Building Psychological Strength
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Explore Peak Mind's articles, episodes, and videos.
It's back to school...and back to chaos and stress for so many. I'm not a parent myself, but as a psychologist specializing in anxiety, this is one of the busiest times of year for my practice. Already, just a few days in, I've had parents and teens alike in tears as they face an untenable...
Despite loving audio books and being a big fan of the work Dr. April (my counterpart here at Peak Mind) does through the Building Psychological Strength podcast, I don't really listen to a lot of podcasts. Unless someone sends me a specific episode, promising me that I'll find it interesting, or...
"Look around at what you have with appreciation. Be happy with it, and if you aren't, reach a little higher," he said as we sat around the fire having a surprisingly deep conversation.
Let me rewind.
The Alaskans
This was about 5 years ago. I was fresh out of a break up...
My job as a clinical psychologist comes with many perks - good coping skills, setting my own hours, witnessing others transform and blossom - but one of the true luxuries is that I get to hear the real deal inside scoop. People share with me the pain points they hide from everyone...
I like metaphors. They make complex concepts easy to understand and have a way of just making things click. One I'm chewing on right now is that your mind is a garden with thoughts and beliefs being the plants that grow there. That concept leads to questions like what gets planted and by whom?...
Guess what...
I learned how to drive a motorcycle this week!
This is a big deal.
A really big deal.
Because I'm legally blind. I haven't been able to drive anything in years because of my visual impairment.
So, you see, driving a motorcycle is a huge deal for me because it meant doing the...
Have you ever worn tinted lenses? Through brown or gray or green or rose-colored glasses, the world looks a little different. Like those colored glasses, beliefs are the lenses through which we see the world. They color our life experience and impact how we understand things. Unlike those...
Your subconscious programming and deeply held beliefs impact how you react, how you feel, what you do, and the decisions you make. Learn how your mind is holding you back.
I love to think of our brains and minds as amazing and powerful biological computers. The interaction of the...
As we get ready to celebrate America's independence on the heels of a Supreme Court decision that feels like a major step backwards, I find myself thinking about freedom and choice, two things that seem so inherently important and so deeply woven into the fabric of American...
Regret is a funny thing. It can be incredibly painful yet informative or a colossal waste of time. It can be a source of growth and motivation, or it can be an anchor that keeps us stuck in the past. Letting go of regret is important for moving forward.
Do you have any regrets? I...
Let's wrap Stress Awareness Month up on a positive note. While we often think of stress as a bad thing, it doesn't have to be. In fact, there's a type of stress, called eustress, that can actually be good for us, physically and mentally. The trick is keeping stress in check and, ideally,...
Did you know that upwards of 80% of the thoughts you have on a given day are subconscious thoughts? These are thoughts that happen outside of our awareness. They're mental habits and heuristics that our mind has learned, and they influence our conscious thoughts, our emotions, and our...