I hate confrontation. As a lifelong people-pleaser, anytime an issue arises that forces me to have what I perceive to be a difficult conversation with someone, I notice my heart rate instantly speed up and my palms get sweaty. This happens even with the people who are closest to me, and who I know are …
Mindfulness
Anxiety and Our Bodies
Perhaps you, a loved one, or someone you know have experienced something similar to the following scenario. One day, you’re going about your normal routine, and nothing seems out of the ordinary, until suddenly, out of nowhere, your chest starts hurting and your heart starts pounding so hard, you feel as though it may pound …
Emotions as Teachers
Emotions have not always been thought of in the most positive light. I’m sure most (if not all) of us can think back to a time when we experienced an emotion, be it positive or negative, and we were told to “tone it down,” “get over it,” or given some kind of nonverbal indicator that …
Get Off the Struggle Bus
“You want me to accept what?!” Sometimes when I talk with clients about allowing their difficult emotions to exist inside of them, instead of offering some “prescription” or intervention for making them disappear, I notice I get one of two reactions: 1) my clients look at me like I have two heads (and may be thinking about …
The Benefits of Self-Reflection
A few years ago, I had a profound experience of crashing and burning. I had been working for a non-profit counseling agency, doing in-home family therapy. I had loved my job for most of my time working there; I loved my co-workers and I believed in the work I was doing. About two years into …
Wholeness
Happy Spring! It’s hard to believe we’re into APRIL already, but I am so glad that we are! I don’t know about you, but, as much as I love the first snowfall of winter, I start to not love the fifth snowfall, especially when it’s in March! I’m excited for spring and the new growth that comes …
A Different Way of Loving Ourselves
I’ve always been a pretty sensitive person. When I say “sensitive,” what I mean is that I’ve always had a pretty strong awareness of how I’m feeling at a particular moment and how another person may be feeling, even if I can’t articulate it. As a result, throughout the course of my life, I’ve picked …
How to Stay Informed Without Losing Your Mind
For the past couple of years, I’ve had several clients present with a common cause of anxiety: the news. It’s not surprising that, given our polarized political climate, when we open the News app on our phones, we see conflict and bickering among those in power. It’s also not surprising that, given the trend of …
Seasonal Affective Disorder
Chances are you’ve heard about Seasonal Affective Disorder (or SAD) – the period of depression that some people tend to experience just after Christmas and that seems to linger until spring. Maybe you’ve even diagnosed yourself with it or attributed someone’s bad mood to it! But what is it exactly? And have we been using …
Out-of-the-Box Ideas for Self-Care
Self-care…we’ve heard of it, we know we should do it, but sometimes it can be so dang hard to implement! Why is that? If you’re anything like me, then you tend to practice self-care at one of two times: 1) on that extremely random and rare day when you have nothing else going on (like, …