Dating and The Magic of Leaning In: Giving Relationships a Chance to Spark
Last month I read an interview with an actor that was single and dating describe how hard it was to find a meaningful relationship. He’d date, but commented that a dating was basically just looking for red flags, assessing things he didn’t like, comparing them to previous relationships, and being disappointed that the chemistry and […]
A Little Patience and Faith: All We Really Need When We Lose Our Way (and sometimes all we have)
One of the things you can count on in life is the fact of change. Even when things are going well, like a career or a relationship, either life changes or we change. Or both. And it doesn’t have to mean something went wrong. We grow out of interests, what matters to us changes, or […]
Why Some Couples Get Closer Over Time while others Get More Strained: Understanding Separate Realities
Back in the 90’s when I first started working at my family business, my grandparents handled all the shipping for our company. If you’re familiar with the early works of my dad, Dr. George Pransky, before there were digital downloads, there were cassette tapes. His tapes were slowly and carefully wrapped and delivered on-foot to […]
Creating Impact with Teen Clients: Learning the Art of ‘Agenda-free’ Listening
A few weeks ago I got to see some of your faces on the webinar I did with Dr. George Pransky. Teens and young adults often have very busy minds. Something that might go in and out of our minds in a matter of seconds, hovers in their thoughts for days, weeks, months…and the problems […]
Helping Foster Kids (and all kids) Handle Unknowns and Stress with Less Self-Destruction
Today’s interview was originally created for parents and practitioners supporting foster kids that are spiraling down or getting into trouble, like skipping school, getting into drugs, or acting out. I’m sharing here because all kids and teens work the same way. Like foster kids, on some level all kids and teens face uncertainty, insecurity, anger, […]
Embracing a Life of Mistakes and Apologies: Taking the Easy Route
A client reached out this week that I helped 15 years ago when she was a troubled teen. She’s 30 now, doing great, and thanked me for something I’d taught her. It had turned her life around. What I taught her was such a small point I don’t even remember talking about it. But I […]
Connecting with Younger Clients: Finding Freedom from the Myth that You have to Fix or Save Them
A lot of the questions I get from practitioners working with younger clients focus on how to handle certain issues, what to say to them, how to say it, what to do. Often the dilemma is that the problems young people have are so different from what they themselves faced growing up. I’m 49, for […]
Making sense of ‘extreme behavior’ in Teens, Tweens, and Young Adults
I recently had a therapist who’s worried about her teen client. This client spends most waking hours under her covers. She dropped out of the school play, two sports, and stopped going out with friends. She mentioned another young client that gets so angry playing video games he’s broken two Xbox controllers, a tv, and […]
Trauma vs The Human Spirit: We’re All Born with the Drive to Survive
Today I’m sharing something I wrote for a young client that’s in the hospital right now. He’s been terrorized by a recent and very severe traumatic event. Unable to have a phone or Zoom call, I decided to write something to him. I share it here because after reading it, I realized almost every client […]
Clarity and Enthusiasm: All You Need to Get Started
If you’ve ever started a business, moved somewhere new, or made a big life change, there’s always a moment at the very beginning when you first hatched the idea. Some of those ideas come together right away, and sometimes they need time, months or years even, to gestate, take shape, or wait until their time […]