Despite the range of issues facing individuals who come in for therapy, one problem has repeatedly presented itself in my office: People who are fundamentally convinced they cannot be loved and will be abandoned for the slightest mistake. For these individuals, every day is another gauntlet of events designed to cause them to stumble and reveal the

We should also be more careful when pursuing things we imagine will spare us anxiety. We can head for them by all means, but for other reasons than fantasies of calm, and with a little less vigour and a little more scepticism. We will still be anxious when we finally have the house, the relationship and the right income.

After all, it is only in anticipation of sorrow that joy seems frivolous. We become so used to bracing for the next devastation, we don’t have time or emotional energy to rejoice. For some of us, this moves us to a permanent seriousness, always on guard against the evils of this world. Some of us even begin to believe we are not worthy of pleasure

Best-selling author Jack Canfield once said, “Everything you want is on the other side of fear.” And he’s right. But I’m going to take it one step further. Pain, discomfort, shock, boredom, impostor syndrome, awkwardness, fear, being wrong, failing, ignorance, looking stupid: Your avoidance of these feelings is stopping you from a life greater than