Here's the link to a thought-provoking Wall Street Journal article about young adults who have been taking anti-depression medications for much of their lives, and the possible harm it causes to adolescent and young adult development, including the evolution and strengthening of a young person's sense of personality, self-awareness, and confidence in their own ability to understand and manage their emotions. The article is a vote of confidence for the value of talk therapy.
The Medication Generation.
"Many young people today have now spent most of their lives on antidepressants. Have the drugs made them 'emotionally illiterate'?"
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303649504577493112618709108.html
Read about Katherine Sharpe's book, Coming of Age on Zoloft: How Antidepressants Cheered Us Up, Let Us Down, and Changed Who We Are, on the Good Reads page of this blog.
Wednesday, July 4, 2012
Monday, September 6, 2010
Coping with Being Unemployed
Labor Day seems like a good time to talk about coping with being unemployed. It helps to remember that being unemployed while seeking work is a transition, especially if you were previously employed, attending school, or voluntarily not working. Transitions tend to elicit feelings of loss and uncertainty. Yet, even when painful and difficult, transitions are a time of opportunity.
First, build a foundation of self-care from which to take advantage of your state of unemployment. Attend to your physical, mental, emotional and spiritual well-being. Here are some simple, yet powerful ideas that will likely improve your mood and confidence, increase your productivity, and decrease your anxiety.
• Create structure in your life through a daily and weekly schedule. Each individual functions best at a different point on the continuum between a rigid and flexible structure. Experiment with what works best for you, and be honest with yourself about it—in other words, find what works and hold yourself accountable.
• It’s usually best to awaken and go to sleep at consistent times all or most days of the week.
• Eat nutritiously and at consistent times of the day.
• Choose an enjoyable form of physical exercise or activity to include in your daily schedule.
• Stay connected to family, friends and acquaintances, including in-person time. Don’t isolate.
• Make time for hobbies or other activities you haven’t had time for in the past.
With this foundation in place, you can focus on activities that will boost your “hire-ability” and your chances of finding work. Use your current wealth of time to grow your professional expertise and your professional network. Think: education.
• Research and read about areas within and outside of your field that interest you. The internet is a vast resource for learning.
• Contact professionals within and outside of your field whose work or organizations interest you. Learn about their work and how it is connected to the work you’ve done or would like to do. You might find that professional connections and relationships that you form while unemployed will continue to develop even after you find work.
• Consider volunteering as a way of learning about a new field, or keeping fresh in your current field. Volunteering can also lead to paid work. Similarly, consider taking a part-time job or a contract job.
Finally, seek help and support. If funds permit, consider hiring a career counselor or coach for direction, guidance and support. Or consider forming or joining a support group with others that are looking for work. If you find yourself debilitated or bogged down by depression or anxiety, consider counseling. Counseling can help you get out from under thoughts, feelings and actions that are getting in the way of making the most of your present circumstances, and help you to take advantage of the opportunities that your situation provides.
May this time be one of growth and development for you, and lead to satisfying work.
First, build a foundation of self-care from which to take advantage of your state of unemployment. Attend to your physical, mental, emotional and spiritual well-being. Here are some simple, yet powerful ideas that will likely improve your mood and confidence, increase your productivity, and decrease your anxiety.
• Create structure in your life through a daily and weekly schedule. Each individual functions best at a different point on the continuum between a rigid and flexible structure. Experiment with what works best for you, and be honest with yourself about it—in other words, find what works and hold yourself accountable.
• It’s usually best to awaken and go to sleep at consistent times all or most days of the week.
• Eat nutritiously and at consistent times of the day.
• Choose an enjoyable form of physical exercise or activity to include in your daily schedule.
• Stay connected to family, friends and acquaintances, including in-person time. Don’t isolate.
• Make time for hobbies or other activities you haven’t had time for in the past.
With this foundation in place, you can focus on activities that will boost your “hire-ability” and your chances of finding work. Use your current wealth of time to grow your professional expertise and your professional network. Think: education.
• Research and read about areas within and outside of your field that interest you. The internet is a vast resource for learning.
• Contact professionals within and outside of your field whose work or organizations interest you. Learn about their work and how it is connected to the work you’ve done or would like to do. You might find that professional connections and relationships that you form while unemployed will continue to develop even after you find work.
• Consider volunteering as a way of learning about a new field, or keeping fresh in your current field. Volunteering can also lead to paid work. Similarly, consider taking a part-time job or a contract job.
