As I wrote about in Is Conflict Avoidance Making You Violate Your Integrity?, having a strong moral compass means being honest with yourself- and others- about who you are, what you care about, what you believe, and what you’re willing to do to put action behind...
Picture this. You’re arguing with your partner about something relatively minor. You’ve made a mistake and now things are escalating. You forgot to get the milk she asked you to pick up. You said you were going to plan a date night and then double booked something...
In my last blog- Do You Overfunction Or Underfunction In Relationships - I outlined a common relationship dynamic that can cause distress in relationships in the long run. Overfunctioners often take on responsibilities that are not theirs to take on, or they try to...
If you’re trying to love someone with a significant trauma history, you’ve probably noticed that it’s not always easy on you- the relatively safe attachment figure. It’s nobody’s fault. Trauma begets trauma, and all trauma deserves our compassion. But it is helpful...
While few people name the pattern, we’ve all seen couples where one person overfunctions, and the other person underfunctions. What do we mean by “functioning?” Dr. Will Meek defined it as “our ability to manage life (make decisions, manage time and stress, etc);...
*My partner Jeffrey Rediger, MD, MDiv was supposed to be delivering a TEDx talk about the topic of our next book together last week, but the tech outage that disrupted flights for days made it impossible for him to get there. So...because it was an idea worth...
I’m preparing curriculum right now for LOVE SCHOOL, an IFS-informed community of practice intended to support those who are more securely attached and trying to love someone with severe attachment trauma, as well as the partners they're trying to support. Jeff and...
Ever since things started opening back up again after the pandemic, I'm very aware of how much change we're all facing. We are definitely in the "space between stories," when one story is definitely in its death throes, and the next story has not yet made itself...