going back to that toxic environment was worse thing [someone] could do.
Rick Riordan (The Tower of Nero (The Trials of Apollo, #5))
There is toxicity everywhere around us. In the environment, in the political atmosphere, but the origin is in people’s hearts. Unless we clean the ecology of our own heart and inspire others to do the same, we will be an instrument of polluting the environment. But if we create purity in our own heart, then we can contribute great purity to the world around us.
Jay Shetty (Think Like a Monk: Train Your Mind for Peace and Purpose Every Day)
We all need support, in the workplace and beyond it. When we both give and receive, we stand a much better chance of survival.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
Spiritual and emotional recovery are possible because the human brain is a living organ that we can transform by making new choices and being in non-shaming recovery-based environments.
Christopher Dines (Drug Addiction Recovery: The Mindful Way)
The human placenta is filled with nutritious benefits, one of which is creating a fertile environment. At my age, I'm going to need all the help I can to have a baby, and if having a placenta smoothie or two helps - I won't count it out." "That's like some pretty satanic shit." Ethan is quick to observe. "Like voodoo or something.
Addison Moore (Toxic Part One (Celestra, #7))
Naysayers can't prevent your brilliance and purpose from entering the world. It will seep under doors like water flooding into a room. Its shafts will beam through windows like dazzling rays on a bright, summery morning. Within the sunlight are galaxies and constellations filled with opportunities for you to take. All you have to do is create the environment for its manifestation and keep striving, keep going.
Keisha Blair (Holistic Wealth (Expanded and Updated): 36 Life Lessons to Help You Recover from Disruption, Find Your Life Purpose, and Achieve Financial Freedom)
AFTER-SUN OIL      Lavender    10 drops      Chamomile         5 drops      Bergamot      1 drop      Geranium      2 drops      Diluted in        Almond oil      approx. 2 oz.      Sesame oil      2 tablespoons
Valerie Ann Worwood (The Complete Book of Essential Oils and Aromatherapy: Over 600 Natural, Non-Toxic and Fragrant Recipes to Create Health — Beauty — a Safe Home Environment)
NASA astronauts have only managed to live continuously on the International Space Station (ISS) for a year and Biosphere 2 on Earth failed at two years of uninterrupted human habitation. Both cases required extracting the sickened people from the toxic environments. At this point it is ludicrous to talk about a permanent manned base on Mars.
Steven Magee
You will only notice the tick by its swollen body attached to your skin. Do not pull it out. A cigarette placed on its body will make the tick drop off, or 1 drop of thyme will also do the trick. Then apply 1 drop of neat lavender every five minutes, to a total of ten,
Valerie Ann Worwood (The Complete Book of Essential Oils and Aromatherapy: Over 600 Natural, Non-Toxic and Fragrant Recipes to Create Health — Beauty — a Safe Home Environment)
Feedback is a gift only when it comes from a person who has earned your trust.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
Toxic remnants of war represent a profound challenge for the protection of public health and the restoration of the environment in countries affected by conflict.
Widad Akreyi
This is what scientists and food activists at Yale University call a toxic food environment. It is the environment in which most of us live today.
T. Colin Campbell (The China Study: The Most Comprehensive Study of Nutrition Ever Conducted and the Startling Implications for Diet, Weight Loss and Long-Term Health)
Everyone has an invisible sign hanging from their neck saying ‘Make Me Feel Important.’ Never forget that when working with people.” Mary Kay Ash
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
GET TOUGH. Mental and spiritual toughness go together. Deepen your commitment to your most essential values and mentally rehearse the specific ways you can take positive action.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
you cannot heal in the same environment that is poisoning you.
Sherrie Campbell (Adult Survivors of Toxic Family Members: Tools to Maintain Boundaries, Deal with Criticism, and Heal from Shame After Ties Have Been Cut)
Culture is more important than vision. Some leaders have great vision, but have created a toxic culture where that vision will never happen.
Phil Cooke
authentic followers of Christ follow Him in the midst of a hostile and toxic environment.
Chip Ingram (True Spirituality: Becoming a Romans 12 Christian)
You know you’re in a toxic environment when... People use the word ‘fairness,’ when in reality, managing the appearance of fairness becomes the job.
Richie Norton
Feeling out of place in old toxic environments we used to feel comfortable in, is often an overlooked sign of growth.
Unknown
If your face is being illuminated by your television or computer screen, then you should increase the illumination in your environment by moving closer to the window or by using filament light bulbs.
Steven Magee
Do an overwhelming number of respected scientists believe that human actions are changing the Earth's climate? Yes. OK, that being the case, let's undermine that by finding and funding those few contrarians who believe otherwise. Promote their message widely and it will accumulate in the mental environment, just as toxic mercury accumulates in a biological ecosystem. Once enough of the toxin has been dispersed, the balance of public understanding will shift. Fund a low level campaign to suggest any threat to the car is an attack on personal freedoms. Create a "grassroots" group to defend the right to drive. Portray anticar activists as prudes who long for the days of the horse and buggy. Then sit back, watch the infotoxins spread - and get ready to sell bigger, better cars for years to come.
