An Old Norse root for the English word shame – kinnroði – denotes “cheek-redness.” Our body as well as our mind protests when we break a rule we have for ourselves, when we do or are something we’ve been telling ourselves we shouldn’t do or be. We may want to continue holding onto rules likeContinue Reading: 2021 World Shame Attacking Championships

Many people understand how our thoughts and behavior create states of emotional suffering such as anxiety and depression. Fewer understand these same inputs create and maintain physical pain. As a result, we can misperceive ourselves as passive victims of pain, failing to see how and why we create this vital human experience. In a recentContinue Reading: Sticks & Stones: Cognition, Behavior & Physical Pain

Have you ever wondered why we worry so much? And what, if anything, we can do about it? We’re taking up these questions in a class I’m co-teaching this term at Georgetown University’s Integrative Medicine Program. In this post I share some PowerPoint slides from the class that shed light on the neurobiology of worry,Continue Reading: Don’t Worry. Be Happy.

Carl Jung wrote about individuation, the process of taking one’s predispositions and life experiences and integrating them into a mature personality. While something like this happens for each therapist on the road to maturity, there appear to be some common dimensions of this process experienced by us all. My Colleague and friend Matthew May andContinue Reading: From Building Skill To Becoming Human: The Evolution Of A Psychotherapist

I first met Kate Tierney six years ago. Within minutes I realized I was in the presence of an extraordinary human being. At age 6 Kate began experiencing symptoms of an extremely rare disease that would not be accurately diagnosed for anther ten years. Eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis [EPGA] is an autoimmune disorder characterized byContinue Reading: Morbidity, Mortality & Magnanimity