Archive

I recently re-read a fascinating book by Ben Sherwood called The Survivor’s Club, which recounts tale after tale of survival stories, explaining what works and what doesn’t when it comes to surviving.  In plane crashes, for instance, apparently many crashes are survivable as long as you remember that you have 90 seconds in general to get off a […]

  I read recently that part of US military training involves teaching what we absolutely need for survival.  The “rule of three” describes a hierarchy of needs, so in a life or death survival situation you can remember what is most important. You can survive only 3 seconds without hope, 3 minutes without oxygen, 3 […]

When I think about the recent shooting at the gay club in Orlando, all I can think of is how often we get it wrong in understanding violence in our country.  Even though it’s true that gay people were targeted this time, three years ago it was school children in Newtown, and 20 years ago […]

Mahatma Gandhi once said, “Be the change you wish to see in the world.”  I love that quote, because it reminds me that while it’s easy to complain about the problems in the world, the first step is to see what we can change in ourselves that will have positive ripples on others.  So often we […]

Albert Einstein was quoted as saying, “There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”  I love this quote, because it reminds us, from one of the great geniuses of our time, that it’s up to us  how we perceive […]

Recently I heard a leading expert speak on the topics of teenage girls.  She spoke about the culture of meanness and how girls use micro-aggression so that they can be hostile while appearing to be nice.  She talked about how girls don’t stand up for themselves and don’t take themselves seriously, how they apologize and defer […]

Earlier this week, I got to hear a thoughtful speaker, Dr. Richard Weissbourd–Harvard Education School professor and author– talk about how to raise caring, ethical and happy children.  His point was that we are so focused as parents today on our kids’ happiness, that it’s often at the expense of other people.  In addition, we are […]

If you listen closely, you will find that lots of us make excuses for ourselves all the time.  People says things like, “I’m not good at keeping in touch with friends” or “I’m not good at exercising” or “I’m not good at saving money,” when the reality is that they just don’t make it a […]

Our lives have gotten so complicated these days, with the constant demands of social media and email.  Is it any wonder that we are feeling stressed by the onslaught?  The fact is, we were not designed to handle this level of input.  Professor Theodore Roszak, famously quoted:  “A weekday edition of The New York Times […]

I had a client once who had been sexually abused for years by her stepfather, and even when she finally told her mother years later, her mom refused to believe her.  And yet, my client was one of the happiest people I’d ever met.  She felt grateful for having survived and felt that she had […]