Tag Archives: Success and Failure

Picture is worth a thousand words? Not always

Posted on by
Reply

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Picture.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Picture or Words?

Sometimes pictures work better than words, but sometimes pictures have a decided disadvantage.

When we need which and how to keep these two memory systems in balance is one of the challenges in building a happy recovered life.

So do you really think a picture is worth a thousand words?

Can you imagine the Declaration of Independence Picture?

OR

What do you think would have been the result of Lincoln unveiling the Gettysburg Picture?

Anyone want to go to court and plead the “Fifth Picture?”

The memory of pictures and the memory of words.

Humans appear to have at least two different memory systems. One, the emotional intuitive system, largely uses emotional sensory data. The other system is the rational word-based system.

Feelings can be conveyed well by pictures, often better than by words. I can write thousands of words about cute but that single picture of the baby or the kitten and puppies, those pictures tell you instantly what cute is at the most basic emotional level.

More complicated things, those need words to map out the concept. Abstracts like ethics and justice those need words.

Some of us get all up in our heads and we forget to make use of our feelings. In a past post, I wrote about the value of intuition based on experiences in making good decisions.

When it comes to figuring out right and wrong those emotional pictures do not seem so dependable. That’s where we need to use our reasoning and thoughts some of the time.

We therapists, like everyone else, struggle with this dichotomy. One school of counseling says you need to talk about your feelings, get in touch with how you feel, and have someone genuinely hear what is going on inside you. Those therapists spend a lot of time asking you “How do you feel about that?” Some people really can’t answer that question as they are way out of touch with their feelings.

Other therapists, I included, tend to believe that the way to be most helpful is to help you find the flaws in your thinking, get a new viewpoint and your feelings will begin to change.

A good therapeutic connection is about the relationship and that means we need to provide you with the thing that you need.

People are not required to pick one thinking style over the other. Some people are high in one style, maybe logic, maybe intuition and they are low in the other way of thinking. There are those folks who are high in using both rational thoughts and in intuitive thinking. Other people appear to be low in using both forms of thought.

Which works best for you – trust your instincts or think it through carefully? Are their times you switch up and use the other approach? Or are you one of those people who just try to avoid thinking about things and making decisions period?

In the posts to come, I plan to change it up, offer you some in-the-head logical reasons that you are the way you are, and also offer you times to get comfortable with your feelings. Let me know which works for you and what you think of the possibilities using the other approach might open up to you.

Photos courtesy of Flickr

Related articles

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Why is love so hard to find?

Posted on by
1

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Feeling of love

Looking for love.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Everyone looks for love but not many find it.

Of all the topics to write about why love? Nothing comes up more in therapy that the subject of love. Despite all the books on love, all the love songs, and the poems about love, few of us seem to be able to find the love we are looking for. Why?

Love is big business. There are dating sites devoted to finding your one true love and books on how to attract that love into your life, but still, so many people are starved for love.

The 1960s were full of expressions about love, love generation, summer of love, love child. One quote from long ago seemed, to sum up, the problem with a shortage of love.

“How come half the world is crying when the other half is crying too? Why can’t we get it together?” I remember hearing that, something close to that, from Janis Joplin shortly before she died.

One of the Jefferson Airplanes most remembered hits – Somebody to love. Despite all the looking for love there still seems to be a shortage.

There are several reasons we can’t seem to find enough love is this life.

If you don’t know what you are looking for how will you know it when you find it? Many of the things we say we want out of life are in short supply for just that reason. In psychology, they have a term for this phenomenon – The expert effect. Sometimes we don’t recognize we have something until it is gone.

Possible if we all worked harder on loving others, not the lusting kind but the real caring for other people sort of love, we might be less hungry for love.

Where do you find love?

The greater problem, the reason love may be so elusive is that we have been misled about where love could be found. When we are young we think love comes from someone else. Parents love, caretakers love and the love of friends and associates these things seem to make us “feel loved.”

