In the wake of another tragic school shooting (the 28th of this abbreviated academic year, according to the New York Times), we again find ourselves searching for answers and, too often, coming up empty. Once again, there are lives lost, and young minds forever altered. Video evidence suggests that, though the surviving students may have [...]
I’m a lucky man in most every way. I have a beautiful family, and we share a beautiful life together. I have a career that is entirely fulfilling and has allowed me to create new bucket lists all the time, previous goals, hopes and aspirations being eclipsed in ways I still find breathtaking. In my [...]
I woke up the Monday before Christmas to the alarming news of two suicides in my area in the past 48 hours, one a high school student, and one a dad. Three family crisis calls awaited me on voice mail as well, kids and parents who reached a tipping point of emotional difficulties reaching out. [...]
I’ve never been a big Thanksgiving guy. I find the meal to be bland, every element of it. Turkey? Eh. Gravy? Intestinal concrete. Mashed potatoes. Paste. Cranberry sauce is particularly morbid to me. I find the celebration, and often the conversation, to be forced. And it feels weird to be preparing and dining on a [...]
It’s Sunday night, late. Election day is Tuesday. Julie just pointed out the degree to which I’ve been all over the map emotionally today. I’m on Twitter running numbers in swing states. I’m optimistic. I’m watching morning news. I’m crestfallen. I’m listening to Matthew McConaughey on a podcast. I’m allright allright allright, until I remember [...]
For my clients, myself and my family, 2020 has offered a patchwork quilt of emotions, most of them painfully negative, the vast majority of which we could never have predicted as we rang in the new year. If I extrapolate my findings, we are a jittery, anxious, depressed, pre- and post-traumatic populace, white-knuckling through the [...]
My son George, my one and only child, is now an 18-year-old man. In a few short months, we will be dropping him off at college. He's busy focusing on his senior year in high school. That moment hugging his Mom and I goodbye on some quad a few months from now isn't remotely on [...]
My son George is a high school swimmer. He was a swimmer, I should say. The area Conference meet was held this past weekend, which also marked the final meet of George's high school career. As my wife Julie and I approached the pool, I was filled with anticipation and no small degree of bittersweet [...]
Dudes: Would you find it absurd, after 20 years of marriage, if a guy told you he still finds his wife really hot? Peculiar that she gets his heart beating perceptibly quicker every day? Odd that he'd still be fired up to see, even talk to her, after a long day at work? Would you [...]
I have a brilliant young client who, in a burst of insight, offered the following in a recent session: "When you spend all of your time nurturing your inner child, you are that child." Man, he is so right. In this particular instance, the young man, we'll call him 'Tim,' was referencing his own mother, [...]