A few weeks ago at Esalen, a retreat center in Big Sur, CA, I co-taught a two-day workshop called “Conquer Your Critical Inner Voice.” As part of the weekend, I showed the participants a video clip of an interview I did with my father Dr. Robert Firestone. The participants found it inspirational, so I thought… Read more »
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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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A friend doesn’t return your email. You wonder if she is angry with you but don’t know what to do about it. Your sister asks you to take care of her children for a long weekend, and although you dread the thought, you don’t want to let her down. Your boss asks you to take… Read more »
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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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[This blog contains excerpts from an interview with Dr. Robert Firestone by Fred Branfman, political activist and author of Voices from the Plain of Jars] Part I: Fred Branfman: In our culture the idea of being vulnerable is associated with being fearful, anxious, and weak. For example, politicians and business leaders tend to project an… Read more »
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Human beings are cursed with a conscious awareness of their own mortality. Human beings, unlike other species, are cursed with a conscious awareness of their own mortality. I believe that the tragedy of the human condition is that people’s awareness and true self consciousness concerning this existential issue contributes to an ultimate irony: Human beings… Read more »
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What You Don’t Know May Hurt You! If you are one of the millions of people who have seen the Matrix, then you would remember that Neo was given a choice to take either the red pill – which would open his eyes to reality, or the blue pill – which would keep him living… Read more »
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Life is stressful. Financial strains, employment worries, relationship difficulties, and parenting challenges can all lead us to feel overwhelmed. But what exactly makes the difference between those who get pushed over the edge with stress and those who, when faced with stressors, actually thrive and develop? In his 30- plus years of research, psychologist and… Read more »
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“To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life.” – Robert Louis Stevenson What gives a person’s life meaning is unique to every individual. At one point or another, most of us find ourselves asking if we are truly living a life that is… Read more »
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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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