Kalle Lasn (Culture Jam: How to Reverse America's Suicidal Consumer Binge - and Why We Must)
The future of the next generation relies on astronomers obtaining a full understanding of the rapidly changing human environmental conditions and the halting of biologically toxic corporate government policies. The overloading of the electromagnetic environment is one of these disastrous policies that must stop.
Steven Magee
If, in 2010, you lived in a county with a higher exposure to toxic pollution, we discovered, you are more likely to believe that Americans “worry too much” about the environment and to believe that the United States is doing “more than enough” about it. You are also more likely to describe yourself as a strong Republican.
Arlie Russell Hochschild (Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right)
If you can't reuse or repair an item, do you ever really own it? Do you ever really own it? Do you ever develop the sense of pride and proprietorship that comes from maintaining an object in fine working order? We invest something of ourselves in our material world, which in turn reflects who we are. In the era of disposability that plastic has helped us foster, we have increasingly invested ourselves in objects that have no real meaning in our lives. We think of disposable lighters as conveniences -- which they indisputably are; ask any smoker or backyard-barbecue chef -- and yet we don't think much about the tradeoffs that that convenience entails.
Susan Freinkel (Plastic: A Toxic Love Story)
I’m now much less of an asset to the company than I could be. I keep my head down and for self-preservation just do my work with little conversation with anyone. Yet the irony is this: in my self-preservation, I’m actually destroying myself. In bottling up my unexpressed feelings, I’m making myself sick emotionally and physically.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
What makes an empath’s overload symptoms worse? Fatigue, illness, rushing, traffic, crowds, loud environments, toxic people, low blood sugar, arguing, overwork, chemical sensitivities, too much socializing, and feeling trapped in overstimulating situations such as parties and cruises. Any combination of these conditions intensifies an empath’s overload. Therefore, keep the following in mind: stress + low blood sugar = drama and exhaustion.
Judith Orloff (The Empath's Survival Guide: Life Strategies for Sensitive People)
Domination and submission can be healthy traits in an environment of trust. But superiority complex in man and inferiority complex in woman forms a toxic circle. One becomes oppressor, the other becomes manipulative. Both harm each other.
Shunya
In our culture, the water temperature increases daily. Without realizing it, we slowly become acclimated to a toxic environment full of poisonous influences. As the water temperature rises, we keep pretending we’re soaking in a hot tub having the time of our lives, never dreaming that we’re scalding our souls. As we become scarred and desensitized to what is right and wrong, good and evil, life-giving and life-draining, we lose sight of our first love. We move away from God one degree at a time.
Craig Groeschel (Soul Detox: Clean Living in a Contaminated World)
Trauma survivors who can remove themselves from a toxic environment may have a higher chance of making progress towards recovery. On the other hand, those who stuck in such an environment may find it more difficult to improve their mental health conditions.
Hong Wang Fung (Be A Teammate With Yourself: Understanding Trauma and Dissociation)
There were three people in my home and I was the only one showing Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity and reactivity to the radio frequency transmitting utility meters. For these reasons I did not shield my home and took the route of adapting my body to the toxic electromagnetic environment.
Steven Magee (Curing Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity)
A negative atmosphere can affect human behavior and can make you question your ability to accomplish goals. We can have difficulties making progress towards what we want. There's no risk in moving away from those toxic environments for the betterment of your wellbeing. GOD will always bless your efforts for the greater good.
Jesus Apolinaris
We always tell anyone who ever does their #2minutebeachclean that it matters because every piece of plastic that gets removed from the ocean environment, or any environment, is a piece that won’t go on to kill. It won’t end up in a whale’s stomach or strangling a seabird. And it won’t end up becoming thousands of toxic pieces of microplastic.
Martin Dorey (No. More. Plastic.: What you can do to make a difference – the #2minutesolution)
To those who value words of affirmation, criticism feels like a knife in the heart.
Paul E. White (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
Achieving great accomplishments doesn’t matter much if everyone who helps you get there dies along the way.” Paul White
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
We need the richness of many good counselors all through our lives and an attitude that nurtures them. That way, we may find the clarity and resilience we need when things go awry.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
SEE THROUGH THE FOG
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
When a workplace becomes toxic, its poison spreads beyond its walls and into the lives of its workers and their families.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
No matter what I did, it was never enough.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
When you’re through changing, you’re through.” Bruce Barton
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
In our present toxic food environment, many have lost the ability to connect with the body signals
Joel Fuhrman (Eat to Live: The Amazing Nutrient-Rich Program for Fast and Sustained Weight Loss)
highly motivated and mission-driven professionals are working in toxic work environments in which they are unable to succeed.
