Ordinary Days Sometimes, ordinary days can produce extraordinary insights into our human need for communication, hope and empathy. Years ago, in a Boston mental hospital, a girl known as “Little Annie” was placed in a solitary room referred to by staff as “The Dungeon.” It was basically a dimly lit … [+]

Are You Molting? Imagine being a young blue crab in Lake Ponchartrain. Up til’ now, daily life has consisted of walking around side-ways, loving the world and just doing what crabs do, but life hasn’t felt so good lately — too much stress, feeling boxed in, barely able to breathe … [+]

I couldn’t help but notice the severe limp as she struggled to walk unassisted into the room. She gathered there with 45 co-survivors, all refugees from Cambodia. They were known as “Boat People.” Historical note: The Khmer Rouge oversaw one of the largest genocides of the 20th century: an estimated … [+]

I recall a very depressed lady whose marriage had recently been pronounced dead. Over intervening months, she regressed to a point where she could barely function. “How do you see the future?” I asked. Her response was a bit startling: “I don’t see the future.” This was unimaginable to someone … [+]

Two buddies with a long-running rivalry were conscripted to star in the church nativity play. The one selected for Innkeeper never missed an opportunity to give his friend a hard time. The other boy played the role of Joseph. On the night of the performance, the Innkeeper deliberately went off … [+]

“The only person who cannot be helped is the person who blames others.”         — Carl Rogers You are the only person who’s going to sort out YOU. No one else can or even cares enough.  All psychotherapy is essentially self-help, and my job is to assist … [+]

   Some couples marry into an ideal, which turns into an ordeal, and then a raw deal, but there’s always hope for a new deal!                                       — Dr. Reid Doster The real … [+]

The phrase “It’s been a minute” can be heard among New Orleans folk to mean a very long time. For example, many years after Hurricane Katrina, the city’s more vulnerable populations still endure secondary wounding and re-traumatization. The vulnerable, however, are not limited only to economically disadvantaged, racial and ethnic … [+]

Everywhere we turn, there are signs of human life being increasingly disrespected. We act shocked at gruesome images of beheadings by the death cult known as The Islamic State, with their unholy combination of the worst traits seen in al-Qaeda, Boko Haram, the Khmer Rouge, and the Nazis. Its soldiers … [+]

Are we earthly beings on a spiritual journey, or spiritual beings on an earthly journey? My sweet sister, Barbara, died when an insulting ordeal with cancer hit her hard and fast. In what seemed like an instant, she was gone. Over the years, she and I had maintained a fragmentary … [+]