Moral certainty and the true believer
Unfortunately, people who are filled with the Holy Spirit are often not satisfied simply to persuade. Sooner or later the need to coerce others into listening begins to surface. read more
View ArticleWhen all is said and done, more is said than done.
Look at the smiling bride and groom in their wedding pictures. Can you imagine that they will end up some years hence bored to distraction with each other? read more
View ArticleSense and sentimentality
The opposite of truth is not necessarily the lie. It can also be another form of dishonesty, namely sentimentality.read more
View ArticleThe role of chance in human affairs.
An important component of of our knowledge of how the world works is how to cope with the passage of time, especially the all-important process of knowing what to hold onto and what to relinquish....
View ArticleReflections on a massacre
True paranoia requires that we believe in a malign intent to injure us, to render us helpless, to take from us what is rightfully ours, to deprive us of our rights, our property, our freedomread more
View ArticleTiger mothers and the case for fear-based parenting
The debate takes place against a background of concern about narcissism and a sense of entitlement that, fairly or unfairly, are seen as implicit cultural values in 21st century America.read more
View ArticleIt is a sense of meaning that nourishes the soul
Pleasure is not the absence of pain; nor is health the absence of disease. It is what we do and who we are with that makes us happy. In a larger sense our mortality confronts us with questions of...
View ArticleThe best of compasses does not point to true north
Do you believe that people are basically good, inclined to fairness and generosity, or are they born selfish, and socialized only by the application of limit-setting and punishment? read more
View ArticleLies, loyalty, and fear
It is a challenge to maintain a sense of unity among a people as diverse as our own. There are many who would divide us for political or personal gain. But nothing has the power to unite us like fear....
View ArticleInfidelity and intimacy
Infidelity is more than a violation of a promise (“forsaking all others”) it is an unmistakable indicator of selfishness, on the part of someone in whom we have reposed our best hopes.read more
View ArticleFaith, fear, and philosophies of governance
Somewhere between the narcissistic belief that we individually are the center of the universe and the conception that we are actors in a preordained play stage-managed by God is a large area in which...
View ArticleAt the Heart of Anger is Sadness
Our political discourse has been degraded by the rise of an angry and self-righteous minority that thinks it is legitimate to impose their vision of the future through threats to damage our political...
View ArticleThe Risks of Being Honest with Ourselves
We search so hard for heroes to inspire us that the word hero itself has lost much of it meaning. Risk and choice are no longer required; simple competence or the putting on of a uniform is now...
View ArticleFear Lurks Behind Perfectionism
We are not taught by our parents or the culture that really good sex occurs in the context of a relationship in which the participants care about themselves and each other equally.read more
View ArticleYou Have Never Suffered Enough
And so we suffer twice: the broken lives and withered hopes inflicted by and upon the addicted in their relentless pursuit of the evanescent pleasure that substances produce AND the suffering we as a...
View ArticleAttachment Is the Source of All Suffering
How each of us confronts loss, in ourselves and in those we would help, defines us as few other attributes can. What we reveal in our attitudes toward grief and mourning determines whether we have...
View ArticleHonesty Is a Prerequisite for Courage
We cannot allow ourselves to be lied to, or worse, engage in a process of self-deception. In psychotherapy I am continually confronted with this problem. I point out to people that there are many...
View ArticleLove and Suffering
And yet the questions of why we are here, how best to live, and the meaning of human suffering remain answerable only by the bargains with life that each of us choose to strike.read more
View ArticleThe First Duty of Love Is to Listen
We are aware at some level that the ability to listen is highly correlated with other desirable traits such as kindness, unselfishness, and empathy. read more
View ArticleWhy should we support the troops?
They volunteered (albeit with insufficient information) to be where they are and do what they do. Like the Roman Legionnaires of old they have chosen to fight their country’s foreign wars. Whether they...
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