This is an extraordinary and difficult time. With so much uncertainty and social turmoil, it is easy to give in to fear and hopelessness. We must keep physically safe to avoid being infected and infecting others. We must also take care of our emotional and mental wellbeing. Below are suggestions to help you maintain your inner psychological balance. [Read more…] about Self-Care during the Covid-19 Pandemic
Fishing for Dreams
This is the first of a two-part article on how to work with dreams. Tongue-in-cheek, I explore different aspects of dreamwork using the metaphor of fish and fishing. In this section, I deal with how we catch, hold on to and recognize different kinds of dreams. A second article will address how to prepare, cook and digest these strange creatures of the unconscious. [Read more…] about Fishing for Dreams
Getting the Most out of Therapy
Therapy is one of the few places where you can be completely honest with yourself and explore all your thoughts, feelings and actions. However, therapy is not simple or easy. Like any worthwhile undertaking, it can be demanding as well as immensely fulfilling.
To get the most out of your time in therapy, you should ask yourself: How can I best use this time? What will help me make the changes I want? What might get in the way of making progress? [Read more…] about Getting the Most out of Therapy
Appreciating Dreams
It was winter 1979 in Edinburgh, and as usual the wind off the North Sea cut to the bone. A group of eight of us huddled in a circle around an electric bar heater in Winifred’s front room. Although we met weekly, we knew little of each other’s outer lives. Our only task was to explore the workings of our inner worlds through sharing dreams.
Dr. Winfred Rushforth sat in an overstuffed armchair, a gently commanding presence, her snowy hair forming a halo around a strong square wrinkled face framed by oversize glasses. At 96 she had been practicing as a psychoanalyst for over 50 years and her owl-like gaze could penetrate any dream to its most obscure depths. [Read more…] about Appreciating Dreams
The Boulder Massacre
Another slaughter of innocents—this time in a Boulder supermarket where we’ve shopped many times. During the following week, my clients express their confused disbelief veiling the anger and anguish beneath. We struggled with the questions: Why does this happen? How can we make sense of something so perverted?
Mass murders (under the euphemism ‘mass shootings’) are a normal, almost taken-for-granted part of American life. We grow numb in the face of so many atrocities, hopeless in the face of political inaction. Our awareness and compassion grows thin. We shed a tear, talk with friends, attend a vigil, donate a few dollars to the survivor’s fund and then it slips away. [Read more…] about The Boulder Massacre
Enhance Your Brain Health
We experience the world and ourselves through neurological processes. That means that every thought, feeling, sensation, memory, impulse, awareness—everything it takes to be a human being—is reliant on electrical/biochemical activity in our brain. All of our healthy functioning depends on the state of our brain—and we need to take care of it.
Below is a wide range of health-enhancing suggestions based on the current research. Using these suggestions, make changes in your life-style gradually and in moderation. Try different approaches and choose methods that suit you best. Use professional resources—massage, bodywork, psychotherapy, nutritionist, coaching, personal trainer, yoga, tai chi or fitness classes—to resolve issues and change behaviors, as needed. [Read more…] about Enhance Your Brain Health
Dreaming of Change
I had a vivid dream recently. In it I was visiting a friend who looked vibrant and told me he had started working with a new kind of therapy offered by a very special therapist. My friend turned to me and asked, “Would you like to make every little change you ever thought of?” [Read more…] about Dreaming of Change
Worrying—And What To Do About It
Given the state of the world and the dire political situation, a certain amount of anxiety is completely normal. However, some of us find ourselves worrying endlessly, particularly if we wake in the middle of the night and our minds get crowded with things that might go wrong.
If you worry excessively, you may be constitutionally sensitive and/or have had unpredictable negative things happened to you earlier in life. However, that does not mean you cannot find a much better way to cope with life’s demands. [Read more…] about Worrying—And What To Do About It
Why New Year’s Resolutions Fail – and What to Do About Them!
You hope this year will be different. You want to get off to a good start and tackle those things you didn’t get to last year. Going to the Internet, you search through the lists of how to tackle your resolutions and feel all revved up to get going. Unfortunately, you are now more likely to fail than succeed. While the Internet suggestions look intuitively convincing, few are based on how the mind and the brain actually work.
[Read more…] about Why New Year’s Resolutions Fail – and What to Do About Them!
Regret: The path not taken
What will we most regret on our deathbed? Immediately after we have been humiliated or made a big blunder, most of us think we will regret it for the rest of our life. No so. The research is clear: we most regret those things we fail to do – not the things we actually do. In the long run, it matter little that we make a mess or mistake. Those things fade from memory. What haunts us and becomes a burden are the things we let slide: our procrastinations, our hesitations, our inability to take a leap of faith and following our dreams.