What would you say to your mom or dad if you were told they would be dead in a matter of months? How would you spend your remaining time with them? Do you wonder what they would want from you at the end of their life? Are there things you would want to express to them before they passed away? As a mother, I sit here writing this with one part of my brain thinking, “What would I want from my kids if, say, they were in their 40s and I had...

Apologies are a necessity in life. Our willingness to repair conflicts is one measure of our relationships’ depth. After all, life is filled with disagreements and issues, whether they be with people at our workplace, our children’s school or friends and family. How do we apologize to those in our lives? We want to do it successfully, in order to foster forgiveness, repair hurt feelings and truly resolve whatever the initial...

In these tough economic times, it’s getting more and more challenging for any of us to feel like “giving” anything right now, whether it be money or our volunteer time. We are stressed out, overworked and fear we are heading into a “double-dip” recession (which sounds like a horrible ice-cream surprise covered in doubt and angst). We’re all tightening our belts. So why do I still feel compelled to give extra...

It’s a classic story: A teenager attends the first day of school and winds up hating one of his teachers. (Can’t you just hear the angry whine of a 14-year-old telling you how this teacher is the worst teacher, mean and a difficult grader to boot?!) As he slams the door to his room, you hear him mumbling about how the teacher “hates” him, too. With their teens’ hormones raging — and peer pressure not helping...

In her People Magazine interview, Elin Nordegren shared that she had no idea that her husband, Tiger Woods, had been having sex with more than 20 women in the past three and a half years. She also said that the word “betrayal” doesn’t begin to describe what her feelings were when she found out about her husband’s infidelities. I have worked with couples wherein one of them claims to have had no idea that the affairs were...