Forgiveness is a word I hear often in the counseling setting. “I know I need to forgive so-and-so...” or “I could NEVER forgive so-and-so…” I understand every angle of forgiveness from my client’s perspective when they are speaking from pain, hurt, anger, and betrayal. Forgiveness is not a natural instinct [...]
“Instead of your shame there shall be a double portion; instead of dishonor they shall rejoice in their lot; therefore in their land they shall possess a double portion; they shall have everlasting joy.” Isaiah 61:7 When you hear the word “broken” what comes to your mind? Close your eyes [...]
Emotion. It can be many things. Emotion is joy, celebratory, excited, happy, peaceful, love. Yes, emotion is all of this. But what happens when emotion is deep? Or painful? What happens when emotions break past your threshold of tolerance and penetrate your very soul? What happens when emotions break us? [...]
Life with teens is difficult, to say the least. As adults we have survived our teen years so we have hope and faith that our teens will also survive their teen years and yet… there is doubt, there is worry, there are concerns, there are complete freak-out moments where the [...]
Hope is an elusive word…what exactly is hope? Everyone likes a feel-good word, something that inevitably makes the light shine in the darkness. HOPE seems to give us that mushy feeling that life…as hopeless as it seems right now…well, it may just have potential to get better! Is hope real [...]
When I have asked clients to describe anger I hear words and phrases like hot, uncontrollable, rage, out of body experience, blackout, temporary release of tension, numb, exhaustion, explosive. When I have asked clients to give anger a color there has only ever been two colors given: black or red. When [...]
THE ATHLETE. THE DRIVEN. THE COMPETITIVE. THE MOTIVATED. THE DETERMINED. THE FEARLESS. THE BRAVE. Athletes are a special breed of people making for an interesting topic in psychology. How can an athlete pick themselves up in the middle of death-gripping fear and make the decision to “feel the fear and [...]
Let’s talk about the ever present SHADOW OF DOUBT that seems to loom over us in the form of SELF-DOUBT. If we’re literal about this idea that doubt is an actual shadow, what does this mean? Shadows distort the actual object. Look at the shadows of trees, yourself, cars, or [...]
Depression is very common. People experience depression for various reasons and at varying degrees. When people find out that I am a counselor they often share an anonymous story of a friend or family member and pose this question, “what should I do?” I wanted to provide a quick reference [...]
Close your eyes for a minute and picture yourself. What do you look like? How do you describe yourself? Are you critical of yourself? Do you love yourself? Are you accurate in your description or is your view of yourself distorted? Too often we are hypercritical of ourselves and describe [...]