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Leading a More Mindful Life

December 5, 2019
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It’s no secret we live in a very fast paced, high stress world. With the influx of social media, news outlets, increasing expectations both personally and professionally, it’s no surprise many of us experience burnout, compassion fatigue, and just overall exhaustion. While there are many things we do have control of, we cannot control unexpected everyday stressors. However, we do have the ability to shift how we respond to these stressors and the impact we allow them…

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Is Stress Actually Good for Us?

December 4, 2019
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I work with many clients who are very stressed related to either their personal and/or professional life. My job as their clinical therapist is to better understand reasons why my clients are stressed and possible coping skills to manage their stress. Sometimes their stress can lead to anxiety and can be quite debilitating, while others have a manageable level of stress. Whether it is stress or anxiety, both can be useful tools to help us better understand…

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The Emotional and Physical Impacts of Facebook

December 2, 2019
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Danielle Bertini A recent study done by researchers from UC San Diego and Yale have some advice for you to stay emotionally and physically healthy: limit the amount of time you spend on Facebook. Although this statement might sound like a broken record, this study has some impressive research to back up this claim. The study spent two years following 5,208 adults who are part of a Gallup long-term study. With permission, the researchers monitored these subjects’…

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Why Multi-Tasking Doesn’t Work – Making Better Use of Your Time

December 1, 2019
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Do you ever find yourself trying to accomplish several things at one time? Or do you find yourself trying to multi-task to get a lot done? Often we find ourselves trying to accomplish several things at one time in attempt to get a lot accomplished, such as multi-tasking several tasks at work or multi-tasking household chores or errands with the attempt to get a lot done. But the reality is that recent studies have a shown that…

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How to Emotionally Respond to Global Warming

November 29, 2019
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According to the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, younger generations have become increasingly concerned about global warming and environment issues. They found that seventy percent of adults aged 18 to 34 worry about global warming. As a therapist, I’ve heard an increase in emotional concern from younger clients about the environment, even to the point of these folks feeling depressed about it at times. They feel discouraged and hopeless after hearing news coverage and seeing friends’…

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Self-Care for Therapists: Part II

November 27, 2019
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In my previous post, I reflected the necessity of maintaining healthy self-care habits for clinicians. Establishing a healthy work-life balance is beneficial to your home relationships, as well as your clients. I have provided a few tips as a way to help incorporate self-care techniques into your lives (this is beneficial for you readers who are not clinicians as well!): Be Mindful: Take time for yourself to understand what self-care activities work for you. Be mindful of…

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Self Care For Therapists: Part I

November 25, 2019
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Self-care is crucial for maintaining a healthy well-being. As therapists, holding boundaries with clients and coworkers is necessary when making self-care a priority. As our job aims to guide others to find their strengths to navigate their stressors, it can often be difficult to be firm in our work boundaries when a client is stressed and we want to help accommodate their needs. Given the emotional strains in the profession, it is necessary to understand our limits…

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Meditation

November 23, 2019
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Shannon M. Duffy, MFT, LCPC Meditation has soared past being the just the latest trend. Research has been presenting the benefits for years and most practitioners in the fields of health and wellness are noting the importance of what finding more calm can do for your lifestyle. However, I still notice the hesitation within my therapeutic practice of those individuals who are unsure of what meditation entails and if they can even attempt to find calm within…

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Understanding How Important – and Unimportant – You Are

November 15, 2019
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Every one of us is a unique human being, worthy just by existing on this planet. We are all important in various ways to ourselves and others, and we owe it to ourselves to understand how we relate to others. At the same time, it is also beneficial to understand just how unimportant we are to the world. We are, paradoxically, both important and unimportant all at once, and we need to understand this in order to…

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The Importance of Emotional Movement

November 13, 2019
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Matthew Cuddeback, LCSW Winston Churchill said “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” This quote stuck with me long after I heard it, it is incredibly profound for many different reasons. Churchill was saying this, as a rousing orator, to motivate the British people during the second World War. However, I find that it is also incredibly impactful for when we are waging our own internal wars as a guide for how to see our way through…

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