Category: Blog Posts

Have you ever put your trust in someone and then been disappointed? As evidenced by the number of divorces, failed business ventures, or broken friendships, it happens often. Which leads us to ask: Since the brain’s function is to protect us, why does it let us make bad decisions that harm us? Where is the decision–making process breaking down?Because we’re bombarded with vast amounts of information every day, the brain uses shortcuts that allow the nonconscious brain to do things on autopilot, like tying your shoe or ducking when something is thrown at you.

But we get into trouble when these shortcuts are based on cultural biases that have been unwittingly encoded into our brains. They can lead us to draw wrong conclusions.

Oftentimes, these biases are based on similarity (“People like me are better than people who aren’t”); experience (“My perception of the world must be accurate”); and expedience (“It feels right, so it must be true”). As a result, we end up making major decisions based on criteria that doesn’t matter…the appearance, social position, mannerisms or talkativeness of a person. (Yes, in this culture, people who talk a lot are viewed as more trustworthy.)

It’s important to recognize your own biases and employ critical thinking to determine if there’s a solid basis for trusting and believing someone. Here are some tips:

• Buy yourself some time between receiving information and making a decision.

• Write out the precise steps that led to your decision and double check to see if you’re missing a vital piece of information or are misinterpreting something.

• Talk it over with someone. As you hear yourself explain the situation, you’ll be more likely to identify your own faulty thinking. Their feedback can be invaluable, too.

• Keep learning, because knowledge is power. The more you know, the less likely you’ll be duped or misled.

• In a business setting, have people write down their ideas, then review the ideas anonymously — that way you’re deciding based on the strength of the idea, not on the source.

Sometimes we make decisions that don’t feel right, because they go against our own notions of propriety and goodwill. To make healthier decisions, don’t always assume you must go with the flow for someone else’s sake. Develop the flexibility to be charitable to others, yet still have the common sense to take care of yourself.

Easier said than done, right? That’s why I wrote, “WHEN EMPATHY FAILS.” Along with my personal story, it’s a guidebook for enhancing self-awareness and empathically making decisions that protect yourself, while allowing others the dignity to live life as they choose. This is what I call EmD-5 or Radiant Empathy.

How often do you feel unsure of yourself – once in a while, all the time, or never? It’s not unusual for people to have trouble assessing their own skills and abilities. Some people tend to undervalue what they can do. On the other hand, some people overestimate themselves – a phenomenon called the Dunning-Kruger Effect, in the world of psychology.

What is the Dunning-Kruger Effect?

To paraphrase what social psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger discovered about the scale of cognitive bias:

• Those with a little knowledge think they know everything, so they overestimate their abilities.
• Those with average knowledge know they have much to learn, so they often underestimate their skills.
• Those with a lot of knowledge think they’re nothing special, because they think everyone must surely know what they know.

Do you recognize yourself or someone you know, in any of those statements? It’s part of human nature to misjudge our own competency. That’s why it’s so important to understand who we are in relation to others. But this self-awareness only comes when we enhance our ability to be empathic.

How is empathy connected to accurately assessing your competency?

How would you know you do something well, if you don’t have something to compare your performance to? The kind of comparison I’m referring to is not about judging your self-worth, but it’s about judging your ability to perform. If someone does it better than you, then you know there’s room for improvement. Radiant Empathy helps you differentiate between self-awareness and self-worth.

There are three steps to achieving Radiant Empathy:

The first step to empathy is knowing, honoring, and caring for the feelings that matter to loved ones—similar to stepping into another person’s shoes.

The second step to empathy is being able to acknowledge what’s in the heart and mind of someone else, by reading the current context appropriately and responding with respect and love.

The third step to empathy requires you to know how you feel in relation to others. You can hold constant your feelings and thoughts, while you plumb the depths of another person.

For example, empathic people know that understanding the mind of another isn’t tantamount to agreeing with their beliefs or principles. EmD-0 people, however, believe that to voice their understanding means they’re indicating agreement. What a difference empathy makes!

Through practice and continued education, you can achieve Radiant Empathy. Stay tuned…I’m working on a website that will assist you in your development of this highest form of empathy. In the meantime, my new book, “WHEN EMPATHY FAILS” is a fantastic resource for starting your journey to Radiant Empathy.

