In this era of political devise, polarization on so many fronts, hatefulness, lack of tolerance and violence, it seems we need some ways to contribute to the good of all. It can feel like a hopeless cause as we don’t feel as if we have any impact in the drama unfolding each day. It is…[ Read the full article ]
Ding. Chime. Notification received. Perhaps we continue through our moment. But our brains caught it, received it and responded. We were alerted. The dopamine was dumped. Conditionally we learn to respond to our phones through the notifications we receive. Ding. Dopamine dump. Respond. Ding. Dopamine dump. Respond. No ding. Quiet. Pick up the phone and…[ Read the full article ]
My dad died March 15, 2017 at 3:51 p.m. By a chance of fate, I was with him when he died. It seemed that the minute or two leading to his final breath were in slow motion and went on forever, suspended in time, as we approach the finality of his time here. Frozen in…[ Read the full article ]
Grief is a tough one. None of us are immune. Sooner or later we will all be hit with loss. Grief is our natural response to loss in our lives. It is the emotional suffering we feel when something or someone we love is no longer with us or has been taken away from us. …[ Read the full article ]
Most people haven’t thought about emotions being a chemical response in the body. However, according to Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, when we are emotionally triggered, it takes less than 90 seconds for an emotion to get triggered, surge chemically through the blood stream, and then get flushed out. Dr. Taylor, a brain researcher who wrote…[ Read the full article ]
As we, one nation, work to come together and move forward after a difficult political battle, I am grasping for guidance in what comes next. I see and hear about the polarization, the fears, the wounding in families, the separation that has blanketed our citizens. And on some level, it feels overwhelming and useless for me,…[ Read the full article ]
It’s that time of the year again. The holidays are upon us and many of us will undoubtedly be saying, “Where did the year go?” or, “I can’t believe it is time for the holidays again.” And as we recount the holidays of the last few years, what do we actually recall? What mattered? For…[ Read the full article ]
One of the Dialectical Behavior Therapy skills (Linehan, 2015) we work on in our groups is accumulating positive experiences. Accumulating positive experiences is a skill that encourages you to increase your positive experiences, both short term, such as daily, and long term, such as planning for a vacation you want to do. Having positive experiences improves…[ Read the full article ]
When death comes to take our last breath from us, it doesn’t greet us by the title we earned at college or the rank we made our way up to in our business or work world. It doesn’t look at our socioeconomic status we arrived at, or the type of car we finally arrived home…[ Read the full article ]
I just got back from another Mindfulness training. During the training session, the teacher used the words, “We often are either rehashing or rehearsing”. We are looking backwards or forward instead of gazing straight ahead and being in the moment. We have all probably been there when we are going over and over an upsetting…[ Read the full article ]