Finally, seek help and support. If funds permit, consider hiring a career counselor or coach for direction, guidance and support. Or consider forming or joining a support group with others that are looking for work. If you find yourself debilitated or bogged down by depression or anxiety, consider counseling. Counseling can help you get out from under thoughts, feelings and actions that are getting in the way of making the most of your present circumstances, and help you to take advantage of the opportunities that your situation provides.
May this time be one of growth and development for you, and lead to satisfying work.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
What is Psychodynamic Therapy, Anyway?
For some, psychodynamic therapy has a bad name. For others, it is a bit of a mystery. What some people might not know is that psychodynamic therapy (a broader application of psychoanalytic therapy) has evolved over the years since Freud discovered the unconscious and theorized that all mental distress originates from unresolved sexual and aggressive conflicts.
Present-day psychodynamic therapy tends to be more accessible and “user-friendly.” Psychologist Jonathan Shedler (2010) found that contemporary psychodynamic therapy is effective and that patients who receive this type of therapy benefit from it and continue to improve after their therapy ends. Shedler (2010, pp. 98-100) discusses seven features that characterize the practice of contemporary psychodynamic therapy and distinguish it from other therapeutic approaches. Here is a brief discussion of these features.
1. Focus on and expression of emotion. The psychodynamic therapist encourages the client to express their full range of emotions, to put words to their emotional experience.
2. Exploration of attempts to avoid uncomfortable thoughts and feelings. We all tend to use certain behaviors and, sometimes, addictions to avoid thoughts and feelings that cause us pain and discomfort. These avoidance behaviors are explored in psychodynamic therapy, to understand how the client uses them to cover over thoughts and feelings. Clients can then work on experiencing previously avoided thoughts and feelings in a safe, non-judgmental context.
3. Exploration of themes and patterns. Increasing awareness and understanding of the themes and patterns in one’s thoughts, feelings, self-concept, relationships and experiences allows a person to make more satisfying choices and to avoid self-defeating behaviors.
4. Exploration of past experiences. Awareness and understanding of a client's past, and how past experiences re-play in the present, can help explain the client's current psychological challenges. "The goal is to help patients free themselves from the bonds of past experience in order to live more fully in the present.” (Shedler, 2010, p.99).
5. Focus on interpersonal relationships. Interpersonal relationships can suffer when one’s self-defeating, recurring behaviors interfere with intimacy and the ability to get one’s emotional needs met in a relationship.
6. Focus on the therapy relationship. A person’s relationship themes and patterns tend to play out in the therapy relationship as well. This provides an opportunity for the therapist and client to explore the client’s interpersonal patterns in a very direct, in-the-moment way.
7. Exploration of wishes, fantasies and dreams. A foundation of psychodynamic theory is that a person’s wishes, fantasies and dreams contain valuable information about a person’s view of themselves and others. Exploration of this material in therapy provides the client and therapist with additional avenues of discovering what is blocking the client from living a more authentic life, as well as the means for the client to begin to live more authentically.
In my work, I use a blend of psychodynamic therapy and mindfulness-based cognitive-behavioral therapy. Cognitive-behavioral therapy can help clients become more aware of their thinking, and how their thinking affects their feelings and behavior. The mindfulness component helps clients sharpen their awareness and learn to breathe and relax even in the midst of uncomfortable or distressing thoughts and feelings. (See my earlier blog entry entitled, A Simple Approach to Working with Mindfulness).
These approaches work well together. Mindfulness-based cognitive-behavioral therapy helps strengthen client’s awareness and ability to tolerate difficult moments, both useful skills for working in a psychodynamic mode. Most important to me is discovering and utilizing a mode of working that seems helpful to each client.
Reference:
Shedler, J., (2010). The efficacy of psychodynamic psychotherapy. American Psychologist, 65, 98-109.
Present-day psychodynamic therapy tends to be more accessible and “user-friendly.” Psychologist Jonathan Shedler (2010) found that contemporary psychodynamic therapy is effective and that patients who receive this type of therapy benefit from it and continue to improve after their therapy ends. Shedler (2010, pp. 98-100) discusses seven features that characterize the practice of contemporary psychodynamic therapy and distinguish it from other therapeutic approaches. Here is a brief discussion of these features.
1. Focus on and expression of emotion. The psychodynamic therapist encourages the client to express their full range of emotions, to put words to their emotional experience.
