Therapy tools for mental health

Therapy Tools for Mental Health

I don’t currently do therapy and haven’t had a lot of success with it in the past, but I’m very pro-therapy in general. I’ve picked up a collection of therapy tools from acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT), and various others that are handy to pull out of […]

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Bias in What You Read Online About Psych Med Side Effects

You can find all kinds of stories online of people reporting negative experiences with different forms of psychiatric medication. However, there’s inherent bias in that kind of reporting of side effects, so you really can’t use that information to effectively generalize how safe or effective a treatment is. In this post, we’ll look at where

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Self-improvement: Shouldn't you be good enough just as you are?

The Problem with Self-Improvement — Aren’t You Good Enough?

I’ve long had issues with the whole self-improvement industry, but the idea for this post came from a quote that Suzette Benjamin shared on her blog: We already have everything we need. There is no need for self-improvement… All the time our warmth and brilliance are right here. This is who we really are. Pema

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What Is... Series (Insights into Psychology)

What Is… Transactional Analysis

In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week’s term is transactional analysis. Transactional analysis (TA) is a theory developed by psychoanalytic psychiatrist Dr. Eric Berne. This may not be the least bit relevant, but it helps set the scene—he has a pipe in his mouth in the

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Mental Health @ Home book review: The Anxiety and Depression Workbook by Michael A. Tompkins

Book Review: The Anxiety and Depression Workbook

The Anxiety and Depression Workbook by Michael A. Tompkins incorporate cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) techniques to help you improve emotional flexibility. This is defined as “the ability to respond to life’s challenges with an appropriate level of emotion, and then to recover as these situations change.” Sounds pretty good to me. Somewhat like Overcoming Avoidance,

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Mental Health @ Home book review: Remember by Lisa Genova

Book Review: Remember by Lisa Genova

Remember by Lisa Genova is a non-fiction book that explores how we do, and don’t, remember. Genova is a neuroscientist who’s also the author of five fiction books, all of which I’ve read. They feature characters with neurological conditions like Alzheimer’s (Still Alice) and Huntingdon’s (Inside the O’Briens – affiliate links). The book begins by

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Psychotic Does NOT Mean Violent

One of the most common and damaging stereotypes about mental illness is that mentally ill people are chronically dangerous and violence-prone (Corrigan & Watson, 2002). This stereotype is especially strongly linked to people with psychosis. Like many stereotypes, it’s not true in the vast majority of cases, but the general public may not realize that.

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