ACT With Compassion

I feel the burn of shame even as I write this.

I have a 19 year old dog, Dalai. I love this dog, I mean really love this dog. She's the best dog in the world. Some of you know what I mean; you may also have the best dog in the world. But this best dog in the world is 19. She’s getting dementia, has arthritis and neuropathic pain. It takes her 15 minutes to walk one block. She’s on more drugs than my grandmother was before she died. This dog has two bionic knees from a surgery she had 12 years ago. Her knees are actually good…not like her hips. She’s got cataracts and doesn’t hear well anymore (unless it’s the sound of the treat jar opening in which case she still seems to have supersonic hearing).

Alrighty then. This is the start of what I hope will be an interesting journey. 

While I've been working on developing treatments for self-criticism, shame, and stigma for over a decade, I haven't felt ready to go public with what I've learned until now. There's still a lot to learn, but I also feel like I have something to add to the conversation. This website is my attempt to do just that. I've already created a variety of materials that I use in therapy with my clients in a daily basis. I've provided a variety of trainings on this topic and even created videos that relate to working with highly self-critical clients. Now, it's time to do the work to get myself increasingly organized and get this stuff out for public consumption. This blog post is a declaration of that. 

I'm making a commitment. Over the ensuing weeks, you're going to see more and more materials relating to self-compassion, shame, and self-criticism coming out on this website. I'll post about my stuff, but also link to the other great resources on the web created by other authors. My goal is to empower those therapists out there who are working with clients in these difficult moments where they feel so broken, damaged, and alone. 

My hope is that together we may bring kindness, compassion, and warmth to those who feel small, weak, and cast aside by life. 

If you want to learn about new information as it comes out, sign up for the site here.

P.S. The first material, with some homework handouts and guidelines for using homework has already been posted.