If you’ve ever had counseling, you most likely experienced negative or critical thoughts and feelings about your therapist. I’ve worked with fantastic therapists myself, and even they will strike a wrong note, or just say the wrong thing, in our work together. What to do?

Simple: tell the therapist. If you think I’m taking us into a topic or issue that’s not interesting, not helpful, or just plain irritating, let me know. Hard as I try, I’m not perfect and might take us down a path that just isn’t right. Not only is it okay for you to let me know, it’s actually a fundamental dimension of good therapy. It could even be a breakthrough moment for you: by confronting me with your concern about our work together, you gain experience connecting with another person on a difficult and painful topic. It’s a chance to practice courageous and healthy honesty. It’s good for both of us!

Often enough I can sense that we’re off track, and I’ll beat you to the punch. “Are you mad?” I asked a client a few weeks ago. “Yeah,” she said. “Are you mad at me?” “Yes,” she replied. And the conversation that followed was probably one of the most helpful experiences she had in our work together.

So…let me have it!

Like This Article? Please Bookmark It!

I admit it: I make fair-weather fans look like die-hards. I just don’t get excited about football. To be brutally honest, I don’t really know how to play it. (What’s a down? What’s a turnover? Sorry, but I am a football nonentity.) But for ten minutes every other year or so, I get excited. And I just had a fun ten minutes. Who dat?!

I think I am glad the Saints won mostly because I went to New Orleans last year and hold the city in a special place in my heart. And of course I love it whenever underdogs win. I’m not completely okay with this, though, since I’m from Minnesota and the Saints beat the Vikes the other week. But…this is good. Congratulations, New Orleans! You aren’t the Ain’ts anymore.

Like This Article? Please Bookmark It!

Sometimes I blog about issues related to general health and well-being. In that vein, today is World Vegetarian Day (and the first day of Vegetarian Awareness Month). I’ll let the organizers speak for themselves, but for me this is a day to do two things. First, yes, I will refrain from eating meat today. But more importantly, I will renew my commitment to being an informed consumer.

True confessions, I am not a vegetarian. But at the same time, I try to find a balance in my eating, which means that there are days and seasons when I refrain from certain foods, and abstain from alcohol. Most spiritual practices and religious traditions encourage some form of what I call “rhythmic eating,” which is a pattern of eating simply (or even fasting), and feast days when you absolutely say yes to French fries (my poison) and dessert. I trust this ancient wisdom.

And I am getting better and better at reading labels. For example, I thought for a long time that “cage-free” was better than “free-range” because it meant that the hens truly did have room to walk, flutter their wings, and do all the other things animals like to do. It turns out that “cage-free” is a more accurate term than “free-range,” but it doesn’t mean the animals were raised or treated more humanely. Now I know to look for the term “free-farmed.” (And I also know that eating animals and animal products is a lot more complicated–and problematic–than I thought.)

So take some time today to pay attention to your diet, and your relationship with all living things. Happy World Vegetarian Day.

Like This Article? Please Bookmark It!

I think I’m on a roll. This is my second political post in a row. I made it through all of 2008–a huge political year!–without talking politics on this blog, but this summer there are too many crucial issues being debated for me to stay silent. The first was the White House being inconsistent and unhelpful regarding DOMA and DADT. And the second is Referendum 71.

I’ve found out that it’s hard to get information about Referendum 71 and how it came into being. This webpage gives you a lot of different takes on the complicated story. But the basics are these:

1) the Washington State Legislature passed–and Governor Chris Gregoire signed–a measure expanding the rights of registered domestic partners in the state of Washington;

2) registered domestic partners are not only same-sex couples, but also heterosexual persons who live as domestic partners, are not romantically involved, and do not want to marry because they would lose government-funded health benefits if their marital status changed;

3) a group of citizens tried to collect enough signatures to put this law–written and signed, as noted above, by the people’s duly-elected representatives–up to a public vote; and finally,

4) a yes vote will preserve the original law, and by extension the rights of domestic partners across the state. (And by “rights” I mean decidedly non-radical things like the right to visit your partner in the hospital, or the right to decide who gets your stuff when you die.)

Oh, and I should mention that there are legal actions being taken that call into question the validity of many of the signatures that got Ref-71 onto the ballot in the first place.

I have at least two problems with Ref-71, and I suppose at this point in the post you know what they are! The first is the basic question of justice and fairness. My partner and I are registered as domestic partners, and while certain people might like you to think that this means we’re dangerous radicals, all it really means is that we enjoy all of the rights of married heterosexual couples, with the exception of saying that we are “married.” As citizens of this state, and of this nation, we simply enjoy the right to choose our kin, the right to manage any health crisis we might suffer, the right to decide what happens after one of us dies.

