As a parent, and as someone who has the great privilege of helping others with their relationships, teen behavior can often be the topic with a great deal of angst, yet few solutions. Instead of writing about this, I came upon this interview on Nashville Public radio. If you have even wondered why teens do [...]
As time moves forward and beckons us to once again “spring forward” on March 12, I am reminded that nature and the seasons prove to be wise teachers. Unlike seasons, we often attempt to live our lives in a linear and horizontal fashion, with “A” preceding “B”, and so forth. Instead, if we could begin [...]
While at my primary care physicians office earlier this week, we began a discussion on anxiety and depression, and how prevalent they are in our society today... especially in first world countries such as ours. As a therapist, I have had the opportunity to learn more about "brain science", and how our brains are actually [...]
Where's Your Zipper? That's an odd question... what do you mean, where is my zipper? We'll get to that in a moment. With the holidays upon us, I thought this an opportune time to get into the business of establishing and maintaining our personal boundaries. So, what is a boundary exactly? Mr. Webster defines a boundary [...]
Gratitude Keeps Thankfulness Going Several months ago when I made the decision to write about thankfulness this week before Thanksgiving, our world looked substantially different… we had not seen the horrific attacks on Paris, nor had we become entrenched as a nation in the debate over Syrian refugees. Thankfulness somehow seems more urgent today. I’ve [...]
Freaking Out and Making Threats Freaking out and making threats… two integrity busters that we have all participated in. Freaking out is NOT helpful, EVER! Yes, of course this makes sense, however in the heat of the moment, when little Susie has just colored all over the walls with her new set of markers, or [...]
Those Pesky Consequences! Back in 1968, at a very young age, I had a terrific learning experience based squarely on consequences. The shear fact that I still remember this after almost five decades makes it even more salient. The musical "Oliver!" had recently been released at the movie theaters, and a promise had been made by [...]
Let's Put Away Our Crystal Balls Because it is one of my favorite chapters in ScreamFree Parenting by Hal Runkel, I would like to begin with the title of chapter seven, You Are Not a Prophet (And Neither is Grandma). Yes, that is correct, neither you nor I (nor grandma) are prophets… we do not [...]
BOSS OR LEADER? When I began this blog, I went to a few of my trusted websites for quotes, entering "leadership" in the search, not realizing that I would be offered more quotes than I could possibly get through in the limited amount of time that I had. Choosing from what I thought to be [...]
Calming Down and Growing Up In the previous blog, we addressed the idea that parenting is about parents, not children. In keeping with this idea, and now that we all have employed our metaphorical remote control, we have had the opportunity to calm our parenting anxiety and ourselves. Moving on… When we are calm, we [...]