Posts by admin

10 Ways to Stop Worrying About Money

Posted by on Apr 14, 2009 in Uncategorized | 16 comments

It seems worry about money and the economy is everywhere, and it is hard to not get sucked in to the fear that is so pervasive in our country at this time.  According to Pew Research, more than seven-in-ten Americans say they worry about money, either often (35%) or sometimes (37%).  For more information on this research you can click here.   I found myself being aware of worrisome thoughts today as I wrote checks to the IRS and the state of Colorado for money owed for taxes.  As I wrote the checks, thoughts started to creep in like, “You were not expecting to put this much money towards taxes!”  and “What if an emergency pops up and you don’t...

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Getting Over the Doormat Syndrome

Posted by on Mar 19, 2009 in Uncategorized | 1 comment

Leave My Key Under My Doormat A friend of mine recently ended a rocky 9 month relationship.  There had been lots of unanswered phone calls, plans canceled at the last minute, and effort on my friend’s part to make it work.  When he decided to go out of town over her birthday instead of spending the day with her like they’d planned, it was the last straw.  She called him and said, “Why don’t you just leave my key under my doormat, which is appropriate given that I’ve allowed myself to be one for so long!” What is the Doormat Syndrome? We all have been in a relationship where we struggled to find our voice. A relationship where no...

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Your Self-Worth is Not Equal to Your Net-Worth

Posted by on Mar 1, 2009 in Uncategorized | 0 comments

Adolf Merckle Commits Suicide The press has been reporting on the life and death of  Adolf Merckle.  Adolf was a German business man who was ranked the 94th richest man in the world.  He employed 100,000 people and saw a profit of 30 billion a year.  As the economy took a dive last fall, so did his business empire.  Unable to cope with what was happening, he wrote a suicide note to his family and stepped in front of a train on Jan. 5th, 2009.  Why did Adolf Merckle commit suicide? We Equate Who We Are With What We Do When you meet someone for the first time, what is one of the first questions you are asked?  “What do you do?”  This has become the way we...

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Understanding Self-Aggression

Posted by on Feb 1, 2009 in Uncategorized | 1 comment

Insight from a 14 year-old girl: I was recently talking to a 14 year-old girl who cuts herself.  “It’s pain I can control,” she told me.  “I prepare for the pain, feel the cut and see the blood and then I don’t have to feel the other pain.”  I was struck by how much insight this girl had into why she wanted to hurt herself.  I was also struck by how we all do some version of this – create pain to avoid another pain. Self-aggression is a way out: Self-aggression, we think, is a way out of feeling our vulnerability.  When we feel the rawness of life, grief, and/or the fear of inadequacy, the pain can be so great that we just want...

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Anxiety ~ An addiction to negative thinking

Posted by on Jan 3, 2009 in Uncategorized | 0 comments

“It starts spinning in my brain and then it’s pounding in my chest.” – Jeffrey Lewis Check out this 3 minute video by Jeffrey Lewis on You Tube:     [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKYDcAsahXY[/youtube]   What is anxiety? Anxiety is an addiction to negative thinking about the past or future that creates a physiological fight or flight response in the body. Fear and panic create a debilitating condition that prevents people from taking risks, pursing their dreams, or sometimes, even leaving the house. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders IV (DSM) describes anxiety in this way: “Anxiety disorders...

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