Even good things can feel scary. Good things can have us feel vulnerable. Vulnerability can feel scary…and so we avoid taking risks…even when the risk means a good thing. Like: applying for a desired program handing in the paper you worked hard on accepting the invitation to the party being the first to smile to …
Christmas–the gift of raw honesty
To be truly, authentically, raw-ly honest is a gift that I have come to appreciate and value as something that is treasured and precious and connecting…and rare. When it happens, there is something almost painful about it…because one’s most innermost thoughts are rarely easy or pretty. But it is beautiful. And poignant. And rare. And …
The Hidden Cost of Public Protection
Becoming a good soldier, a good cop, or a good fire fire fighter and being a warm, engaged, vulnerable partner/parent is difficult. Because being a good public protector means not staying in control, dominating, exerting power and never showing vulnerability…it’s a requirement to stay alive on the battle field… …and sets that same public protector up for …
My Anxiety Victory
Small confession here…I’ve taught at the university for years, but have always been intimidated by the whole academia thing…I’ve sometimes felt that if they really knew me, they wouldn’t ask me to teach…because, y’know really, you should be really, really smart to work at the university. I’ve read about this in the literature as “imposter …
Walking the Stairs on Dragon’s Den
The Women Business Owners of Manitoba sent out an email blast letting the community of female entrepreneurs know that Carolyne Braid, the vice president of WBOM, and owner of Pole Fit Canada is going to be on Dragon’s Den on November 2, 2011 . Carolyne described the extensive process of working towards being on the …
Fear–the Robber of Connection
The most often repeated commandment in the Bible is, “Do not fear.” It’s in there over two hundred times. That means a couple of things, if you think about it. It means we are going to be afraid, and it means we shouldn’t let fear boss us around. Before I realized we were supposed to …
Curiosity replacing Fear
Seems to me that the idea of replacing anxiety and fear with curiosity is a worthwhile idea…but one that can minimize the difficulty of that. I mean, it’s one thing to say it, but a whole other task to pull it off. But I have watched clients be able to experiment, to “play around the …
The Parts
For many of us, it’s very busy in our heads…multiple conversations internally with different parts of ourselves: We have one part express a fear–say, for example over having a conversation with someone–say about financies with your spouse. Another part logically goes through why it doesn’t make sense to have that fear, and runs though all …
The Electrician’s Broken Doorbell
Melanie, our office manager, spoke wisely to me last week when she handed me the message: “The electrician’s doorbell doesn’t work.” Cracked me up. Reminded me of an interview Diane Sawyer had with Dr. Ruth Westheimer’s husband years ago. It always stuck with me. Remember Dr. Ruth…the tiny blunt talking sex expert on radio and …
Death Anxiety
I was listening to a DVD of an interview with Irvin Yalom, one of the formative psychotherapists in my training today. He quoted a line of his colleague, Otto Rank: “Some refuse the loan of life to avoid the debt of death” He talked about how some are so afraid of dying, that they never …