Do You Have A Covert Narcissist In Your Life?
Do You Have A Covert Narcissist In Your Life? They are just as toxic as overt narcissists but harder to spot. I’m telling you this because I want to spare you some unnecessary pain, confusion and manipulation. Covert narcissists infiltrate your mind. Here are some ways to untangle and free yourself. Just for the record, […]
How the Homeless Made Me Feel at Home
The homeless made me feel at home at a time when it looked like I had it together but I felt destitute inside … I grew up in New York, which has always had a homeless population — a term most people use with a mixture of pity, disgust, fear, and guilt. The homeless, who proved to be […]
What Psychotherapists Need to Do to Prevent Harming Clients
7 Ways Clinicians Miss the Mark and Their Patients Pay the Price When I was training to be a Gestalt psychotherapist, we covered ethics, empathy, transference and counter-transference, the field and contact boundary, presence, the impasse, Gestalt cycles, and much more, but many things are learned through experience, not education. That’s inevitable. This piece is about sharing some of my […]
How Do You Feel After a Fair Fight?
How do you feel after a fair fight? Closer, safer, stronger, freer … Yesterday, I mentioned the idea of anger without hostility. Fair fighting promotes the expression of anger without antagonism. When you approach your own anger and the anger of others with interest and respectful attention, anger turns conflict into fertile ground for partnership. […]
I Have A Reputation For Making People Cry
Or, how a sea of salty tears could save 7.442 billion lives It’s one of the few things of which I am most proud. Frequently Heard Comments: “I knew I shouldn’t have put on my eye makeup before coming here!” “Two blocks from your office and the tears are flowing!” “Sorry, I just used your […]
What Happens When You Turn a Thief …
What happens when you turn a thief into a recipient of a gift? Radical innocence, radical generosity, radical kindness. When I was just getting started as a psychotherapist, I rented a room in a shared office space in Park Slope, Brooklyn. It was on the ground floor of a charming brownstone. You walked down three […]
How To Confront Problems If You Hate Conflict
Instead of putting off what needs to be said, try these tips … You may have been ruminating for days, weeks, months, even years — rehearsing a conversation you still haven’t been able to begin. It could be about your relationship, your career, your spiritual journey, your health, anything. You may need to face your lover, your boss, […]
A Better Way to Say, “I Miss You”
There is a way to be together even when you’re far apart. There was a time in my life when I was separated from someone I loved because he had to do military duty in Iraq. We were able to text and send letters and occasionally we even spoke on the phone. But even so, inevitably […]
8 Ways To Be a Good Listener
and what’s in it for you Have you ever been talking to someone who is looking around the room while you speak? Or who interrupts you to say something about a completely different subject? Maybe you were confiding in a friend who seemed distracted and when you accused her of not listening, she said indignantly, “I […]
Your Children Do Not Belong To You
Your children do not belong to you is not a lecture, but a loving reminder: You are the earthly guardian of your kids. You are not their owner. Treasure the 18 years or so that they are directly under your care, because if you pay attention, it is you who receives the gift of their innocent […]
Dare To Say Nice Things To Strangers
Sharing a true New York moment I stopped into a local Soho deli for a late afternoon snack. It was my usual spot, owned and operated by an elderly, hard-working, not-overly-friendly husband and wife team. As I stood on line at the sandwich counter, a man queued up behind me. He looked a little rough […]