By Tammy Blackard Cook, LCSW, CDWF Y’all, this is hard. None of us have been through anything like this before. For me, Brené Brown’s words and wisdom have always been a balm, so I was grateful to hear her new podcast “Unlocking Us.” Full disclosure: This post distills the first episode of “Unlocking Us” and [...]
As we enter the busy and sometimes over-focused Christmas and Hanukkah seasons, we offer these thoughts for consideration. Holidays can be times of joy and togetherness, yet it is so important to remember that not everyone is looking forward to the holidays. Some people are not surrounded by wonderful families. Some people are struggling during [...]
As part of Aspire’s move toward being a resiliency-focused counseling group, we are helping to train professionals in the Wake County Public School System in the Community Resiliency Model (CRM). CRM is a skills-based model that helps people bring their nervous system back into balance after periods of chronic stress or a traumatic event. What’s [...]
Time magazine recently ran a cover story titled “Anxiety, Depression and the American Adolescent: Why the Kids Are Not Alright,” which indicated 30% of girls and 20% of boys have had an anxiety disorder — that’s 6.3 million kids. Another three million have had a major depressive episode in the past year. The article asserts “adolescents [...]
My therapist probably (definitely) wouldn’t appreciate me saying this but, I suck at MANY things. From waking up on time to backflips to that stupid statistics class my junior year of college…there is a significantly long list of things I am inherently bad at. Recently, and probably more detrimental than my lack of backflipping skill, [...]
You may or may not be old enough to remember the 1975 Paul Simon hit song, 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover. In keeping with that idea, we want to give you some therapy goals headed in a positive direction — saving important love relationships, rather than losing them! In the spirit of the positive, we offer you 5 Ways to Keep [...]
Aspire has just announced its 2016 The Daring Way™ Residential Workshop dates! We are excited about leading another daring group of men and women toward more wholeheartedness, creativity, and love in their lives. It’s hard to put into words the power of these workshops, so we asked our past Daring Way™ workshop participants about their experience. Here [...]
In college, one of my favorite songs was the Indigo Girls’ “Closer to Fine.” The lyrics felt like freedom to me and still do: I’m trying to tell you somethin’ about my life Maybe give me insight between black and white And the best thing you’ve ever done for me Is to help me take [...]
The winter doldrums have set in, and most everyone I talk to is feeling it. Lately, I haven’t been practicing my own mix of mindfulness: yoga, hikes, dharma talks. It is, of course, exacerbating the winter blues and I have to get back to it. The thing is: We have to practice what we preach [...]
by Allison Grubbs, LCSW, LCAS, CDWF-Candidate “Me too.” Two of the most powerful words we can hear. You know the experience of sharing an “I thought it was just me” moment or thought… then the other person says, “yeah, me too!” It’s a feeling of relief — that someone gets it, that you’re not alone, that [...]
