Julianne Harvey

This week I heard someone say, "Love is not the same as control."  I stopped what I was doing to write this down immediately because it struck me as profound and meaningful.

When relationships are dysfunctional, love becomes synonymous with control.  Each person jockeys for position, competing to get ahead, and manipulation is one of the key tools utilized.  Real love giv...

William had a friend over to play and I overheard their conversation.  His friend asked, "Can I take some of your trash pack guys home for awhile and then bring them back to you?"  William said, "Hmm, you want to take some of them home?  Just wait a minute and let me think about it."

His response struck me as brilliant.  He repeated back what his friend wanted, possi...

I know that change is good for me.  Digging a hole and sitting in it forever might be safer than taking regular risks, but it sure as hell isn't healthy for me.  Why do I long for security for myself and my loved ones above all else?

I think the answer to this question is rooted in my childhood.  It has been crazy hard but ultimately rewarding to go back in my mind to fea...

I am learning to live with what is, instead of what I wish it would be.  When I have a high expectation on myself or someone else, and it does not get met, I feel resentment and anger.  But if I take each day as it comes, intentionally staying in the moment instead of racing ahead in my mind to all of the potential outcomes, I have a much better chance of avoiding disappointment.

The greatest thing we can offer another person is to maintain their dignity in all of our interactions.  This is especially true with children, because they depend on us for their survival, and when we damage their dignity we are permanently scarring them in their development.

We all get frustrated and lose it from time to time.  That's a given.  But in Wal...

I drove past a church sign this week which said, "Don't make me come down there! - God".  Instantly, my blood began a slow boil.  I felt so mad that I wanted to pull over, storm into the church office and start cracking heads together.

Then I remembered the wonderful Al-Anon slogan Live and Let Live.  I am not in charge of the whole wide world...

I no longer expect perfection from myself or from others.  It's an unrealistic goal, and always has been, only I couldn't see that before.  It developed like an illness does, slow at first and unnoticeable, before blowing up into a full-fledged and crippling problem.

It helps to understand my background as a child in an alcoholic home when I consider how I developed the idea t...

On Sunday, my pastor used the phrase "lean in" when he was talking about vulnerability and community.  The day before that, I watched Stephen Colbert interview Sheryl Sandberg, the COO of Facebook, about her new book Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead (which I haven't read yet but it's on my reading list).  All week, I have been mulling this phrase over in my mind, and loving how...

I feel strong.  This is the first time in my life I have ever felt this way.  For years, I pretended to be strong, but I could not back it up with actual strength.  I had a lot of bluster and sleight-of-hand movements to distract from the emptiness and gripping fear I felt inside.

For almost 3 years, I have been dismantling the disguises I wore since childhood.  One ...

I am coming to understand that things happen to us, and we ascribe meaning to the event.  What happens to us is far less important than the meaning we give to it.

I think of the meaning we assign as an illusion.  We build one illusion after another, and then live inside of them.  The more illusions we have, the less connected we are to reality.