The document summarizes key ideas from the neuroscience masterwork by Gabor Maté. It discusses 10 threads or ideas extracted from the work, including that addiction arises from emotional isolation, powerlessness and stress, and that emotional nurturance is essential for healthy brain development in children. It also notes that fathers can be a source of protection from or cause of stress for the family, and that unfinished emotional business is passed from parents to children.

1. The Enchanted Loom
Teasing sturdy threads from
neuroscience masterworks

2. Teasing 10
threads from
Gabor
Maté ’s …
é

3. Thread 1:
No society can
understand
itself without
looking at its
shadow side.
(pg. 2)

4. Thread 2:
Adults envy the openhearted, open-
minded explorations of children;
we pine for
our own lost
capacity for
wide-eyed
wonder.
(pg. 39)

5. Thread 3:
Emotional isolation, powerlessness and
stress are the conditions that promote
addiction.
(pg. 145)

6. Thread 4:
Addiction to opiates arises in a brain
system that governs the most powerful
emotional
dynamic
in human
existence:
the
attachment
instinct.
Love.
(pg. 162)

7. Thread 5:
One of the most
important duties
of the cortex
is to inhibit
inappropriate
responses.
(pg. 176)

8. Thread 6:
Emotional
nurturance is
an absolute
requirement
for healthy
brain
development.
(pg. 193)

9. Thread 7:
An impoverished
childhood
environment
can decrease
1000-fold
the number of
connections
per brain cell.
(pg. 195)

10. Thread 8:
Fathers are
often the best
protection
from stress
for the family,
or the
greatest
source of it.
(pg. 216)

11. Thread 9:
No one is born with the capacity for
emotional self-regulation. It only
develops when the conditions are right.
(pg. 236)

12. Thread 10:
Whatever unfinished emotional business
we don’t deal with in our own lives, we
pass on to our
children.
Children
swim
in their
parents’
unconscious.
(pg. 116)

13. Image Credits:
Title Page: http://www.rappler.com/science-nature/23193-personality-traits-brain-scans
Slide 3 - http://veilofreality.com/tag/carl-jung/
Slide 12 - http://theredbamboo.deviantart.com/art/Underwater-10-38602999
Slide 2 - https://twitter.com/satdharamkaur
Slide 6 - http://www.deviantart.com/art/Love-50316085
Slide 5 - http://www.deviantart.com/art/isolated-29942351
Slide 11 - http://www.deviantart.com/art/Meditation-335576560
Slide 10 - http://dailym.ai/1KNYWoJ
Slide 14 - http://www.rappler.com/science-nature/23193-personality-traits-brain-scans
Slide 9 - http://bit.ly/1cEPp7K
Slide 8 - http://meimicat.deviantart.com/art/Nurture-314707850
Slide 7 - http://www.deviantart.com/art/Inner-Self-36887004
Slide 4 - http://www.deviantart.com/art/Child-Dream-s-191915453

14. Mark Brady, PhD
TheEnchantedLoom@gmail.com
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