I Wonder What You Think of Me

This morning after I dropped my son off at preschool, I went running. Normally, I wouldn’t tell you that. Why? Because you might think I was lazy, or a bad mom, or self-centered, or shallow, or any of a million other things I have no control over. But I just re-read...

Emotional Adulthood II

Ever since I’ve lived in my own home, I’ve always hated cleaning the floors. I would look at the wall-to-wall carpet in my apartment and think, Someone should really vacuum this  carpet. Did I mention that I lived alone? When I moved to a house with hardwood floors, I...

Emotional Adulthood

My email inbox got to overwhelming proportions this summer. As I worked on clearing it out last week, I realized that I’d missed a number of not-earth-shattering-but-not-trivial emails from a good friend of mine. I sent her an email apologizing for missing the emails...

Compliments 101

How well do you receive compliments? Do you accept them with a gracious “Thank you?” or do you brush them away? How do you feel when you offer a sincere compliment and it is accepted graciously? How about when it is brushed aside? When someone offers you a compliment,...

Setting a Boundary

A boundary is something you do for yourself. It is a way of practicing self-kindness and self-compassion. A boundary is you saying: I’ve thought about this and this is what I need. I’m not telling you what to do, but if you do this (or don’t do that) again, I’m going...

When a Request Is Not a Request

When I was seeing patients, I would often say to a patient, “Can I examine you now?” Sometimes, when I said it to a child, the response was, “No!” At that point, I would say, “Let me rephrase that: I’m going to examine you now.” My initial request was not really a...