What Role Do Therapists Play?
Esther Perel • 4/18/2018 • No Comments
Our relational lives are undergoing a radical shift, says Esther Perel, couples therapist, bestselling author, and TED speaker. In the following video clip from her 2018 Symposium Keynote, "The Future of Modern Love," Perel explains why today's romantic landscape—and the questions we're asking ourselves about desire and couplehood—are unprecedented, and what therapists have to offer clients who come to us for guidance.
Read more...
Bridging the Racial Gulf by Listening to Untold Stories
Ken Hardy • 4/10/2018 • No Comments
By Ken Hardy - I’ve spent the last four decades of my life working with young people who live their lives hidden in the shadows of invisibility as far as white society is concerned. Too many therapists charged with helping them fail to see the untold stories in their lives of family dysfunction, poverty, and racial oppression. And no real conversation about race can begin until, as a society, we’re willing to listen to those stories.
Read more...
How to Create an Invitation for Connection
Jack Kornfield • 4/4/2018 • No Comments
Trained as a Buddhist monk and clinical psychologist, Jack Kornfield has been a pioneer in bringing meditation, mindfulness, and Buddhist psychology to the West. In the following clip from his Networker keynote address, he shares how to embody a fuller spiritual wisdom in your work with clients to heal difficult emotions, create calm focus, and connect deeply with others.
Read more...
Dealing with the Challenges to Mindfulness in a Digital World
Tara Brach • 3/21/2018 • 3 Comments
It should come as no surprise that, in our culture, immersion in cyber activities far outpace the interest in mindfulness. But how do you deal with the trance-like quality of immersion in the digital world? Find out in this video with Tara Brach.
Read more...
How the Latest Movement Against Sexual Predation is Rattling Some Therapy Clients
Lauren Dockett • 1/27/2018 • No Comments
By Lauren Dockett - Many therapists who specialize in sexual abuse and trauma are reporting that the #MeToo movement and the ongoing accusations of sexual assault and harassment against powerful, public men are deeply affecting their clients.
Read more...
Creating and Holding Connection with Black Teenagers
Ken Hardy • 1/23/2018 • No Comments
By Ken Hardy - Therapy with teenagers has to be about creating and holding a connection. As a therapist, I'm like a spider trying to lure my clients into a web that will support them. While I try to use the context of racism to help African American teenagers understand their situations, verbalize, and vent their feelings, I also want them to develop inner resources and tools for handling the adversity they face in more useful and productive ways.
Read more...
The Key to Translating Youth Culture to Mystified Parents
Ron Taffel • 12/12/2017 • No Comments
By Ron Taffel - What I've discovered, after talking with hundreds of teens, is that with their friends, they're almost a different species than when they're in the alien company of adults. If parents want to reclaim a connection with their children, they'll have to pay deep and respectful attention to a culture many of them abhor.
Read more...
For the Field of Therapy, Group Identity is an Unexplored Territory
Michael Ventura • 11/27/2017 • No Comments
By Michael Ventura - What might therapists contribute to understanding and healing the intense political polarization going on all around us? We came across an unusually prescient article by longtime contributor Michael Ventura that still offers a provocative perspective on our current cultural ferment. We've republished it—and provided an excerpt in this blog—in the belief that, in some ways, it still seems as relevant today as when it first appeared 10 years ago.
Read more...
Commenting Even When It's Not Convenient
Dee Watts-Jones • 10/19/2017 • 1 Comment
By Dee Watts-Jones - I believe that addressing racism, in whatever form it appears, is always relevant to therapy. As therapists, we have a responsibility not only to our clients, but to the wider community, to speak up in the face of values and practices that oppress. So when I encounter racist language in my office, whether it can be linked directly to a family's presenting problem or not, I address the issue.
Read more...
The Challenges—and Rewards—of Work in an Inner City School
Howard Honigsfeld • 9/26/2017 • No Comments
By Howard Honigsfeld - Public School 48, where I’m on staff as a social worker, sits on a block between a juvenile detention center and a strip club. A week of work can be exciting, frustrating, and often hair-raising—anything but boring.
Read more...
Page 1 of 5 (41 Blog Posts)