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Category: Relationships

SUFFERING

April 30, 2014
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| Categories: Addictions, Aging, Anxiety, Depression, Life Stress, Personal Growth, Relationships, Seniors, Transitions, Trauma

“The foundation of all mental illness is the avoidance of legitimate suffering.” -Carl Jung No one who is suffering wants to be told that their suffering is legitimate suffering. Mentally Healthy people want the suffering to stop, want to return to a mental place where they are no longer suffering. If you are looking for a sign or a guide, this post will help you. That makes sense. Emotional suffering can be just as awful as physical suffering. I can tell someone that their suffering won’t last, that even if they do nothing a better day will come or, at the very least, they will grow and learn new ways to be that are more rewarding  but no one has ever skipped out of my office praising the virtues of suffering no matter what I say to them. Still, Carl Jung, the founder of analytical psychology, made a good point with his statement. Suffering is part of the human condition. No one escapes suffering. The question is what is legitimate suffering? Here’s a partial list: 1. You lost a loved one to death, divorce, or illness. 2. You lost something you valued, a job, a home, a pet. 3. You...

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FOR DADS AND MOMS

April 17, 2014
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| Categories: Families, Parenting/Children, Relationships

This article is about a wonderful gift a father can give his child. It's also a wonderful gift a mother can give her child. Parents model adult behavior for their children. They also model what loving someone is about: caring, consideration, communication, tolerance. If a child doesn't have good role models the child won't know what is acceptable and unacceptable, won't have anything to fall back on when navigating a relationship that, like all relationships, hits a difficult patch. Read this article for insight and  inspiration. http://www.families.com/blog/the-best-gift-a-father-can-give-his-child  

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HOW TO HAVE A SUCCESSFUL ARGUMENT OR DIFFICULT DISCUSSION

March 31, 2014
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| Categories: Life Stress, Personal Growth, Relationships

This is a technique that is a very simple tool to vastly improve communications between any two people, man and woman, parent and child, employer and employee, immediately. For many years, along with Fair Fighting, I've instructed people in this technique. Yet, I find that people will try it for a day or two and then not use it anymore. I've tried to understand why people won't use something that is so helpful and will greatly reduce, if not eliminate, conflict and lead to conflict resolution. I've inferred that there are two or three things about this technique that cause people to ignore using it during times when it absolutely should be used. First, when people are upset or angry, they want to say what they have to say, in rapid fire, making sure they deliver all of their points to the other person as quickly as possible and then, when the other person is talking, they are only hearing part of what is being said while, at the same time, composing in their mind what they are going to say next. So the person who is talking doesn't get the full attention of the listener. I've observed that people...

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A DIFFERENT WAY TO LOOK AT CHANGE

March 31, 2014
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| Categories: Life Stress, Personal Growth, Relationships

Most people in relationships will try to change if their partner nags, yells, threatens divorce, or refuses to speak for a week. They'll change for a short time but they won't really change because they resent you and they resent how mean you are to them. They don't think of what they could/should be doing to foster a good relationship. That would require taking responsibility for the problem which they can't do because they, in my example, don't have a problem. You have the problem. You can change yourself. A different way to look at change is to think of your partner as someone who wants to please you (even if you don't believe it) and approach your partner as if he/she were your best friend. Isn't it interesting how nice we are to friends and how rudely we can behave toward our partner because we have rationalized to ourselves that they deserve it. Then think of something you can offer your partner by way of change. For instance, if you are very unhappy about your partner turning into a couch potato to watch ball games all day on Sundays, and you feel lonely and uncared for, try offering something...

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STOP DREAMING ABOUT MONEY AND START DREAMING ABOUT LIVING

March 31, 2014
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| Categories: Life Stress, Personal Growth, Relationships

“The effects of rampant materialism are, according to research, pretty damaging to the human psyche. An international survey of over 90,000 people published in the journal BMC Medicine found a direct correlation between wealth and depression. Wealthier countries recorded higher levels of mental illness, while citizens in poorer countries were happier and better adjusted.” From Ben Cohen, Why Wanting to Be Rich is a Form of Mental Illness, Huff Post, 04/12/2012                   It’s true. Sure money is great, and it will buy you lots of stuff, if you need more stuff. Of course you’ve already realized having more stuff is having to maintain it, clean it, store it, repair it, and so on.                   Did any of us ever really need that blender that sits on the counter top taking up space and gathering grease splatters? Yes, you made juice and all kinds of cool things for a week or two and now it just occupies a square of your kitchen counter and glares at you, since you just don’t have time to stop and actually put things into it and then, turn it on and then drink whatever it is and then clean the entire thing, blades...

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INTUITION AND ABUSE

March 26, 2014
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| Categories: Anxiety, Depression, Personal Growth, Relationships

Most people experience times when they believe they know what another person is thinking or feeling. Sometimes, you're doing what is called, "projecting." That is you are projecting what you think or feel onto the other person. And sometimes your intuition about a situation is accurate. If what you're attributing to the other person is important, IE. "You're mad at me," it's important to find a way to inquire about it without sounding confrontational or defensive. You can't have good communication skills if you walk around in the world believing you know when, in fact, you might or you might not. An interesting thing about adults who were abused as children, whether emotional or physical, is that they tend to be more intuitive than the general population. That doesn't mean they shouldn't check it out with the other person because it could still be projection or just plain false. It does mean that very often an adult abused as a child can walk into a room and accurately report who is having a good time, who is pretending to have a good time, who is angry, sad, and so on. Adults abused as children are better at "reading" other people...

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