therapy -

Learning About Where We Goofed Up

By kpluseiswise | April 11, 2024April 10, 2024 by kpluseiswise

What went right? Do you ever wonder how we got here? Do you ever think about what has changed over hundreds of thousands of years of human evolution? The past few decades have seen exponential growth in technology. Smartphones. Passenger trips to space. Electric vehicles. Lots of crazy new tech. In most of our lifetimes, technological advances have dominated the changes we experience. Science changed the world. Medical advances like germ theory and surgical techniques have…

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Can We Treat Death as a Mentor?

By kpluseiswise | April 4, 2024April 2, 2024 by kpluseiswise

Ok, I know, this sounds weird but hear me out. Humans are freaked out by death. I’m not saying I’m any different, just drawing attention to this in hopes of reducing our suffering. Today I’m wondering what life would be like if we could change our relationship with death. The Toltec civilization of Central America considered death an advisor like a friend who gives advice. In this way, Toltecs navigated their lives knowing they were temporary.…

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Will You Talk to Me?

By kpluseiswise | March 28, 2024March 26, 2024 by kpluseiswise

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me Do you remember this nursery rhyme? When I was younger, I believed it. I thought I would rather be yelled at than physically harmed. While I feel lucky to have received more verbal bullying than actual butt-kickings, I’m not so sure the damage was less harmful. As an adult, I realize words have real power and do a lot of harm on…

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What Is the Matter?

By kpluseiswise | March 21, 2024March 19, 2024 by kpluseiswise

Ranking importance is critical to mental health What IS the matter? Matter is an interesting word. It’s a noun and a verb. The noun means something of substance and can be physical or metaphysical. The verb means for something to be important. There’s matter, and there is the matter. I like words like that, but the complication of communication and understanding. The idea of something mattering, as a verb, has been on my mind lately. The…

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Things We Could Care Less About

By kpluseiswise | March 14, 2024March 19, 2024 by kpluseiswise

I couldn’t care less about that. How many times have you said that? We use this phrase as a euphemism to mean we completely don’t like, disagree with, or are opposed to whatever is being discussed. There are things in life we don’t care about, and some things we care a lot about. We pay attention to and direct our energy toward the things we care about. These can be family, health, jobs, money, or…

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The Cumulative Stress Hypothesis

By kpluseiswise | March 7, 2024March 19, 2024 by kpluseiswise

Are you aware of the stress in your life? Can you FEEL it when stressors are building up and you think you may pop? Do you ever feel like you’re right on the verge of a meltdown? I think most of us are familiar with these scenarios. We can only take so much stress. When I was an ecologist, I had a vision for my life’s work. I planned on studying how aquatic ecosystems resist or…

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Mindfulness Practice Is the Key to Human Success

By kpluseiswise | February 15, 2024April 23, 2024 by kpluseiswise

Are you familiar with Jon Kabat-Zinn? In short, he’s one of the people who has made meditation mainstream. While I generally don’t like words like ‘mainstream’ and ‘conformity’, anything that makes helpful tools more accessible to the masses is good in my book. Known as one of the creators of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), Kabat-Zinn has written a bunch of books and helped teach meditation to all sorts of regular people. This article is inspired…

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How Neurodivergent People Can Learn Healthy Boundaries

By kpluseiswise | February 8, 2024February 6, 2024 by kpluseiswise

Have you ever thought about your boundaries? Maybe a therapist told you your boundaries were weak. Or maybe you read something about relationships and how some people might not respect your boundaries. I learned early on that my boundaries are weak. I tend to pay attention to other people’s needs more than my own. Some people in the world will take advantage of this. Many of us struggle to simultaneously love other people while protecting our…

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Masking is One Way Our Amazing Minds Protect Us

By kpluseiswise | January 25, 2024January 23, 2024 by kpluseiswise

But can lead to bigger problems if misunderstood. How do you feel about terms like, We use these terms to describe when we are not ‘being ourselves’ in the presence of other people. This phenomenon reminds me of a quote attributed to comedian Chris Rock: When you meet somebody for the first time, you’re not meeting them, you’re meeting their representative. So this isn’t something I’m making up, it’s in the human vernacular. It is…

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What This Neurodivergent Dude Gained From Therapy

By kpluseiswise | January 11, 2024January 10, 2024 by kpluseiswise

What is your experience with therapy? Have you tried it? Wanted to try it? Hesitant to try it? Overwhelmed? Did you have a bad experience? Recently I have noticed some neurodivergent people have had negative experiences with therapy. Here I want to clarify my own story about how both therapy and neurodivergence are helping me heal and become the person I want to be. Briefly, I have been in therapy, counseling, or coaching (I use…