Category: Change

There have been a few times in my life when I found myself standing at the edge of a cliff.  

One of my favorite times was when I visited the Grand Canyon while I was in college. It was breathtaking, but I'll admit that I was thankful for the railing. 

When I visited the Grand Canyon, I was able to hike down to the bottom. I didn't scale down a cliff, but instead took a meandering, all-day hike to a place called Phantom Ranch. 

Our lives can often mirror this same journey. 

There is rarely a time when we make one big decision to get us where we end up going. Instead, we often take baby steps down a path that can leave us wondering how we ended up there. Just as often, we look for the one “big decision” to change our life for the better. 

Unfortunately, we often don’t pay attention to the little things along the way that lead us down the path.  We can become so preoccu ...

            Whether we realize it or not, we use coping strategies everyday.  Some maybe as subtle as sleeping in to avoid the traffic or procrastinating on a project or term paper due (guilty) hoping it will just do it itself.  It is when our unhealthy habits become a problem with our normal daily routine is when we need a change.  Our skills, routine, or what we think is working needs to be looked at.  Is this beneficial for me, is this getting me where I want to be, am I seeing bad consequences from these decisions?  These are just some of the questions we need to ask ourselves if we aren’t where we want to be.  

            Coping skills, strategies, or techniques have a couple of common threads that can be applied to just about any disorder: anxiety, anger, alcohol abuse, or any other ...

As the New Year rolls around, many of us are reflecting on the past year and considering what we want to focus on during this next trip around the sun.  As I’ve spoken with clients and thought about my own goals, the topic of holistic, well-rounded self-care has come up regularly.  Self-care is paying attention to and making good choices for your mind, body, soul, and spirit.  Without being aware of this, we risk falling into complacency, remaining stuck in unhealthy patterns, and hindering our ability to live the kind of story we want to experience.

As you think about what kind of life you want to live this year, it can be helpful to separate the areas of your life into different categories in order to properly assess and plan.  Here are seven common categories of self-car ...