What Is Your Normal?
When somebody comes in for therapy, my first question is, “What brings you here?” I am grateful for the mere fact that they are willing enough to let me in. With myself, when I first went into therapy, I was guarded, minimized my symptoms, because I was trained by my family to pretend and tell everybody that I was great, which I was far from. I learned in therapy to let down my guard, let...Learn More
The Start of a New Year
With the start of a new year our thoughts can go one of two ways: To grow, adapt, and be a better person, or to drag the familiar past with us. How do you envision your new year? Are you hopeless or hopeful? To me, life has always been a battle to remain positive. It seems as if there are so many forces in the world, trying to bring us down. It isn’t that hard to see the suffering, the anger,...Learn More
Holiday Memories
What do you think about Christmas? For many, it fosters great memories, for others only pain. Our wish is for you to see this holiday with new eyes, letting go of the past, so you can make of it what you like. This letting go of the past takes some effort. Processing through our pain is the key to experiencing a happy holiday. To do so, it may be as simple as putting pen to paper. If you find...Learn More
Coping with Anxiety
At the University of Santa Monica, where I studied Spiritual Psychology, they believed that applying love to anxiety made it fade away and we would truly heal. On paper and in real life it has been a difficult task. I entered therapy to tackle my problems with anxiety and the mere task of addressing anxiety – which was something I had avoided like the plague, has caused me even more anxiety....Learn More
Healing Through Compassion
Twenty-seven years in the industry and I am still learning that heart-centered listening is the best way to treat people. After thousands upon thousands of sessions, I often hear the same things, but I feel it is ultimately important to simply listen with a full heart. I teach my interns how important it is to not fix people. If we were to do this, they would be dependent on us. When you help...Learn More
A Tribute to my Father
When I was five years old my mother divorced and married her soul mate – if there is something like that – my stepfather. Who knew that he was going to make such an impact on me? My natural father was an angry and bitter man who exhibited daily fits of rage. Not Les, Les was a kind soul that was genuinely happy, loved being around a lot of people, and always had something memorable to say or...Learn More
Top 10 Steps to Treating a Problem
When you are sick and tired of feeling sick and tired what should you do? Most people wait and hope for the symptoms to go away, which will only push the inevitable away. Eventually, you have to face the facts that your efforts aren’t working and need to do something about them, but what? Depending on the ailment, it is important to address the symptoms head-on. If you have a physical ailment,...Learn More
The Hero’s Journey
As the state gets back to normal, we are seeing a lot of people coming in for treatment. Perhaps it is the shock of being out in the public again. For whatever reason, it is good seeing so many people making the effort to improve themselves. For many, working on themselves is foreign. Unlike having regular doctor or dentist appointments, our mental health is very important because how we are...Learn More
Why Can’t I Just Fix This On My Own?
The answer to the question above is you can, given the know-how. When I graduated from High School, I was depressed, anxious, and didn’t know a thing about life. I did pretty well in school, with what was taught there, but nobody taught me about what was really important – how to keep myself emotionally stable. At that time, my family didn’t deal with my emotions. If you acted out you were...Learn More