Paul DeChant (Preventing Physician Burnout: Curing the Chaos and Returning Joy to the Practice of Medicine)
Trust is a fragile commodity. Know your code of conduct and the values you stand for. Remember: if you wouldn’t want to explain it on ‘60 Minutes,’ don’t do it.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
There isn't enough positive self-talk you can practice in a toxic work environment, and there isn't enough strength you can possess to survive.
Elelwani Anita Ravhuhali (Sometimes it's your workplace: "A toxic workplace doesn't end at the office ,it follows you into every part of your life.")
Bosses use humiliation to dominate.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
Any species that devours its natural environment will eventually fall victim to the resulting silence and I call the toxicity of silence: Extinction Silence
Steven Magee (Curing Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity)
The realities of nursing are that they work in environments which are typically filled with toxic air, toxic light, high levels of radiation, and potentially deadly infectious agents.
Steven Magee
Pages could be written on the immense losses of productive soil that occur annually in almost every continent of the earth; on lethal air pollution episodes in major urban areas; on the worldwide distribution of toxic agents, such as radioactive isotopes and lead; on the chemicalization of man's immediate environment—one might say his very dinner table—with pesticide residues and food additives. Pieced together like bits of a jigsaw puzzle, these affronts to the environment form a pattern of destruction that has no precedent in man's long history on earth.
Murray Bookchin (Post-Scarcity Anarchism (Working Classics))
For many Westerners, “it’s natural” seems to mean “it’s good.” This view is wrong and comes from shopping in supermarkets and living in landscaped environments. Plants evolved toxins to deter animals, fungi, and bacteria from eating them. The list of “natural” foods that need processing to detoxify them goes on and on. Early potatoes were toxic, and the Andean peoples ate clay to neutralize the toxin. Even beans can be toxic without processing. In California, many hunter-gatherer populations relied on acorns, which, similar to manioc, require a labor intensive, multiday leaching process. Many small-scale societies have similarly exploited hardy, tropical plants called cycads for food. But cycads contain a nerve toxin. If not properly processed, they can cause neurological symptoms, paralysis, and death. Numerous societies, including hunter-gatherers, have culturally evolved an immense range of detoxification techniques for cycads. By contrast with our species, other animals have far superior abilities to detoxify plants. Humans, however, lost these genetic adaptations and evolved a dependence on cultural know-how, just to eat.
Joseph Henrich (The Secret of Our Success: How Culture Is Driving Human Evolution, Domesticating Our Species, and Making Us Smarter)
When envy lies within a woman's heart it cuts into her soul & gives her a toxic spirit. It is truly something to be disgusted by. I have experienced it so much in my own life that I can sense the energy of envy without any communication from the other person. It lingers in the air to pollute your environment. Envy is a brutal force of bad vibes sucking the love right out of your heart.
Bindu Envy In Women
Emotional abuse poisons a relationship and infuses it it with hostility, contempt, and hatred. No matter how much a couple once loved each other, once emotional abuse becomes a consistent aspect of the relationship, that love is overshadowed by fear, anger, guilt, and shame. Whether it is one or both partners who are being emotionally abusive, the relationship becomes increasingly more toxic as time goes by. In this polluted environment it is difficult for love not only to grow but to survive. At the very least, emotional abuse causes both the abuser and the victim to lose sight of any redeeming qualitites his or her partner once had. The more a partner is allowed to degrade, criticize, or dominate her partner, the less she will respect her partner. And the more a partner is emotionally abused, the more he will slowly build up an intense hatred towards his abuser. The disrespect and hatred each partner begins to feel leads to more and more emotional abuse and to each partner justifying inappropriate, even destructive, behavior. Over time, anger can build up on the part of both abuser and victim, and emotional abuse can turn to physical violence.
Beverly Engel The Emotionally Abusive Relationship How to Stop Being Abused and How to Stop Abusing
Dear Mauna Kea Observatories, I know that telescopes do not belong on sacred sites. I also know that you are willfully damaging your workers health by building astronomical observatories in known biologically toxic environments. As such, I now respectfully request your resignation from the very high altitude sacred mountain of Mauna Kea. Sincerely, Steven Magee, Damaged Mauna Kea worker.
Steven Magee
...maintaining our lawns in their prestigious, weed-free states has become quite a toxic undertaking...40% of the chemicals used by the lawn-care industry are banned in other countries because they are carcinogens.
Douglas W. Tallamy
These pups are not damaged goods; they are not defective. If they can get a safe, stable, and nurturing environment at an early age, the biology says that this sets them up to develop a healthy stress-response system in adulthood. As we’ve mentioned, the key to keeping a tolerable stress response from tipping over into the toxic stress zone is the presence of a buffering adult to adequately mitigate the impact of the stressor.
