Blog
Creative Coping Strategies For COVID-19
Creative Coping Strategies For COVID-19 Basics! Take care of your health: Be sure to rest, get some exercise, and eat as well as you can. Do 15-20 min of exercise a day—walk in place, do an online yoga or aerobic video, walk up and down stairs, lift up soup cans,...
CBT or Pluralism – which works?
NCBI - US National Library of Medicine - Frontiers in Psychiatry - “Gold Standards,” Plurality and Monocultures: The Need for Diversity in Psychotherapy - Published online 2018 Apr 24 Back when I was in graduate school studying for my Masters in...
Is it possible to be grateful in the midst of suffering?
Greater Good Magazine – How Gratitude Can Help thru Hard Times Robert Emmons - Published May 13, 2013. Gratitude does not eliminate pain. It cannot cure suffering. But it can heal it – allowing the suffering to contribute to a meaningful and life-affirming...
Make Peace with Your Unlived-life
Harvard Business Review – Psychology – “Make Peace with Your Unlived-life” - December 21, 2016 There’s no statute of limitations on “identity crisis”. Oddly, our culture seems to endorse a belief that once we cross the threshold out of young adulthood, we have...
We Can’t Just Let Boys Be Boys
Locker rooms are not the place to learn about sexual ethics. Neither is the internet. Furry is a political weapon. Women are wielding it. Peggy Orenstein, in her NYT Op Ed brings out the big guns with “We Can’t Just Let Boys Be Boys: Locker rooms are not the...
How Does Talk Therapy Work?
How Psychotherapy Retrains the Brain to Expect (and Feel) Better - June 5, 2017 • By Alex Afram, PhD, GoodTherapy.org Infant attachment styles are emergent responses to threatened loss of a caretaker. The pattern displayed provides an intuitive and emotionally...
Do Psychiatric Service Dogs Really Help Veterans?
Psychology Today - Do Psychiatric Service Dogs Really Help Veterans with PTSD? - Hal Herzog Ph.D. - February 15, 2018 There’s a mighty lot of mumbling these days about “service dogs” and “emotional support animals.” For those folks who love dogs, there’s no doubt that...
Emotionally Intelligent Friendships
This Is How To Make Emotionally Intelligent Friendships: 6 Secrets - Eric Barker If you follow any of Brené Brown’s research, you have heard her lament over and over again that Americans are in a crisis of disconnection, that the polarization of society has led...
Selling Bad Therapy to Trauma Victims
Jonathan Shedler - Articles on Trauma Guidelines and Long-term Treatment Sadly, the prestigious American Psychological Association (APA) recently released new guidelines for treating trauma. Most therapists experienced in treating people impacted by trauma are...
“Winter Blues”, or Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
“Winter Blues”, or Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) With the longer nights and cooler days approaching, you may be noticing a shift in your energy. Like most in the animal kingdom, you are hardwired to respond to the change in season. Energy turns inward,...
Ecstasy could be ‘breakthrough’ therapy for soldiers, others suffering from PTSD
WashingtonPost – Health & Science - Ecstasy could be ‘breakthrough’ therapy for soldiers, others suffering from PTSD – William Wan – Published: August 26, 2017 Feels like groundhog day. Washington Post correspondent, William Wan, recently wrote an article...
How Therapy Reduces Shame and Helps Us Access the Freedom of Adulthood
GoodTherapy.org – How Therapy Reduces Shame and Helps Us Access the Freedom of Adulthood - By Alex Afram, PhD – August 7, 2017 As I read the blog post, I find my mind drawn to wondering about the set of clients with whom I have worked over the years who have...
Thoughts
HuffPost - The Blog - Don’t Believe Everything You Think: 5 Tips for a Happier Mind - By James McCrae William James wrote, “The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.” Victor Frankl wrote, “Between stimulus and...
You’re Too Busy. You Need a ‘Shultz Hour.’
The NY Times – Opinion Pages - You’re Too Busy. You Need a ‘Shultz Hour.’ - By David Leonhardt – Published: April 18, 2017 If there were one thing you could NOT do that would allow you to think more strategically and arrive at solutions to life’s more...
A heart shattered – If you can’t feel it, you can’t heal it
The NY Times - Prince Harry Says He Sought Counseling Over His Mother’s Death - By Hannah Olivennes – Published: April 17, 2017 People who have never fully confronted – and grieved – the pain of their early-on heartbreak cling to their hope that perhaps,...
