While parents may assume a teen would rather share their struggles and worries with their peers, teens express wanting their parents to be the ones listening. When parents create an environment at home that allows for expression of feelings and discussion of difficult topics teens know they have a safe landing place. The best thing […]
How “View of Self” taints communication between teens and parents Ever notice how hard it is to “stay present” during a conversation with your teenagers? Parents and teens often try to juggle too many thoughts simultaneously. We can become “flooded” with things we want to convey. It helps to take a beat before responding. We […]
How do you handle yourself when something doesn’t go your way? Do you sit with your feelings, process them and move on? Or do you become grumpy, edgy, or angry… and then carry those bad feelings around with you all day? We all do it, push unrelated emotional stuff on to someone else. Maybe it’s […]
I hear the word “pressure” often in my counseling sessions with teens and young adults. They express feeling pressure related to academics, sports, and life direction. What is causing this pressure? Are we asking too much? Adolescence has always been a time of change and transitions. There’s a lot to figure out. It’s a time […]
During the pandemic, we have all realized the need for face to face connection and how a lack of can take a toll on our mental health. Connection has shown to be the color in our lives. We need it! Our phones have turned into our companions. A constant in our lives we reach for […]
“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me” This is the biggest BS I’ve ever heard. For some reason, we should only hurt when someone has physically injured us, not when someone says something painful about us or to us. Teasing, taunting, and bullying have been around forever. And unfortunately, […]
Social media feeds into our human natural tendency to be curious. We need curiosity; it helps us learn new things and serves as a vehicle for growth. But curiosity with regard to social media can be like falling into a large black hole we can’t get out of. The ease and immediacy lures us in […]
When I was growing up my mother would buy magazines. I remember looking at the images and wishing I looked like the women in the photos. Of course I didn’t realize how much it affected me at the time. It wasn’t until later I truly understood how those images contributed to how I felt about […]
Along with connection, we have an innate need to belong. It’s a basic human need and is, infact, necessary for our well being. The Belong Theory, according to Roy Baumeister and Mark Leary, states “humans have a fundamental motivation to be accepted into relationships with others and to be a part of social groups. The […]
Humans have a biological need to connect with others. In fact, it’s a large part of our survival. Social media feeds this basic need to connect with others. And it let’s us do it with ease and immediacy. We can find someone to chat with in an instant. We can see what’s going on with […]