“Can’t you see that this is not that and that is not this?” He barked out the response when she made reference to what had happened two years previously when we had been speaking of a current crisis. I realized that his 10-word statement was a great representation of what I had just been studying…
“Well for God’s sake, I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings!“ That was the husband‘s surly-toned response when I asked him to empathize with his wife whose feelings had been hurt because he missed an opportunity to support her in front of their children. To his response, I explained that we were not addressing his…
Five boulder rocks were towering in the photographs. She had stacked them while out on a hike. She called them “the five giants in her life.” They represented things like the divorce she was facing, financial ruin, terror about her past, horror about her present, and trepidation about her future. You’ve been there. You’ve faced…
I was saddened to hear him say: “I am too old, I’ve made too many mistakes, and I can’t do the things she needs.” After years of struggling, his wife had informed him that she needed things to change, or she was prepared to leave the marriage. As a last ditch effort, he had reluctantly…
“You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, and you can’t train your brain! It’s got a mind of its own!” He was a salt of the earth “good ole boy” … but his marriage was failing. I had heard him say in an earlier session, “If you can’t run with the big dogs, you…
Tom Jones. How could you not love that crooning voice? And Jerry Lee Lewis. He made pianos come to life! And what did they have in common? Just a year apart, they recorded the ballad, “The Green, Green Grass of Home.” Most people don’t know that what seemed like a sweet story was only the…
”There have been so many tears and such grief. I so wish he wanted to fight for this, for me, for us, for our family!” This was the text I received last night from an amazing young woman whose husband seems to be giving up on the marriage. As I read the words, I thought of…
Wow! If I had only known that as a child! The formula for my life was very different: “You are such an idiot.” (Complements of my unaware Dad) + “She’s not educational material.” (Complements of my 1st grade teacher) = An ordinary life with a potential of 3 inches off the ground if I was…
“You can certainly keep on shoving those pink elephants up under the rug and feeding them peanuts! But you’re either going to trip and break your neck, or the city is going to come and condemn your home when their ‘stuff’ keeps piling up!“ All three of us belly laughed, but the couple got my…