Dr. Gary Bell's Absurd Psychology

Dr. Gary Bell's Absurd Psychology

By Dr. Gary BellEducationSelf-Improvement
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Dr. Gary Bell's Absurd Psychology episodes

  • Denial: The Unacceptable Truth
    Denial is a defense mechanism in which an individual refuses to recognize or acknowledge objective facts or experiences. It's an unconscious process that serves to protect the person from discomfort or anxiety. For example, a loved one may insist that she doesn't have a problem with alcohol, despite the fact that it interferes with work and family life. Or a loyal employee may refuse to see signs that his boss is stealing from the company. Tune in and learn all about denial and how to heal it!
    58 min
  • Repressed Emotions: Where They Come Out
    Repression is a defense mechanism in which people push difficult or unacceptable thoughts out of conscious awareness. Repressed memories were a cornerstone of Freud's psychoanalytic framework. He believed that people repressed memories that were too difficult to confront, particularly traumatic memories, and expelled them from conscious thought. Tune in and learn how repressed emotions can run your life and how to prevent them!
    1 hr 2 min
  • Somatic Pain: It's All in Your Head
    Somatic symptom disorder involves focusing too much on physical symptoms such as pain or tiredness. This focus causes major emotional distress and makes it hard to function. You may or may not have another medical condition that causes these symptoms. But how you think, feel and behave because of the symptoms can be extreme. Tune in all learn how to identify and work through somatic pain!
    59 min
  • How to Recognize Mania
    Mania is a state of elevated energy, mood, and behavior, most often seen in those with bipolar disorder, schizoaffective disorder, or who have taken certain drugs or medications. While the feelings present in mania can be positive, energetic, or even euphoric, they may also manifest more negatively—as emotions like irritation, anxiety, or grandiosity. Tune in and lern how to recognize and work through manic episodes!
    1 hr
  • The Intoxicating Feeling of Being Chosen
    Curiously, many of my clients report that they don't feel "chosen" by their significant other, while remaining uncertain about what it would mean to feel chosen. Life partners are engaged in choosing or not choosing one another. It typically remains unspoken and may lie just below the surface of consciousness. To be clear about what counts toward feeling chosen brings a new level of depth and meaning to a relationship. Tune in and learn the power of being chosen!
    1 hr 2 min
  • Inner Freedom
    Freedom, as described by the German social psychologist and humanist philosopher Erich Fromm (1941), is the final goal in the process of individuation. Fromm's concept of freedom is close to David Shapiro's (1981) concept of autonomy—becoming an independent agent in the world. It encompasses a capacity to manifest what makes you uniquely yourself without recourse to either self-absorption or self-abnegation. Murray Bowen's concept of "differentiation of self" also entails this idea and ideal of individuation. Tune in and learn how freedom impacts all of your life!
    59 min
  • Divorce Prevention

    No one enters marriage expecting it to fail. You enter with hope, commitment, and the faith that love will see you through the hard times. But when things fall apart, it's generally not because partners didn't care. Often it's because they felt disconnected, hurt, or unsure how to find their way back to each other. Tune in and learan how to keep your marriage strong!

    1 hr
  • How to Have a Covenant Marriage

    It's not easy to break a covenant. Grounds for divorce in a covenant marriage are limited to abuse or adultery; otherwise couples must seek counseling and wait two years, as opposed to the six-to-12-month separation that is imposed in no-fault divorces. Tune in and learn all about staying in a covenant marriage!

    1 hr
  • Living in Uncertainty
    In the realm of psychological inquiry, much focus has been placed on the "knowledge-action gap," which separates what we know from what we do. However, another critical yet underexplored area is the "question-answer gap." This gap is where uncertainty, the unknown, and the unknowable live, marking the distance between the questions we pose and the answers we seek. Tune in and learn all about how to live in uncertainty!
    58 min
  • How To Know You Are Old
    Erikson's old age, the age of wisdom, started at 50. In his 1950 book, Childhood and Society, Erikson called the eighth stage of development, old age, a crisis of integrity versus despair, a stage of generalization of sensual modes with the basic strength of wisdom. Tune in and learn al about how aging effects us and how to realize we are getting old!
    1 hr

About Dr. Gary Bell's Absurd Psychology

From the publisher's feed

Not for the faint of heart or sensitive spirit, Dr. Gary Bell's Absurd Psychology is about helping our lives in the insane world we exist today. It is a sarcastic, smart and witty view of the lives we…