One of my clients, Joe, recently confessed to me that he told a cousin who was visiting from out of town, that he had plans to be in Alaska. A little “white lie” in order to avoid the obligatory “let’s get together”. Instead of coming clean and sharing the truth (that Joe didn’t feel like meeting up while his relative was in town), he hid behind this elaborately drawn fiction. Another of my clients, Kim, shared that she is scared to ask for a raise because she thinks her boss will fire her. Kim even refused to inquire about her annual review, as she feels that she is bound to fail.

Are there times when you want to speak up, but don’t? Do you often say "yes" when you mean "no"? Are you embarrassed by praise or crushed by criticism? Does it often feel as though you live your life for other people?

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Yesterday, while running in Central Park, I noticed a young father helping his son as they both rode bicycles. I couldn’t help but smile as I watched Dad push his boy on the back, ever so gently coaxing him up the hill. It was a steep incline, so the little guy needed multiple shoves in order to reach the top where he was then able to pedal over the crest and down the other side. 

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I recently attended a talk hosted by IGC featuring Gretchen Rubin. If you haven’t heard of her yet, Gretchen is the author of The Happiness Project, a memoir of the year she spent test-driving the wisdom of the ages about how to be happy--from Aristotle to Martin Seligman to Oprah.

Rubin didn't have the option to uproot herself, nor did she really want to; instead she focused on improving her life as it was. Each month she tackled a new set of resolutions. On Gretchen’s blog, she shares her insights to help her readers create their own happiness project.

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My mom hides her purse behind her pillow at night. Inside her bag is a roll of pencils, a set of steel pliers, a wallet full of change, four hair curlers, safety gloves, a deck of playing cards and three rubber bands. Why is her bag in that specific spot and as heavy as a box of rocks? A child of the Great Depression, I suspect it’s because she was raised to keep your valuables close, and to throw nothing away. But if you were to ask my mom, she could not tell you why she is carrying the contents of a plumber’s toolbox in her pocketbook. She probably wouldn’t even recognize it as her own. My mom suffers from dementia. She’s all mixed up and she knows it.

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