There is also a philosophy of less-is-more, and a little dignity that never hurt anybody. There are many qualities to admire about our father's generation.

Many people have overcome that home situation simply by having at least one caring adult, whether a teacher, mentor or religious leader.

There is a wonderful documentary called 'A Room to Breathe,' where a school brought in a TM instructor, to try and establish a better classroom environment, and the results and transformations were profound. It's impossible to ignore, and we make some passing references in my film, but 'A Room to Breathe' is a closer look at just how powerful meditation can be.

The word 'resilience,' in our American culture is closely aligned with 'grit,' and that word implies a certain moral fiber that says you can survive and thrive in any adversity, because you are strong - but that message of strength is both disqualifying and problematic.

When you introduce these tools into the community, they can be adopted and implemented at the local level - and the results have been powerful. We have to ask the questions, how do people survive in poverty and other challenges of traumatic childhoods? And, until we fix this underlying problems, how do we help people in the meantime?

I'm in full support of that technique [meditation] , and what David Lynch is doing. It's very important.

The interesting thing about the ACE study, as it began in the 1990s, is that it was based on a very strict set of ten questions. But what is evolving from that is a better understanding what kind of experiences are beyond the ten questions, and what kind of stressors it generates, there are so many ways that children can be exposed to ongoing stress.