Did you know that gossip can be as simple as sharing news about someone that the listener hasn’t heard before, like, “Mary is going to have a baby”? But more often than not, gossip is harmful. A number of months ago, I read an article in the New York Times that makes me think about how easy it is, through the Internet, to gossip and destroy lives with fake news and lies.The writer, Sinan Aral, and his colleagues analyzed major true and false stories spread on Twitter from 2006 to 2017. Their data included approximately 126,000 Twitter “cascades” (unbroken chains of retweets with a common, singular origin) involving stories spread by three million people more than four and a half million times. The results?

“Disturbingly, we found that false stories spread significantly more than did true ones. We found that human behavior contributed more to the differential spread of truth and falsity than bots did.”

People do love to gossip and spread sensational “news”! It feels like harmless fun, until it happens to you. I’ve been the recipient of hurtful, nasty gossip online. For example, a disgruntled client created a website in my name and posted lies about me. He paid for the website for ten years in the hopes of destroying my psychology practice. Trust me, there is no legally expedient way to stop this practice. However, he eventually tired of hosting the website and let the URL lapse. I decided to buy the URL so that it couldn’t be used again for nefarious purposes, but found that I couldn’t buy my own name back unless I wanted to pay a “premium.” Apparently the group in Brazil who now owns my name thinks it’s a hot property! (You can read more in my new book, WHEN EMPATHY FAILS: How to stop those hell-bent on destroying you.)

When you hear “news” that you’re tempted to share, why not ask yourselves these three questions before you spread it…

You’ll, at the very least, buy yourself some time to think about the consequences, before you act. While there are cases of people being sued for retweeting a false, defamatory story, common human decency should be enough to motivate us to refrain from spreading lies, because we recognize the hurt they cause. But maybe that’s the problem – human decency isn’t so common anymore.

Human decency stems from the quality of empathy. The hardships of life can cause us to become callused to the feelings of others. Would you like to increase and enhance you ability to display empathy? You’ll find practical tips in my book, WHEN EMPATHY FAILS: How to stop those hell-bent on destroying you.

If you’d like my personal help, and you live near Portland, OR/Vancouver, WA, please contact my Jantzen Beach office and schedule an appointment. I also offer online therapy if that’s convenient for you.

Do you feel drained, overextended, sluggish, unmotivated, even uncommonly cynical or ambivalent because of your work load? These are all symptoms of burnout. Even though a nationwide 2016 survey shows that 50% of Americans in the workforce are exhausted, it’s not normal to live like this! The World Health Organization classifies occupational stress and burnout as a very real and dangerous health hazard.You are not a “wimp” or a “slacker” to make wise choices that protect your mental and physical health. Even if you’re not able to take a few days off work, there are things you can do today to recover your health and happiness:

Connect with a loved one. Whether it’s a friend or family member, you need to spend more time with those who understand and support you.

Practice focused breathing. Mindful breathing activates your parasympathetic nervous system, which helps you relax and manage stress.

Take frequent breaks. Preferably include walking in your break – just five minutes for every hour will make a huge difference.

Create a more peaceful work environment. Get an ergonomic chair and desk. And have a screen saver or framed photo that makes you feel happy. Adding a plant to your work space may help too.

Start a hobby. Outside interests give you something to look forward to after work. It helps you decompress and dissociate from work.

Refocus on your health. Consciously make improvements to your diet, exercise and sleep. You may feel like you don’t have time, but you will be forced to take time later, when your health seriously fails.

Find something to laugh about. Laughter releases feel-good brain chemical, so it’s a great stress reliever.

Quit procrastinating. When you feel anxious over a task, it’s easy to put it off. You may experience a small sense of relief, but that task will be nagging at you, always there in your mind. And more importantly, you’re depriving yourself of a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment.

Break a big task into smaller steps. Achieving tiny goals can lead to increased dopamine levels in the brain. Do just one thing. Pat yourself on the back. Take a deep breath and do the next thing. You can do this!

Give these tips a try and visit me on Facebook to share the ones that work best for you. If you’re experiencing a prolonged or severe form of anxiety, stress, or depression, please consider seeking professional help. If you live near Portland, OR/Vancouver, WA please contact my Jantzen Beach office and schedule an appointment. I also offer online therapy if that’s more convenient.

