How to Recover from Compare and Despair

A week does not go by without me hearing about the rage and unexpressed grief from a client who is hurting from what I call “Compare and Despair.” This happens when you see someone on Facebook or in real life have something you want, or think you should have, and it creates a terrible pain from the perceived lack in your life.

Parents stress out from seeing their friends’ children get into better colleges, or win awards, and much more jealousy runs rampant from those vacation pictures and fitness bravados.

After one of my “close” relatives unfriended me on Facebook, I went through a psychospiritual process about this and came out the other end and wrote about it: Compare and Despair: how free do you want to be?

Up Next: Behavioral Health Best Practices

We have had a successful year going through the entire DBT Skills curriculum (Dialectical Behavior Therapy).

This past trimester we explored Mindfulness, Dialectics and Interpersonal Effectiveness. Learning how to communicate effectively, set healthy boundaries, say NO when you mean NO and YES when you mean YES opens amazing doors for improved friendships, work relations and romance. I think this group has experienced a deep shift in how they approach negotiations and relationship challenges thanks to these powerful DBT skills.

A new semester is starting in November, on Mindfulness, Dialectics and Distress Tolerance, offering dozens of powerful and effective exercises. There will be an evening class on Wednesdays and a daytime class is currently forming on Thursdays.

As always, please contact me if you have any questions or need further information about anything you read here.