Category: Ready to Heal

In Western cultures, the ideal is to be an independent individual: think for yourself, be self-sufficient, be a leader.  Yet in the same breath we are encouraged to obey and conform.  The upshot is a stratified society, where a few lead and the rest follow. There is room for only a handful of independent thinkers,…

I once met a woman with long, dark hair who moved with a flowing grace. She revered Gandhi, listened to Andreas Vollenweider, and treated all beings with kindness. We found ourselves nodding in agreement so much we hardly had to talk. We were the perfect couple, and that first year together I thought we had…

Experiencing physical pain is pretty much a given; experiencing emotional pain is optional. When pain receptors in the body are stimulated, we suffer, plain and simple. However, we are much more in control of our emotional reactions. The mind’s emotional responses are governed by a belief system, which we can consciously choose. Once installed, it…

It is commonly believed that feelings are either expressed, which is healthy, or repressed, which is unhealthy. As a child in a family where the expression of feelings was sometimes traumatic, even violent, I couldn’t buy into the belief. It was a matter of survival—I found safety in stuffing my feelings and insulating myself from…

Every day a woman elder followed the path down to the stream to get water, which she brought back in two rawhide buckets on the ends of a pole she carried across her shoulders. One of the buckets had a tear in it, while the other was perfect. By the time the woman made it…

Do you suffer from chronic pain? So do I, along with one out of three US citizens, but only one out of eight Japanese. Why the difference? Most chronic pain is self-made, and the way we deal with it is culturally dictated. When pain persists beyond an injury’s healing phase, it no longer has a…

I’m a passionate man—a doer. At the same time, I like to approach change gradually. Too fast and I don’t have time to adjust, which usually results in my efforts backfiring. Or so I thought. Yesterday I read an article in a health report that claimed 90% of those who were successful at quitting smoking…

Why do so many of us of us feel helpless when someone close to us sinks into a state of depression? And why do those of us who experience depression often feel helpless ourselves? I know many people who just want to withdraw and be left alone, or else they turn to medications and therapists….

I once thought the odds of kicking a habit would be in my favor if I just waited until everything was right—a supportive relationship, low stress, and a fulfilling activity to replace my habit. There was only one problem: it didn’t work. Instead of a supportive situation, I actually set myself up to fail. How…