By Rhegina Sinozich - If you really want to help people open a doorway to a different way in life, therapy needs to give them powerful experiences—positive ones. I've learned that the most powerful and effective way to get therapy off on the right note is to help clients access the power of the hope and openheartedness that’s embedded in childhood.

By Ann Weiser Cornell - Clients need to tell their stories, of course. But when the stories manifest habitual categories—ways of labeling and explaining experiences—the process can get stuck. The formation of a felt sense is a breakthrough moment, in which we slow down and form a new bodily awareness of some life situation.

By Rubin Naiman - Traditionally, sleep and darkness have had positive connotations. Yet many of us don't go gently into the night: we knock ourselves out with alcohol, sleeping pills, or sheer exhaustion. Our widespread fear of and disregard for darkness may be the most critical, overlooked factor in the contemporary epidemic of sleep disorders.

Often we hear things from clients like “My relationship ending was so traumatic for me,” or “When my uncle passed away, I was totally traumatized.” With the word trauma being used so loosely and for such a wide range of problems, how do we know what it actually means anymore?

Most therapists recognize that physiological processes hugely influence emotion and behavior. But according to psychiatrist Robert Hedaya, too many tend to practice as if treatment should focus entirely on the mind. A comprehensive physiological evaluation is needed, he says, before determining that a medication trial is appropriate.

By Steve Andreas - Getting immediate, nonverbal feedback from clients is essential to knowing how they’re responding in a session, and in maintaining the therapeutic relationship, which research shows is essential for successful therapy. Here are some strategies to increase your sensitivity to nonverbal shifts.

By Barbara Fredrickson - At work, you and your teammates celebrate a shared triumph with hugs and high fives. On your morning jog, you smile and nod to greet fellow runners and silently wish them a good day. After a trip that’s kept you apart for too many days, you share a long embrace with a family member. Can these everyday moments be called love? What exactly is love?

With all the buzz about brain science, is it possible to lose sight of the mind? Dan Siegel, a pioneer in the applications of brain science to psychotherapy, says that the mind is much bigger than the brain. In the following video clip, he explains what this means for psychotherapy.

By Rob Fisher - In therapy, it's important to notice the storyteller, not just the story. As therapists, we can notice and attend to outward signs of internal experience. The client may be looking down, squirming in her seat, or being very still, for instance. Each of these is an indicator of an internal experience as well as a set of beliefs and models of the world that underlie a client's behavior.

By Richard Schwartz - As clients embody more Self, their inner dialogues change spontaneously. They stop berating themselves and, instead, get to know, rather than try to eliminate, the extreme inner voices or emotions that have plagued them. Even clients who've shown little insight into their problems are suddenly able to trace the trajectory of their own feelings and emotional histories with startling clarity and understanding.