I Hate Hugging: Getting Over the Fear of Intimacy
“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.” ~E.E. Cummings
I was a shy kid. My mom said that when I was in pre-school, the teacher asked all of the kids to hold hands and I …
Category “love & relationships”
10 Ways Overcome Conflicts in Relationships and Grow Together
“You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.” ~Jon Kabat-Zinn
About six months into a serious relationship with my boyfriend, we started experiencing major conflict. Fighting over small things, flipping out over misunderstandings, we just couldn’t seem …
Knowing When to Walk Away from Unrequited Love
“Love does not obey our expectations; it obeys our intentions.” ~Lloyd Strom
To say that love hasn’t obeyed my expectations would be the understatement of the century.
I have not been lucky in love. I’ve been blessed with some amazing …
Choose Love, Choose Life
“I believe that every single event in life that happens is an opportunity to choose love over fear.” ~Oprah Winfrey
Facing fear came in the form of the death of my father in 1997. He was diagnosed HIV positive and …
Why We Sometimes Choose Judgment Instead of Compassion
“In separateness lies the world’s great misery, in compassion lies the world’s true strength.” ~Buddha
We talk about boys these days at our dinner table.
Boys are sneaking into our home now—or at least the idea of boys. Although I …
Lost Love: What It Means to Move On
“‘Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.” ~Alfred Lord Tennyson
I met a special someone. It was my first taste of love and I was sheepishly drunk with it. His were eyes I …
11 Ways to Turn Strangers into Friends
“Fear makes strangers of people who would be friends.” ~Shirley Maclaine
Up until a year ago, I saw the world as a place where very few doors opened for me. At first I thought it was due to being …
Love is a Choice: 30 Ways to Love in Action
“We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.” ~Sam Keen
I recently went with girlfriends to hear one of our favorite beach bands play. Since I turn into a …
4 Simple Tips for Confronting Someone Who Hurt You
“To get something you never had, you have to do something you never did.” -Unknown
For many years I maintained a relationship that I was not happy with. I’m sure a lot of people have been there, or are there …
How to Maintain a Relationship with a Loved One Who’s Hurt You
“Forgiveness does not change the past, but it does enlarge the future.” ~Paul Boese
In a previous post about forgiveness, I mentioned that I spent years holding onto anger toward someone who hurt me repeatedly years ago.
I eventually …
How to Help Someone Feel Loved and Understood
“The most basic of all human needs is the need to understand and be understood. The best way to understand people is to listen to them.” ~Ralph Nichols
Did you know that one in ten U.S adults suffer from depression? …
21 Ways to Build Strong Friendships
“To have a friend and be a friend is what makes life worthwhile.” ~Unknown
I lost my beloved husband from complications following a routine surgery. His sudden death changed every facet of my life and rocked me to my knees. …
How to Deal with a Break Up
“No feeling is final.” ~Rainer Maria Rilke
I met him the last semester of college and was instantly attracted to him. I was definitely attracted to him physically, but it was the way he sat in class with such quiet …
How to Set Healthy Boundaries: 3 Crucial First Steps
“You change for two reasons: Either you learn enough that you want to, or you’ve been hurt enough that you have to.” ~Unknown
I learned about boundary work when I was teaching in the NYC jails with male prisoners.
After …
10 Ways to Love the People in Your Life
“At the end of life, our questions are very simple: Did I live fully? Did I love well?” ~Jack Kornfield
We all grow up with some healthy stories about love and some unhealthy ones. I learned some beautiful, life-giving ideas …
Lose Control to Find Closeness in Your Relationships
“Always be mindful of the kindness and not the faults of others” ~Buddha
In these hectic and often chaotic times, for most people (controllers included), the need for intimate, close bonds with friends and family is more important than ever …
How the Differences in Your Relationship Can Be Gifts
“We need not think alike to love alike.” ~Ferenc David
Our commonalities were small, insignificant perhaps, but being in high school, we were both uninterested in comparing notes on religious beliefs or political affiliation. I appreciated his humor and he …
Get Connected: How to Expand Your Offline Social Network
“Strangers are friends you have yet to meet.” ~Unknown
We are living in times of massive change.
Looking at some of the problems we are facing—the crumbling economy, environmental pollution, wars over scarce resources—sometimes the idea of moving far away …
10 Ways to Create a Strong, Intimate Relationship
“We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.” -~Sam Keen
Before I married my wonderful husband, I dated a lot of men. For most of my 20s (and even …
Why Judging People Makes Us Unhappy
“It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.” ~Henry David Thoreau
A friend of mine likes to joke that dying will be a relief because it will put an end to the “heavy burden of judging,” …
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