The Overwhelmed Brain

Emotional Intelligence for Better Relationships

The pain you sometimes need to go through to increase your quality of life

The level of happiness and fulfillment you feel on a day to day basis can change based on many factors. One of those factors has to do with the ability to make hard decisions that may involve big changes that you’re not ready to face.

The fear and pain associated with change can often prevent us from doing what we need to do to increase our quality of life.

However, sometimes the lesson is that in order to reach a higher level of satisfaction in life, it might involve scary steps you don’t want to take. 

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The intimacy that happens behind their back

Cheating and infidelity can be a sensitive topic. You could be a victim to it, you could be the cheater, or you could be the one seeing someone who is cheating on their partner to be with you.

No matter what, there is almost always heartache on the other side. It doesn’t mean there isn’t healing, but there is almost always pain.

In this episode, I receive a message from a woman who is seeing someone cheating on his wife to be with her, and I read another message from someone who was once the cheater. 

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Should commitments always be a forever thing?

Getting that job, buying that house, moving in with that person, promising to repay a debt… all commitments that that most of us go into with good intentions, but is it required to keep them no matter what?

Some commitments that started off as a good idea may need to be re-evaluated if what you thought was going to be great isn’t.  [Read more…]

The emotional aftermath of getting free of the narcissistic relationship

The emotional challenges you experience after breaking up with a narcissist usually go way beyond grieving the end of a relationship.

You can be stripped of your ability to see life clearly from that point on unless you heal.

In this bonus episode, I cover a lot of ground when it comes to dealing with what happens to your mind and body as you transition out of one of the more toxic relationships that exist.

My Healing Journey from Being an Emotional Abuser

Emotional abuse is the ultimate brainwashing technique. It hides in the form of feigned helpfulness, generosity, compassion, and love. The perpetrator knows how to appear kind and caring while intertwining abusive behavior, causing their victim to become powerless.

Emotional abuse is a method of controlling, manipulating, belittling, and invalidating a person over time. It is often hard to spot in the moment as it can be seen as benign or even “normal” to most observers. But as this behavior is repeated time and time again, the insidious compound effect of this form of covert abuse causes its victims to lose confidence in themselves, stop trusting in their own decisions, feel devalued and unimportant, and blame themselves for being the cause of, and sometimes even deserving, of the abusive behavior.

(for my podcast on emotional abuse, be sure to visit loveandabuse.com)

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Making difficult or impossible decisions

If you’re always looking in the rearview mirror, it’s quite possible you’re not creating the life you want.

Sometimes you get to the tipping point where you just can’t stand it anymore and you take action. Segment one of this episode covers this and more.

In segment two, there’s a seriously difficult decision facing someone who wrote to me who is married but wants to explore being transgender, but his wife is upset and the marriage is in limbo. The impossible decision looms over him.