How to Make Every Day Feel Sacred: Cultivating the Profound Inside the Mundane
I recently returned from a remarkable and different kind of weekend. It was a weekend infused with poetry, ritual, music, beauty and kindness. Three days dedicated to bringing meaning to the surface of life, up from the hidden depths where it normally lives. We listened to the exquisite words of the poet David Whyte, resonated with stories of love, friendship, […]
When Someone We Love Believes Something We Hate
A dear friend believes something that I think is absurd — unimaginable in fact. That he could think what he thinks is not just absurd and unimaginable to me, but also distasteful, and profoundly difficult to respect. Complicating the matter in this case is that what he believes is something that I “should” do, that […]
The #1 Most Important Relationship Skill
I received an outpouring of feedback on my recent blog, “What We Really Want and Almost Never Get,” about the profound importance of listening in relationships. The comments confirm that what men and women alike most desire in our relationships is to be heard without judgment and understood where we are. So many have poignantly […]
What We Want Most From Relationships (But Rarely Get)
Most couples come to see me to learn better communication skills—or at least that’s what they say in the first session. What gets described as communication problems, however, are in fact usually listening problems. The truth is, we’re not very good listeners; we don’t know (and are not taught) how to listen to each other, at least not in […]
How to Live in the Real World (Minus One Troubling Word)
Of all the words that exist in our language, “should” may be the one that creates the most suffering. Every aspect of our life is affected and infiltrated by it: I “should” be, he/she “should” be, my life “should” be, this moment “should” be… Sometimes we utter our “shoulds” out loud, sometimes we think them consciously, […]
Is Technology Disempowering Us?
I recently reached out to a number of parents, six to be exact, about my concern for our children and what personal technology is doing to their minds, moods, behavior, relationships, and just about everything else. Specifically, I pointed out what I witness: the constant need for distraction, relating to the device rather than the person […]
Why We Hold Grudges and How to Let Them Go: It’s Not About the Person Who Wronged You, It’s About Who You Want to Be
Karen, 65, is very angry at her ex-boyfriend. It seems he asked her best friend out on a date, a few days after breaking up with Karen. He was her boyfriend in high school. Paul, 45, can’t forgive his sister, because, as he sees it, she treated him like he didn’t matter when they were children. […]
Are Your Spiritual “Shoulds” Sabotaging Your Spiritual Life?
A person on a spiritual path should not get angry, and certainly not furious. This was high on my list of spiritual “shoulds.” The problem was that I was on what I thought of as a spiritual path (and had been for a long time) and I still got angry and furious and still, sometimes even acted […]
Spiritual Beings On a Human Journey: How to Remember Our Stardust
“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.” Most of us have heard these words from the French philosopher, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. And for most of us, there is something about this idea that resonates at a very primordial level. Something in us knows, deep […]
Dropping Your “Me” Story: How to Stop Taking Your Life So Personally
Kate’s previous evening had culminated in a post-midnight event of Moo goo gai pan. When she arrived at my office the next morning, she was not only full of chicken and mushrooms, but even more full of remorse and self-loathing. She was swimming in a cocktail of emotions, which included shame, frustration, disappointment, disgust, sadness […]