The Dalai Lama recently co–authored an op-ed in the New York Times that I put aside for a bit.

And I reread it this week after speaking to someone about helping people who are homeless.…

When I counsel couples in my practice, I always try and get a “feel” for who gets what priority in the family. Are spouses each other’s priority? Or do the kids come first? Most importantly, what is the family structure, and are things a bit wonky?

For families with small children, I’ll ask the question, “who comes first,” and nine out of ten times, each parent will say “the children.” It’s not surprising, since we’ve been taught that children’s needs should always come…

Anyone out there remember the weird cults of the ’80’s and ’90’s? I do – and I REALLY remember wondering: Why would all these seemingly normal people follow someone preaching such a bizarre doctrine?

After a while, I figured out the followers weren’t your usual run-of-the-mill folks – oftentimes, they were former drug addicts, formerly incarcerated folks, and generally misguided souls. So, why were these particular types of people so attracted to what we most of us consider a…

Several months ago, I read in the paper, that the new governor of South Carolina was a man known for his ability to ‘disagree affably.’

I wasn’t quite sure what the reporter meant by this because she didn’t site any examples.

However, I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to share a list of words and attributes I thought described being “affable.”

People who are affable are:

• pleasant;
• easy to approach and to…

We write a lot about conflict on our blog (it’s a conflict resolution blog, after all!). But, I fear we don’t pay enough attention to our inner conflicts – those that we fight in our heads and hearts.

One of the most common inner conflicts is how we present ourselves to others vs. how we really feel about ourselves. The conversation is appropriate, after all, considering how many people have a “Facebook-self” or “Instagram-Self” that’s far different from their “real” selves.…

We all want to be our best self, but sometimes we get off track.

When this happens, we feel unhappy, weighted down and stuck.  And our poor attitude negatively affecting our relationships with others. We are short tempered, petty and argumentative.

Last year, I attended an advanced mediation training and learned this very simple tool to start to understand where we want to be — as opposed to where we are.

First you need sticky notes in two…

These days, the word “role” can garner a pretty negative reaction – few of us like being defined by anything, much less a “role” we’re supposed to play in our relationships. But, the mental health community agrees – roles can actually be pretty useful, as long as they’re healthy.

What I often find, however, is that role confusion contributes to quite a bit of distress and conflict, especially in relationships.

Take a woman who is a wife, mother, daughter, and sister.…