For many out there that “love” was contingent on doing or saying what that other person wanted from us. We began a lifelong search for someone who could love us enough for us to feel lovable.

The problem is confounded for those who learned to substitute sex for love. If you just had the right kind of sexual partner then you might feel loved. So we look for lovers and friends that can make us feel loved.

Humans are social creatures; there is no denying we need other people. But finding someone who can love us so completely that we will never feel unloved and unlovable again, that is a futile search.

The place we need to look for that fullness of love is the last place most people would ever think to search. If you are to ever feel really loved, you need to begin by loving yourself. For if you are not able to love yourself no other person will ever be able to fill you with love.

What if you are so far down that you can’t even love yourself?

That is the time we need to look for that higher power, that thing beyond ourselves and those other failed human relationships. Look for someone greater than yourself and by that, I do not mean some earthly person.

Some find that unconditional love in a religious institution or in a recovery or 12 step group.

A saying around those tables is that other recovering people will love you until you are able to love yourself.

You can’t fill up that love-shaped hole in your being by rushing around looking for the right person to love you. First, you need to learn to love yourself and feel worthy of love, and then you will be able to accept other’s love into your life.

Just my thoughts. What have you found out about solving this love shortage?

“Image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net”.

Related articles

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

What is Serenity?

Posted on by
4

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

What is Serenity?

Serenity

Serenity.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

How would you know serenity if you found it?

Serenity: Clearness, calmness, quietness, stillness, peace.

From The Century Dictionary, 1890-91

Additional posts on feelings and emotions. More on other topics are listed in the categories list to the right.

Related articles

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Where have all the feelings gone? Emotions or rational logic?

Posted on by
4

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Where have all the feelings gone?
Photo courtesy of pixabay.

Good feelings, bad feelings, too many or too few feelings, which is it?

You need feelings skills.

Feelings, sometimes called emotions, are one of the major things that send people to therapy. Learning appropriate feelings skills is a part of recovery regardless of what you are recovering from.

One way to define a goal of therapy is having a happy life. I have liked that definition from the first time I heard it. Some people are in so much pain that having a happy life is beyond their expectations; they might define their goal as having less pain. Reducing pain is, in my opinion, one way of describing “Happying up” your life.

Is it OK to be happy?

Recovering people are often uncomfortable with the whole idea of having a happy life. They have spent a good part of their life chasing happiness by using drugs, alcohol or sex in an effort to make them happy. Society tends to equate a good time or being happy with doing drugs or reaching for something outside yourself to make you happy.

The idea that there is something out there that can make you happy is a great deceiver. It comes as a shock to some of us that you can be happy and have fun without reaching for those outside objects.

True happiness comes from inside. Setting things right with yourself and then the rest of the world can fit in its proper place.

Are you too emotional?

Excesses of negative emotions, anger, sadness, anxiety, and so forth, are the major cause of people who come for treatment. They often define their problem as too many feelings. They say that they are “too emotional.” By two emotional they appear to mean they are flooded by negative, unpleasant emotions.

There are also those who come to the counseling room and report that they are just numb. They have lost the ability to feel anything. Sometimes they self-injure, cut, or mutilate themselves in an effort to feel again.

The great irony of using pain to feel again is that often the cause of numbness has been an intense unbearable pain. The emotional part of the body has shut down the feeling systems to protect these folks from an overload of negative emotions.

To move from an excess of negative emotions or numbness to a place where you can feel happy positive feelings require several things.

Recognize that you are feeling.

You need to get past the numbness by recognizing that you are having feelings. You need to allow yourself to experience emotions. For someone engulfed in pain and negative emotions, this can be overwhelming. We call learning to sit with negative emotions and not be swept away by them “distress tolerance.” Sometimes it is OK to feel bad, just for now. If you can hang on, those bad feelings will subside.

If you want a happier more positive life you also need to be able to recognize the positive emotions when you have them. Some people were taught that it was bad to have feelings. Turns out that avoiding emotions and trying to run you on rational logical principles only is not the solution.

