Speaking from the Sacred Self
The pain you feel on behalf of people you’ve never met? That is your divinity. - K.C. Wilder News reports, social media and conversations around the office water cooler have focused on the seemingly endless examples of non-civil discourse in our communities and on the...
Just Hang On
Much has been written over the past few weeks in response to the suicides of celebrities Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain. Words of sorrow, confusion, and even judgement have attempted to make sense of the harrowing choice that some people make to end their lives, and...
Look At Me!!!
Thirst trap refers to our desire for attention on social media. Recent studies suggest that our minds are bathed with a dopamine rush when our post is acknowledged on Facebook or we are tagged on Twitter. The same pleasure hormone that is triggered by drug use...
Unlearning Helplessness
Learned helplessness occurs when an individual feels helpless in the presence of negative stimuli, has accepted that he has lost control and thus gives up trying to change the situation. We’ve all thrown up our hands at times when faced with a seemingly...
The Gender Box
Seemingly simplistic and straightforward, the concept of gender is anything but. While one’s sex refers to an individual’s genitalia and chromosomal makeup, gender is a social construct determined by the times, ideas and mores of a culture. Certainly, most of us can...
April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month
Sexual violence takes many forms. While most of use are aware of violations including rape, incest and child sexual abuse, sexual violence can be defined to include “any event in which someone is sexually touched or violated without giving consent.” This definition...
Trauma: The Complexity Within
Sure, we have all heard the word. Chances are we have spoken about it from time to time, and felt as though we firmly understood its meaning. Maybe we use the word in a joking context or with hyperbolic flare. Regardless, it is in our vocabulary, it is part of the...
We’re All in This Together
The t-shirt hanging in the lobby of my yoga studio caught my eye at first because of its vibrant colors: an ombré blend of royal purple that blurred into aquamarine, then bled into the color of pistachio ice cream. But it was the message silk-screened on the front...
The Myth of “Otherness”
When we experience or hear about tragedy befalling our fellow beings at the hands of other humans, our knee-jerk reaction is to distance ourselves emotionally and physically from those we label “ evil.” We claim to not understand their bent for destruction, or...
The Line in the Sand
You cannot set a boundary and attend to someone else’s feelings. The two are mutually exclusive. - Melody Beattie Boundaries provide safety; they delineate where something ends and another begins. Knowing how and when to set boundaries is an act of self-love, and...