2. Exploration of attempts to avoid uncomfortable thoughts and feelings. We all tend to use certain behaviors and, sometimes, addictions to avoid thoughts and feelings that cause us pain and discomfort. These avoidance behaviors are explored in psychodynamic therapy, to understand how the client uses them to cover over thoughts and feelings. Clients can then work on experiencing previously avoided thoughts and feelings in a safe, non-judgmental context.
3. Exploration of themes and patterns. Increasing awareness and understanding of the themes and patterns in one’s thoughts, feelings, self-concept, relationships and experiences allows a person to make more satisfying choices and to avoid self-defeating behaviors.
4. Exploration of past experiences. Awareness and understanding of a client's past, and how past experiences re-play in the present, can help explain the client's current psychological challenges. "The goal is to help patients free themselves from the bonds of past experience in order to live more fully in the present.” (Shedler, 2010, p.99).
5. Focus on interpersonal relationships. Interpersonal relationships can suffer when one’s self-defeating, recurring behaviors interfere with intimacy and the ability to get one’s emotional needs met in a relationship.
6. Focus on the therapy relationship. A person’s relationship themes and patterns tend to play out in the therapy relationship as well. This provides an opportunity for the therapist and client to explore the client’s interpersonal patterns in a very direct, in-the-moment way.
7. Exploration of wishes, fantasies and dreams. A foundation of psychodynamic theory is that a person’s wishes, fantasies and dreams contain valuable information about a person’s view of themselves and others. Exploration of this material in therapy provides the client and therapist with additional avenues of discovering what is blocking the client from living a more authentic life, as well as the means for the client to begin to live more authentically.
In my work, I use a blend of psychodynamic therapy and mindfulness-based cognitive-behavioral therapy. Cognitive-behavioral therapy can help clients become more aware of their thinking, and how their thinking affects their feelings and behavior. The mindfulness component helps clients sharpen their awareness and learn to breathe and relax even in the midst of uncomfortable or distressing thoughts and feelings. (See my earlier blog entry entitled, A Simple Approach to Working with Mindfulness).
These approaches work well together. Mindfulness-based cognitive-behavioral therapy helps strengthen client’s awareness and ability to tolerate difficult moments, both useful skills for working in a psychodynamic mode. Most important to me is discovering and utilizing a mode of working that seems helpful to each client.
Reference:
Shedler, J., (2010). The efficacy of psychodynamic psychotherapy. American Psychologist, 65, 98-109.
Saturday, July 10, 2010
A Simple Approach to Working With Mindfulness
Imagine mindfulness as a three-legged stool. The seat is mindfulness, the three legs are awareness, acceptance, and compassion (starting with self-compassion). Each leg is one part of a three-step process, to be used in conjunction with awareness of your breathing.
First, present awareness involves focusing your attention on the present place, the present moment--paying attention to where you are right here, right now. By paying attention to what is happening within you and around you, you can calm your mind rather than being "hijacked," without realizing or choosing it, into peripheral thoughts, feelings or things going on in the environment
Second, acceptance. Acceptance does not mean resignation or being passive. It simply means seeing what is happening within you or around you as it actually is in the present moment. Seeing it and stepping back from it, without judging it. By doing so, you are further calming yourself, and allowing yourself to make choices about how you wish to act, or not act, in that very moment. Even if you cannot change an internal or external event, by practicing mindfulness, you can learn to remain calm in the face of it.
Third, compassion, which begins with self-compassion. Self-compassion involves showing yourself kindness and understanding, not judging yourself. It can be very powerful in creating a sense of calm and joy. As you show compassion towards yourself, you are better able, and more willing, to extend compassion to others.
First, present awareness involves focusing your attention on the present place, the present moment--paying attention to where you are right here, right now. By paying attention to what is happening within you and around you, you can calm your mind rather than being "hijacked," without realizing or choosing it, into peripheral thoughts, feelings or things going on in the environment
Second, acceptance. Acceptance does not mean resignation or being passive. It simply means seeing what is happening within you or around you as it actually is in the present moment. Seeing it and stepping back from it, without judging it. By doing so, you are further calming yourself, and allowing yourself to make choices about how you wish to act, or not act, in that very moment. Even if you cannot change an internal or external event, by practicing mindfulness, you can learn to remain calm in the face of it.