And now, because of fear, misunderstanding and ignorance, those rights are in jeopardy.

But that’s not all. My second concern has to do with the fact that a certain number of citizens are trying to second-guess a law written, passed, and signed by the elected representatives who were sent to Olympia by all of us. It’s not the second-guessing itself that I object to: please understand, I think that dissent is a crucial part of a healthy democracy. It’s that they’re trying to do an end run around the system. They know they don’t have the votes in the Legislature, and they know Gov. Gregoire doesn’t share their views. Unseating all the public servants who oppose them would take a long time, and be very hard to do. So they’re trying to bring down this law using the undemocratic method of a referendum.

It’s clever, really. A referendum seems to be democratic. What could be more democratic than having every citizen participate in a state-wide show of hands? But it’s not. For more on why it’s undemocratic, go here. But I’ll say briefly (because this post is pretty long already, and maybe starting to sound like a rant!) that we don’t live in a pure democracy. We live in a democratic republic. And only in a democratic republic do all the voices have a forum in which to be heard. Minority rights aren’t protected in a pure democracy. In a pure democracy, whoever motivates 51% of the crowd wins. That’s why our forbears took such trouble to construct a form of government that functions more fairly, and with more stability.

So I encourage you to vote “yes” on Referendum 71. The next rights to be questioned and denied could be your own.

(And thanks for listening to my rant!)

Like This Article? Please Bookmark It!

For some reason I haven’t been paying a lot of attention to news articles over the past few months about the Obama Administration and its positions on the “Defense of Marriage”* Act (DOMA) and the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.

Maybe it’s just that I had a busy summer. But I’m now starting to take an interest. And I’m not surprised to tell you that my favorite take on the issues was written by Hendrik Hertzberg. He summarizes the facts, offers a good analysis of how the Administration got itself into this mess, and states well the consequences of further inaction.

I tend to be a moderate, politically speaking (firmly left-of-center, and I was quite sorry to see Ted Kennedy leave the scene, but a moderate nonetheless). And I understand that Obama is tackling a lot of problems right now. Just today I said to someone that Obama didn’t just take over managing the store, he took it over while the building was on fire, a hurricane was hitting the town, and someone was holding up the cash register. Still, I don’t understand why–at a bare minimum–the White House and the Department of Justice can’t be more consistent, and more progressive, on the issue of GLBT civil rights. I understand some of the moderate-to-conservative arguments about the issue–that we can’t legislate our way through issues like this. (Though I disagree.) And I understand the political realities Obama faces. I would even understand if he and his staff are being a little superstitious: President Clinton tackled both gay rights and health care in his first year, and that didn’t go well. No, not at all.

But it’s time. It’s time for this new president to honor the promises he made to the GLBT community. I have little doubt that sometime this fall a health-care reform bill will become law. And as a health-care provider, I look forward to that. But the civil rights of GLBT Americans must also be asserted, and protected.

* I just couldn’t resist putting “Defense of Marriage” in quotation marks, since in my view DOMA does nothing to defend marriage, no matter how you define the word.

UPDATE: View the comments section for an interesting back-and-forth on the word “moderate.”

Like This Article? Please Bookmark It!

I’m feeling a little curmudgeonly today, so I want to talk about the pop-culture use of the word “schizophrenic.” To borrow a phrase from someone I admire and respect, I want to say this to our whole culture: “You keep using this word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.”

If you hold opposite beliefs, or do contradictory things, you are not being “schizophrenic.” If you’re a Gemini who loves a great joke but also has a serious side, you are not “schizophrenic.” If you have a taste for both country music and Chopin, you are not “schizophrenic.” The appropriate disease metaphor would be “dissociative-identity disorder,” formerly known as “multiple-personality disorder.” (But then, is it really appropriate to use these serious illnesses as metaphors for ordinary contradictory behaviors?)

Here ends my rant. (And I’m actually in a fairly good mood!) It’s just something that has rankled me for years and years.

UPDATE: A friend tells me that the #2 definition of ‘schizophrenia’ in Webster’s Dictionary is, “noun: the presence of mutually contradictory or antagonistic parts or qualities.” Okay, well, I think they put that in there because people have used the word this way so much that this definition has finally gained official sanction. I see it’s definition #2, though, so I stand by my opinion. (But thanks for the tip, N.!)

Like This Article? Please Bookmark It!