Logic and rational thinking are not always correct. So just going by rules and regulations may not be the answer either.

Just because you believe it does not make it true.

In CBT therapy we spend a lot of time looking at irrational or faulty beliefs. In other forms of therapy, the emphasis is on talking through all your feelings and having someone who can really understand what you are going through. Turns out that depending on the situation both approaches can work and the same person may need to do work both on their feelings and their thinking.

There is also a connection between intuition and using feelings to help you make good decisions. There is also a connection between the various senses and the way in which we all experience our emotions.

In keeping with the theme of this blog, recovery from substance abuse and mental illness and generally having a happy life, we will spend some extra time exploring feelings, the senses, and the role of logic and intuition and having a happy recovered life.

Related articles

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Fairytales end at the wedding – Marriage and Divorce

Posted on by
4

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Fairytale world.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Why are there no happily-ever-after relationships around here?

In this collage of life, one recurrent theme is people’s search for that one ideal romantic relationship, the perfect person that will complete their life and make them happy.

The other side of that picture is the near-universal failure of the romantic relationship to live up to our expectations.

Every day millions, soon to be billions, of people fall in love. Some for the first time, many for the umpteenth time. Always we hope this time will be different, this time we have found the one. The result of these repeating patterns has been that more than half of marriages end in divorce. More than ever people are getting into relationships without the benefit of marriage.

A generation has come to believe that the principle cause of divorce is marriage.

Why can’t we all have one of those storybook romances where the prince finds his Snow White, Cinderella gets the glass slipper and the relationship of her dream and we all live happily ever after?

The truth is, ladies and gentlemen, that in the fairy tale the curtain always comes down on the magical moment when the couple begins their relationship full of expectations.

We never see the rest of the happy relationship story.

Cinderella, should she have children, and there is a high probability that she will, then she will find that life is not so rosy after being up all night with a sick child. What does that prince do, after a few dozen nights of coming home and finding his beloved in a vile irritable mood after a day of scrubbing and cleaning and caring for princelings?

Most likely he starts spending time trying glass slippers on other women’s feet.

The truth is that life is real and fairy tales are fiction. Real relationships take hard work. Some time spent upfront making sure you know that other person and that you are on the same page can pay off on those long nights when things in your realm are not going so well.

Good relationships, like good gardens, require work to maintain them each and every day.

In the real tale, the price may not get promoted to king, even if he does there is that long period of struggle before he gets there. Cinderella can get awfully grumpy when she finds that being with the prince is not an escape from doing chores for the wicked stepmother. A few years toiling over a hot fireplace can make the most charming Cinderella say things just like her wicked stepmother used to say.

Nothing tests romance so well as having a sick child cover you with vomit. Notice in the fairy tales the problems all end with the wedding? In real life that is when they begin.

Fairy tales are about fantasy, marriage is real life and real life is hard work.

My advice, for all it is worth, is to leave the fairy tales in the books and movies and spend the time in your real-life relationships doing the hard work of making your life something that is worth the effort that inevitably needs to be invested in that relationship.

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Why your diagnosis does not fit

Posted on by
7

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Medical record

Diagnosis.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Why do they keep changing my mental health diagnosis?

If you or someone you know has a mental health diagnosis you might be wondering why the information you get is so inconsistent. You read about your diagnoses somewhere and yes you have some of those symptoms some of the time but there may be other symptoms you do not think you have had ever.

Then you see another professional and they give you a new diagnosis. Keep getting treatment and the diagnosis may keep changing. What is wrong with this? Which of the things you have been told are your problem is the correct diagnosis and why? Are the other diagnoses wrong?

You can have more than one problem.

Could be several diagnoses are correct. You could have high blood pressure and still have diabetes. You may have Depression and Anxiety and still have Partner Relational Problems.

It could also be that none of the diagnoses are right on the money and that what you are being given is a “provisional” diagnosis. As more information comes in your diagnosis might get changed. I know this is frustrating for you, it bothers most professionals also, but the truth is that the correct diagnosis is not always that clear.

