How Do You Know You Need Counseling or Therapy?
Most of us picture therapy as something you only consider when life has totally gone off the rails. But, truth is, taking a step toward counseling isn’t about hitting rock bottom, it’s a conscious move to get more clarity, peace, and connection in your day-to-day life. Sometimes the signs that we could use expert support […]
How Does Therapy Help With Depression?
Therapy for depression goes far beyond just easing difficult feelings. It’s about restoring clarity, helping us find our footing, and building up that sense of resilience we sometimes think we lost. Imagine therapy as a space to root out old thought patterns, learn practical ways to deal with stress, and build new emotional tools you […]
How to Find the Right Therapist for You: What to Look for (and What Actually Matters)
If you’re searching for a therapist, you already know it’s not as easy as picking a name from a list. Even for folks who handle high-stakes decisions all day, finding mental health support can feel unfamiliar and, honestly, a bit overwhelming. There’s no single formula to guarantee the “right” therapist, because what matters most will […]
You don’t need IFS or EMDR
The Music Theory of Psychotherapy As a white dude in his early twenties with a penchant for melancholy, at some point, I had to learn guitar. This seems to be genetic destiny for my people, like how homing pigeons instinctively know how to find True North. At some point our DNA activates and we know […]
Lost in the Alphabet Sauce Of Therapy Approaches
In our last entry, we examined why the dominant therapeutic paradigm of technique-focused learning and approach is incomplete and inadequate. I likened techniques to musical scales—useful, but incomplete without knowing the rhythm and key. Rather than just focus on techniques, I’m arguing (along with a lot of research, bee tee dubs) that one needs to […]
Everyone’s Meditating But Me
Aftermath: I’m having lunch with my supervisor, a meditation and Buddhism enthusiast, someone particularly interested in the fusion of psychotherapy and meditation. I am present with him and in my day-to-day life in a way that is both different from before and yet paradoxically noteworthy and not-special at the same time. He tells me he […]
Meditation, Disassembled.
Day 2: I am somehow surviving. Waking up at 4 AM. No speaking, no eye contact, no journaling. I have never looked forward to meals so much—they’ve become one of the only remaining distractions in this new austerity. The food is all recognizable but Northern California hippie-ified: yogurt toppings include stewed prunes and toasted sesame […]
How Meditation Became Medicine
Day 3 S.N. Goenka, the teacher of this technique, offers only the meditation technique of “the body scan.” A copper-skinned bullfrog of a man with a sonorous baritone voice, he instructs us to scan from our feet to “the top of de head” over and over. The amount of sensations that reveal themselves is staggering—numbness, […]
The Promise and Limits of Meditation Research
Day 5: My capacity to notice small details has increased exponentially, for better and for worse. I am acutely aware of my body in a way I’ve never experienced. I can track with minute precision the moment a thought arises, the way it causes a ripple of physiological impact, the way that shapes the subsequent […]
When Meditation Goes Very, Very Wrong
Day 6: I cycle through every meditation posture I can think of. I have amassed a pillow fort of props and cushions, desperate to help myself make it through each session. I fear I am doing permanent damage to my knees. The physical challenge heralded by my first practice was worse than I had feared. […]
