Existential realities are like primal states of being. They are core to who we are and how we act. To understand our existence is to have insight about the emotions we experience and of course, our mental state. Loss is one of these primal states, and its marks on our personal narratives are ubiquitous and often significant. There are the times in which we shiver in response to its lingering touch. From the moment of the neonate's cry for warmth of its mother's womb until the flashes of a li...

Uncertainty is a powerful and nearly all-present state in our lives. Human beings have a wonderful capacity to fill in the gaps – whether it is visual system creating holistic images in our head, or our auditory and language system creating meaning from misheard statements. Our brains are able to fill in the holes and make interpretations that help us to navigate the world. It gives us certainty. But to a large extent this is an illusion. In the same way, our brains fill in the gaps of unc...

When friends ask me about finding a therapist the first distinction I try to make is whether it is for personal self-development, or for treating some kind of perceived condition. By the way, these things are not mutually exclusive. But here's the main reason why I think it's important to distinguish the two:

 It's really hard to go to therapy when you are actually unwell.

If it is for some kind of actual mental health disorder, I tend to suggest practical, physical or pharmacological solu...

I am ambivalent about the word “therapy”.

For me, it connotes the idea of something to be fixed and to be made better because there is something wrong, bad and diseased. That makes sense when talking about chemotherapy, or drug therapy, or physiotherapy.

Obviously, there many individuals who have experienced or currently has a mental health illness in which the appropriate word could be therapy, which denotes the act of medically caring for someone who is unwell. In this case, the word �...