“Strict Criteria” leaves a lot of people out.

Mental health diagnoses, in practice, are a lot fuzzier than they look in the textbooks. When we read research reports these are based on “strict criteria.” This means that the research participants are fully screened by someone on the researcher’s team and then they, or their files, are often reviewed again. During this process lots of potential subjects are screened out.  Anyone who has ever had a substance use disorder is not included.

So if you have bipolar disorder and have abused alcohol – no research for or about you. The result of these screening out process is that we know a lot about people who have exactly one and only one issue but not so much about anyone who has two or more problems or whose symptoms do not exactly match the “strict criteria.” The problem with getting a correct diagnosis does not end with strict criteria.

Mental illness as a brain disorder.

Mental illness, as currently understood, includes most all thinking, feeling, and behaving disorders. This creates a conflict when we start talking about “brain disorders.”

You could be born with a brain problem that makes you at more risk for depression – but then being neglected, abused, or other sad life experiences could overload your system and result in depression. So the environment can change the brain. Learning can alter your mood and if you learned to be depressed you can unlearn it.

Life experiences can and do change the wiring in your brain.  As far as your brain is concerned every thought you have is an experience as the electrical impulses and the chemical messengers move through your brain.

Change your thinking and your feelings change. As your feelings change your behavior will change. New feelings, new behavior, and your diagnoses could change.

Changes in thinking are not the only way you can change your feelings.

This freeway in your brain and nervous system moves in both directions. Change your behavior and your feelings will start to change. As your feelings change your thinking will change.

You keep changing without trying.

As you add more years to your life experiences, I am avoiding saying that anyone is getting older, your brain undergoes changes. Some of this is the result of learning and the growth of nerve cells. Other parts of the changes include hormones, puberty, menopause, and so on.

Some mental illnesses are first seen at certain times in people’s life. Schizophrenia symptoms are a lot more likely to first start or become pronounced enough to be recognized during the teen years or early twenty’s.

Bipolar Disorders do not get diagnosed until after you have had your first recognizable manic or hypomanic episode. The result is that most people first get a diagnosis of some kind of depression, with or without irritable mood and behavior, and then, later on, they may get a diagnosis of Bipolar Disorder.

As we age our symptoms may change and the diagnosis will change. The underlying person is still the same person, just the life problems they are working on have shifted.

If you do not feel that your current diagnosis is accurate, do not stress. You could try another provider or you could just wait and that diagnosis may change all on its own.

Diagnoses, like off the rack clothing rarely fit perfectly. What you need is a good enough fit that it assists you in developing a program of recovery. Sometimes that recovery program is primarily about managing your symptoms so you can stay out of the hospitals or institution. For other people recovery involves seeing how far they can take their life.

Personally, I am a believer in recovery. I have seen so many people with serious mental illnesses recover that I find it hard to believe there is anyone who can’t have some recovery in their life.

Recovery means different things to different people. Focus on what you can do, what you can improve, and see where your recovery will take you. Don’t let that ill-fitting diagnoses deter you from making the recovery journey.

Related article

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Driving the recovery bus – the role of self-motivation in recovery

Posted on by
6

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Bus

Driving the recovery Bus.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Why you need to take charge of your recovery.

Have you ever considered who is in charge of your recovery? Someone needs to take charge and if not you then who? This recovery may be from mental illness, substance abuse, or most any other problem in life.

People go into recovery from the 28-day program (now often 30 days) to the long-term commitment without ever think about who will be guiding their recovery process. Yes, there are professions that work in these places but they can only do so much. As a professional, I can give you directions but to really arrive at the destination you want to reach you need to get upfront and take the wheel.

In recovery, we get out of programs what we put into them.

Recovery or treatment programs have their place. One reason that programs work is that they can break the cycle of drinking, drug use, and abuse or other self-destructive behavior. It is hard to get clean in a place where everyone is still active in their addiction.

