I was on the phone with a woman who was desperate to fix her marriage and my heart broke for her. But I knew I would not be helping her. She started off telling me the names her husband called her and then I was thinking, "I work with verbal abusers; no problem."  She...

I was on a zoom call with a couple I'd just met. The wife had spent a year in personal counseling and found it helpful. The husband went briefly to counseling for a crisis with his sister but never mentioned a marriage problem that had come up. What's more, a girl...

As I look at all the people I've worked with over time and the people that I'm currently helping across rocky terrain, one thing becomes clear to me: Our society dismisses emotions. It's normal to dismiss something you don't understand. Not too helpful and certainly...

Coaching isn't about feelings. That's what I used to think. That is, until I put together my own coaching program. Which clearly focuses on feelings. How could it not? Feelings run the world! Politics is all about feelings. Love and marriage - of course - is certainly...

Peter was miserable and didn't know why. He decided it was his wife's, Elizabeth's, fault. After all, she was his wife; she was supposed to love him, and since he was miserable, she must have let him down in some way. He didn't know what way, exactly. But it must have...

I've heard the story too many times of people who go to therapy to fix a problem and they walk out with a bigger one. The therapist wants to hear what's going on so the couple obliges by starting a fight! Right there in front of the therapist. The therapist feels...

I would like to share with you a compliment I got recently. I never know what people are thinking until you tell me, and I was very touched by this compliment. I asked this individual why they reached out to me and they said something like, "You have a way forward no...

I myself used to subscribe to this myth. After all, I was a marriage counselor. How do you do marriage counseling with only one person?? That was until, we'll call him Joey, came to see me, insisting that his wife wanted no part of therapy. We worked slowly together...

Mary screamed. She did not like herself screaming. She hated it. But she couldn't help it. She screamed at Tim. It was nasty. Tim retreated to his phone. In fact, he walked out the door and retreated to his phone. But the reality is that Tim did not do any of the...

Hey, I'll Bet You Love Being Examined Under A Microscope I once was interning to acquire the number of hours necessary for my license. I met with a particular family. They were really lovely people. Okay, they would fight. Okay, they didn't seem to know how to get out...