Third, compassion, which begins with self-compassion. Self-compassion involves showing yourself kindness and understanding, not judging yourself. It can be very powerful in creating a sense of calm and joy. As you show compassion towards yourself, you are better able, and more willing, to extend compassion to others.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Share Your Gifts
“Sin is humanity’s refusal to be who we are.”- Rabbi Abraham Herschel, June 21st entry from The Reflective Counselor: Daily Meditations for Lawyers, by Coffey & Kessler
Coffey and Kessler distinguish between modeling valued and noble characteristics of those we admire and taking on another’s personality and style while neglecting our own unique qualities, strengths and talents. I believe this is an important distinction. We learn so much from our mentors, heroes and others we admire. At the same time, each of us has gifts of our own to offer the world.
Whether in your professional or personal life, if you hide your gifts because you're trying to be like someone else, the world loses out, and so do you. In my opinion, the challenge is to find your own way of weaving the qualities you admire in others into your own unique qualities, strengths, talents and vision. And, sometimes you have to accept that you can't be or do it all. You can appreciate and enjoy others' qualities and gifts while being true to yours, which may be very different.
Coffey and Kessler distinguish between modeling valued and noble characteristics of those we admire and taking on another’s personality and style while neglecting our own unique qualities, strengths and talents. I believe this is an important distinction. We learn so much from our mentors, heroes and others we admire. At the same time, each of us has gifts of our own to offer the world.
Whether in your professional or personal life, if you hide your gifts because you're trying to be like someone else, the world loses out, and so do you. In my opinion, the challenge is to find your own way of weaving the qualities you admire in others into your own unique qualities, strengths, talents and vision. And, sometimes you have to accept that you can't be or do it all. You can appreciate and enjoy others' qualities and gifts while being true to yours, which may be very different.
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Self-Care Tools for Transitions
Transitions challenge us on all levels—physical, mental, emotional, interpersonal, and spiritual. You might feel physically fatigued, unusually energized, or alternating between the two. Your thoughts may be in overdrive, or you might feel mentally stalled. Many feelings are likely to surface, including depression, sadness, loss, disappointment, fear, anxiety, anger, excitement, joy and hope. Your relationships might feel “off.” On a spiritual level, you might find yourself questioning your spiritual beliefs.
I’d like to provide some tools that can help you maintain or improve your mental health when going through any transition--a relationship change; a job or career change; beginning or graduating from college; going through a life-stage transition, such as entering young adulthood or midlife. Focus on what you find helpful and intriguing. Experiment with those tools that feel foreign to you. Modify the tools to suit your preferences. I think you’ll find they are interrelated and support each other and, most important, you.
Click here to read about the tools.
I’d like to provide some tools that can help you maintain or improve your mental health when going through any transition--a relationship change; a job or career change; beginning or graduating from college; going through a life-stage transition, such as entering young adulthood or midlife. Focus on what you find helpful and intriguing. Experiment with those tools that feel foreign to you. Modify the tools to suit your preferences. I think you’ll find they are interrelated and support each other and, most important, you.
Click here to read about the tools.
Saturday, March 20, 2010
The Reflective Counselor
I’m reading The Reflective Counselor: Daily Meditations for Lawyers in preparation for a group and workshop I’m offering. The book has an entry for each day of the year. Each entry begins with an inspirational quote from a well-known person. Following the quote, the authors discuss the significance and applicability of the quote for lawyers seeking to imbue their work and lives with balance and meaning.
I believe the quotes and discussions in The Reflective Counselor can be enjoyed not just by lawyers, but by anyone looking for inspiration and guidance in living a meaningful life, including those working in challenging, stressful professions. I will be sharing some quotes from the book on my blog, along with my own musings on the topic. Feel free to share your thoughts.
Click here to learn more about The Reflective Counselor: Daily Meditations for Lawyers by F.G. Coffey & M.C. Kessler.
Click here to learn more about A GROUP FOR LAWYERS: FINDING BALANCE AND MEANING IN YOUR WORK AND YOUR LIFE.
http://www.transitionstherapist.com/Page_4.html
I believe the quotes and discussions in The Reflective Counselor can be enjoyed not just by lawyers, but by anyone looking for inspiration and guidance in living a meaningful life, including those working in challenging, stressful professions. I will be sharing some quotes from the book on my blog, along with my own musings on the topic. Feel free to share your thoughts.
Click here to learn more about The Reflective Counselor: Daily Meditations for Lawyers by F.G. Coffey & M.C. Kessler.
Click here to learn more about A GROUP FOR LAWYERS: FINDING BALANCE AND MEANING IN YOUR WORK AND YOUR LIFE.
http://www.transitionstherapist.com/Page_4.html
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