<![CDATA[  Windows of Opportunity Counseling Services - Evelyn's Blog ]]>Thu, 17 May 2012 15:06:08 -0800Weebly<![CDATA[Some Principles That Help Keep Couples Together by John Gottman, Ph.D]]>Thu, 10 May 2012 09:49:44 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2012/05/some-principles-that-help-keep-couples-together-taken-from-john-gottmans-phd-books.html Why is marriage so stressful at times? And how can we prevent a marriage from going bad or rescue one that already has? After 40 years of research, John Gottman, Ph.D. has answered these questions. Here is what he says:
 
1. Enhance Your Love Maps: Emotionally close couples are familiar with each other’s world. They know the major events in each other’s history, and they keep updating their information.

2. Nurture Fondness & Admiration: Fondness and admiration are two of the most crucial elements in a long-lasting romance.

3. Turn Toward Each Other: In relationships people make requests for their partner’s attention, affection, and  support. People either turn toward one another in response to these requests or they turn away. Turning toward is the basis of emotional connection, romance, passion, and a good sex life. It creates secure attachment.

4. Let Your Partner Influence You: The happiest, most stable marriages are those in which the husband treats his wife with respect and does not resist sharing power and decision making with her.

5. Solve Your Solvable Problems: Work together as a team to attack problems not each other goes a lone way.

6. Honor Each Others' Dreams: Support each other in your goals and dreams.

7. Create Shared Meaning: Marriage and relationships can have an intentional sense of shared purpose, meaning, family values, and cultural legacy that forms a shared inner life.

Taken fromSeven Principles for Making Marriage Work, By Dr. John Gottman PhD. and Nan Silver, Three Rivers Press, 1999. For further information on practical, research-based relationship tools for couples, contact The Gottman Institute at www.gottman.com and visit www.gottsex.com.

 


]]><![CDATA[Basic Human Need]]>Thu, 10 May 2012 09:31:34 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2012/05/basic-human-need.htmlI often get people questioning whether or not it is okay to need their spouse or partner. I hear, "Doesn't that make me needy? Aren't suppose to be able to handle this by myself?" I think people ask this because we have been trained in our culture that independence is the epitome of maturity. Children are dependent. Adults should be independent. Sadly as a result, this need for others as a close reference points has been generally dismissed and even ignored as an extremely important aspect of emotional and physical health. It is important and we do have proof! Needing and being needed are two very human qualities. Love and being loved is wired into our physiology.
]]><![CDATA[Relationships Tips by Dr. Nicastro]]>Tue, 27 Dec 2011 15:49:04 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2011/12/relationships-tips-by-dr-nicastro.htmlTaken from: http://www.strengthenyourrelationship.com/
by Dr. Nicastro who pulled together all the expert advise.

1. Couples need to set up a clear boundary around their relationship—this boundary involves saying “no” to the influences that can undermine your relationship.

2. Healthy marriages/relationships require balance between having shared couple-experiences that will feed the relationship while at the same time nurturing their individual interests and pursuits.

3. Without a clear expression of commitment to the relationship, trust and emotional security will suffer. A strong relationship foundation is built on mutual commitment.

4. Direct, clear communication should always be a top priority.

5. Being attuned to your needs, wants and desires is the first step in getting them met—when you’re unclear about your own needs, how can your spouse/partner ever meet them?

6. Not everything needs to be discussed, analyzed and “processed” between partners. Letting go, giving your partner the benefit of the doubt, and practicing forgiveness will go a long way in creating a fulfilling relationship.

7. Words have the power to build empathic bridges between partners, and words also have the power to hurt and create a wasteland of distance between you. Choose your words wisely.

8. Important issues that are repeatedly ignored, minimized or go underground will resurface with a vengeance. A healthy relationship requires facing uncomfortable issues from time to time.

9. Like a wildfire, emotional wounding and defensiveness can spiral out of control and quickly consume a relationship.  Couples need to be mindful of the negative cycles that arise in their relationship.

10. Deliberately creating positive experiences and interactions between the two of you (while facing the uncomfortable issues that need to be addressed) should be an ongoing priority.

