Have you ever gotten so angry at someone (perhaps a child or a partner) that something in you just “snaps” and you find yourself responding almost automatically (and in a less-than-ideal way)? Or perhaps someone says something to you that results in you freezing in place with your heart pounding, unsure of what to say or do? Or maybe in overwhelming situations you simply mentally “check out.”

Something I've been hearing a lot more lately is the fear that if you start crying, you might never stop. Like if you allowed yourself for even just a moment to feel the full weight of your grief, it might simply overtake you in a way that would destroy you.

Here's what I want you to know: not only will your emotions not destroy you, but there's actually a right way and a wrong way to cry. The wrong way? Rumination crying—where you're replaying events in your head while tears fall. The right way? Staying with your body's experience. Let me show you how...

I am delighted to be a featured therapist for the Center for Mindful Psychotherapy this month, and I wrote a few pieces just for the occasion. The first is all about my journey and my shift from living entirely in my head to living in both my mind and my body.

Tapping can help you weather tough situations, whether you’re feeling a bit overwhelmed, triggered, or just emotionally exhausted. In this video I show you the basics of tapping, including all of the areas of the body you can tap on.

In this video I show you the basic structure of a signal breath, and then take you through three different ways of taking a signal breath.

A lot of us are afraid to say “no.” Sometimes we don’t want to say no to someone because we really want them to still like us. Sometimes we don’t want to say no because we think it reflects poorly on us—like we can’t do the thing or don’t know how.

Here’s a little video to teach you the salamander. It’s a really easy exercise to do that can help reset your nervous system whenever and wherever you need it.

I have a sticker that reads, “THE FUTURE WILL NOT BE A DISASTER. You just have anxiety, sorry.” I originally picked it out for myself from a pile of stickers that an instructor was handing out during training…

I’ve had 5 therapists over the course of my adult life, some of whom have been more influential to me (in both personal and professional ways, now that I’m also a therapist) than others, but each of them has taught me something really important.

Change can be scary, and some changes are unwelcome, yet change is also something we yearn for in our darkest moments. When you come to therapy, it is a declaration of hope and a plea for change. But meaningful change takes thoughtfulness, time, patience, and grit.

Even once we have a developed nervous system, it continues to be impacted by other nervous systems around it. Even as grown-ass adults, we continue to rely on others for regulation.

When you show up to work, your personal material does, too—like how you relate to those in power, how you relate to peers, and how you deal with (or run away from) conflict... Once we begin to look at your experiences with curiosity, we might find that they're beautiful entry points to doing deeper work on a personal level.

No matter who I talk to about the group I run, The Aftermath of Job Loss, everyone wants to know the same thing: why are you running this group?