Summer Dreams

June 21, 2025 by Justin Cunard

Do you consistently find yourself in the fall asking where summer went?

Do you often need a vacation to recover from your vacation?

Lush greenery in the background, beach sand in the foreground with scrabble letters stood up in the sand spelling SUMMER.

Summer…ahhh yes…time for a deep breath. Maybe you envision your toes in the sand and waves crashing in the background or maybe a trip into the mountains. Summer is typically a time where people travel, schedules change, and we head to the beach. This season can be a time of looking forward to a break after a long stretch from the holiday season. We go in with the best of intentions, but it can become just another stressful season if we do not slow down to check in with ourselves.

A speed bump question I would like to put in your path: is there too much pressure on your Summer?

One of the things we have seen with others and frankly ourselves, at times, is that we can put too much pressure on these trips or we pack too much into the Summer season. We end up getting back from a trip and we never really get the benefits of the break. We pressurize these trips to be this all-encompassing event to give us rest, bolster our physical, emotional, and spiritual tanks, and oh yea…have fun. Just writing that makes me feel a bit stressed. The beach trip now has these expectations and these pressures can be projected onto fellow travelers. Expectations are also kindling for resentments to burn. Ah! Who wants that?! We are doing this for fun and to cut loose remember?!

A suggestion is that instead of the usual family trip that happens every July to the same place, maybe a conversation needs to happen with the family to ask: “Hey do we still want to make this trip? Is this still relevant to the season we are in or are we just making ourselves do this for tradition’s sake?” Maybe you decide to keep the same trip, but instead of staying with family you choose to rent somewhere nearby to make sure you have down time. Sometimes we do not need wholesale changes, but adjustments to the travel/schedule plans.

This may not come as a shock to those of you who know me, but my suggestion is to slow down. Check in. What is it that you actually need in this season? What is refreshing to you? How does fun and adventure fit into this? If you are a believer in God, check in with Him as to what He has for you in this Summer season. Remove the pressure of: it is all up to me.

A good podcast for entering the Summer season is: John Eldredge’s Wild at Heart podcast episode 823 The Secret To Summer.

Filed Under: Emotional Health, Family Tagged With: Life Seasons, Mindfulness, Self Care, Summer

Choosing Well

April 21, 2025 by Justin Cunard

Do you feel like you just don’t think of great solutions in the moment?

Do you find yourself thinking after the fact, “why didn’t I try ‘xyz’ instead”?

Choices. Sounds so simple doesn’t it? Hey you’ve got options man…Choose! Some of us may freeze under the duress of choice. Others may struggle to find choices within a situation and those are the people I am going to be talking with here today. Why? Well, frankly I am one of those people and this is a current learning point in my life right now.

When we grow up in traumatic situations, we have to make decisions in survival mode. Survival mode decision making is usually quite rudimentary to put it mildly. It isn’t very complex or detailed. It’s – do this or that to survive – narrowing your decision tree into 2 options; the classic black and white thinking. In my world it was: make the choice fast and furious and sweep up the fallout later. Oh, and you better make the right choice in this game that you haven’t been told the rules about or else bad things follow. Sounds like a winning formula, right? Yikes!

I struggled so much in relationships because it was hard for me to slow down, pause, and recognize the other person’s side in the conflict. My mind and nervous system would be so quickly activated that I didn’t even recognize that I was in survival mode. All I knew was to defend and counter strike. Not very useful when wanting to form healthy, loving, meaningful relationships.

After a long season (ten years and still counting) of learning to slow down I am now in an era of learning to develop options in scenarios. Holy cow, what a challenge. Feeling activated, pausing, and literally saying aloud, “Okay Justin, here are the things in front of me. I have two quick options in my mind, but what is the third option – down and around the corner – I am not seeing right now?” You see, that last part with the “down and around the corner”, is what helps me begin to shift because I like to solve problems and I am pretty good at it. Learning to see beyond the moment presses me to use all the slow down muscles I have developed over the years which allows my problem solving skills to shine.

