Ideas on Mental Health & Meaning
Anxiety, Trauma, & EMDR – Return of the Podcast
That's right, The Meaning Project Podcast is BACK!!! It seems like we have been an experiencing increasing rates of anxiety and trauma, post-COVID. A recent statistic I read suggests "90% of people will face some kind of trauma in their life." In this episode of the...
Difficult Decisions in Affluent Times
We live in an age of affluence in many respects. The mass media bombard us with stimuli and we have to protect ourselves against them by filtering them, as it were. We are offered a lot of possibilities and have to make our choice among them. In short, we have to make...
Disappearing Values
Again, Frankl said this in The Will to Meaning in 1969 - over 50 years ago!! Today we live in an age of crumbling and vanishing traditions. Thus, instead of new values being created by finding unique meanings, the reverse happens. Universal values are on the wane....
Avoiding Tension
Another one of my favorites, and one I talk about often, from The Will to Meaning: "Tension is not something to avoid unconditionally, and peace of mind, or peace of soul, is not anything to avow unconditionally. A sound amount of tension, such as that tension which...
On the Future of Psychiatry & Pharmacotherapy
In the 1969 book The Will to Meaning, Dr. Frankl discusses his views on using medication to treat "endogenous", or physically manifested, depression, suggesting that in some situations, medication or even ECT, electroconvulsive therapy, might be warranted. What holds...
Narcissism, Gaslighting, Bad Therapy, and Other Meaningful Pet Peeves
Narcissism, Narcissist, and "gaslighting" have gained an unwarranted amount of attention in the past few years - in this episode, I'll share my candid opinion about that, as well as "Bad Therapists" and other clinical pet peeves I've experienced in the past few years....
The Meaning of Freedom
Happy Independence Day! “Freedom is in danger of degenerating into mere arbitrariness unless it is lived in terms of responsibleness. That is why I recommend that the Statue of Liberty on the East Coast be supplemented by a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast.”...
Homo Noeticus 2
I hope you were looking forward to this as much as I was. If you listened to Homo Noeticus 1, you know the author, Dr. Ann Graber, had a profound impact on my career and professional trajectory. I hope I honored her well with the recording of her speech from 2005 -...
Homo Noeticus 1
I've been meaning to share this with you for quite a while - probably since I started The Meaning Project Podcast. "Homo Noeticus" is the name Dr. Ann V. Graber gives to the potential evolution of humankind in her 2005 speech at the World Congress of Logotherapy,...
Purpose Summit 2022 – Recap
For those who follow along on social media - which I am not very good at, so don't feel compelled to follow along, but if you want to, I believe the links are on this page and on the website - for those of you who do, you know I attended The Purpose Summit 2022 at the...
Mental Health & Meaning in a Messy World
This conversation with Rabbi B. started with me saying, "B., I'm getting calls to come talk about Mental Health & Meaning from places I never would've expected it - construction, manufacturing, business... People are struggling." And so it went. That's the funny...
Memorial Day & The Meaning in Military Service
Today we celebrate Memorial Day in the US - the unofficial start to summer - more importantly, the day we remember those who sacrificed their lives in military service. My good friend, Chief (retired) Paul shares his experience in the military - what led to his...