This process can hold true for those with mental illness also. It is hard to get your life under control when you live in the midst of chaos. When you are struggling daily with your issues it is hard to look at the big picture and see what needs to change for you to find recovery.

If these programs, and sometimes the stays in the psych hospital, however brief, can be so very helpful in getting the journey of recovery underway, why does the situation revert to the old struggles so soon after you leave the safe walls of the program or hospital?

One reason that recovery does not “stick” is a misunderstanding of what recovery is and where it lives. Do not make the mistake of thinking that recovery lives in the white walls of safe places. You do not need to keep returning to that place where you first started your recovery journey in order to stay on track.

Recovery is a journey, a process, not a place. Once your recovery is launched you need to keep on doing the work. This is where so many people get in trouble. They expect the place, the counselors, therapists, and staff to change them, and then they will never have that issue again.

Change comes from the inside, not the out. Yes, knowledgeable people, professional staff, can give you lots of help and information in the beginning stages of your recovery, but to continue to recovery you need to take charge and drive that recovery bus yourself.

You should know what your life looked like when it was saturated with problems and have a clear idea of what recovery looks like. Helpful people can assist you along the journey but eventually, you need to take hold of that wheel and steer your life in the direction of a recovered life however you see that recovery.

Are you driving your recovery bus or are you a passenger going wherever life takes you?

Related articles

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

What is a blog? Why are you writing a blog?

Posted on by
5

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

blog

Blog.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

So you ask: “What is a blog and why are you writing one?”

Probably 5 years or so ago, I asked a friend “What’s a blog.” Just recently she commented on one of my posts, an in-person comment by the way not an “at the end of post” comment. Seems she gets my blog delivered to her smartphone daily.

She informed me, back then, that a blog was a “Web Log” a sort of public journal where people talk about things that are important to them and hope those ideas are important to others. This intrigued me.

Finding that people I actually knew were receiving my blog, hopefully occasionally reading it, has me thinking about how I learned about blogs, why am I writing this one, and more importantly why people read these blogs. Clearly, for most of us, it is not about becoming rich or influenzal (Influential?) Bloggers keep hoping their post will go viral right?

Back then I kept running into blogs and occasionally reading about them on the internet. Mostly I seemed to be reading about how people made a lot of money blogging and how if I would just sign up for their program I to could become a world-famous advice-giver blogger. I almost added Blogs to my allergy list at that point.

I am clearly old school. Learning that a computer is something that fits on my desk, not a person to contract with took me some adjusting. But somehow I have learned a thing or two about blogs.

One reason I wanted to write a blog was that there were all these thoughts in my head and that I wanted to get them down on paper (electrons?) and hoped that they would be useful or of interest to someone else. Also, I want to write a book or two and all the writing sites say you need to have a blog and let people know what you are about if you ever want to get them to read your book. So I took the plunge.

Most of my posts are about substance abuse, mental health, counseling and therapy, and the whole recovery process. I wanted to share what I had learned about creating a happy life and about that journey.

The cool thing about this is that I get to write about what interests me and then see if any of you want to read that post. Sometimes I am really surprised. Things I thought were just an oh-by-the-way, have gotten a lot of readers and other posts, ones I worked on really hard, did not get many hits. Clearly, I am still learning.

Reader questions and search terms have gotten me thinking, made me do more research, and spawned some posts. I have learned a lot.

Learning the technology part has sometimes been painful. Anything labeled user-friendly should not include docs (documents) that are longer than a Tolstoy novel.  I am glad that I discovered WordPress since this site has been easier to use. They still have way more features than I will have the lifespan to learn to use, but it is nice to know that I could do more if I was so inclined.

If you who are from a post-big-war era find technical problems or care to make a suggestion please leave a comment. Just make your comment in intelligible English as I still have mastered only third-grade computer speak.

In the process of writing this blog I have read and subscribed to a lot of other blogs, some were really good ones and some not so good. Some blogs strike me as very uneven. One day they are so great and the next post is not so much. I think my blog has that same issue. Coming up with a new topic on a regular basis and then turning out a post takes time and effort and not everyone is a hit.