The other subtle thing I have realized is sometimes it’s a ‘fourth’ option that leads me to that ‘third option down and around the corner’. A third option arises and then it blends with another idea and bam, we have our best choice. It is hard to describe in words what this process feels like. It can be quite stress inducing, frustrating, and triggering because remember – if I didn’t answer fast and furious back in the day, bad things happened. Slowing down becomes a time to rewire my responses and thoughts, while also finding that thinking in this new way (I call it the “down around the corner option”) brings joy and excitement because once my mind calms (and this may take a bit) I usually find new ideas arise fairly easily. What a smile it puts on my face.

So take the slow down challenge if you are a person who has an internal response like me. Look for that third option down and around the corner. You are not bound by old processes and ways of doing things. Go beyond, and if you could use some help figuring it out – reach out. I believe in you.

Filed Under: Emotional Health, Mental Health Tagged With: Choice, Choosing

Confessions of a Counselor Part 3

December 7, 2021 by Justin Cunard

Confessions of a Counselor Part 3

How aware are you of your self-talk and the words you use with yourself and others?

It’s time again to share another hidden treasure of therapy, which at first can seem really annoying, but over time becomes a tremendous asset. That hidden treasure: awareness of the actual words you use with yourself and others. What do I mean? Well let’s take a quick inventory. I want you to stop, slow down…. and listen to what is going on in your mind right now. Do you notice these words: must, have to, got to, should have. Those are cue words. Those words are pressuring and usually a solid sign that your self-talk has switched into a critical nature. If you are in therapy with us and you have chosen to use parts of self as your lens for the work, the words listed above are signs your critical parent is in the driver’s seat, which is not where we want that part of self in the car.

Again – stop, slow down, and take notice of the words you are using with others. Are you noticing those, have to, should have, need to, and got to’s? This is typically a sign that you are triggered and maybe feeling that you are not good enough, you didn’t do enough, or feel a loss of control. When those feelings rise up, we tend to grasp at controlling those around us. Yikes…

So, why are we talking about this? Well, one of the benefits and early annoyances in therapy is that not only are you generally growing in awareness of how you behave, but also the words that are running around your mind. Now, more than ever, you’ll be cognizant of the verbiage you use to communicate with others. This is important because sometimes we are unaware of how our self-talk switches through the day. Becoming aware of those words you use with yourself is imperative to the therapeutic journey because it is in those moments of catching the self-talk changing that you can check-in and ask, “what just happened?”. Otherwise, you simply go on the ride of how your mind always operated before you began therapy.

When you are able to stop and ask the above question it now gives you the opportunity to see what may have triggered you or bothered you. This is amazing because now you can take back the power and control over your thoughts and reactions. You can really begin the process of change!

Filed Under: Emotional Health, Mental Health Tagged With: Coping Skills, Counseling, Mindfulness, Psychotherapy, Self Care, Self Knowledge, Therapy, Transformation

Confessions of a Counselor Part 2

November 15, 2021 by Justin Cunard

I guess I am going to turn this into a mini-series (check back to last week’s blog post). Except, I am not going to a Catholic Priest to confess and then do my penance. I have done that twice in my life though. I was a child and had no idea what I was doing. Had I been going to confession during my late adolescence and 20’s, the congregation may have had to toss me in the holy water fountain and hope for the best. We all have our histories right? Right guys?! Okay, onto the topic at hand.

Confession #2: There are parts of your dysfunctional behaviors you will keep and that’s a good thing. Wait…what!? Read on…

In therapy you may ask yourself, “Do my dysfunctional coping mechanisms have any redeeming qualities or am I just highlighting it all, hitting the delete button, and starting over?” Good question. And every counselor says, “It depends.” Confession: That’s our go to response. I will say this post is most relevant to those of you who have ventured through the first 2 phases of therapy (awareness and grief), have gotten to the other side (no small feat!), and have begun the process of developing your new story. If you are not at this point in therapy, it’s okay, because if you stay the course this will become relevant to you down the road.

I started this blog by mentioning dysfunctional coping mechanisms and whether they have to be eliminated completely or not. To simplify this blog, let’s focus this down a bit and highlight codependency as a dysfunctional coping mechanism.

Codependency is a common struggle for many people. Confession: I am one of these people. Codependency is really centered around a thought and behavior process where you have learned to anticipate other people’s needs, meet them, and forget all about yourself. That is until you are frustrated and become resentful of the person you are rescuing. If you want more on this – come to therapy.

