Psychotherapy Blog

When I gear up to read a blog I invariably have the same thought: Tell me something I don't know. In this blog I am going to fulfill that promise for my readers since I have never encountered a psychotherapist or addiction counselor who knows what I am about to share. (If you are the one in a million exception, please accept my apology.) So make yourself comfortable and let's get this party started. Let's begin with something you do know. In...

Often when I “terminate” with a client (what a horrendous term for the conclusion of a meaningful human encounter) I let them know that I don’t see therapy as some kind of permanent cure to the concerns that brought them in to see me. At best it offers some meaningful relief, and some expanded awareness and resources that they may draw on when they inevitably face future challenges. I usually tell them I’d be happy to be of help in the...

When I think about why clients choose online therapy, the first intuitive answer that comes to mind is about convenience: the comfort of being in your own office or home, no travel necessary, the time saved, and the possibility to have sessions during a work trip or a holiday. For many of my clients online therapy was the only practical option. For example, I have worked with refugees or expats unable to find a therapist speaking their language within reachable distance....

One of the joys of running Psychotherapy.net is my interactions with customers. But of all the correspondence I’ve had over the years, this a recent exchange I’ve had has been perhaps the most intriguing. It began with this email describing our videos: Good evening Victor, I have enjoyed the almost freakishness of Albert Ellis telling it like it is, he was a man to be respected by the way he wanted the patient to come clean, and at the same time to...

I was just on the phone with Peter Levine discussing a new video we are making  using his Somatic Experiencing approach to working with pain. I started to tell him that want to release the video next year….and I caught myself as I realized that next year is now this year. Hello 2017! I still remember my kindergarten teacher writing 1964 on the board after our Christmas vacation, and I was so surprised. How could it be a new year? What...

As I tap away on the first installment of a my little blog about mental health in music I sit only a hundred yards or so from a Chinese restaurant in my little East Texas town where, legend has it, Mick Jagger was at one time known to dine on occasion with his former paramour, model Jerri Hall. Hall is or was the owner of a ranch in the general vicinity, according to local lore. In any case, while wondering...

According to Ray Kurzweil, futurist extraordinaire, the singularity is approaching at the speed of Jimmy John's delivery. The technological notion of the singularity asserts that computers, robots, and related super-intelligent machines will reach a stage when they match and then exceed the capabilities of human beings. When will the singularity occur? Ray has his calendar marked for 2045, so I should have the majority of my credit card bills polished off by then. Now, of course, we could dismiss Kurzweil's predictions...

We have an American cultural norm to disrespect teenagers. For example, it’s probably common knowledge that teens are: Naturally difficult Not willing to listen to good common sense from adults Emotionally unstable Impulsively acting without thinking through consequences Wait, most of these are good descriptors of Bill O’Reilly. Isn’t he an adult? Seriously, most television shows, movies, and adult rhetoric tends toward dismissing and disrespecting teens. It’s not unusual for people to express sympathy to parents of teens. “It’s a hard time . . . I...

A recent article on a study from the University of Zurich offered the headline, "Psychotherapy Via Internet as Good as If Not Better Than Face-To-Face Consultations." It does not surprise me when I think about many of my clients’ everyday lives in the Bay Area: technology tends to be seen for the most part as a fun, useful and normal part of life. It also makes sense when I think about the ways that technology, if wielded strategically, can sometimes...

On this past Sunday’s broadcast of “Weekend Edition” on National Public Radio, the focus was on the 50th anniversary of Betty Freidan’s The Feminine Mystique. In this book Friedan raged against the status of women in the 1960s. Although millions of people have read this feminist manifesto, it seems very few presently understand how anger in general and Friedan’s anger in particular could be a source of insight, motivation, and personal and social transformation. Anger is an emotional state that has...