Nadine Burke Harris (The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Trauma and Adversity)
As humanity progresses its technology on a global level, the observed degradation of natural processes and growth cycles are the alarm systems that nature uses to alert us that some of this progress is biologically toxic.
Steven Magee
I’ve never been ashamed of my struggles, my breakdowns nor those moments where I felt the most chaotic, so damn unbalanced or anxious about all those things that have eaten me alive. I’ve never played the role of a victim because such a silly role has never been mine. on the contrary , I’ve always been my worst judge, my harshest critic, and if I have ever been a victim , I was the victim of my stupid decisions and my wrong choices of toxic people , environment that I’ll never belong to and paths that led me nowhere . I owe the world no apologies, all the apologies I really owe to myself for being so hard on myself in a world that has never made it any better nor showed any mercy on me …
Samiha Totanji
Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is sadness, joy; where there is darkness, light.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
Horney said that it is essential to recognize when we are not operating from self-determined beliefs, but from those internalized from a toxic environment. These play out as internalized messages, especially in the form of “shoulds,” such as “I should be recognized and powerful” or “I should be thin.” She taught her patients to become aware of two influences in their psyche: the “real self” with authentic desires, and the “ideal self” that strives to fulfil all the demands of the “shoulds.
Nigel C. Benson (The Psychology Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained)
I keep my head down and for self-preservation just do my work with little conversation with anyone. Yet the irony is this: in my self-preservation, I’m actually destroying myself. In bottling up my unexpressed feelings, I’m making myself sick emotionally and physically.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
The environmental problems facing us today include the same eight that undermined past societies, plus four new ones: human-caused climate change, buildup of toxic chemicals in the environment, energy shortages, and full human utilization of the Earth’s photosynthetic capacity.
Jared Diamond (Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed)
Can two walk together, unless they are agreed?’ Amos 3:3 ‘Does This Person Belong in your Life?’ A toxic relationship is like a limb with gangrene: unless you amputate it the infection can spread and kill you. Without the courage to cut off what refuses to heal, you’ll end up losing a lot more. Your personal growth - and in some cases your healing - will only be expedited by establishing relationships with the right people. Maybe you’ve heard the story about the scorpion who asked the frog to carry him across the river because he couldn’t swim. ‘I’m afraid you’ll sting me,’ replied the frog. The scorpion smiled reassuringly and said, ‘Of course I won’t. If I did that we’d both drown!’ So the frog agreed, and the scorpion hopped on his back. Wouldn’t you know it: halfway across the river the scorpion stung him! As they began to sink the frog lamented, ‘You promised you wouldn’t sting me. Why’d you do it?’ The scorpion replied, ‘I can’t help it. It’s my nature!’ Until God changes the other person’s nature, they have the power to affect and infect you. For example, when you feel passionately about something but others don’t, it’s like trying to dance a foxtrot with someone who only knows how to waltz. You picked the wrong dance partner! Don’t get tied up with someone who doesn’t share your values and God-given goals. Some issues can be corrected through counselling, prayer, teaching, and leadership. But you can’t teach someone to care; if they don’t care they’ll pollute your environment, kill your productivity, and break your rhythm with constant complaints. That’s why it’s important to pray and ask God, ‘Does this person belong in my life?
Patience Johnson
Ecologically, bourgeois exploitation and manipulation are undermining the very capacity of the earth to sustain advanced forms of life. The crisis is being heightened by massive increases in air and water pollution; by a mounting accumulation of nondegradable wastes, lead residues, pesticide residues and toxic additives in food; by the expansion of cities into vast urban belts; by increasing stresses due to congestion, noise and mass living; and by the wanton scarring of the earth as a result of mining operations, lumbering, and real estate speculation. As a result, the earth has been despoiled in a few decades on a scale that is unprecedented in the entire history of human habitation of the planet.
Murray Bookchin (Post-Scarcity Anarchism (Working Classics))
But after nearly two years, still working as an assistant and having the goalposts for what I’d need to become a stylist constantly moving, I knew that I wasn’t going to make it there. It wasn’t worth giving up my well-being and working in a toxic and frequently abusive environment to make 20 percent from a clientele that I knew I would have to build myself.
Jonathan Van Ness (Over the Top)
Heck’s attempted rewilding serves to reinforce a very important fact: Europeans are now the mind over their land. What they desire, the land will become. And if their desires are toxic and dangerous, then that will manifest itself in nature. Europeans cannot escape responsibility for shaping their environment; as even withdrawal from management will have profound consequences.
Tim Flannery (Europe: A Natural History)
People have been carping in this way for many centuries. Socrates feared that the act of writing would “create forgetfulness in the learners’ souls.” The sixteenth-century scientist Conrad Gessner worried that the printing press would facilitate an “always on” environment. In the eighteenth century, men complained that newspapers would be intellectually and morally isolating, and that the rise of the novel would make it difficult for people—specifically women—to differentiate between fiction and fact. We worried that radio would drive children to distraction, and later that TV would erode the careful attention required by radio. In 1985, Neil Postman observed that the American desire for constant entertainment had become toxic, that television had ushered in a “vast descent into triviality.