As you begin to walk out your new story you may think to yourself, ‘Wow, I have to get rid of all this codependent behavior with my new story.’ Well, not so fast. There are gold nuggets and good that can come from even the most traumatic backgrounds. Where codependency falls flat on its face is when you forget about yourself and others’ needs become more important than yours. Well, a focus in therapy would be to learn how to voice yourself and let your needs be known. This is a great and amazing goal because YOU MATTER! The gift you attained with being codependent is that you know how to read people and situations and see what is needed or missing.

Maybe you recognize a facial expression in somebody ahead of you in line at the grocery store. When they are at the register to pay and you already know the face they are making means they are short money. Maybe you have been there before and maybe now you have the means to pay the difference and be a blessing to that stranger. Your prior codependent skill of anticipating needs will help you in situations like this. How about that person in the office that people tend to take for granted? You notice that, that person has been sad and it looks like they need a pick-me-up. So, you intentionally bring flowers and a card to their desk reminding them they matter. Again, you see the need and the hurt, so you are able to take action when appropriate.

You see, therapy isn’t a firesale of all things you, but rather a remolding of yourself. The authentic you was/is always there, it just got covered up by life’s unhealthy happenings. Hang in there. Stay the course. Keep writing that new story.

Filed Under: Emotional Health, Mental Health, Relationships Tagged With: codependency, Counseling, Hope, Psychotherapy, Relationships, Self Care, Self Esteem, Self Knowledge, Self Love, Therapy, Transformation

Confessions of a Counselor Part 1

November 8, 2021 by Justin Cunard

Have you ever wondered what some of the hidden benefits or struggles are with therapy? Have you ever wondered how you came into therapy wanting to reduce anxiety, and a few months later you are grieving losses from your childhood, and seeing the world differently? You see, here at Phenix, we have a strong belief in transformational work, which is why you see the word ‘transformation’ on our website and all our social media accounts. We firmly believe in the process of long-term sustainable growth and change. Not saying there is anything wrong with solution focused approaches, but generally it is not our cup of tea. Within the deconstruction and reconstruction phases of therapy, there are goals put in place by the client. In our field we call this the treatment plan. The treatment plan becomes the flight path for the focus of therapy, but other benefits and challenges come along the way.

So, onto Confession #1

There comes a point in therapy where there is a point of no return. Not that you are forced to continue the process or that you must complete some mandatory journey, rather that your eyes and mind are now more aware than ever. You cannot unsee what you’ve already seen. You cannot unknow what you now know. The joy, pain, and sadness in the world will hit you in new ways and in ways you never thought about. Just because you stop therapy does not mean the new insights stop.

Since we are heading into the holiday season, let’s use the holidays as the scenery for this first confession. Maybe in years past you have joined your family for Thanksgiving dinner or Christmas Eve adventures, but you never were able to recognize the maladaptive behaviors and functioning of your family of origin like you do now. Maybe you begin to see and sense the sadness in your brother or mom’s eyes, even though they mask it with a smile on their face. These are the things you can no longer unsee and unfeel. Sorry. What you become aware of now causes the brain to create new neural pathways and it becomes a daily part of the ‘scanning’ your mind does.

It is like the old cliche’ car salespeople use when you are on the lot looking to buy a car from them. They usually say something like this, “You’re gonna be seeing a lot of these on the road.” Yea, that’s because they know your mind is now wired to be looking for the same new car/SUV as you wander down the highway. The car/SUV was always there roaming the roads with you, but they never stuck out to you because your mind never had a reason to cause it to come to your consciousness. Now it does. Has this ever happened to you? Where you went to the Ford dealership to check out a Mustang and now you see every new Ford Mustang on the ride to work. You cannot unsee the Mustangs….they’re everywhere ha.

Again, my apologies… sorta. Awareness is a part of the journey. Gaining awareness and insight into your functioning is amazing. It gives you the power and control back in your life to begin choosing new ways of responding, behaving, etc. The more you become aware of, the more you can change. The more you realize you can change, the more hope you have of a brighter future, and after the last couple years, I think some extra hope is a good thing. Join me next week for confession #2.

Filed Under: Emotional Health, Family, Mental Health, Relationships Tagged With: Counseling, Hope, Identity, Life Seasons, Mindfulness, Psychotherapy, Relationships, Self Knowledge, Therapy, Transformation