BLOG FEED

"Therapy seems to have become the default prescription for all forms of unhappiness," writes Dr. Harvey Lieberman in "I'm a Therapist. Not Everyone Should Be in Therapy," a guest column that ran July 5 in The New York Times (and now lives on in cyberspace). I'm a big fan of therapy. I've had a lot of it myself. Still, Lieberman suggests that it's not appropriate for everyone, that situational distress — say, procrastination, job frustration, financial worry — isn't necessaril

Not many weeks go by when I don't think about Bill Mould, left, who was as close to a life mentor as I've had. Let me correct that: He WAS my life mentor. And I miss him terribly. There's so much I'd want to tell him, were he here. I met Bill when I was a college freshman and he was the dean (known as "the master") of South Carolina College, the honors program at the University of South Carolina. He shepherded me into intriguing classes designed to build upon my synthetic op

Autumn leaves. Oh, how I love them. I'm writing this blog the morning of Sept. 2, the first day after Labor Day. I know it's not autumn...

I've spent years on that question — "radical acceptance and contentment, or radical development and growth?" — even though I wasn't aware that that kind of contentment was much of a possibility till my early 30s. Actually, I think I've only been really getting the idea since I turned 60. Early in life I was aware of my need and desire to grow — to learn, to explore, to change plans, to deepen experiences, to have adventures, to change or evolve ("not the same thing!" I can

New Year's Eve has long been my favorite holiday. It's not because of the big celebrations, as I tend to keep things relatively quiet on the day itself. This year I had some bubbly and nutritionally unsound snacks while watching Anderson & Andy on CNN with my family. Pretty calm evening, with space for my mind to wander — as I prefer. (By all means, party on if that seems like a good time.) What I love about New Year's is being on the verge of the new. All of that possibility

Every morning after meditation, I write a 10-item gratitude list. When a coach first suggested it, I said something like, "Sorry, that's a little too Oprah for me." Nowadays, that reply makes me cringe a bit. I did try the gratitude list, and I've continued it ever since. And that morning check-in has really helped me in a range of ways. While I might sometimes pause at No. 6 or 7, I ALWAYS find 10 reasons to be thankful — mostly by looking at my present, but often my past an

Joseph Chaikin, far right, in Megan Terry's "Keep Tightly Closed in a Cool Dry Place" with the Open Theatre. He sure knew another world. I first encountered this Paul Éluard quote — "There is another world, and it is in this one" —while studying the acting theories of Joseph Chaikin, who founded the Open Theatre and was a frequent collaborator with Sam Shepard. I couldn't imagine many quotations more exciting and hopeful. In the years since, I've found it useful when describi