11. Emotional intimacy and closeness are built upon both partners being consistent, emotionally available and responsive to one another.

12. Expecting to get all (or even most) of your needs met whenever you want is like expecting the weather to change based upon your whims and preferences.  Unrealistic expectations lead to unhappy marriages/relationships.

13. For some, emotional closeness is a prerequisite for sexual intimacy; for others, sexual intimacy leads to emotional intimacy.

14. Passion and fulfilling sex often needs to be talked about, planned and negotiated (a lack of sexual spontaneity isn’t necessarily a sign of marital/relationship problems).

15. What makes you feel loved and emotionally connected may be very different from what makes your partner feel loved and emotionally close. Communicating and understanding these differences can go a long way in improving your relationship.

16. Certain differences between your and your partner’s communication styles and emotional expressiveness need to be accepted. You can’t make an introvert outgoing, and likewise, don’t expect an extrovert to happily sit home every evening.

17. Friendships are built on joint activities and common interests. In addition to being lovers, couples need to learn to be friends.

18. Couples who actively practice gratitude and appreciation feel a deep sense of connection with one another. It’s too easy to simply focus on what bothers you about your mate while ignoring why you fell in love with him/her in the first place.

19. While a relationship obviously takes two committed people, one person can make a difference in improving the overall quality of the relationship.

20. Fulfilling, healthy relationships are co-created, not found. Couples who work together (at keeping their relationship strong) are more likely to stay together.

While it can be easy to feel overwhelmed by the information presented in this article, remember that you can pick one or two items from the above list and began implementing them into your relationship right away. As a marriage/couples counselor, I’ve seen couples make big differences in their relationship with a simple and relatively small change—the goal is to be consistent and persistent with whatever positive change you’re trying to make.

]]><![CDATA[Mindfulness and Meditation: Day 30 and Beyond]]>Sun, 04 Dec 2011 12:23:05 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2011/12/mindfulness-and-meditation-day-30-and-beyond.html“Nothing can be more important than being able to choose the way we think.” -EKNATH EASWARAN

I am glad I switched my mediation mantra to something in English. If you want to get something out of it, I guess it makes sense to reflect on something in your own language. Who knew? Anyhow, what I have found just in the few days I have been focusing on the St. Francis invocation is that when I am out and about in the crowded public and get frustrated with people, as I sometimes do, the words to the quote I am meditating on come up and help me put things in perspective and remind me of my renewed chosen purpose.

For example, my greatest challenge these days is right before my once-a-week 8:15 pm yoga class begins. I get there early so I can stretch a bit and then just be at peace. The class is crowded and often there are many new people there. It is the end of the day. I am a bit tired and less patient than usual.

Consequently, I struggle to keep my sense of internal peace. In this late and often overcrowded class, many seem to disregard all the nicely designed posters which state the studio's practice rules: 1) Silence in the Yoga Room (never happens), 2) No Cell Phones in the Yoga Room (never happens; instead, we get texting, checking email, and phones ringing right up until class begins and sometimes even after it begins), and 3) Please Make Sure Your Bags Are Not in the Yoga Room But in the Locker Rooms (never happens; the back of the room looks like a teenager's messy closet). The teachers periodically remind us of the rules. No one listens. Hence, I (at least in my mind) become a "Yoga Nazi." I grumble; I complain; I sigh. Not a good way to start out the class.

What I found last Thursday night before class is that when internal grumblings and rumblings started up within my mind, rather than letting them go on and on and allowing myself to get frustrated, I was able to acknowledge and notice my emotion, and then my mind immediately brought up a phase from the passage I had been meditating upon earlier in the day: "May I be an instrument of peace. May I not so much seek to be understood as to understand." This permitted me to step back and take a different and more compassionate perspective not only on others in the class but with myself as well. I could then decide how I wanted to think about the situation and respond. It was nice. I felt calmer and more in control. I definitely plan on making meditation a regular part of my life. I can see it bringing more goodness and vitality into my life and relationships. I highly recommend it to all.

For more on self awareness see: 7 Steps to Develop Awareness.

