Topics

Topics

 

Freeing Your Love from Insecurity

Many people feel that they’ll never be happy in love; never experience the consistent, secure warmth of a healthy intimate relationship.

Dr. Becker-Phelps offers insights and solutions for this dilemma based on clinical experience and research. She explains how this insecurity is driven by an anxious attachment style, which leaves people feeling – at least to some degree – unworthy of love and insecure about whether a partner will really be emotionally there for them. She also introduces the concept of compassionate self-awareness, which is a balance of self-compassion and self-awareness. It is a way for them to transform their way of connecting to a more secure one – offering the promise of a happy, loving relationship, as well as feeling happier within themselves.

This presentation offers – and expands upon – many of the insights offered in her book, Freeing Your Love from Insecurity: How Anxious Attachment Can Undermine Your Relationship and What You Can Do About It. (available Spring 2014)

Maintaining Healthy Relationships: Advice for Couples

Most couples begin a relationship without having to think much about how to keep it happy, healthy, and invigorated. But, as the glow of the “honeymoon” period wears off, their relationship can begin to languish or grow tense.

Dr. Becker-Phelps teaches the essential elements in a healthy relationship. She will address how they can maintain their positive relationship in the course of daily life; and the essential skills for talking through conflict.

Staying Resilient

Resilience is well defined by the Japanese proverb “fall down seven times, get up eight.” The problem is that when you are down, it can sometimes feel impossible to get back up. In this workshop, Dr. Becker-Phelps addresses this problem by answering these questions:

Who is resilient?

Where in your life do you need this ability?

How can you become more resilient?

How can you prepare yourself to become more resilient?

What specifically can you do to become more resilient?

Participants will learn about the qualities that can enable them to become more resilient. They will also learn how increasing self-awareness in the domains of STEAM (Sensations, Thoughts, Emotions, and Mentalizing) can lead to greater resilience.

Overcome Self-Bullying with Self-Compassion

People too often criticize themselves unmercifully as a way to self-motivate; but all they are really doing is self-bullying. Though they might sometimes respond with better performance, they also constantly feel inadequate and doubt themselves. And, in the long run, it can hurt their performance and keep them from getting ahead in their careers; as well as making them unhappy in their personal relationships. Fortunately, there is another way.

You can still learn to do your best while nurturing positive feelings about yourself. The combination of acting from a position of self-assurance and feeling an inherent sense of motivation can change your life!

In discussing this topic, Dr. Becker-Phelps will define self-bullying and explain how people hurt themselves with it. She will also describe compassionate self-awareness and how it can help people stop self-bullying while improving performance and enhancing relationships.

Compassionate Self-Awareness: An Approach to Making Real Change

(Similar to the Work Happier, Not Harder presentation; but addressing broader life issues)

There are many self-help books that tell people what they need to do to change — to lose weight, find love, get rich, stop smoking, be happy – just to name a few.  And sometimes, that advice happens to fit with how people think and function, and it works.  But, all too often, people blindly follow the advice without feeling that it truly applies to them — and inevitably, their efforts fail.

Dr. Becker-Phelps will explain how you are controlled by unconscious processes that act as “invisible puppeteers” and keep you repeating old patterns. She will also explain how you can cut those strings using “compassionate self-awareness” — a balance of self-compassion and self-awareness – to make lasting change.

Unstressed for Success

This is an ideal workshop for people who are looking to foster a positive attitude toward their lives in general and in their search for employment. Dr. Becker-Phelps will help participants reinvigorate their lives. She will help them identify their individual stressors, define a plan to reduce them, and reclaim the joy in their lives.

Work Happier, Not Harder To Become More Effective at Your Job

Non-assertiveness. Procrastination. Self-doubt. Disorganization. These and other problems often get in the way of people being effective at their jobs. In these situations, it’s time for people to reassess and make some changes. A direct approach can be helpful: State the problem; decide on a concrete goal; and develop a plan to walk from the problem to the goal. Unfortunately, this method often fails. And, when that happens, people need to go a layer deeper, addressing the obstacles to change.

Dr. Becker-Phelps will explain how these obstacles are within you. You are controlled by unconscious processes that act as “invisible puppeteers” and keep you repeating old, ineffective patterns. She will also explain how you can cut those strings using “compassionate self-awareness” — a balance of self-compassion and self-awareness – freeing you to advance in your career.

 

Dr. Becker-Phelps can also create presentations to fit your needs.