Recently, our group of psychologists got together to interact with an AI therapist to assess the quality and also see if we could integrate these platforms into our practice to help our clients. In our discussions, we thought to the future and quipped that our future marketing edge will be: We are 100% human! After a chuckle, we started to think of how certain groups in our patient population actually may prefer to work with a robot, instead of a human. I reflected at the pro

Your life is happening right now and you have an unknown expiration date. Humans can easily get sidetracked from the present to living in either the past or the future, both of which don’t exist. Not really. It is admirable to plan and work for the future. I hope you have one. The risk is that you are sacrificing today’s joy in the hope for a better tomorrow. American values dictate that success is partially defined by external achievements. This is quantified i

So cliché, no? Clichés become clichés because they are so true. Your therapist knows his work won’t go far if you don’t love yourself. Let’s start with, do you like yourself? If you met you, would you like you? We need to get all the way to love. Real quick, what are three things that you don’t like about yourself? …pause for thinking…Now three things you absolutely love about yourself. If you had no problem with the first list but struggled with the second, I’m speaking t

Trauma unveils the danger in this world. If raised in a sheltered and loving environment, we come to assume the world is basically safe. We know bad things happen. To other people. This premise allows for blissful ignorance and a feeling of calm and safety. And then something terrible happens. We are shocked. The blinds are raised and the danger appears ubiquitous. Suddenly you are vulnerable. There are some commonalities experiences many individuals have direct

Your therapist might be silently wondering if you over-indulge in happiness. That’s right! There can be such a thing as too much of a good thing. This is why addiction occurs. Dopamine is one the neurotransmitters in the reward system in our brain that helps us feel good. There are numerous ways in which we can manipulate our brain chemistry to seek happiness highs that can lead to real problems, when overdone. For some this looks like overindulgence in drugs an

Morbid, I know. But it’s a good question if your therapist asks you. If you were to die today, would you be satisfied with your life? So many of us would answer no, but then make no changes! This is always something that has fascinated me as a therapist, having worked with thousands of humans. So many people just go through the motions of life. They go to college because their parents said they should. They marry because it is the next step. They make one of the most life-al

Love? Therapists shouldn’t love their patients! We are to be warm, friendly but professionally distant, right? Yeah, right! Therapists are human too and I believe I do my best work with people when I’m emotionally invested in my patients’ wellbeing and progress. In therapist training we are taught that the relationship is integral to doing any meaningful therapeutic work because it creates a safe space wherein the patient can feel comfortable being vulnerable. T

We all experience anxiety, and that’s usually a good thing! If you don’t study for a test, you should be nervous so it gets you off your butt to do something about it! If you are in charge of a newborn’s survival, you are going to start thinking about all of the bad things that might happen so you can protect her. If you get bit by a big black dog it would only make sense that you would panic when seeing another similar beast. This is a built-in alarm in our brain that helps

A common problem a client brings to your therapist is lack of motivation. “If only I felt like cleaning my house…”, “I just can’t get myself to the gym”, “I know I should be working on that project but I find every reason not to do it.” Lack of motivation can be a symptom of depression, yes. Others turn inward and call themselves lazy. Yet others wonder if their level of fatigue is to blame. Could it be their thyroid, perimenopause, testosterone deficiency, anemia? It coul

I often sit across from patients who are incredibly hard on themselves and have no idea what they’re capable of. As a therapist, my first step is not to convince him otherwise but to understand where this came from. The answer is often childhood. Whether you had an idyllic childhood or a traumatic one, we all get a little messed up in our childhood. Of course, to varying degrees. If your father was a violent alcoholic, you might have grown up walking on eggshell

Think your therapist is going to convince you that you should love yourself as you are? NOT THIS ONE! I want you to become a person you respect and love. When you sit across from me in session and tell me you hate yourself, I’m not going to argue with you. I’m going to sit with you and figure out how to get back on track! Poor self-esteem is a common presenting concern in therapy. You may think your therapist will ask you to look in the mirror and say “you are b

Many times patients wonder what their therapist is analyzing about their speech or behavior. Am I bouncing my leg and that means I have ADHD? Am I avoiding eye contact and that lends itself toward low self-esteem? Let me share one characteristic we do look for that has some relevance to therapy work. Are you on the extremes with your comfort level with human attention? As with many human characteristics, the degree to which you are comfortable with social attention lies on a

Depressed? You aren’t alone. 1 in 13 Americans will have a depressive episode this year. 1 in 5 of us at some point in our lives. So how will talking to a therapist help? First of all, DEPRESSED PEOPLE! You are the reason we went into this profession. If most therapists were to condense their passion for mental health treatment into a sentence, it might be: to help people be happy. WARNING: This article is long. REASON: Therapists use far more angles to treat depression than

Therapists are quick to say, what is normal anyway? We are reassuring our patients that there is significant variability in humans and encouraging people to not judge their symptoms or circumstances by comparing their problems to others. This level of judgment is counterproductive. Rather, we implore our clients to be curious about their issues. We want them to join us in investigating further, not feeling shame for having their problem. That being said, therapi

If your car broke down, how many people could you call for help without feeling guilty? Not acquaintances. Not Facebook friends. How many would jump out of bed at a momen’ts notice and not be annoyed? Take a second and see how long your list of reliable loved ones is. We live in a sea of acquaintances. How many close connections do you have? A personal belief of mine, working with people in therapy for over 15 years, is that regardless of what a client’s presenting concern i

After a smile and a handshake, my job as a therapist starts out by asking what the problem is. What are we working with here? Next comes the context. Would you be surprised to know that your therapist might be asking herself if you are part of the problem? Conceptualizing our patient’s concerns within the context of their life requires us to ask ourselves what caused/is causing the problem and what is perpetuating it. If it sounds derogatory to ask if you are th

Feel free to be offended reading this initially. But stay with me, folks! The vast majority of patients are desperate to get better. But regularly we get others that are less committed to making changes and more interested in venting, processing (with little intention to make changes out of session), or just seeking validation. This is not a bad thing! Most individuals hold the answers to their problems already. I need to break up with my partner, I have to leave my job, I sh

Does my therapist think I’m crazy? The short answer is: no. We understand the complexity of the human condition. We have all seen the variety of ailments that can afflict a human. From meeting with thousands of people to discuss their most personal issues, I can affirm: everyone has their own battles to fight. Part of the human experience is to deal with hardship. No one is immune, but not everyone seeks healing. To become a therapist is to learn that most behavior makes sen