How I love air-conditioning! I’m camped out in my office, reflecting on the blessing and gift of AC. And yes, I understand the terrible irony of it: air-conditioning puts carbon in the atmosphere, which leads to global warming, which leads to wacky weather that plagues the Northwest with desert temperatures, the Southeast with drought, and the Northeast with floods. Ideally we humans will figure out how to cool ourselves–and transport ourselves, and warm ourselves, and everything else we do–without making the whole situation worse. But for now, I hope you can understand that I’m choosing to enjoy a few hours of AC.

If you’re interested in my take on the ethics involved, read further.

(more…)

Like This Article? Please Bookmark It!

We’re in the–what is it now?–fourth or fifth day of the heat wave? Or is it ten or twelve? I know it hasn’t rained properly for three months. Yesterday it was at least 97 degrees, if not higher in some places. My household has been camping out in the basement at night. The dogs go on shorter walks, much earlier in the morning. Lots of ice cubes in their water dishes. And still–it’s way too hot.

I have relatives in Arizona, and I wonder if they would laugh at this. 97 degrees?! That’s spring weather, right? And my relatives in Minnesota would point out that they have 90-degree weather at some point every summer, and lots of humidity to boot.

I don’t care. It’s really hard for Seattlites to handle extreme weather. We don’t have enough air conditioners, or snow plows. Most of us moved here because we enjoy temperate weather. And if you think we’re wimps, I would only introduce you to Arizonans and Minnesotans who can’t endure the Seattle rain. It’s always hard to deal with something that’s both uncomfortable and unfamiliar.

On top of the weather–or is it because of the weather?–there seem to have been a few more crime stories in the last few days. Three murders, one of them about a mile from my house. And a disturbing story of cruelty that really threw me. I’m not the type to panic when a string of stories like these come out, and I know that awful things happen when the weather is nice. But I do have a sense that the city is really feeling strung out right now. Tempers are short, and it really, really is *hot*.

All of which leads to this advice: don’t push yourself too hard this week. Take the weather seriously. If you don’t live in air-conditioning, take advantage of it whenever you can. Wear lots of sunscreen. And above all, drink lots of water! For Seattlites, 97 degrees is really awful. It’s something that can lead to injury–even tragedy. Be careful out there!

P.S. My office is air-conditioned! Come on in for a session!

Like This Article? Please Bookmark It!

I just returned to Seattle after a week-long service project in New Orleans. Our group worked on homes in the Gentilly and Upper Ninth Ward areas of the city, north and east of downtown. We managed to get to the French Quarter a couple of times, since the trip wasn’t all work and no play. (That just wouldn’t go over well in the Big Easy.)

I was glad to do this. It was the first time I’ve done several things–hanging Sheetrock on a ceiling, nailing siding on a house, mudding and sanding and priming walls, laying ceramic tile. I was glad to make a small contribution to the cause. The homeowners we worked with are proud of their city and see their return home as a way to honor their heritage. After all, New Orleans is a city where generations of families spanning three hundred years have chosen to stay and flourish. To move to Houston (or Seattle, for that matter) in the wake of a hurricane is a momentous decision for a New Orleanian. The culture of the Crescent City is not big on the notion of diaspora.

And yet, I had a divided heart about our work. The map below, from 1728, roughly thirty years into the history of New Orleans, shows how the city was wholly confined to what we now call the French Quarter. There’s high ground around the Quarter, hugging the north bank of the Mississippi, but fully 80% of New Orleans was devastated (or completely destroyed) by Katrina. And that 80% was built on drained swamps. When you walk up to a levee, you can see the river (or Lake Pontchartrain) standing high above the streets and neighborhoods behind you. It’s unsettling. It’s not unreasonable to ask why–even in light of the great heritage of the New Orleanians who long so desperately to come home–we rebuild here.

One of my work partners was insightful about it. She said that it’s obviously much harder and less sensible to build houses below sea level, but it’s not really an unusual thing for humans to do. Across the world we’ve built cities in the unlikeliest of places–scorching desert, frigid tundra, and atop earthquake fault lines, to name just three. New Orleans is no different. It’s harder to build here than, say, Lincoln, Nebraska. But not everyone wants to live in Nebraska.

Whatever my thoughts and feelings about all this, it was gratifying to go to another part of the world and lend a hand. And I also had this thought: it may not have been as much about the actual work as much as simply being present with our fellow citizens in New Orleans. A catastrophe like Hurricane Katrina is a once-in-a-century body blow to a city, and whether or not you want to lay bathroom tile, your simple presence (and yes, the money you spend on a sazerac), is treasured.

But if you’re like me, you won’t go until later in the year. It is *muggy* down there right now!

Like This Article? Please Bookmark It!