This blog (counselorssoapbox.com) is now in its third year with over 500 posts published so far. The book has turned into several books and they are all still works in progress. My current plan is to put more emphasis on the books as we head towards 2014 so I may have to miss posting a day or two on the blog.

So there you have it: What a blog is and why I am writing one. Any questions?

Related articles

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Has intuition gotten a bad name?

Posted on by
2

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Picking the right door.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

People who use intuition correctly make better decisions.

In this modern scientific era, it has become conventional wisdom to dismiss intuition as nonsense and to insist that everyone thinks rationally – whatever rationally means. Recent research tells us that people who have developed their intuition make better decisions much of the time and that just relying on rational explanations does not get you the best answer all the time.

Top business executives and successful entrepreneurs use intuition to get ahead and stay ahead of their competitors.

Psychological tests and particularly the Myers-Brigs personality types distinguish two personality types. Those who decide “in a blink” and those who need time to think. One way of deciding is not necessarily better than the other and people who are able to use both methods do better at many tasks.

To understand the role of intuition in our lives we need to look first at what it is and then at how its proper use might help us have a better and happier life.

The dictionary definition, from an old paper dictionary, includes “To receive or assimilate knowledge by direct perception or comprehension.” This section on defining intuition is exceptionally long and includes a list of ways in which one might receive information: look at or upon, observe, regard, contemplate or consider, immediate perception.

The principal meaning of intuition is those things you know immediately by personal experience as opposed to thinking them based on some theory or second-hand knowledge.

While I may not trust that I get everything a see correctly, the essence of intuition is found in the old adage “seeing is believing.” Which explains why knowledge based on personal experiences including feelings can often be trusted more than the opinions of others including experts who have studied the subject but have no firsthand knowledge of the thing they are talking about.

Intuition, it would appear, is firsthand knowledge based on experiences not only in the head but in all the nerves in the body. We tend to believe that our brain is in our heads. More than half of those nerve cells that process information are outside the head. That feeling in your gut just might be telling you something your head needs to know. We experience these nerves outside our head as feelings or emotions and it turns out that this “felt-sense” is often more accurate than what we might be thinking.

What are some of the advantages of using intuition in making decisions and why might it beat out slow careful deliberation?

Using intuition has several features to recommend it.

1. It is easy, requires no effort to assemble data, analyze that data, and deliberate decisions.

2. It is often much faster than deliberative or logical decision-making. By the time you get the research done the market opportunity may be passed and your competitor may be in charge.

3. Using intuition does not require deliberation, committee meetings or extensive testing.

4. We are often more confident in the results of our intuitive decisions because they – just feel right.

Taking the slow deliberative approach does not eliminate mistakes as any marketing research director should be able to tell you. Here are the problems with doing market research to use as a basis for your decisions.

1. The information you will get is often not what you wanted.

2. If you get the facts you want they might not be the ones you need.

3. Fully researching things may take too much time and cost too much

4. Even when you get all the facts, can afford the cost, get the info you were looking for it still might not tell you what you need to do.

The trends in products may take years to develop and a new introduction by a competitor could change the whole market overnight while you are doing research. Try applying this research model to your personal life.

A personality test may tell you if you have things in common with a potential partner but it does not guarantee success in the relationship. Making that cute guy or gal take a 5-hour personality test may just blow the whole deal even before you get to the first date.

There are times in our lives, both personal and professional when we just might need to trust our instincts and use that old friend intuition.

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel

Therapists have therapists – Who do pastors and priests see?

Posted on by
5

By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.

Church.
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com

Who is helping the helpers?

Therapists are encouraged to go for their own therapy. Rather than being a sign that there is something wrong with this professional, having someone you can talk to about your problems is recommended practice, and for good reason.

This got me thinking, wondering, which professionals who help others are encouraged to get help for themselves and who are too embarrassed, ashamed, or arrogant to get help for themselves.

