“Information brings knowledge, but stories bring wisdom.” These words guide my clinical work more than any others, for I have learned that it is the power of the patient’s story, rather than that of the patient’s dogged data, that defines and informs psychotherapy’s curative properties. Or, as Mark Twain once put it, “Never let the […]

We frequently use the term “self-sabotage” to describe behavior that, at least on the surface, appears to work to the patient’s disadvantage. Wikipedia defines sabotage as “a deliberate action aimed at weakening a polity or corporation through subversion, obstruction, disruption, destruction or underhand tactics…one who engages in sabotage is a saboteur. Saboteurs typically try to […]

There are three kinds of people in the world: those who would never get a tattoo, those who after a couple glasses of wine in an artsy district say to themselves, “What the heck,” and then there are those who LOVE tattoos!

In a recent online discussion, a colleague wrote “Perhaps psychodynamic therapists have relied too heavily on the relationship at the expense of client skill-building, while the opposite tends to be true for CBT therapists.”  This is a common criticism of CBT, but is there reason to believe that CBT therapists emphasize client skill-building at the […]

When I talk about the ability to choose an emotional response, this idea is sometimes mistaken for a compulsory task. As one person said, “I have already tried that. Growing up, my father would often say, ‘Force yourself to have a good time,’ and I am sick of hearing that because it does not work!” […]

What happens if you ask a child to look into an empty box and just pretend that something is there? In an interesting series of experiments, some children were asked to pretend that a puppy dog was in the box. As part of the experiment, the researcher was called out of the room, after which […]

For centuries, poets and priests have reflected on the influence of emotion, noting its ability to suddenly take control of thought and behavior. After reading Paul Ekman’s research on universal emotions, I was curious to know which emotion is most powerful. Some would suggest it is love. Having begun my career as a domestic violence […]

The Selfish Gene got it backwards. Dawkins accepted Tennyson’s metaphor of “tooth and claw,” expressed W. D. Hamilton’s ideas in plain language, worked in synchrony with Hawk and Dove fans, and reinforced the image of selfishness “learning” cooperation. (Irony: all of this happened despite tenuous degrees of kinship between the investigators!) Strogatz (Sync) and Barabsi […]

I’ve toyed for several years with using “complexity theory” to understand human interactions. It really does work and in some very powerful ways. Meanwhile, Robert Wright independently applied the ideas to human social evolution and wrote Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny, recently published by Pantheon. Thus, I’ve reacted to his ideas and dry wit […]

Patients express themselves in many ways. As therapists we have an obligation to listen and an opportunity to learn from each expression. However, it is often difficult to know what it is our patients are tying to say to us. They often present confusing and contradictory information and act in ways that pull for unwanted […]