The mini van in front of us threw on its brakes and came to a dead stop directly in front of us in the middle of a darkened interstate highway on Thanksgiving night. No emergency blinkers flashed an alarm. Before my husband and I could register what was happening, the front passenger-side door of the [...]
Standing with some colleagues in a crowded restaurant one night, a group of shirt & ties inquired our occupation. ‘We’re Rehab Counselors,’ we shouted over the cheers of the Phillies’s game. Confused, they glanced at each other, ‘But…you’re drinking!?’ as we responded, “Umm, yeah, and…?” Did we put down our Miller Lites and make a [...]
The Penn State community has been rocked by tragic allegations of the worst kind. Our collective hearts, thoughts, and prayers go out to victims of sexual abuse in our community and in every community. The allegations have exposed locally what is a global issue that needs serious and immediate attention by all of us. One [...]
It’s easy for some people to see that individuals who commit the heinous act of child sexual abuse are monsters. But human problems seldom, if ever, occur in isolation. Rather, they usually occur in context. And so is the case of the Penn State child sex abuse scandal. According to linguist and social activist Noam [...]
I am in the midst of teaching a course on social justice in which I use Sue and Sue’s (2008) well known text which requires an examination of areas of personal and systemic prejudice, bias and privilege. It is within this framework that I have been assessing the sexual abuse scandal at Penn State. Rereading [...]
“It’s the most wonderful time of year.” However, many people are in employment situations which are causing them grief and stress. For example, there are many people who are unemployed, and there are many high school and college students who are unsure of their college and career direction. So, as you gather together during the [...]
Trust is inherent in much of what we do. Faith, whether it being in a deity, person or program can make us feel safe to take giant leaps. A lack of faith can leave us feeling afraid to do even the most trivial thing. What is trust? It would appear that trust is defined differently [...]
On my last post I talked about the idea of doing your own work individually – see “Do your own work.” In that post I talk a lot about the “self” of the therapist and what that means. I acknowledged that there are ways to let things go and other ways to unburden the pile [...]
The views expressed here are solely those of the blog authors; they are not necessarily the views of the American Counseling Association.