Handling Internal Conflicting Ideas
Internal Disagreements I walk around with unexamined, conflicting worldviews in my head. We all do. In fact, it would seem the whole of science, emotion, and religion is engaged in the management and unification of these conflicts. Which one actually describes...
My First Encounter with Self-Compassion
Self-compassion: I loosely define self-compassion as caring about myself at least as tenderly as I care for my friend or my dog or my houseplant. (I have one. It’s a red one. That’s all I know about it. I don’t care very much about it. But at...
Student Follow-Up
So far, no one has ever reached out to say, “You were my least favorite teacher ever.” Thanks for that! Don’t worry, Inner Critic – I know that doesn’t mean I don’t have any haters. I hated some of my teachers, and I haven’t reached out to tell them so. Plus,...
Paying It Forward
Love is a tough thing to catch up on. I really should tell my favorite teachers how much they really meant to me. I should tell my biggest influences that they impacted my growth as a person. I should write to the authors of the books that transformed my life. I’m...
Too Much To Process
Only too recently, I’ve been diving into emotional intelligence and emotional health. “Emotional sickness is avoiding reality at any cost. Emotional health is facing reality at any cost.” -M. Scott Peck I am now open to the idea that my emotions can...
Feeling Feeling Feeling
How are you feeling? Fine, you say? Cool. I’m good with that. I am too. Mentally. Physically. But “feeling” is a homonym – a single word with multiple meanings. At least it is in my life. I feel physical sensations, but I don’t feel...
Making Friends as An Adult
Leaving my family’s cult a couple years ago, and losing nearly all my friends and family in the process, I had to start completely over. It was a crash course in community building, starting at zero. Kids do it all the time, moving to new cities, changing...
No – YOU Walked Away from ME
Old Rules Back when I was a part of my family’s cult, people left [or were kicked out] all the time. We were supposed to cut them off when they left us, but I held a slightly different policy. I figured the last thing in the world they needed was to look at...