]]><![CDATA[Meditation: Days 24-28]]>Mon, 28 Nov 2011 13:51:08 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2011/11/mediation-days-24-28.html “The secret of meditation is simple: you become what you meditate on. When you use an inspirational passage every day in meditation, you are driving the words deep into your consciousness. Eventually they become an integral part of your personality, which means they will find constant expression in what you do, what you say, and what you think.” 

– Eknath Easwaran 

"Whatever is true, whatever is right, whatever is bound to be excellent, let your mind dwell on these things."

- The Bible

I am in a place in my life now (I have hit the over 50 mark) were I realize that life is short and I really want my attitude, actions, and reactions to bring about good in the world, both personally and professionally. Over the past 12 years, I have had a mother who died at 62, two friends die at 52, and a more distant relative die at 38. In addition, in the past few years I have seen several women I know undergo breast cancer treatment. As a result, it is important for me to have a purpose-driven life and a life-enhancing existence.

During my week off this past week, two things really scared me and made me think about having a positive impact in our world. The first was watching the Maury show on TV. I never watch daytime TV but I was home and so I did. What I saw was unreal. Maybe it was fake, I do not know. The style of interaction and the yelling and posturing concerned me deeply. The second was the news item about the woman who pepper-sprayed people at Wal-Mart over a game. Just seeing the crowds fighting over the X-Box disturbed me. Wow. What has become of Americans?

I guess I think something needs to change in this country but feel a bit powerless to do anything that would affect our country on a grand scale. Therefore, I have decided that rather than feel overwhelmed, I would continue my meditation but change my mantra to my most favorite prayer by St. Francis of Assisi. I think the intentions in this prayer are universal and applicable to those who believe in God and to those who do not. Just doing this prayer of intention has helped me stay focused on the good I can do making me feel more empowered and less discouraged about humankind. I feel peaceful and more focused as a result.

Below is my (Evelyn's) edited non-religious version:

"May I be an instrument of peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; Where there is injury, pardon; Where there is doubt, faith; Where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; Where there is sadness, joy.

May I not so much seek to be consoled as to console, To be understood as to understand, to be loved as to love another; For it is in giving that we receive; It is in pardoning that we are pardoned; It is in dying to our false self that we give birth to the true self and bring vitality into our world."

Great Article on Mediation!

]]><![CDATA[Meditation and Mindfulness: Day 6-24 ]]>Fri, 25 Nov 2011 19:39:46 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2011/11/meditation-and-mindfulness-day-6-24.htmlWell. I have been pretty consistent and the overall experience has been good. I am realizing that it is important to set aside a regular time for this practice or the day goes by and then it is gone and then it is bed time and you realize you forgot to mediate. Whoops! Consequently, I have had to remind myself that this is an experiment not a competition. And as with yoga, I remind myself to be gentle on myself.

What have I learned or experienced? I guess the biggest thing I have noticed as a result of this practice is that I am more aware of my automatic responses or thoughts to things and how easy it is to judge things and get caught up in negativity. As a result, I have been able to catch myself, reassess my response, and correct it before it gets going in the wrong direction. It has been interesting for me to see how easy it is to automatically assign attributions to objective data or interpretations to feeling tones that come up in the body without slowing down and thinking things through. 

Reflecting upon this experience, I think, if we slow things down we have better control of how we think, feel, respond, and what we create in our universe. We have a deeper and more profound ability to choose to do good rather than harm. According to Rick Hansen in Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, and Wisdom, this is the beginning of virtue.


“By virtue of being human, each of us has the capacity to choose, to change, to grow.”

And to thrive, may I add!

“The secret of meditation is simple: you become what you meditate on. When you use an inspirational passage every day in meditation, you are driving the words deep into your consciousness. Eventually they become an integral part of your personality, which means they will find constant expression in what you do, what you say, and what you think.”