Jia Tolentino (Trick Mirror: Reflections on Self-Delusion)
Put another way, the world we believe in becomes the world we live in. If I see the world as a hostile place where only winners thrive, I may well become aggressive, selfish, and grandiose to survive in such a milieu. Later in life I will gravitate to competitive environments and endeavors that can only confirm that view and reinforce its validity. Our beliefs are not only self-fulfilling; they are world-building.
Gabor Maté (The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness and Healing in a Toxic Culture)
The repeated finding that people with happier, less troubled thought patterns can suffer more illness seems to defy common sense. The general belief is that positive emotions must be conducive to good health. While it is true that genuine joy and satisfaction enhance physical well-being, “positive” states of mind generated to tune out psychic discomfort lower resistance to illness. The brain governs and integrates the activities of all organs and systems of the body, simultaneously coordinating our interactions with the environment. This regulating function depends on the clear recognition of negative influences, danger signals and signs of internal distress. In children whose environment chronically conveys mixed messages, an impairment occurs in the developing apparatus of the brain. The brain’s capacity to evaluate the environment is diminished, including its ability to distinguish what is nourishing from what is toxic.
Gabor Maté (When the Body Says No: The Cost of Hidden Stress)
While it is clear that our food choices are a matter of personal responsibility, it is important to recognize that we do not make our choices in a vacuum. We select our foods in an environment toxic with government policies that encourage cheap prices for foods with low nutrient value, and in which billions of dollars have been spent to convince us to distrust ourselves, to overeat, and to eat foods laced with ingredients that raise our setpoints and damage our health.
Linda Bacon
These senior claims were supposed to be very low-risk; after all, how likely was it that a large number of people would default on their mortgages at the same time? The answer, of course, is that it was quite likely in an environment where homes were worth 30, 40, 50 percent less than the borrowers originally paid for them. So a lot of supposedly safe assets, assets that had been rated AAA by Standard & Poor's or Moody's, ended up becoming "toxic waste", worth only a fraction of their face value.
Paul Krugman (End This Depression Now!)
THRIVE ON CHANGE. Many of us get tired of hearing that mantra, especially when we must cope with changes disrupting what we most care about. Yet the relentless acceleration of change requires flexibility of all of us, whatever our skills and roles. We are hurtling into the future, and the future will soon be a very different culture. Like an immigrant to a land with different customs and languages, we have to continually adapt and cultivate mindsets that maintain both our integrity and capacity to contribute.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
Again, we are reminded that life is precious… fleeting. Let’s endeavor to live this amazing life to the fullest. Let’s have the courage to pursue our dreams…To unapologetically cultivate a personal environment conducive to our growth, by nourishing healthy relationships and starving the toxic ones. Let’s laugh at the little nonsense that used to anger us and let go of the grudges that used to weigh us down. Let’s help each other. Let’s show our unquestionable love to the special people in our lives. Let’s squeeze this experience for all it’s worth. We are so blessed to be here, NOW… Let's not throw away another day of this beautiful precious life.
Steve Maraboli
But the story of BPA is not just about gender: it’s also about class. Or at least it’s about gendered class. Fearing a major consumer boycott, most baby-bottle manufacturers voluntarily removed BPA from their products, and while the official US line on BPA is that it is not toxic, the EU and Canada are on their way to banning its use altogether. But the legislation that we have exclusively concerns consumers: no regulatory standard has ever been set for workplace exposure.5 ‘It was ironic to me,’ says occupational health researcher Jim Brophy, ‘that all this talk about the danger for pregnant women and women who had just given birth never extended to the women who were producing these bottles. Those women whose exposures far exceeded anything that you would have in the general environment. There was no talk about the pregnant worker who is on the machine that’s producing this thing.
Caroline Criado Pérez (Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men)
Imagine the daughter of a narcissistic father as an example. She grows up chronically violated and abused at home, perhaps bullied by her peers as well. Her burgeoning low self-esteem, disruptions in identity and problems with emotional regulation causes her to live a life filled with terror. This is a terror that is stored in the body and literally shapes her brain. It is also what makes her brain extra vulnerable and susceptible to the effects of trauma in adulthood.                              Being verbally, emotionally and sometimes even physically beaten down, the child of a narcissistic parent learns that there is no safe place for her in the world. The symptoms of trauma emerge: disassociation to survive and escape her day-to-day existence, addictions that cause her to self-sabotage, maybe even self-harm to cope with the pain of being unloved, neglected and mistreated. Her pervasive sense of worthlessness and toxic shame, as well as subconscious programming, then cause her to become more easily attached to emotional predators in adulthood. In her repeated search for a rescuer, she instead finds those who chronically diminish her just like her earliest abusers. Of course, her resilience, adept skill set in adapting to chaotic environments and ability to “bounce back” was also birthed in early childhood. This is also seen as an “asset” to toxic partners because it means she will be more likely to stay within the abuse cycle in order to attempt to make things “work.” She then suffers not just from early childhood trauma, but from multiple re-victimizations in adulthood until, with the right support, she addresses her core wounds and begins to break the cycle step by step. Before she can break the cycle, she must first give herself the space and time to recover. A break from establishing new relationships is often essential during this time; No Contact (or Low Contact from her abusers in more complicated situations such as co-parenting) is also vital to the healing journey, to prevent compounding any existing traumas.
