We all experience anxiety in social situations, whether it’s the flutter of nerves you feel before giving a presentation or …
Overcoming Resentment in Relationships
It’s normal to feel resentment, which involves feelings of anger or bitterness, over a slight injustice or a major incident. …
Yes, You Can Heal Your Mother Wound
For most of us, the mother is the first person we meet in the world. The mother feeds, clothes, and …
What Is Revenge Bedtime Procrastination?
Revenge bedtime procrastination refers to a phenomenon in which people put off going to bed to engage in activities that …
How Often Do Couples Express Compassion to Each Other?
Imagine you’re coming home from work at the end of a long day. You feel tired and distracted, and you …
Introversion vs. Social Anxiety: What’s the Difference?
While some qualities overlap, these are two very different things The terms “introversion” and “social anxiety” get thrown around a …
Emotional Contagion: Can Emotions Really Be Infectious?
Why we mimic people’s emotions and how to regulate it You’ve likely heard the expression, “smiling is contagious,” and instantly …
What It Means to Feel ‘Angsty’ and How to Cope
The term ‘angst’ denotes anxiety and emotional turmoil. Someone who is feeling angsty may feel, display, or express worry, dread, …
The Painful Effects of Attachment Trauma
Bonding to a parent or caregiver is a critical part of a baby’s emotional development. In fact, the absence of …
Five Reasons Emotions Are Important
Emotions can play an important role in how you think and behave. The emotions you feel each day can compel …
Understanding and Managing Anguish
Anguish is an intense and complex emotional state caused by mental or physical suffering. When people experience anguish, they often …
What Does Grieving Do to Your Body?
How to Cope With the Physical Symptoms of Grief In addition to the powerful emotional effects, there are also a …
Getting Through Grief
Getting Through Grief and Letting Go Letting go of grief is no easy task. Grief is something you might be …
The Other Side of Grief
After months of preparing for her father’s death due to a terminal illness, his actual passing set off a series …
Grief: When Your Loved One Becomes a Goose
On a walk the other day, a goose stretched its long neck and released a territorial “hisssssss” in my direction. …
The Power of Tiny Shifts: All-or-Nothing Thinking
There can be immense power in tiny shifts. If I turn left just slightly and walk forward several feet, I’ll …
Carving Your Riverbed
Looking back through an old journal, I read a reflection on the function of boundaries during a time I was …
Meet Yourself in the Muck
Today there are 9 hours, 23 minutes, and 55 seconds of daylight, but who’s counting? The limited daylight is one …
Accepting Mistakes
In the book I just published (Wildly Wise: Trusting the Nature Within), I included illustrations in every chapter. Well… almost …
Being Emotionally Available to Yourself
We tend to focus externally to identify the source of our suffering. We ask questions like: Is it my job? …
Communication and HFA
Communication can be tricky territory for anyone; it’s a skill that takes practice and can make or break a relationship. …
The Changing Relationship Landscape
Relationships are an area that feels both thoroughly explored and, at the same time, enigmatic, especially as cultural values shift. …
Self-Sabotage
Self-sabotage can be hard to identify when it is happening, and can leave us questioning ourselves and how we are …
Developing a Self-Compassionate Voice
Have you ever had the thought, “if I talked to other people the way I talk to myself, I would …
Choosing to Live Your Life
Remember that list you keep? It might not be a literal list, but it is a list somewhere in your …
Benefits and Risks of 5-HTP
5-hydroxytryptophan (5-HTP) is the precursor to serotonin, and is an amino acid produced naturally in your body. In supplement form, …
Questioning for Clarity
We have all struggled with uncertainty at one point or another in life, and you may find that the more …
Intuitive Eating: Honor Your Hunger
The second principle of Intuitive Eating is to Honor Your Hunger. If you have a history of officially dieting or …
Women and Body Image
Body image does not just affect how we feel about our bodies, it impacts how we move through life. Body …
Active Listening
When communicating, it can be easy to focus more on what we are saying than how we are listening. If …
Menstrual Cycle and Mood
The menstrual cycle is composed of four different phases, which vary in duration from woman to woman, and may fluctuate …
Intuitive Eating: Rejecting Diet Mentality
Intuitive Eating is a term developed by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch in 1995, but has roots that extend further …
Cortisol, Stress, and Overall Health
Cortisol is our body’s primary stress hormone. Our levels of cortisol fluctuate throughout the day, with morning typically being when …
Binaural Beats
Binaural beats are a tool used by some people to help them induce states ranging from sleep to high alertness. …
The Effect of Oxidative Stress on Mental Health
Understanding oxidative stress is important because we are exposed to many environmental and dietary stressors that can contribute to an …
Harmful Oils
Polyunsaturated Fats, or PUFAs, from the right sources and in the right quantities, are important for your health. However, several …
Soothing the Stressed Amygdala
If you look deep inside your brain (please, don’t), you’ll find a part of your brain that’s critical for emotion, …
Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence, a term coined in 1990 by Peter Salovey and John D. Mayer, refers to “a form of social …
Materialism and Mental Health
Do you find yourself stuck in a loop of feeling like the secret to your happiness lies in something you …
Your Gut is Your Second Brain
There may be more validity to the statement “go with your gut” than you previously realized. The gut-brain axis refers …
Omega -3 Fatty Acids and Depression
Depression is considered to be one of the most widespread diseases globally.1 Depression is often considered to be emotionally or …
Are You Drinking Your Hot Cacao?
For many, chocolate may seem like a guilty pleasure. However, you can have chocolate guilt-free while supporting your mental and …
Excitotoxins: When Your Food is Too Exciting
Excitotoxins can be found in commercial food additives used to enhance flavor. Acting as neurotransmitters, this class of substances are …
Understanding Bipolar Disorder
Bipolar is a disorder that causes someone to experience abnormal changes in their energy, mood, and ability to manage daily …
Social Media and Suicide Among Teens
Digital media, including social media, became a centerpiece of day to day life at a seemingly exponential rate. Before I …
Why Are We So Negative?
Have you ever wondered why there’s mostly bad news being reported, or why it can be so easy to focus …
The SAD’s Impact on Mental Health
The standard American diet, or SAD, includes foods that provide a lot of calories but little nutritional value. As a …
Dealing with Loneliness During COVID-19
As the pandemic continues to unfold, many people are facing mental health issues. Even if you are venturing out into …
Disorganized Attachment
Mary Ainsworth’s work on attachment identified three attachment categories (secure, insecure avoidant, and insecure ambivalent/resistant). The development of the disorganized/disoriented …
Mindfully Eating for Mental Health
Practicing mindfulness during a meal can be a wonderful way to begin to incorporate mindfulness practices into your daily life. …
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