Think of how many times when you were growing up you cried out “it’s not fair!” It was a cry of a kid experiencing something as unjust, the forces of the universe arrayed against you to make your life unpleasant. Having to come inside after playing all day with friends. Suffering through a family …
My Team is Me Frequently, I am amazed at how easily people identify with a particular sports team. In my case, it’s the Minnesota Twins. I was in Junior High when the old Washington Senators came to Minneapolis-St. Paul to set up shop. It was so exciting! And, to my thirteen-year-old brain, exotic. Imagine …
I commonly use a “shame board” when doing a seminar or workshop. I ask participants to say words or phrases that come to mind when asked “what did you hear, growing up, about what it means to be a boy or a girl?” And then I have them relate that to being an adult …
THINK FEEL SAY DO BLOG_Think Feel Say Do; vol. 2, no. 12 Recently, I was at our grandson’s Little League game. There was a high school girl’s softball game wrapping up, on the field that our guys were going to be using. While the boys warmed up with tosses and fungo, I watched the …
Just because something is simple does not make it easy. Think about it. In baseball, to go from a .250 (read: two fifty) hitter to a .300 (three hundred) hitter requires the player to get one more hit per week. If an average week includes six games, and each game brings the person to the …
There is no perfect metaphor. Whenever we try to understand or talk about some important aspect of our life, like our love for another person, or an experience like seeing the Grand Canyon for the first time, we often resort to metaphor in describing it. We say something along the lines of “my love is …
Have you ever heard of the expression, “arrival psychology?” I know the phrase as a counseling expression used within the Recovery community; especially those overcoming addictions. I have also heard it used to describe the kind of thinking common among people wrestling with shame and shame triggers. Not surprisingly, also people we see in the …
Late January/early February is a time of great activity at local “Y’s” and fitness centers. The YMCA that I belong to was so packed when I went there the other day, I couldn’t find a parking place. I came back later. Inside, it’s a buzz of activity. People grunting, sweating, lifting, jumping, you name it; …
Welcome to a New Year! New life. New growth. New adventures. New discoveries. New… My hope around this blog is that readers will find helpful tools or insights that they can apply to their own relationships. I want to strikeout shame and the toxic environment it creates in our lives. I especially want to strikeout …
‘Tis the season to be jolly. And anxious. And jealous, depressed, sad, lonely and (fill the blank). There’s something about the Christmas season that brings together two of the most common building blocks of shame, money and religion, as we’ve noted in other blogs. Money, because the constant barrage of ads, telling us to buy …
