#024 - Growing up tough and the art of softening

#024 - Growing up tough and the art of softening

I grew up wanting to be tough, strong, and independent. I placed high value on getting through pain and not showing when I hurt, I have the tattoos to prove it! My greatest fear was to show my softness, my vulnerability, to another or even admit it to myself. In my early 20s I cried for the first time, while sober, in years. This was a real accomplishment for me! 

Read More

#022 - Relationships: When Getting Close Feels Scary

#022 - Relationships: When Getting Close Feels Scary

Your partner reaches out to you, holds extended eye contact, or even wants to make plans for a few days from now and you get that tightening in your stomach. Your not sure why but there is that jump in your belly and the associated feeling that something is bad or wrong. Logically you see there is no reason to be afraid in this moment, you know this is a good person who would not intentionally harm you, but the nagging feeling of imminent danger or mistrust of this person is very present.  Sometimes you can shake off this brief impulse to run and get away, other times it signals a landslide of panic and fear that takes you over.  

Read More

#020 - Guest Blog! Understanding And Healing Emotions Alternatively: How Emotions Can Cause Dis-Ease and What You Can Do About It

#020 - Guest Blog! Understanding And Healing Emotions Alternatively: How Emotions Can Cause Dis-Ease and What You Can Do About It

In most languages, there are phrases that point to the body-emotion connection. For example, in Germany, we say, “Someone walked over your liver!" This means that someone made you angry. Or, "I got cold feet," meaning, “I got afraid.” Fear is connected to the kidneys.

 

Read More

#019 - Relationships: Room to Come and Go

#019 - Relationships: Room to Come and Go

Has your partner ever said to you, “Babe, I need some space tonight.”? Then your knee jerk reaction is something like anxiety, anger, dread, or fear? If so, then congratulations you are in a relationship in which you are connected enough to have your core issues arise!  While no one likes to feel these deep issues of abandonment they are often hanging around right under the surface unconsciously driving your behavior. 

Read More

#018 - Top 5 Indicators That You Rock at Being a Human

#018 - Top 5 Indicators That You Rock at Being a Human

If you are reading this you might feel like you are sucking at life right now, because if you were a really successful human you probably wouldn’t need me to tell you! Maybe you lost a job, a relationship, your clothes don’t fit right, or you are full of self-pity for the choices you made. Possibly you are looking for a pick-me-up and hope to find yourself in this list. Well if you are a human I guarantee you will find yourself in this list! Ok lets get started…

Read More

#017 - And We Stop Kicking the Wheel...

#017 - And We Stop Kicking the Wheel...

Kicking the wheel goes something like this: We notice that our jaw is tight, for example, and then we say, “Oh my god I’m getting TMJ, and this is going to be really annoying and I’m going to have to go to someone to fix it. And you know who else has TMJ?! Mom! This is all her fault, she passes all her crap on to me and now I have to deal with this. Like my hips! One is higher than the other, just like her, ugh! I can not believe she passed this on to me!!” 

Read More

#016 - Slow Relationships

#016 - Slow Relationships

This is like slow food, but with people. It’s like slowly cooking yourself with another so that there is a melding of flavors, but still distinct ingredients that hold their form. Often this type of relationship is difficult to do, but vitally important if intimacy is tough for you. This type of fear of intimacy often comes in two forms. There is the “jump in real fast to relationship” and the “scared of relationship” type

Read More

#015 - Loving Alcoholic/Addicts, A Wonderful Opportunity!

#015 - Loving Alcoholic/Addicts, A Wonderful Opportunity!

Alcoholics and addicts have been some of the most amazing, frustrating, and downright ridiculous people I have ever had the privilege of working with. These are the people who are destroying their lives, the lives of the people they love, and their own sanity to have just one more go at making their addiction work. They go through benders, for days or weeks, and emerge saying, “I promise to never do that again.” And a few hours, days, or weeks later they are back at it. If you have the curse/privilege of loving one of these people you are in for a ride, often you will wish you never met them! Then other times you will be struck by their sensitivity, huge heart, charisma, passion, and charm and feel their potential under all that chaos.

Read More

#014 - God In Psychotherapy

#014 - God In Psychotherapy

God, yup that’s right, I’m going to talk about God in psychotherapy. Everybody just calm down it’s going to be ok! It seems interesting to me to combine two often ineffable topics: God and psychotherapy. People since the beginning of spoken word have been trying to describe this sense of something greater than themselves, this presence, this energy, which is beyond description. Also with psychotherapy we have been trying to find a way to move this “soft science” to a “hard science,” to find some credibility for what we know works and maybe even get insurance to pay for it!

Read More

#013 - Number One Marketing Tip for Therapists and Helping Professionals

#013 - Number One Marketing Tip for Therapists and Helping Professionals

I was talking with a friend the other day and she was asking me what marketing I am doing that was allowing my practice to grow so much. She being a therapist in private practice wanted to see what she could do to boost her client base. As I reflected on her question I realized I had done no direct marketing over the last 4-5 months. Yet my practice was feeling lively, sustainable, and new people were coming in on a regular basis. So what was going on that clients were coming in, staying, and feeling like good fits? 

Read More

#012 - Sometimes Just Surviving is Good Enough: Family and The Holidays

#012 - Sometimes Just Surviving is Good Enough: Family and The Holidays

Like the title states sometimes we need to lower our expectations when interacting with family over the holidays. Even if you really love your family they push your buttons from time to time (because they put them there!), which can be really irritating or enraging! Just remember this is totally normal, most people find the holidays challenging even if they don’t realize it. 

Read More

#011 - Love: Can’t live with it, can’t live without it

#011 - Love: Can’t live with it, can’t live without it

“For even as love crowns you so shall she crucify you.

Even as she is for your growth so is she for your pruning.

Even as she ascends to your height and caresses

your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,

so shall she descend to your roots and shake them

in their clinging to the earth.”

-The Prophet

 

Read More

#008 - Heart on hands off

#008 - Heart on hands off

When I was in my early twenties I was the classic “tough guy.” I was not about to let anyone into my heart or my inner life. If I was involved romantically with someone and they got too attached to me or said they loved me, I was out the door. At the time, I thought I was calm, cool, and collected: how wrong I was! In retrospect, I was terrified of letting someone touch that place in me that was so tender, so raw, and so vulnerable.

Read More

#007 - The Three A's

#007 - The Three A's

First, a disclaimer:  I did not come up with the three A’s. I wish I did! They are a wonderful lens through which to view challenging situations or challenging emotions. I first heard of them a number of years ago and in the past few years began to really feel and experience the significance of this practice. I found the three A’s brought about a new perspective in areas of my life I felt stuck in; they are awesome because who doesn’t like to feel some movement when you’re stuck?

Read More

#006 - Boundaries?! What the hell are those?!

#006 - Boundaries?! What the hell are those?!

Boundaries are the places where we interact and contact the world and other people. The edges of our physical, energetic, and emotional bodies are where we experience our lives.  Often people come to me because the world and the people in it feel overwhelming; the boundaries where they experience the world are too loose or too tight. 

Read More

#005 - So you're attracted to your therapist, huh?

#005 - So you're attracted to your therapist, huh?

Let me start by saying that being attracted to your therapist is very normal. Think about it: your therapist is kind to you, listens to everything you say, they show up when they say they will, they are accepting, supportive, and sometimes they are even good looking! Add all that together and you would have the perfect partner, except that in this case they are your therapist...

Read More