True Love

Here in Oregon spring is in full bloom with warm days, later sunsets, floral color all around and birds building nests and feeding their young.  The changing of seasons can remind us that life is constantly changing.  If you are personally experiencing a tough season of life, this is especially good news.  Marital struggles improve  as couples perservere in their commitment, depression lifts, and anxiety and worries pass.  An emotion is never permanent, intense emotions that in a moment may seem …

Hold Me Tight by Sue Johnson is a great tool for couples to have and to work through on their own or in conjunction with marriage counseling.  Sue Johnson is the developer or Emotionally Focused Therapy which is a highly effective research based approach to marriage counseling and therapy.  Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) addresses the bond or connection that exists between couples.  Many conflicts, misunderstandings, or standoffs that couples get stuck in are really about how secure the attachment or …

A recent article in the NY Times interviewing Francine Shapiro the founder of EMDR discusses  the evidence that exists for the effectiveness of EMDR.  Check out this link to read about it:  (you may need to copy and paste it in your browser)http://consults.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/02/the-evidence-on-e-m-d-r/ Below is the link to the followup article to the one above again interviewing Dr. Francine Shapiro and giving a great and easy to follow explanation on how and why EMDR works and the supporting research for …

February is the month when we are prompted to think about “true love”.  What is true love?  I often hear people speak of love quantitatively as in “I love him/her sooo much”.  I think a much better measure of love is the quality of love rather than the quantity of it.  I notice that too often that love is conditional and causes many problems in relationships, particularly marriage relationships.  “I love him/her so much” often means “I feel good about …