The Virtue of Quitting
02/09/14: How many times have you heard phrases like "winners never quit and quitters never win"? Or some motivational speaker telling you to "never give up on your dreams"? Now how many times have you heard "sometimes it's best to give up when something isn't working and start on something new"? This post is about the value of knowing when, and how, to give up; not for trivial things, but for the larger goals and paths we pursue in our careers or personal lives.Opposing Virtues
A virtue defined as a quality that is morally good or desirable in a person. Every culture has a set of these, and in the US, we could say that "f...
Source: Staff Psychologist - February 10, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Tags: General Source Type: blogs
You At Your Best
12/21/13: It's hard to know where to go if you don't have a destination. That is the basic principle of this article. Most of my clients, people I know, and even myself at various times, have not had a clear vision of how we wanted to be, or what we wanted to do in the future. It leaves us lost and stagnant. The following article is a way to help develop a vision of where you want to venture next in your personal development by defining what you are like when you are at your best.Before going any further, pause and give some thought to the best (healthiest, happiest) that you have been in your life; not in a single moment,...
Source: Staff Psychologist - December 22, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Tags: Blog Source Type: blogs
Substance Use & Addiction
This article is not going to cast many moral judgment or advocate any side, but instead will lay out the latest research and knowledge about this subject.
Symptoms of Substance Use
In the past year, the main psychiatric diagnostic manual (DSM-5) updated its criteria for what constitutes substance "abuse" and "dependence" (addiction), into what is now called a "substance use disorder", which has levels of severity. The symptoms related to substance use issues are below. Take the number of them that are experienced and plot them on the continuum below to determine what the level of concern should be.
1. Using the substanc...
Source: Staff Psychologist - December 6, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Tags: Blog Source Type: blogs
How to Relax
Conclusion
Once you get the sequence down, I'd encourage you to innovate and find little tricks that will specifically make this more powerful for you. Remember to practice this everyday, especially during times of lower stress, because the effect is cumulative. Meaning, the 20th time you do this should have a faster and greater impact than the first. If it doesn't work right away, stay with it and keep going, and make sure you are following all of the steps. Furthermore, if this process isn't preferred for you, try doing the 5-step Processing Emotions as an alternative. (Source: Staff Psychologist)
Source: Staff Psychologist - October 13, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Tags: Blog Source Type: blogs
Healthy Relationships
09/22/13: I get asked a lot about what a healthy relationship is like, or is supposed to be like. The easy answer is that it looks different for every couple. However, I realized a long time ago that if we didn't grow up with parents who had wonderful ways of relating to one another, that there was virtually no where else to turn to find a healthy couple to learn from. This leaves the ways that happy and healthy couples relate as secrets that many of us don't get to experience. So I hope that the following article gives some general ideas on how healthy couples function, although the details will be up to each couple to fi...
Source: Staff Psychologist - September 23, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Tags: General Source Type: blogs
How to Set Goals
08/17/13: Goal setting is something that we hear about throughout our lives, but I have found that very few people actually sit down and articulate the things they want. I personally have yawned at the mention of goals mostly because the whole idea has been co-opted by self-help gurus and ultra-achievers. But what about just making some goals for living better? The following is a brief overview of the importance of goal setting, and the questions that you should answer to put your life in a new focus. Goal Basics
In psychology language: a goal is "a mental representation of a desired outcome that a person is committed to."...
Source: Staff Psychologist - August 17, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Tags: Blog Source Type: blogs
Communication Basics
06/30/13: A large portion of our lives is spent communicating with others. Sharing your thoughts and understanding another person's feelings is an essential skill for functioning in any society in the world. It is no surprise then that difficulty with communication is the #1 issue that brings people to couples counseling, and is at the core of many other things that we struggle with. The following is a simple model of communication that can help illustrate how communicating with others really works, all the places it can go wrong, and what we can do to be better.Overview
The picture below is a really simple map of how any ...
Source: Staff Psychologist - June 30, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Tags: Blog Source Type: blogs
Four Types of Feelings
1. Core Affect
What I feel like at any given time, related to energy, states
2. Raw Emotions
Universally provoked flashes of intense feelings that motivated us in evolved ways
3. Habitual Emotions
Automatic responses to things based on previous learning
4. Self-Created Emotions
Using imagination of thoughts to generate a feelings, this is also done to sustain the experience of an emotion since we ruminate on things that have happened. This means that after experiencing a raw or habitual emotion, circling through it in your mind over and over again will perpetually keep it alive. (Source: Staff Psychologist)
Source: Staff Psychologist - June 3, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Tags: General Source Type: blogs
