Tom O'Neill Therapy

06/14/2023

Really appreciating Carl Rogers's view of organicity. To paraphrase: If the organism has the right conditions, it will tend toward health. For Rogers those conditions in the therapeutic relationship are: acceptance, caring, empathy, playfulness, and 'let's be real with each other' authenticity. He adds that offering the field of acceptance allows the client to accept herself and relax into a fuller sense of self, which will likely obviate many perceived problems.

06/03/2023

Care to take a stroll through the following questions?

How do you feel in your body?
Do you like your body?
What does your body long for?
What does your heart long for?
And your soul? Do you have a soul?
What do you long for in relationship? Closeness? Partnership? More affection?
How do you betray yourself?
What makes you vulnerable to betraying yourself?
In what ways do you stand by yourself?
Are you patient with yourself?
In what kind of space do you hold yourself? Is it warm or cool? Tight or roomy? 'It'll work out' or 'I need to do more'?
Silence is _____________.
Solitude is ____________.
Are you a good son/daughter/child to your parents? (This might be a trick question.)
What brings you joy?
Pleasure?
Do you enjoy s*x?
What would allow you to enjoy s*x more?
Who can you tell about that?
What helps you trust someone easier?
What helps you trust a situation easier?
How do you get in your own way?
Do you let yourself cry?
Do you appreciate your own suffering?
What do you do when you notice your own suffering?
When do you feel belonging?
When don’t you feel belonging? Why?
Who do you compromise yourself for?
What do you compromise yourself for?
What song reminds you of your mother?
What song reminds you of your father?
When you remembered your parents just now, what feelings did you have? Did any surprise you? (Not trying to make trouble or nothing…)
Where do you find your power?
How do you lose your power?
What trait in a person do you protect yourself from?
Are there measures you can take to protect yourself?
Who do you enjoy taking care of?
What do you enjoy taking care of?
Do you have a recurring dream?
What are you ashamed of?
What are you proud of?
If you’re looking down at yourself from ‘heaven,’ how do you feel about yourself?
What advice would you give yourself?
Do you want to 'meet your potential'?
Do you like your face?
Do you deserve to be successful?
Can you be forgiven?

04/26/2023

In one of her early lectures, Pema Chodron, the great Buddhist teacher, tells of being deeply impacted by a scene in a documentary about an order of Carmelite nuns. For fifteen minutes, the camera remains on one nun offering comfort to a badly convulsing child. The child resists, struggling against the nun’s care, until, realizing the nun’s love is sincere, intent on meeting her beyond her infirmity, the child looks at the nun with trust and relief and finally lets herself relax in the nun’s arms.
Loving relationships can offer that kind of healing space (over time), as well as therapeutic relationships (hello!). But perhaps the most accessible is within the practice of meditation. As we allow ourselves to sink below the noise and anxiety or our thinking minds, into the deep rest of simple beingness, we start to trust in our own capacity to care for ourselves, offer ourselves true sanctuary. For those of us used to seeking comfort outside ourselves, this is radical. So I encourage you to take a seat, start to relax, let the movement of your breath caress you...

04/23/2023

There is nowhere that is not the Bardo, populated by the deities of the five energies. They enter through the wound, for that is where we are most vulnerable--jealousy, rage, resentment, torpor. We have all found ourselves with bulged eyes, swilling blood from a skull, have we not? It is best to consider these energies mere self-display, emanations of the beleaguered human mind, and resist their seductions lest we find ourselves wandering once again through the realms of Samsara...

Post inspired by Songs From the Bardo, by Laurie Anderson, Tenzin Choegyal, and Jesse Paris Smith, whose source material is The Tibetan Book of the Dead

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04/14/2023

Working on this myself: Food is not fulfillment. For the soul, I mean, which is most fulfilled in the ineffable, in a nourishing silence. So can we sit in that deeper longing, and resource in what is already available in our essential nature...instead of seeking fulfillment symbolically in overeating?

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03/26/2023

Consider the idea that we are not unlike the rodent, predisposed to fear because fear helped us survive and evolve. Is it any wonder we live such fearful lives?
A mouse walks into a therapist's office, says, 'Doc, I don't know what's the matter with me. It's like I'm nervous all the time...'

01/05/2023

Imagine you're sinking down, down, to the bottom of a lake, away from the noise and commotion on its surface. Take a moment to enjoy the silence and the stillness, and let yourself rest deeply, removed from all responsibilities and storylines at play on the surface, removed, too, from the version of you responsive to that activity. Reflect on that version of you, on the effort you make, the striving. Do you have a sense of what catches you up, what in you gets caught up? Does your caught-up-ness feel congruent with who you are? Is your striving in service of your values? Is there joy in it? Authenticity? Is the swimmer tired?

12/29/2022

I think this should qualify as an archetype.

Subscribe to SaturdayNightLive: http://j.mp/1bjU39dSEASON 35: http://j.mp/179YJIuPrepare for a hard landing. Aired 09/26/09Subscribe to SNL: https://goo.gl/...

12/22/2022

Contemplation for today:
Knowing that our minds are wild, tossed on the waves of fear and longing, how do we anchor our minds?
Knowing that the predicaments of living a human life are difficult to navigate and cause suffering, by what means do we cultivate compassion in our hearts?
May we steep ourselves in that compassion and nourish ourselves.
May we rejoice in the sustained, and sustaining, note of beingness.

12/05/2022

In a powerfully intimate interview brought to you by Mayim Bialik (I swear, I do listen to other programs), Wil Wheaton talks about his experience with PTSD and Depression. For me, a particularly powerful moment came when at 1:18ish Wil says: "I know my life. I know my truth." It can take years to own our experience, to disempower the voices of doubt in order to embody our authority. Often we do it for the child in us who couldn't.

Wil Wheaton is a well seasoned actor, recognized for his work on The Big Bang Theory, Stand By Me, Star Trek: The Next Generation, and countless other classi...

11/20/2022

On the theme of Escape Rooms: In this life, we are tasked with escaping the tangle of ourselves. It just so happens that the way to do that (perversely) is to hold ourselves with deepening acceptance. Doing so, over time, serves to weaken the power our tangle has over us. Actually, it is best not to call it a tangle.

11/19/2022

Gabor Mate breaks it down... Really!

Dr. Gabor Maté (addiction, stress, and childhood development speaker & bestselling author) joins us to explain which groups of people tend to be most prone t...

11/05/2022

This is brilliant, and easily suggests an exercise in therapy.

Psychologist James Hillman gives an in-depth talk on the boy inside each of us, and lays out strategies to acknowledge, to co-exist, and ultimately to father...

09/13/2022

My approach to therapy is clearly articulated in this talk by Charlotte Joko Beck. Give it a listen!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKtoSnys-Vs

Charlotte Joko Beck (1917-2011) established the Zen Center of San Diego in 1983 and the "Ordinary Mind Zen" lineage in 1995. This recording of a live Dharma ...