Healing Ourselves at the Root
Every psychological approach has its own theory of healing and it is important to ask a perspective counselor on theirs. As for me, I am old school, and like the face-to-face sessions, avoid talking about the weather and politics and try to get people to open up a dialogue regarding the difficulties, traumas, and frustrations in life, then track them back to where they stem from and create...Learn More
What is Psychology?
For many people, Psychology is an unknown process that manipulates people who are weak in their mind through medication, hypnosis, and electric shock. It also helps them realize they were attracted to their mother and want to kill off their dad. The negative stigma that surrounds the practice of psychotherapy still permeates society, today. It is common for people who enter our facility,...Learn More
A Fond Farewell – Charity
With a heavy heart, one of my staff members is leaving the nest and moving to Florida with her family in a few days. We have been together for six years and after supervising her during her college years and while she was working to obtain her counseling license we had grown very close. I am well aware of the fact that people enter and leave our lives, but that doesn’t prepare you for the...Learn More
What Is the Best Healing Strategy?
They gave us an assignment in graduate school to create our own healing strategy. At the time I didn’t take it very seriously and came up with something cute to impress all the ladies. Well, that was 25 years ago, and from that moment I’ve asked myself the same question, what is the best strategy for a person to heal? I’ve learned many psychological approaches and tools that to one degree...Learn More
A Tribute to Peter
Last week my father-in-law passed away. The tricky thing was he lived 30 miles away from the nearest neighbor, just north of Joshua Tree National Forest in California, and all by himself. It was a miracle a delivery person found his body or his dog Max would have been lost too. Peter was a young 82-year-old, who walked 5 miles a day but had a problem with smoking. The desert oasis he lived...Learn More
Special Memory #8
There are some interesting experiences as a therapist, which have aided me in being the best therapist I can be. When life and death situations presented themselves in my practice, I wasn’t that prepared to deal with them. As a college intern, my first placement was at Tarzana Treatment Center, a facility just north of Los Angeles. My position was counseling individuals suffering from HIV...Learn More
How to Heal with Spiritual Psychology
With Spiritual Psychology, we see healing as the application of love to hurt. There is an art form to this and it can take on many strategies. Claims of healing have been frowned upon in this industry since many of the top approaches showed improvements in people, but not the true ultimate healing. For example, with Gestalt Therapy, Fritz Perls believed that when people saw many angles of a...Learn More
The Passing of Two Friends
This past week marked the passing of one of my best friend’s father, and the wife of another dear friend. Both of these people loved life, loved people, and were active in the community. The biggest part of being a therapist is keeping yourself in balance. In doing so, you are able to be there for others, unfortunately, both of the deaths hit me hard and I found myself counseling myself as I...Learn More
The Comparisons
I learned a long time ago that when I compare myself to other people I always lose. My mother used to say, “The grass is always greener on the other side.” I think the reason why I made comparisons was in having low self-worth. We always assume that people are perfect and better, and we make ourselves second best – but that is just my theory. The real issue here is not the comparisons but...Learn More