"At each moment you choose the intentions that will shape your experiences and those things upon which you will focus your intention. If you choose unconsciously, you evolve unconsciously.. If you choose consciously, you evolve consciously." Gary Zukav from Thoughts from the Seat of the Soul

My Intention
I decided to write this blog as a way to give my clients and other readers various techniques and insights to help them become their true self.  It is my hope that the information and workshops I provide will help people gain more self-awareness about the obstacles that interfere with them reaching their highest potential. The phrase that came to me when thinking about this blog, “Be Aware or Beware,” captures the essence of living a conscious life. By peeling away the layers of conditioned, ingrained messages and learning to tune in to who we truly are, I believe we can learn our lessons in life less painfully and more gracefully rather than needing to be hit over the head by the proverbial two by four. My ultimate goal is to help people get out of the loop of insanity which has been aptly described as “doing the same thing over and over and expecting to get a different result.”

Understanding the Psychology Field
One of confusions in my field is the difference between psychotherapists, psychologists, and psychiatrists.  The term psychotherapist refers to any Ph.D- or Master’s-level degree therapist who has been trained to do therapy with people who have various psychological or situational issues. Situational issues include difficulty adjusting to losses, or life changes such as  divorce, physical limitations, loss of employment or death of a loved one.  

A psychologist typically has a Ph.D., a  PSY.D., or a Master’s in psychology or school psychology.  They are often trained and qualified to do psychological testing. Those with  a Master’s-level degree often become high school counselors or perform psychological testing to determine if students qualify for special education services. Ph.D-level  psychologists either focus on doing research in the behavioral health field,  practice psychotherapy, or may become university professors.  

Psychiatrists attended medical school and specialize in the diagnosis and treatment of  mental health disorders.  In the  last century, psychiatrists traditionally treated patients both through medication and through psychoanalysis, which is based on Freudian psychology. Since the beginning of the 21st Century, psychiatrists have primarily focused on prescribing psychotropic medication and rarely provide psychotherapy.

Trends In My Psychotherapy Practice
I’ve seen a number of other trends in the past few decades. In the early 1990s, it was almost unheard of to diagnose someone with Bipolar Disorder (which was formerly known as Manic Depressive Disorder).  In the past 5 to 10 years, Bipolar Disorder seems to be one of the most commonly diagnosed disorders, next to other mood disorders such as Major Depressive Disorder. Other common diagnoses include various types of anxiety disorders such as Panic Attacks, Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Social Anxiety Disorder and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder.   

In addition, as many of you may remember, Attention Deficit (Hyperactivity) Disorder, also known as ADD and ADHD, were very popular diagnoses beginning in the late 1980’s, and continue to be commonly diagnosed today.

Although I have not compared this to the national average, another trend I have seen in my private practice in the past 10 years is that more men seem to be attending psychotherapy. One of my theories is that going to therapy became more acceptable among men in the mainstream after they watched Tony Soprano from the hit show The Sopranos attend weekly psychotherapy sessions. Many of my male clients commented that “…if a macho guy like Tony Soprano can go to therapy then why can’t I?” I often wanted to write the network and thank them for helping to create a more accepting climate for men to feel comfortable opening up and discussing their innermost feelings.  I would say that my male client-base rose from about 30% of my totals to nearly 50% over the past 10 years. This is important because it is my belief that both men and women need to share equally in the responsibility of knowing themselves and how their behaviors impact their relationships and the world in general.

Finally, the newest and most significant trend I have seen in the psychotherapy world is people seeking more “spiritual meaning” in their lives.  Not to be confused with religion, “spiritual” is a non-secular term that encompasses a person’s desire to understand how a higher power, the universe, and/or how the divine flow affect their life. I have studied these “metaphysical concepts” to help me better understand how to make needed changes in my life and have incorporated them into my therapy practice to help my clients understand and find solutions to their issues from a very different perspective.  Some of these concepts are very new to the therapy world, and I am excited to be on the forefront of sharing them with you and clients through my blog and workshops. Thank you for being a part of this journey with me!

"Your struggles themselves do not create karma or determine the way you will evolve, only your responses to them." Gary Zukav from Thoughts From the Seat of the Soul.

Most people know the story of Alice In Wonderland in which Alice’s curiosity gets the better of her and she ends up falling down the rabbit hole. For Alice, the rabbit hole represents the beginning of a journey that includes danger, intrigue and strange happenings. When I use the term “rabbit hole” in my therapy sessions, I am referring to our habit of spiraling into the depths of despair many of us experience whenever life throws us a curve ball, or when we get “stuck” in the old negative thought-patterns of beating ourselves up.

One of the techniques I teach my clients is to learn to recognize when they are in danger of falling into that rabbit hole, and to learn to stop themselves before it happens. When you can identify that you are in that same negative loop, you can see the rabbit hole and even go near it, but remind yourself, “I know where this leads and how difficult it is to get out once I fall into the dark abyss.”

So what do you do instead?  You identify the trigger that started the negative thoughts, and track it back to other times you felt that way. For instance, if someone cuts you off in traffic, you don’t get recognized at work for a job well done, and then your kids don’t listen to you, your trigger may be feeling invisible or not feeling important. Once a person becomes skilled at identifying their triggers, then it will become clearer each time you have an intense emotional reaction to an external circumstance what your childhood wound or wounds are.

Typically a “childhood wound,” is an unmet need from childhood usually related to receiving and/or interpreting negative messages from our primary caretakers and other influential people in our life (i.e. teachers, peers, coaches). Those messages develop into faulty belief systems about ourselves and the world which in the therapy field is often called “stinking thinking” or “distorted thoughts.” Once we have developed these ingrained faulty belief systems, we not only filter information that supports those beliefs but we may also manifest those beliefs, often known as a self-fulfilling prophecy. Therefore, it is important to both identify your core wound(s), as well as gain clarity about how certain beliefs you hold are the basis for your downward spiral.  

Ultimately, our core wounds boil down to several possibilities including not feeling good enough or adequate enough, not feeling loveable, not feeling important or feeling invisible, or not feeling deserving or worthy.  One of the best ways to figure out what your primary and/or secondary wound is, is to recall painful experiences from your childhood and then decipher which message or messages they translated into as you became an adolescent and adult.