By Robert Taibbi - However we may resist the idea, we’re in the therapy business, and the reality is that our initial contact with clients represents the same challenge faced by salespeople seeking to turn shoppers into satisfied customers. Our job isn’t to make people buy things they don’t need, but to assess people’s needs and show them the match with what they have to offer.

By Kirsten Lind Seal - Before I became a therapist, I spent 20 years as a professional performer, during which time I was a regular at standup comedy clubs. Many of the skills I learned as a performer have proven readily transferable to therapy, namely the skill of using humor to defuse tension, create alliance, and challenge what we often call resistance in difficult clients.

Often, our attitudes toward anxiety symptoms are misguided, says Richard Schwartz, the originator of Internal Family Systems. By understanding responses like cold sweats and heavy breathing, for instance, as positive expressions of a wish to protect oneself, rather than simply negative symptoms, Schwartz says, trauma survivors are in a better position to begin the process of healing.

By Wendy Behary - Narcissists are notoriously difficult clients. The key to working with them is being direct about the roiling emotions they trigger in us, and remembering that their self-aggrandizement almost always covers up painful longings for true connection, intimacy, and a sense that they’re "good enough."

Alicia Muñoz - Boundaries bind. They limit, stop, and inhibit. But they also free people up to be themselves. In couples where one partner is a people-pleaser, things can get even more complicated.

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By Chris Lyford - A male client uses his therapist in hypothetical examples, which the therapist finds inappropriate. Recently, when they were discussing healthy dating habits, he said, “So if you and I went to a movie, would it be okay to hold your hand afterwards?” The therapist wants to bring it up in their next session but is unsure how to do so. Here's how six clinicians say they'd tackle the situation.

By Ellen Wachtel - In couples therapy, if we can help each partner be a better therapist for the other, all three of us can feel more helpful and effective. My favorite way is to start by using a particular exercise to provide a window into each partner’s psyche.

By Todd Kashdan and Robert Biswas-Diener - A common theory holds that happiness is humanity’s natural resting state. But positive emotions and thoughts aren’t always useful. Here are several often overlooked research results about a happy mindset that sound a warning.

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.