– Eknath Easwaran

]]><![CDATA[Meditation and Mindfulness: A 30 Day Challenge]]>Fri, 11 Nov 2011 11:39:11 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2011/11/meditation-and-mindfulness-a-30-day-challenge.htmlAfter having such a nice response to my first attempts at mediation, I thought it would be a breeze.  Well, not so much as day 2-5 have been filled with avoidance. I found myself doing everything under the sun but meditating. I really had to force myself to do it daily. Just like anything else new, I am learning, meditation takes practice and discipline. It is a skill, which needs to be developed. Remember learning to write the alphabet in kindergarten or first grade or practicing riding a bike? Those things did not come easily at first and sometimes we avoided the practice. As kids, we did not think of these things as cultivating a skill but really, that is what we were doing. It was work but we did not know it. "Meditation is the cultivation of skillful qualities of mind, particularly mindfulness, effort, and concentration. Mindfulness is the presence of mind or attentiveness to the present without drifting away from the experience." --From The Beginner's Guide to Insight Meditation by Arinna Weismann and Jean Smith, 2010. ]]><![CDATA[Mindfulness and Meditation: A 30 Day Challenge]]>Tue, 01 Nov 2011 11:39:15 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2011/11/minfulness-and-mediation-a-30-day-challenge.html
I have been doing a bit of reading on mindfulness and mediation lately. My husband has studied, practiced, and taught it for years. He takes his information from many sources and traditions and primarily teaches it to the church. For years, I always looked at him as super discipline and thought, "Oh. It is not in my nature to meditate." Now, however, I have decided I am up to the challenge of trying to meditate. I just finished a 30-day Birkam yoga challenge. I made 26 out of 30 days, which is good for me! If I can do that I can meditate 20 minutes a day for 30 days. I am going to write about my experience. I recommend mediation and mindfulness to my clients and have only dabbled in it a bit. I think it is about time I take this very good for you practice seriously for myself because mindfulness changes the brain.

I am going to practice something very simple called passage meditation recommended to me by my husband and can be practice regardless of one's faith tradition. It is mantra based. I am using it because I like the idea of saying a word or passage that has meaning. It is a little like TM, which has been researched and found effective. As well, I have used this style in the past when I was trying to meditate. It is recommended in the book  "Anticancer, A New Way of Life" by David, Servan-Schreiber, MD, Ph.D. He recommends the Buddhist mantra, "Om mani padme hum", which means the jewel in the lotus of the heart. I like this one because of the way it sounds and feels to me. I can sing it as well and hear the overtones in my head. I will probably use this one although there are plenty to chose from. The web site "Timeless Wisdom for Daily Living" has a good list of them.

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Day One: Day one is today but I actually kind of started the day before yesterday. I think I am already experiencing some benefit. I found two things happening to me. The first was I did not become stressed out over the complete breakdown of my iphone calendar. I as a therapist my calendar is my life. I called Apple and they made things worse. It took time and energy I did not have to reconstruct my life. Oddly, I was not stressed out but felt peaceful during the process. The second thing that I have been feeling is more energy and greater focus. This inspired me to try to do this 30-day challenge and write about it. Try it with me. See what happens. Comment here or on my facebook page: Windows of Opportunity Counseling Services. I think this will be fun!
]]><![CDATA[Invest in Your Happiness: Invest in Your Relationships!]]>Sun, 30 Oct 2011 14:45:45 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2011/10/invest-in-your-happiness-invest-in-your-relationships.htmlI was thinking about this today. I tweeted about hugging your loved ones. It only takes a second and has great emotional benefits. It is a small and simple investment. However, real long term investment does take some time. It takes thinking about what those in your life need, want, feel, think, etc. You get it. It involves investing your time and energy. It involves face-to-face time as well as electronic time with others you care about. My advise, "Do not skimp on your relationships. Do what it takes to nurture them." Even though it feels like the world is going a little crazy right now and people have lost their jobs and homes and retirement, we still have each other. No body can take that away from us!
Susan Johnson talks about investing in your marriage and why it is so important.
]]><![CDATA[Relationships, Relationships, Relationships!]]>Sun, 23 Oct 2011 23:01:24 -0800http://www.windowsofopportunitycounseling.org/1/post/2011/10/relationships-relationships-relationships.html
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Lisa, a great Marriage and Family Therapist has a great e-magazine with many helpful articles by her and other therapists. Her site is worth visiting: http://lisakifttherapy.com/
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