“Are they just being rude? Shouldn’t I be offended?” That’s how we feel, when someone ignores us, as we try to talk with them. Being ignored usually signals that something is wrong. But, what about when you converse with those on the Spectrum? Have you noticed that they often break the rules of conversation etiquette?

Sometimes our Aspies say NO! Sometimes they ignore us. Sometimes they resist and walk off — then inexplicably do as asked. What on earth is this about?

A number of years ago, I wrote about how those with Aspergers default to non-committal answers. I used a true-to-life setting where a wife beats around the bush, trying to get her hubby to go on vacation, and the Aspie husband just doesn’t get it. It’s the perfect storm for miscommunication and hurt feelings in a NT/AS relationship.

We have to remember that Aspies have great difficulty with change or spontaneity, much more than the rest of us. A new idea creates tension. In the decision-making process, we have to think it through, examine its relevance to our plans, get past the novelty, build a new paradigm to incorporate the idea, and so much more.

Non-Spectrum people create change fairly easily, even with all of the aforementioned steps, because we aren’t self absorbed. Because we have empathy, we can include the other person in our new paradigm. Into the equation, we incorporate the person asking, how they ask, and the mind of the asker.

On the other hand, Aspies don’t do any of this. Instead they opt for saying “no,” or “I’m not interested.” This buys them time to get away from our demands and to protect themselves from confusion.

There’s much more to learn about this phenomenon. If you’re a member of my Asperger Syndrome: Partners & Family of Adults with ASD group, I invite you to the next international, free teleconference: Why do they always say NO! It will be held on Thursday, June 21st. We’ll be building interventions to get past their penchant for saying NO.

If you have questions about this teleconference, you can post them on my Facebook event page or you can post them to the group on the Meetup page. I’m looking forward to seeing you there!

Isn’t it ironic? The world is becoming more aware of Autism Spectrum Disorder (a good thing) yet there’s a group of people affected by Asperger’s Syndrome who are still being overlooked and ignored by the world and by their families – the adult children raised by an Asperger parent.Many adults who have been raised with an Aspie parent are now reporting severe depression and self-esteem problems, because they lived with an Aspie parent who struggled to nurture them and get to know them. With a lack of warmth, tender affection, and communication, a child can feel emotionally rejected by their parent even though they may have all of their physical needs taken care of.

This is not to say that an Aspie parent doesn’t love their child. That is far from the truth. But the communication and relationship deficits confuse the child and can lead to the child feeling unloved. Remember it is the child’s experience that defines the parenting, not whether the AS parent loves their child.

In my own case, I had no idea my mother was an Aspie until many years after her death. I discovered my daughter’s autism first and it was confirmed by a psychiatrist and psychologist. I always thought it odd that my adopted daughter was so much like my mother – until the light bulb went off. A rush of relief and tears swept through me with the realization that I was raised by an Aspie.

So much of my life finally made sense. Mom was this terribly confusing mix of good intentions and abusive parenting. Mom insisted that I eat whole, organic food. Preservatives and sugar were not allowed in our house. Sounds good right? What about using a toothbrush made from boar bristles? No toothpaste either; I had to use baking soda. Still not so bad? What about the fierce tongue lashings I would get when she had her meltdowns and called me ever foul name in the book?

There’s more and I bet you have your own stories too. Our quirky, abusive, brilliant Aspie parents made a lasting impact, didn’t they? Now it’s time to ferret out what it means to be raised by a parent who has Zero Degrees of Empathy – a parent who cannot enter your world and help you discover who you are.

It’s time to take back your life and recreate your own timeline of adult development. Yes, it’s complicated, but together we can do it. Please join me for this private Video Conference for Adult Children of Aspies on Tuesday, June 19, 2018. Know that you are not alone. If you have questions about this teleconference, you can post them on my Facebook event page.

NOTE: I know there are others who want to be on this call, because you’re worried about your children being raised by your Aspie co-parent. However, please be respectful of those who are already grown and want to break free to “Be Me!” There will be ample opportunities for us to speak at another time. Thank you.