Six Ways To Get Back On Track In Your Relationship
Six Ways To Get Back On Track In Your Relationship – Deborah Fox’s Blog – Published: March 22nd, 2017 In the therapy room, it's natural to become immersed in the "why?"s of our own behaviors. We become deeply curious about the obstacles that are generated by...
Somatization: Is What I’m Feeling All in My Head?
GoodTherapy.org - Somatization: Is What I’m Feeling All in My Head? By Maury Joseph, PsyD, Topic Expert Contributor – Published: August 30, 2016 Maury Joseph concisely explains the mind-body connection and its implications on physical health. “The fact that emotional...
You’re making me believe in hope.
My clients tend to think I’ll be surprised when they cancel a session. The truth is, I’m surprised when they show up. In fact, it amazes me whenever anyone chooses to go to therapy. Think about it. When you go to therapy, you’re choosing to be vulnerable. You’re...
Can Attachment Theory Explain All Our Relationships?
New York Magazine – The Cut – Can Attachment Theory Explain All Our Relationships? – By Bethany Saltman It seems like cultural progress that many people, particularly people interested in either raising children or people interested in their own intimate...
Envy camouflaged by shame…
A barely audible engine humming in the back of my brain scans these days to understand the impetus of the anti-Hillary vitriol. Envy camouflaged by shame seems to be a critical ingredient. Brené Brown’s observation, below, seems to be elucidating. "Show me a woman...
Are You in Despair? That’s Good
The New York Time – Sunday Review - Are You in Despair? That’s Good - Gray Matter - By Lisa Feldman Barrett – June 3, 2016 OK…so while this NYT article by Lisa Feldman Barrett has an unfortunate title, it presents a very valuable concept: that emotional granularity...
Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person
The New York Time – Sunday Review – Opinion - Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person - By Alain de Botton - May 28, 2016 A client sent this article to me, reporting that, as he read it, he was sure that I had written it. On oath, it was not me. But, it does sound a lot...
Wise Habits of Supremely Happy People
LinkedIn Pulse - Dr. Travis Bradberry – Posted: May 4th, 2016 Dr. Travis Bradberry, Coauthor of Emotional Intelligence 2.0 & President at TalentSmart, recently posted Wise Habits of Supremely Happy People, in which he offers a synopsis of the theory behind...
48 Things Women Hear In A Lifetime (That Men Just Don’t)
48 Things Women Hear In A Lifetime (That Men Just Don’t) - HUFFPOST WOMEN - Jessica Samakow & Oliver Noble - Published 12/08/2015 Can The White House Explode the Barbie Myth? Michelle Obama is spearheading an initiative to challenge gender stereotypes. How can we...
Walking Together for Health and Spirit
The New York Times, The Opinion Pages – “Walking Together for Health and Spirit” – By David Bornstein – April 5, 2016 I’m hopeful when I’m walking. I’m courageous when I’m walking. I’m powerful when I’m walking. I’m connected to my community when I’m walking. I’m...
7 Signs You Grew Up With A Toxic Parent & Didn’t Know It
7 Signs You Grew Up With A Toxic Parent & Didn't Know It | JR Thorpe | Bustle.com - Lifestyle | Published: December 14, 2015 JR Thorpe knows a lot about toxic parents. She grew up with one. Toxic parents can be intentionally malevolent, but more often, they're...
“The Good Life”
"The Good Life" | Robert Waldinger | TEDxBeaconStreet | Published: November 30, 2015 The YouTube video titled “The Good Life” is an inspiring talk from Bob Waldinger who is the current director of the oldest longitudinal study ever undertaken (75 years). The study...
Everything You Need, You Have
Cognitive Therapy for the Country
The New York Times, Sunday Review - "Cognitive Therapy for the Country" - Richard Friedman In Richard Freidman's NYT op-ed he calls for President Obama to be our Cognitive Therapist in Chief. Premise (not part of the article, but is at it's core): The limbic brain...
The Myth that Millennials are coddled
Enough already about the terrible college students of today. Jeffrey Slingo’s Washington Post article, Helicopter Parents Are Not The Only Problem. Colleges Coddle Students, Too is a classic. Clueless, condemning, and poorly researched reflections from a disconnected...
Karenna Armington, LICSW
Call me for your complimentary 15 minute phone consultation at (202) 510-1141 or email me at Karenna@ArmingtonTherapy.com. My office is conveniently located next to the Woodley Park-Zoo-Adams Morgan Metro station.