The Happy Loner
“Loners” get a bad rap. “Loner” is the label we affix to criminals, outcasts, and just about everyone else we find scary or unsettling. In my all-time favorite book on the topic – Party of One: The...
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Do You Fight In Front of Your Kids?
"Yesterday my husband and I had an argument at dinner time in front of the kids. My four year old daughter yelled at us to ‘Be quiet!’ … My two year old had a tough time going to bed, which is unusual...
View ArticleWhat Drives You To Help Others?
I’m on a plane on my way to Pasadena to speak at the Hay House I Can Do It conference, where I’ll be surrounded by well-intentioned spiritual self-help authors who are committed to helping people live...
View ArticleLife Is Cheap, If It's For Sale
A robust literature within philosophy and the political and social sciences suggests that markets influence value, and that a certain amount of “moral decay” occurs when we commodify something. This is...
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Is Obesity a Psychiatric Disorder?
I suspect there are only a select few readers who have never gone on a diet with the intention of dropping a few pounds. Indeed, being overweight is a state with which all too many of us are familiar,...
View Article10 Tips for Helping Your Grieving Pet
Toby, my Border Collie/Weimeraner/Jindo/Other Various Breeds mix, died on Thursday. He was almost 14. He had a good long life, and it was his time to go. Lucy, 11 years old, is now The Dog of the...
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Asian Shame and Addictions
If you want to understand Asian addictions, you need to understand the principle of cultural shame and its underlying impact on those from Asian backgrounds. This concept of shame is what undergirds...
View Article13 Thoughts on Love and Hate
1.You love — who knows why?You know joy — does the reason matter? 2.There is kindness — what love!What joy! 3.Love with an educated heart. 4.What does love mean if you hug too tightly? 5.What does love...
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Fathering a passion for sports
The 2014 World Cup is in full tilt. Billions of fans are watching the action, rooting for their favorite teams and players in this burst of nationalism and athleticism. The World Cup also gives us an...
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Do Laptops and Tablets Undermine our Ability to Learn?
When I was growing up, I thought my dad could fix anything. His toolbox in the garage held a hammer, drill, and pliers, assorted screwdrivers, wrenches, vise grips, and files, along with a range of...
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Where are you from?
July 1, 2014“Where are you from?” It’s a question I get all too frequently. It’s seemingly benign, a marker of curiosity, yet I’ve always found it awkward, sometimes off-putting, and occasionally...
View ArticleDiscover Your Financial Type
Money can bring out your most fearful self or your largest heart. Which one you surrender to changes everything. How do you do this? By finding effective ways to surrender fear, stinginess, and other...
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Graduation, Commencement, and Moving On: Family Transitions
I was sitting with several hundred other parents, grandparents, family, and friends on the middle school field and listening to name after name being called. You could see and hear the cheers from...
View ArticleSecrets in Therapy
In a previous essay here I spoke of a lecture I attended on keeping secrets in therapy (http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/sex-sociability/201406/tidbits-sexuality-conference). I stated “There are...
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Should You Seek Out Fame?
To be famous is to be known and recognized. More than that, it is a way of standing out, of being special, of being a ‘somebody’ rather than a ‘nobody’ like everybody else. It is also a way of...
View ArticleWhatever You Want
In his groundbreaking work, Toward an Emancipatory Psychoanalysis (Routledge, 2010), Bernard Brandchaft distinguished sharply between behavioral compliance and perceptual accommodation. Whereas the...
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Edward Snowden, the War on Terrorism, and the War on Drugs
Edward Snowden has released thousands of secret National Security Agency (NSA) documents to the journalist Glenn Greenwald, for him to evaluate and selectively publish, in order to start a debate about...
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Healthy Partner Conflict Resolution When you Live With Kids
"Dr. Laura....In your last post, you warned parents against fighting in front of our kids. But as you always say, we're not perfect, we're human! What are we supposed to do when we disagree? And isn't...
View ArticleThe Existential Agony of Parenting
Pretty much every mom friend I encountered a few weeks ago started our conversation with the same question: “What did you think of that Salon.com essay about the mom who left her kid in the car?”That’s...
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"Earth to Echo" Echoes with Nostalgia for 80s Movies
The heroes of the new film “Earth to Echo," opening Wednesday, recall those in films such as “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial,” “The Goonies,” “Stand by Me” --- kids who bust free from the suburbs and the...
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