Shahida Arabi (Healing the Adult Children of Narcissists: Essays on The Invisible War Zone and Exercises for Recovery)
The big lie of American capitalism is that corporations work in their own best interests. In fact they’re constantly doing things that will eventually bring them to their knees. Most of these blunders involve toxic chemicals that any competent chemist should know to be dangerous. They pump these things into the environment and don’t even try to protect themselves. The evidence is right there in public, almost as if they’d printed up signed confessions and sprinkled them out of aeroplanes. Sooner or later, someone shows up in a Zodiac and points to that evidence, and the result is devastation far worse than what a terrorist, a Boone, could manage with bombs and guns. All the old men within twenty miles who have come down with tumors become implacable enemies. All the women married to them, all the mothers of damaged children, and even those of undamaged ones. The politicians and the news media trample each other in their haste to pour hellfire down on that corporation. The transformation can happen overnight and it’s easy to bring about. You just have to show up and point your finger.
Neal Stephenson (Zodiac)
Chemical fertilizers, pesticides, insecticides, and fungicides affect the soil food web, toxic to some members, warding off others, and changing the environment. Important fungal and bacterial relationships don’t form when a plant can get free nutrients. When chemically fed, plants bypass the microbial-assisted method of obtaining nutrients, and microbial populations adjust accordingly. Trouble is, you have to keep adding chemical fertilizers and using “-icides,” because the right mix and diversity—the very foundation of the soil food web—has been altered. It makes sense that once the bacteria, fungi, nematodes, and protozoa are gone, other members of the food web disappear as well. Earthworms, for example, lacking food and irritated by the synthetic nitrates in soluble nitrogen fertilizers, move out. Since they are major shredders of organic material, their absence is a great loss. Without the activity and diversity of a healthy food web, you not only impact the nutrient system but all the other things a healthy soil food web brings. Soil structure deteriorates, watering can become problematic, pathogens and pests establish themselves and, worst of all, gardening becomes a lot more work than it needs to be.
Jeff Lowenfels (Teaming with Microbes: The Organic Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web)
There has been a revolution in the way people think. They have just noticed, without daring to say it, that the old paradigm, according to which ‘the fate of humanity, individual and collective, is getting better every day, thanks to science, democratisation, and egalitarian emancipation’, is false. The age that believed it is over. This illusion has fallen. This progress (debatable anyhow according to people like Ivan Illich)[203] lasted probably less than a century. Today, the unintended consequences of mass technology are beginning to be felt: new resistant viruses, the toxicity of processed food, the exhaustion of the soil and the shrinking of the world’s agricultural production, the general and rapid degradation of the environment, the threat of the invention of new weapons of mass destruction to add to nuclear weapons, and so on. In addition, technology is entering its baroque age. The fundamental inventions were discovered by the end of the 1950s. The improvements to them made in later decades have contributed fewer and fewer concrete ameliorations, like so many useless decorative motifs added to the superstructure of a monument. The Internet has probably had fewer revolutionary effects than the telegraph or the telephone. The Internet is a significant improvement applied to a pan-communication that was already substantially realised. Techno-science is following the ‘80-20’ power law. At the beginning it takes 20 units of energy to obtain 60 units of force. Later it takes 80 units of energy to realise only 20 units of force.
