Colleen Grote, PhD, LMHC, RPT

06/18/2024

04/10/2024

01/18/2024

Hey friends! I am looking for guest presenters for this year! Anyone want to present a live webinar or join me on a podcast? We are able to provide CEs and would love to promote your knowledge, work, practice, or other activities!

You can learn more at

You Need a Training CE-Eligible Trainings for Providers View Trainings Guest Trainer Application Heart and Solutions is excited to be able to offer training opportunities for mental health professionals through our platform called You Need a Training. You Need a Training provides opportunities for i...

02/15/2022

Photo by Lang Accent Photography

02/15/2021

02/08/2021

It’s National play therapy week! Be on the look out for some great posts about the value of play therapy.

01/19/2021

***Martin Luther King Junior Day Giveaway!!

In honor of Martin Luther King Junior day today and Black History Month coming in February, we are giving away FOUR Colors of the World activity pack and crayon kits!!!

Like this post and tag a friend to automatically enter you AND your friend to win an activity pack! Four winners will be randomly selected on Wednesday 1/20/2021

12/19/2020

Amazing!!

11/20/2020

A friend shared this and I really liked the lesson! *original poster (Kate Scott 2020)*:

RUN THE DISHWASHER TWICE.

When I was at one of my lowest (mental) points in life, I couldn’t get out of bed some days. I had no energy or motivation and was barely getting by.
I had therapy once per week, and on this particular week I didn’t have much to ‘bring’ to the session. He asked how my week was and I really had nothing to say.
“What are you struggling with?” he asked.
I gestured around me and said “I dunno man. Life.”
Not satisfied with my answer, he said “No, what exactly are you worried about right now? What feels overwhelming? When you go home after this session, what issue will be staring at you?”
I knew the answer, but it was so ridiculous that I didn’t want to say it.
I wanted to have something more substantial.
Something more profound.
But I didn’t.
So I told him, “Honestly? The dishes. It’s stupid, I know, but the more I look at them the more I CAN’T do them because I’ll have to scrub them before I put them in the dishwasher, because the dishwasher sucks, and I just can’t stand and scrub the dishes.”
I felt like an idiot even saying it.
What kind of grown ass woman is undone by a stack of dishes? There are people out there with *actual* problems, and I’m whining to my therapist about dishes?
But my therapist nodded in understanding and then said:

“RUN THE DISHWASHER TWICE.”

I began to tell him that you’re not supposed to, but he stopped me.
“Why the hell aren’t you supposed to? If you don’t want to scrub the dishes and your dishwasher sucks, run it twice. Run it three times, who cares?! Rules do not exist, so stop giving yourself rules.”
It blew my mind in a way that I don’t think I can properly express.
That day, I went home and tossed my smelly dishes haphazardly into the dishwasher and ran it three times.
I felt like I had conquered a dragon.
The next day, I took a shower lying down.
A few days later. I folded my laundry and put them wherever the f**k they fit.
There were no longer arbitrary rules I had to follow, and it gave me the freedom to make accomplishments again.
Now that I’m in a healthier place, I rinse off my dishes and put them in the dishwasher properly. I shower standing up. I sort my laundry.

But at a time when living was a struggle instead of a blessing, I learned an incredibly important lesson:

THERE ARE NO RULES.
RUN THE DISHWASHER TWICE!!!