COUNSELING IN CINCINNATI
Nurturing Courage & Change with Evidence-Based Care
for humans of all stripes looking for relief, stillness, and growth.
EMPOWERING COMPASSIONATE MINDS
You aren’t a machine with broken parts. You are a human whose needs are not being met.
You need to have a community. You need to have meaningful values, not the junk values you’ve been pumped full of all your life. You need to have meaningful work. You need the natural world. You need to feel you are respected. You need a secure future. You need connections to all these things. You need to release any shame you might feel for having been mistreated.
— Johann Hari “Lost Connections”
Paruresis, commonly dismissed as a minor inconvenience, is a misunderstood social anxiety disorder with profound physical and emotional effects, often leaving sufferers isolated and overlooked—yet effective, compassionate treatments are within reach.
Understanding Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) through an evolutionary lens helps us de-shame its symptoms, revealing that therapy—especially CBT-SAD—offers lasting relief by working with, not against, our brain's natural design.
Understanding porn addiction through an evolutionary lens allows individuals to view their struggles not as moral failings, but as a predictable response to modern stimuli, making compassionate, non-judgmental therapy the key to recovery.
Pedophilia OCD (pOCD) is a deeply distressing form of obsessive-compulsive disorder that traps sufferers in a cycle of relentless doubt and fear over thoughts that are starkly opposed to their values. Despite the torment, effective treatments like Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) therapy offer a path to recovery, helping individuals separate themselves from their intrusive thoughts.
Depersonalization/derealization disorder (DPDR) involves profound feelings of detachment and unreality, making the world seem both strange and familiar. Although often misunderstood, effective treatment combining Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) and mindfulness offers hope, helping individuals reclaim their sense of reality and navigate the fog towards recovery.
Lew Richmond's battle with encephalitis deepened his understanding of Buddhism, leading to the profound realization that "Everything is connected; nothing lasts; you are not alone."
Just as wild animals display signs of distress when removed from their natural habitats, humans may experience depression as a signal that their deeply ingrained social and environmental needs are not being met.
In our evolutionary past, stories began as rituals that helped us navigate our minds and social environment.
When left unchecked, this critical voice can lead to several mental health problems, making it the top vulnerability factor for these issues.
This perspective on ADHD not as a simple disorder but as a set of traits that were potentially advantageous for survival in nomadic environments underscores the potential for evolutionary psychology to foster a more compassionate and nuanced understanding of ADHD.
Research shows that practicing self-compassion and other-compassion can significantly reduce burnout by replenishing essential psychological resources, making them powerful strategies to integrate into therapy for those looking to improve their mental and emotional well-being.
When choosing a therapist from a social work background, consider their training in evidence-based practices and their understanding of scientific principles like falsifiability—the ability of a theory to be disproven through empirical evidence.
Evolutionary psychology increases compassion by providing insights into the adaptive origins of human behaviors and emotions, fostering understanding and empathy toward clients' experiences and struggles.
True compassion is about courageously confronting suffering with unwavering presence