Barbara Jordan

Recently a client of mine was struggling to forgive his administrative assistant for late, sloppy reports she submitted in his name. But, then we tested the reality of this story. After some discussion, he realized that he really had to forgive himself for not having the reports ready for her in time for her to type them accurately and do a good job. Like this client, your own lack of forgiveness may be avoiding or delaying the inevitable. Without it, hurts fester and grow unchecked. As a result, you replay failures, resentments, bitterness, and mistrust in your life. Forgiveness is essential to peace, happiness, and success. With forgiveness, you acknowledge and mend hurts. You are able to break the destructive cycle of retaliation and build the positive cycle of success.

Here's an oldie but goodie. Do you remember Stephen Covey's First Things First? If you haven't read it, you're missing out on a real gem. I recently brushed off the dust from my copy and dug into it full force.

Usually my blog posts are focused on providing you with practical suggestions on various topics such as clinical supervision, work-life balance, stress/time management, leadership development, and self-care for people in the helping professions. Today, however, I am asking the ACA blogging community (both readers and writers) for their most valuable insights regarding presenting a paper at a conference. For the first time, I will be presenting a paper at the International Counselors Association in Jamaica in June. I've presented several workshops and seminars, but I never presented a research paper. So, I am asking you for your best advice. What works? What will my critics look for in my paper, my presentation, and in my research design?

Do you struggle with organizing time, details, and paperwork? When people expect you to do things in a linear (successive, direct, straight) fashion, do you have trouble? What works for me is to keep all related project papers in piles stacked in left-to-right (or right-to-left) tiers, overlapping 50% so you can see half of the top sheet of each pile. This works best because "out of sight" is usually "out of mind" with people who have a lot of ADD traits.

I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of all the stigma surrounding Attention Deficit Disorder. After all, we all experience a little distractibility, impulsivity, memory lapse, and disorganization every now and then.  I propose that we consider ADD a diversity issue rather than a deficiency.