Counselors need to have counselors. 

First, let’s talk about the counselor or therapist who goes for therapy, and then we will inquire about other professions.

Beginning counselors are encouraged to see another professional both as a part of the training process and ongoing after they are licensed. Being a helper is a stressful job and you would have to be pretty arrogant to think that once you become a professional you will not need to see someone for your own stuff.

Clients sometimes ask about this. I see it in the search terms from time to time. There is no reason to avoid a therapist who is going for personal counseling and in fact, we think this is a good thing. Many licensing boards feel it is so important that the counselor work on their own stuff that they allow us to count a certain number of hours of personal counseling towards licensure. This process is so important there is even a bonus of extra credit for some hours of personal therapy.

Many schools require counselors in training to go for their own counseling. Doctors see other doctors. Teachers take classes from other professionals and it just makes sense to take good care of yourself.

Drug counselors need help staying sober.

Substance Abuse Counselors have recognized this for a long time. They are at high risk of relapse by virtue of spending all day talking about drugs with their clients. Sponsors should have sponsors and therapists need to see another mental health professional.

In substance abuse counseling it is common, almost universal for the counselor to be in recovery and often they are still attending meetings.

Mental health staff needs self-care also.

What we do not hear nearly enough about is the number of mental health professionals who are in some form of mental health recovery. Our professional schools are still too under the influence of those Freudians who never self-disclose anything to anyone. But a whole bunch of mental health professionals has told me privately that they have struggled with or are in recovery from some mental illness or other. If not them then they have a relative or friend who has that issue.

Why else would you want to work in this field if you or someone you knew had not had to overcome an issue?

Incredibly that mental health professional who entered the field because someone helped them create a happy life, once they are in the field, becomes too embarrassed to talk about their own issues. Some have even been threatened with the loss of job or friends if they self-disclose this item. Peer counselors and members of self-help groups are at a special risk to think that having “fixed” themselves they can now stop working on themselves and just help others. This is a relapse waiting to happen.

If you work in this field, as a professional, a peer, or even a volunteer, you need to stay connected to a support system that can help your recovery and that may mean you need to continue to go to meetings or see a professional.

So what about other profession’s self-care?

It is Sunday, I wrote this on another day and scheduled it to appear later, but it is being posted on a Sunday. Which brings up the question – who – mostly works on Sundays?

The first thing that comes to mind is what about religious leaders?

One way of understanding churches and similar institutions is that they are hospitals for the spiritually sick. Many recovery programs include spirituality or religion as parts of the life that need to be included in your recovery plan.

So do religious leaders, pastors, priests, rabbis, Imam and so forth ever need spiritual guidance, or are those guys and gals that close to spiritual perfection? Far as I know there are relatively few perfect people on earth and the ones who think they are there, that they have arrived at perfection, they are at the highest risk of taking a wrong turn into thinking that they need to take over and do the job of being God.

Does anyone out there know – do pastors see other pastors? They can’t very well go to church can they, what with having to work every single Sunday.

I know that some denominations have a hierarchy and that the local pastor or priest has to report to a superior. Mostly that looks like running a business. How many viewers did your sermon get and how much was in the collection? What about real spiritual guidance?

Given the number of cases of child sexual abuse and the affairs of the clergy, one has to wonder. Pastors and Priests do, for the record, end up in rehab. We can’t tell you which ones. That is about confidentiality. It would appear that religious leaders have the same prohibition on self-disclosure therapists are encouraged to observe. They just seem able to hide it better than depressed psychotherapists.

What is up with us not wanting to admit that the caregiver sometimes needs help and that needing help sometimes does not disqualify you from being of service to others?

Related articles

Staying connected with David Joel Miller

Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!

My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.

Story Bureau.

Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.

Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.

As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.

Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.

Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.

Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.

Planned Accidents  The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.

Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.

What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?

Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.

For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller

Want the latest blog posts as they publish? Subscribe to this blog.

For videos, see: Counselorssoapbox YouTube Video Channel