personal growth

Why It Is Good For You to Feel Negative Emotions

How can we best deal with our day-to-day emotional reactions? What can we do when our partner lets us down, when we have a struggle with our child, or when we feel provoked by a friend? Oddly enough, the first piece of advice is to stay with the pain. It turns out we expend much… Read more »

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Stress Counseling Can Slow Aging: Strengthening the Mind-Body Connection

In the stone age, tiny holes were drilled into human skulls in order to release evil spirits and cure an individual of a disease. These tiny holes, called trepanation, were a reflection of a belief in a relationship between the mind and the body, a belief that has been wrestled with throughout the history of… Read more »

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The Emotional Life of Students: An Interview with Dr. Daniel Zamir

Student counselor, Dr. Daniel Zamir, draws upon his experience working at UCLA’s counseling center and discusses common issues university students seek to address. He touches upon a variety of key topics, including  relationships, anxiety, body image, depression, sexual identity, and stress reduction. [SlideDeck2 id=13141]

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Self-Esteem vs. Narcissism

As a culture, we are highly concerned with self-esteem. And this is a good thing. How we feel about ourselves determines how we treat those around us and vice versa. In 1890, William James identified self-esteem as a fundamental human need, no less essential for survival than emotions such as anger and fear. And yet,… Read more »

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A New Look at Differentiation

Remaining undifferentiated renders one unable to fully accept the gift of life and, instead, leaves one merely living out the life of another. The Self Under Siege I believe a fundamental question for people to consider is whose life are they living? Are they pursuing the things that really light them up, that matter to… Read more »

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The Unselfish Gift of Going on a Retreat

As any of you still shopping for that perfect present for that certain someone knows, this time of year is designed for thinking about others. Thoughts of getting away or doing something for yourself seem, at best, foreign and, at worst, selfish. Odd as it may seem, taking real, quality time to “escape” from your… Read more »

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It Is Immoral To Stop People From Loving You

Some of the most destructive behaviors, commonplace in relationships, are those that people act out in an attempt to ward off loving responses from their partner. In The Ethics of Interpersonal Relationships, I wrote about the dynamics underlying this phenomenon, explaining why we often punish the very person who appreciates and acknowledges us for our positive… Read more »

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Living Free From Regret

A friend of mine sent me a list of The Top 5 Regrets People Say on their Deathbed as compiled by Bronnie Ware, a woman who works closely with the dying, It wasn’t relevant that the list was not necessarily the result of stringent empirical research or that it could even be fictitious; what seemed relevant to… Read more »

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Laugh it Up: Why Laughing Brings Us Closer Together

Having the last laugh may be more important than you think…literally. New research reveals that the physical act of laughing can actually elevate an individual’s pain threshold. Whether you’re rolling on the ground in stitches over the latest YouTube video with friends, politely chuckling at your uncle’s knock-knock joke, or laughing nervously at your boss’… Read more »

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Are You the Cause of Your Jealousy?

Irish writer Elizabeth Bowen once wrote, “Jealousy is no more than feeling alone against smiling enemies.” This simple statement sets a perfect scene in our minds of what jealousy feels like; others are happy, overtly joyful or secretly mocking, while we are left alone to look like a fool. However, what drives us to feel… Read more »

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