I walk my dog between 7 and 8 am most mornings. We are grateful to live beside a gorgeous, off-leash ocean walk with mountain views across a strait. This stroll through paradise is interrupted by the screams of a homeless gentleman who does a version of primal therapy most mornings. The screams are blood-curdling and…
What are you trying to prove? Maybe you’ve heard this one directed at you when you did something reckless or annoying. Minus the emotion and directed objectively toward ourselves it can be revealing, even healing. When taken seriously, as a question of self-inquiry, (and not as an attack) it gets at what’s driving our emotional…
I’m reading two challenging books by the late British psychologist, David Smail. Ironically, he was dubious about the effectiveness of psychotherapy. Particularly when it does account for the oppressive impact of hidden societal “interests” on the quality of our individual lives. Why, he asks, do we always direct the client inward, as though something…
Boredom. Tolstoy defined it as a “desire for desires”. You want to do something, anything, but nothing is compelling. And then there’s the awful restlessness. If you could be simply bored and sit there with equanimity you’d be a guru. But you’re not. The emptiness/restlessness combo is maddening. Lars Svendson, in his book, A…
I was shocked to discover that approximately 100,000 lobotomies were performed throughout the world, starting in the early 20th century and continuing right up until the 70’s. The heyday was the 1940’s. The procedure might seem both bizarre and gruesome. And it was both. But it was consistent with a burgeoning belief, still prevalent today,…