Family Visits and Emotional Upsets

What's it like when your family comes to visit? Do things go smoothly? What about when your in-laws come? How are things then? How are you left feeling when any friends or guests enter your home? Do any of these situations take a toll on you? For a long time, when anyone visited, it was wonderful and… Continue reading Family Visits and Emotional Upsets

Emotional Offspring. Yeah, That’s a Thing.

When I learned emotions are messengers that tell us important things we need to do, I was so relieved! This simple but profound understanding could help me work through my emotions to avoid the negative consequences from them, and to finally regain my sense of peace. But how could I ever learn all the meanings… Continue reading Emotional Offspring. Yeah, That’s a Thing.

How to Feel Better After Overwhelming Social Gatherings

Have you ever experienced feeling fine before a big gathering, but then afterward, you felt exhausted, overwhelmed, perhaps angry, frustrated, irritated, or even completely depressed? Has that happened to you before? It's happened to me. And afterward, I always vow to myself--I'm never doing that again! But the problem is that I can't not ever be… Continue reading How to Feel Better After Overwhelming Social Gatherings

A Ruined Funeral and How I Fixed It

Have you ever had an important event ruined because you were angered by someone? I have. Were you able to work through that anger? I am remembering the funeral for my grandfather a few months ago and how I observed many things—about how people grieve differently, about how not dealing with current emotions contributes to… Continue reading A Ruined Funeral and How I Fixed It

My Anxiety for an Award (and why it’s not on my bucket list anymore)

Have you heard of Active4Youth? It is an amazing running program for elementary aged children. Every year they do a cross country season where hundreds of kids practice, train, and work toward running a half mile (for first graders) or a whole mile (for 2-5th grade). There are two meets, and then an all-city meet… Continue reading My Anxiety for an Award (and why it’s not on my bucket list anymore)

3 Steps to Helping Children in their Emotions

How do I help my kids in their emotions? This has been an epic journey for me. Not epic in a sense of heroic, but epic in the sense of incredibly-long-and-exhausting. Along that journey were sleepless nights, tears of pain, and many, many questions. And more and more, I began to recognize that I really… Continue reading 3 Steps to Helping Children in their Emotions