Guillaume Faye (Convergence of Catastrophes)
that night she dreamed of employing an army of women cleaners who would set forth across the planet on a mission to clean up all the damage done to the environment they came from all over Africa and from North and South and South America, they came from India and China and all over Asia, they came from Europe and the Middle East, from Oceania, and from the Antarctic, too she imagined them all descending in their millions on the Niger Delta and driving out the oil companies with their mop and broom handles transformed into spears and poison-tipped swords and machine guns she imagined them demolishing al the equipment used for oil production, including the flare stacks that rose into the skies to burn the natural gas, her cleaners setting charges underneath each one, detonating from a safe distance and watching them being blown up she imagined the local people cheering and celebrating with dancing, drumming and roasted fish she imagined the international media filming it- CNN, BBC, NBC she imagined the government unable to mobilize the poorly paid local militia because they were terrified by the sheer numbers of her Worldwide Army of Women Cleaners who could vaporize them with their superhuman powers afterwards, she imagined legions of singing women sifting the rivers and creeks to remove the thick slicks of grease that had polluted them and digging up the land until they'd removed the toxic sublayers of soil she imagined the skies opening when the job was fone and the pouring of pure water from the now hygienic clouds for as long as it took for the region to be thoroughly cleansed and replenished
Bernardine Evaristo (Girl, Woman, Other)
At first glance, professionalism tries to convince you it’s a neutral word, merely meant to signify a collection of behaviors, clothing, and norms “appropriate” for the workplace. We just ask that everyone be professional, the cis white men will say, smiles on their faces, as if they’re not asking for much. We try to maintain a professional office environment. But never has a word in the English language been so loaded with racism, sexism, heteronormativity, or trans exclusion. Whenever someone is telling you to “be professional,” they’re really saying, “be more like me.” If you’re black, “being professional” can often mean speaking differently, avoiding black cultural references, or not wearing natural hair. If you’re not American, “being professional” can mean abandoning your cultural dress for Western business clothes. If you’re not Christian, “being professional” can mean potentially removing your hijab to fit in, sitting by while your officemates ignore your need for kosher or halal food, sucking up the fact that your office puts up a giant Christmas tree every year. If you’re low-income or working class, “being professional” can mean spending money you don’t have on work clothes—“dressing nicely” for a job that may not pay enough for you to really afford to do so. If you’re a woman, “being professional” can mean navigating a veritable minefield of double standards. Show some skin, but don’t be a slut. Wear heels, but not too high, and not too low, either. Wear form-fitting clothes, but not too form-fitting. We offer maternity leave, but don’t “interrupt your career” by taking it. And if you’re trans like me, “being professional” can mean putting your identity away unless it conforms to dominant gender norms.
Jacob Tobia (Sissy: A Coming-of-Gender Story)
Fuel your body. Think about your environment as an ecosystem. If there’s pollution, you’ll feel the toxic side effects; if you’re in the fresh air of the mountains, you’ll feel alive. You’d be surprised at how many of the foods that we eat actually sap our body of fuel. Just look at three quick examples: soda, potato chips, and hamburgers. I’m not a hard-liner who says that you should never consume these things, but this kind of steady diet will make it harder for your body to help you. Instead, look at the foods that are going to give you energy. Choose food that’s water soluble and easier for your body to break down, which gives you maximum nutrition with minimal effort. Look at a cucumber: it’s practically water and it takes no energy to consume, but it’s packed with nutrients. Green for me is the key. We overeat and undernourish ourselves way too much. When you eat bad food, your body will feel bad and then you will feel bad. It’s all connected. I drink green juice every day and eat huge salads. I am also a big believer in lean protein to feed and fuel the muscles--I might even have a chicken breast for breakfast. Growing up, because I danced every single day, I would basically eat anything I wanted and I wouldn’t gain any weight. I would eat anything and everything trying to put on a few pounds, but it never worked--and my skin was terrible as a result of it. We’d blame it on the sweat from the dancing, but I never connected it to what I ate. As I got older, I started to educate myself more about food. I learned that I need to alkalize my body. It’s never about how I look. Instead, I go by how I feel. I notice immediately how good, clean food boosts my energy while junk makes me feel lethargic. I’m also a huge believer in hydrating. Forget about eight glasses of water a day; I drink eight glasses before noon!
Derek Hough (Taking the Lead: Lessons from a Life in Motion)
Do you know where bad breath comes from? Do you know where body odor comes from? Bad breath and body odor come from a variety of things, including bacteria, infected tonsils and glands, cancer, yeast, and an overload of toxins and/or foreign substances including those along the alimentary tract. Putrefactive bacteria from the meat, dairy, eggs, and other chemicals you have overloaded your body with are problematic for the eliminative and cardiovascular systems. They also leave behind a toxic residue. This residue helps to create odors and taints your vitality, slowing and dulling the systems. Even the strongest chewing gum and heaviest deodorant will not get to the root of this problem and cease the odors from returning. These residues and putrefactive bacteria can also create the environment for illness and disease.
Jesse Jacoby (The Raw Cure: Healing Beyond Medicine)
Macho men, without their grief, must find a way to gain power and control over their environment. They have a unique way of rationalizing and justifying their behavior and violations of others,
Stephen Arterburn (Toxic Faith: Experiencing Healing Over Painful Spiritual Abuse)
As long as my tone induced toxic fear in others, I was creating an environment that would ultimately take away from what I wanted us to achieve while adding to the problem that was bugging me.
