You can choose to be right or to be happy - not both

Oh I can already hear the outcry: "Of course I can be right and happy!"
Bear with me please, I am not saying this lightly.

I am talking about handling conflict or arguments in any relationship, when you defend a point of view and your friend or partner has a different one.

These are the possible outcomes in an argument:

1. You are right, hence your partner is wrong.
2. Your friend is right, hence you are wrong.
3. You agree to disagree.

Now, how can a situation have a positive outcome, if it depends on someone else being "wrong"?
Once you have proven that you are right, or the smarter one, the "good one", how do you think it feels to be wrong, the dumber one, the bad one?

How well are you going to connect, when you are not equals, but one is "better than" and the other is "less than"?

Have you ever noticed how easy it is to feel righteous, to let your pride talk? As opposed to being tolerant and accepting, listening with an open mind?

You may feel that glow of victory, but it's a pyrrhic victory - best case scenario, you're gloating and your partner is subdued; worst case scenario, your partner makes life hell for you as payback. I cannot see happiness in either case.

There are so few cases in which there is black/white or right/wrong, how about trying to understand the other's position? Not judging it, but finding tolerance for it?

That is what agreeing to disagree is about. You are allowed your convictions, but as a corollary, they are allowed to keep theirs.

I know our society keeps repeating that we must win, but that always implies that others must lose. And "being the winner" cannot be a relationship goal.

What if instead, we made connecting our relationship goal?

Can we reconcile marriage and "fear of missing out"?

I'm sure you've heard of FOMO - the "fear of missing out". Apparently Generation Y is much afflicted by it, but I've seen signs of it in older people too.

That fear that if you commit to one thing, you'll miss out on another...

That in turn translates into anxiety, that wherever you decide to go, another party in town might just turn out to be bigger or better.

Now marriage is a prime example of closing all other doors once you chose "the one". How can we possibly choose to marry one person if it means giving up on the idea of any other - for life?

There is that moment when we meet someone who makes us think that we couldn't possibly find anyone better, when waking up next to that person every day seems to be THE thing to wish for.

Yet the sentence "till death do us part" might still send a shiver down our spine. It sounds too much like "for the remainder of your natural life" - a life sentence really.

Maybe it's a matter of perspective.

What if instead of deciding once for the rest of our life, we decided every day?

What if, once we meet that "special someone", we decided to make that person our choice, one day at a time...

Do you service your car? Then why not your mind?

I imagine that you get your car serviced quite regularly, at least once or twice a year.

You do it without really thinking about it, while your car is still going fine - you drive it to the garage or dealership, pay a few (or many) hundred dollars, get it checked, the oil changed, a little tuning perhaps (whatever that means lol) then drive it home, confident that it won't break down until the next service.

So why wait until you suffer from depression, addiction, a relationship breakdown or anxiety to seek therapy?

Why not have a session or two when you are actually feeling quite ok, just to check in with yourself, make sure that everything is still functioning, nip any concerns in the bud, and work out the general direction that you would like your life to go, and what changes you'd like to introduce to make it even better?

In the same way that it is easier to drive the car to the garage rather than having it towed there, it is much easier to do therapy when you are functioning well.

It is more constructive to maintain mental health than to try and "fix things" that have gone wrong - especially when relationships are concerned, and you run a risk of them becoming "beyond repair".

So, are you ready for a check up?

I've reached the pinnacle: I'm "clinical"

After years of slogging away, meeting all the requirements of my professional association, I have at last reached the pinnacle - I'm "clinical".

I work in an unregulated profession: anyone can hang up a sign saying "counsellor" or "psychotherapist" and start "treating" people. Scary thought, right?

So when you decide to see "a therapist", it might be worth your while checking that they belong to a professional association - in my case, the Psychotherapy and Counselling Federation of Australia.

In order to become a member, I needed to hold a degree in the field, see a supervisor (the therapist's therapist) on a regular basis, do a certain number of hours of professional development every year and agree to work ethically.

You start off as a student member, become an intern, then provisional clinical, and at last, the highest level, a clinical member.

I think it's in the public's interest that my professional body has standards that its members have to uphold. And I find it's in my interest to have someone telling me what is "best practice" in my field.

Please feel free to congratulate me :)
I have invested time (years), money (lots) and my heart (all of it) into becoming the best therapist I can be - and I will continue to do so.

Resentment: how we hurt ourselves by holding on to our grudges

Have you ever been hurt?
So badly that you really struggled to forgive and move on?

Sometimes, the hurt we feel, the injustice we face, seem so big that we do not want to let go, that we want to stay angry, resentful, with whoever hurt us, or with the world for allowing it.

Our anger feels righteous.
We have been wronged.
We are allowed to - we even want to - feel resentful about it.

What happens next?
We disconnect, by refusing to connect.
We punish the other, or the world, by casting them out.

But who are we really disconnecting when we do that?
Yes, our self. Whilst we hold on to our resentment, we are the one in the corner, alone.

My feeling is that as human beings, as herd-animals, we need connection more than anything else.

Who do you think feels more connected?
The victim who has chosen to forgive the perpetrator?
Or the victim who holds on to the hurt?

Especially in relationships, it is easier to be the one who dishes out blame, and harder to be the one who forgives and moves on.

I was once told that "you can choose to be either right, or happy".
Now, those who know me well know how hard it is for me not to be right...
Yet life keeps setting me that same challenge (as life tends to do, until we "get it"). And I guess life is setting it for everyone else too.

We can choose to be self-righteous in our anger, and stay disconnected, or we can choose to forgive, and strive to reconnect.

The choice is ours, every single time.

What will you choose next time?