life lesson

respecting yourself is protecting yourself…

coming off of the bacchanal that is midsommar, the indicator that we are full swing in the lusty summer season, i thought it was worth a little PSA-themed life lesson…

always protect yourself.

unprotected sex is ill-mannered, inconsiderate and perilous. respect yourself and the health of your partner and always use a condom!

having sex with someone without protection is like having sex with all your combined partners at once. it is disrespectful to your health and well-being and that of your partner. it may not be as instantly gratifying … so what?  insisting on protection is simply decent and prudent.

i know, no duh, right? but getting swept up in the moment, we may have a lapse in our good judgment; we act on impulse and throw caution to the wind. well, i just want to repeat something my mormor told me: pregnancy is curable; other things are not.

out on the battlefield of love, protect yourself, respect yourself and put a helmet on that soldier!

lament

so far away but still so near

the lights go on, the music dies

but you don't see me standing here

i just came to say good-bye...

kissing toads

the type of people we are attracted to says a lot about who we are and where we are in our life.

not all the people we are attracted to or that we attract are suitable for lasting relationships. it is tempting to act on our instant attractions but the past has shown us that the result isn’t often in our best interests, won’t get us what we want or will not allow for our needs to be met.

some of us have a hard time seeing what is right in front of us. we are blinded by projections, urges or wishful thinking.

it is important to see who someone is today, and not be seduced by their potential. it is essential to see clearly without rationalizing, explaining or analyzing what someone does, says or how they make us feel.

sometimes this process is slow and frustrating. it can be seductive to follow our instincts, our chemistry and repeat unhealthy compulsions but we are learning from our mistakes and trying to alter our self-sabotaging patterns.

looking for what is good for us is a clue. being with people that make us feel valuable, meaningful and cherished…without strings or conditions. the more we learn to respect and care for ourselves, the more naturally we will find ourselves attracting people that reflect that genuinely back to us.

love is not a magic wand. kissing toads does not turn them into princes. many of us have been taught that we were only deserving of love if we acted a certain way, did certain things or just tried harder…this is not true. the more we work through these issues, the less we will need to reenact them in our relationships. as we learn to believe we are worthy of being loved, the more we will find love that is worth our while.

* photo credit: doris day and brian keith "with six you get eggroll"

life lesson

 moving through...

two new clients started with me recently. both are going through very difficult breakups; a very typical therapy topic frankly. interestingly both are struggling with a lack of support from friends and family seemingly exhausted by their respective breakup drama. something many of us may have (silently, right?) experienced ourselves with friends that just can’t seem to “get over it and move on”. these are the complaints voiced repeatedly by my two new clients. they say their friends are now saying enough—move on!

but why? there is no victory lap, no blue ribbon won, no medal received for “getting over it” quickly. and what does that mean anyway? the truth is, none of us are “moving on”; we are all just moving through. every day.

so i say- no rush, no hurry. there is no set time frame for grief. move through. the grieving process is a tricky one. it travels in fits and spurts, with twists and turns. some days we progress, others we regress…still we move…sometimes we feel stuck, but that is just where we are In That Moment. we are still moving through our mourning process.

there is a saying in addiction recovery that sobriety isn’t always better but it is certainly different. i think that idea works with all changes in life. even though we rid ourselves of bad habit, a substance, relationship or job etc. and even though the motivation behind the change was a desire to improve our life in the larger sense, change itself doesn’t work like a magic wand casting rainbows and cupcakes in our wake.

working through loss, working through change is a process…the only guarantee we have is that our circumstances will be different than before. our only choice is to keep moving through life and experience it as it is, as it unfolds…

nothing is perfect. life is messy. relationships are complex. outcomes are uncertain. people are irrational.

                                                                                         hugh mackay

photo courtesy of f*** yeah edie