Henry Cloud (Boundaries for Leaders (Enhanced Edition): Results, Relationships, and Being Ridiculously In Charge)
The media have indeed informed the public about threats to our air, water and food. Ever since 1962, when Rachel Carson published Silent Spring, more and more information has been made available. And the public has responded. About fifteen years ago, public interest in the environment reached its height. In 1988, George Bush Senior promised that, if elected, he would be an environmental president. In the same year, Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney was re-elected, and to indicate his ecological concern he moved the minister of the environment into the inner Cabinet. Newly created environment departments around the world were poised to cut back on fossil-fuel use, monitor the effects of acid rain and other pollutants, clean up toxic wastes, and protect plant and animal species. Information about our troubled environment had reached a large number of people, and that information, as expected, led to civic and political action. In 1992, it all reached its apex as the largest-ever gathering of heads of state in human history met at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. “Sustainable development” was the rallying cry, and politicians and business leaders promised to take a new path. Henceforth, they said, the environment would be weighed in every political, social and economic decision. Yet only two weeks after all the fine statements of purpose and government commitments were signed in Rio, the Group of Seven industrialized nations met in Munich and not a word was mentioned about the environment. The main topic was the global economy. The environment, it was said, had fallen off the list of public concerns, and environmentalism had been relegated to the status of a transitory fad.
David Suzuki (From Naked Ape to Superspecies: Humanity and the Global Eco-Crisis)
. The Truth: In this case the negative effects completely outweigh the positive. Sure, GM crops may be “no-till,” but we have effectively increased the amount of toxic chemicals released into the environment while simultaneously creating a new breed of “superweed” that is resistant to “safe” herbicide. Myth 7: Monsanto's glyphosate, known as Roundup, is a nonthreatening, biodegradable herbicide. The Truth: Roundup was forced to remove the term biodegradable from its packaging.  Roundup persists in the environment and has toxic effects on wildlife. During crop growing season, the toxin known as Roundup was found in 60-100% of air and rain samples taken from the Midwest. Yuck. Myth 8: GM and Non-GM crops have
Matthew Johnson (GMO Free Diet: How to Stay Healthy by Identifying and Avoiding Dangerous Foods)
If this hypothesis of hunger, satiety, and weight regulation is correct, it means that obesity is caused by a hormonal environment—increased insulin secretion or increased sensitivity to insulin—that tilts the balance of fat storage and fat burning. This hypothesis also implies that the only way to lose body fat successfully is to reverse the process; to create a hormonal environment in which fatty acids are mobilized and oxidized in excess of the amount stored. A further implication is that any therapy that succeeds at inducing long-term fat loss—not including toxic substances and disease—has to work through these local regulatory factors on the adipose tissue.
Gary Taubes (Good Calories, Bad Calories: Challenging the Conventional Wisdom on Diet, Weight Control, and Disease)
This is an opportunity to access your deepest wisdom and assimilate it so that it becomes a part of your daily living. Beware of any potential traps or ruses that you’re tempted to get involved in. Rather than staying stuck in this apparent impasse, open your mind to the infinite number of possibilities that are before you, and make a choice. Don’t limit yourself to the mundane world, but instead be willing to explore other dimensions and realities. It’s time to write creatively without limits of tradition or habit, allowing yourself to be inspired by Nature. BLACK WIDOW SPIDER It’s time for a fresh perspective on what you’re doing, perhaps even a perspective that’s contrary to your usual way of thinking and seeing things. Your intuitive powers are very strong now, so pay closer attention to the subtle sensations in your body rather than relying solely on what meets the eye. You’ve done the hard work; now be patient and wait expectantly for the rewards that will come. There’s soon to be a substantial shift in the direction of your life, with a beneficial and renewed sense of purpose. This is a good time to do a dietary cleanse and detoxification to clear out any toxicity or pollutants in your body. Be direct and straightforward in all of your dealings, rather than dancing around the issues. What you once thought of as threatening is really quite harmless, so there’s no need to fear. There’s a situation you’re involved in where it will work better for you to remain in the background. BROWN RECLUSE SPIDER This is an opportunity to eliminate as much toxicity in your life as possible, in your body and in your relationships. Honor your need for solitude. This is a time of great transformation for you. TARANTULA Trust your intuitive senses—what you feel in your body—more than what you see. This is a time to shed anything that has served its purpose for the growth of your consciousness but is now no longer needed. Your sensitivity is increasing, particularly to the vibrations you feel from your environment. Be especially gentle to yourself in the next few days, doing whatever you can to provide comfort and self-nurturing. In spite of your sturdiness and strength, this is a very sensitive and delicate time for you, so treat yourself accordingly. Although you tend to stay in the background and by yourself, be willing to come forward as necessary for your own social and emotional nourishment.
Steven D. Farmer (Pocket Guide to Spirit Animals: Understanding Messages from Your Animal Spirit Guides)
Misinformation, rumors, and gossip are making this time stressful for everyone.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)
comes from sturdy stock and knows how to work hard and take what comes.
Gary Chapman (Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment)