In her recent blog post, our friend and colleague Adelaide Lancaster discusses how entrepreneurs, and especially women entrepreneurs, are prone to work-related burnout. She should know! Along with Amy Abrams, she is the co-founder of In Good Company, a community for women entrepreneurs. Their membership provides women business owners with professional peers, events, learning opportunities, and a variety of office space solutions. They also offer programming and content designed to help teach women entrepreneurs the business of running a business.

In a recent discussion with friends, the issue of mental illness came up, and as is often the case, there was much lamentation about how prevalent it is becoming, and how diagnosis and treatment are often pushed by money-hungry pharmaceutical companies hell-bent on convincing us that everyone is mentally ill and that they have the pill that can cure us.

I had a friend many years ago who applied to a highly competitive graduate school for business. He desperately wanted to get into this prestigious institution. He researched how best to write his personal statement to ensure that he would sound like the kind of candidate the university selects. This struck me. I wondered why he wouldn't write an honest letter of intent so the school could determine if he was actually a good fit for their institution. I remember thinking; I wouldn't want to go to a school that didn't want me for who I really am. (Those are mother issues, by the way).

The Art and Science of Self-Talk

At a recent conference about ADHD I attended, a speaker pointed to the importance of self-talk in being able to organize one’s life, set goals, follow through, handle disapointments and challenges, and soothe one’s self in times of stress. This got me thinking about how crucial a skill self-talk is and how it is involved in all aspects of our life.

What is self-talk?

I don't have much to add to this fascinating article about the effect of praise on children's performance and self-esteem. It is must-have information for parents and in some ways goes against the common thinking. http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/ A more recent exploration about this issue was featured on Huffington Post, with a focus on how we tend to praise girls differently than boys.

This recent article in the times sparked a debate, (at least between my colleagues and I!).
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/27/garden/27art.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1&sr...

As a therapist and as a mother, the question of what to keep and not to keep comes up frequently. Not all art is created equal, and sorting out how to handle a proliferation of art products requires some understanding of the creative process, ownership, and authorial intent.

The advances in brain imaging technology over the past decade have helped propel the exciting field of neuropsychiatry way beyond what one would ever have thought possible even a generation ago. Mapping the brain is allowing more and more precise diagnoses and treatments for brain disorders and mental illnesses than ever before.

Before my children were born, besides thinking that they would be the most wonderful magical beings to ever walk the earth (or, before that, to just lay there and coo), I also promised myself to nurture and validate them in ways that I had not always been nurtured and validated. When my son was born, I had principles and ideals for myself as a parent, and for my new, unspoiled child, that I couldn’t wait to put into effect. I couldn’t wait to hear all the wonderful observations he would have about life and the world.