When we are in pain and fear, anger and hate are our go-to emotions.
Connection as the energy that exists between people when they feel seen, heard, and valued; when they can give and receive without judgment; and when they derive sustenance and strength from the relat...
Without exception, spirituality—the belief in connection, a power greater than self, and interconnections grounded in love and compassion—emerged as a component of resilience. Most people spoke of God...
When we engage in dehumanizing rhetoric or promote dehumanizing images, we diminish our own humanity in the process. When we reduce Muslim people to terrorists or Mexicans to illegals or police office...
When we deny our stories and disengage from tough emotions, they don’t go away; instead, they own us, they define us.
What’s the most significant barrier to creativity and innovation? Kevin thought about it for a minute and said, I don’t know if it has a name, but honestly, it’s the fear of introducing an idea and be...
What’s the difference between shame and guilt? The majority of shame researchers and clinicians agree that the difference between shame and guilt is best understood as the differences between I am bad...
We live in a world where most people still subscribe to the belief that shame is a good tool for keeping people in line. Not only is this wrong, but it’s dangerous. Shame is highly correlated with add...
We invite compassion into our lives when we act compassionately toward ourselves and others, and we feel connected in our lives when we reach out and connect.
We don’t want to be uncomfortable. We want a quick and dirty how-to list for happiness. I don’t fit that bill. Never have. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to skip over the hard stuff, but it just doesn’t...
We do that by numbing the pain with whatever provides the quickest relief. We can take the edge off emotional pain with a whole bunch of stuff, including alcohol, drugs, food, sex, relationships, mone...
We can talk about courage and love and compassion until we sound like a greeting card store, but unless we’re willing to have an honest conversation about what gets in the way of putting these into pr...
Until both men and women are allowed to be who we are rather than who we are supposed to be, it will be impossible to achieve freedom and equality.
Trying to escape media influences in today’s culture is as feasible as trying to protect ourselves from air pollution by not breathing.
To begin by always thinking of love as an action rather than a feeling is one way in which anyone using the word in this manner automatically assumes accountability and responsibility. — BELL HOOKS1
Spirituality is recognizing and celebrating that we are all inextricably connected to one another by a power greater than all of us, and that our connection to that power and to one another is grounde...
Self-kindness: Being warm and understanding toward ourselves when we suffer, fail, or feel inadequate, rather than ignoring our pain or flagellating ourselves with self-criticism. Common humanity: Com...
Pema Chödrön. In her book The Places That Scare You, Chödrön writes: When we practice generating compassion, we can expect to experience our fear of pain. Compassion practice is daring. It involves le...
Pain will subside only when we acknowledge it and care for it. Addressing it with love and compassion would take only a minuscule percentage of the energy it takes to fight it, but approaching pain he...
One of the greatest barriers to going back is related to empathy. If our goal is perfection rather than growth, it is unlikely that we are willing to go back, because it requires a level of self-empat...