Carrie Rutman Therapy, Associate MFT

05/12/2022

During Mental Health Awareness week, I felt compelled to highlight a podcast that specifically addresses one of my passions - issues related to Men’s mental health. While mental health conversations are more prominent than ever, the resources specifically addressing Men’s issues still feel quite limited.

In this episode of The Man Enough Podcast, guest Jason Wilson (author of the book Battle Cry: Waging and Winning the War Within) speaks from the heart about the challenges he has faced as a man, explores the ways in which masculinity and masculine roles/stereotypes have limited him as an individual, and addresses the incredible value and importance of learning how to cry.

“If I can help break this narrative, this cycle that we can’t cry, even Justin as we talk about masculinity… there’s nothing toxic about masculinity. A man becomes toxic when he only lives his life from masculine attributes such as strength, boldness, aggression. When you only allow yourself to operate under that umbrella, now you shut off half of your humanity. You can’t be a nurturer, you can’t be compassionate, you can’t be in suffering because it counters what the world has told us a man is”

‎Show The Man Enough Podcast, Ep Jason Wilson: Teaching Our Boys To Feel - Dec 6, 2021

03/17/2022

Today’s mental health (related) podcast episode comes from The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos. On this episode, Laurie speaks with psychologist Susan David about emotions, in particular difficult emotions, and the importance of listening to them and treating them as valuable data.

When speaking about what she calls "emotional agility" Susan David shares the following: “So holding our thoughts and emotions lightly is by being curious with them, and being able to recognize that when we experience these difficult emotions while the dictates of society might say ‘oh you've just gotta be positive you've just gotta push them aside,’ in fact, there's extraordinary beauty when we just slow down with them in a way that is curious. “What is this emotion telling me about my needs or my values?” There's also connected with that this need to be compassionate, because it's hard to human, it's hard to be a human being in the world regardless of what the circumstances are of your world. Emotional agility is really about this ability to be with our emotions in ways that are curious, compassionate, and courageous.”

‎Show The Happiness Lab with Dr. Laurie Santos, Ep Emotions Are Data...So Listen to Them - 2 Jan 2022

01/25/2022

Happy to share that I am currently able to accept new clients and referrals! I offer telehealth sessions for adults, young adults, and couples, and have a passion for working with the male population and Men's mental health. I work with my clients to address symptoms of anxiety & depression, life transitions, career difficulties & stress, communication skills, emotional literacy, sexuality, intimacy, peer relationships, self esteem/self-worth, and family dynamics.

Feel free to contact me at CarrieRutmanTherapy@gmail.com or find our more about my services at CarrieRutmanTherapy.com

01/07/2022

This week’s therapy podcast spotlight comes from the Mark Groves Podcast where he and guest Silvy Khoucasian talk all about Attachment Theory. Their discussion covers many aspects of Attachment Theory, most importantly how understanding your attachment style can help you in your current various relationships.

When breaking down the understanding of one’s attachment style, Silvy makes an important distinction, “It’s not so important to get fixated on which style it is, it’s important to just recognize the behavioral pattern. Is it relational anxiety where I’m afraid of losing connection, or is it relational avoidance where I’m afraid of getting overwhelmed by connection? We can get really fixated on “I’m this attachment” “I’m that attachment”….instead paying attention to the behavioral patterns that come up for you.

‎Show Mark Groves Podcast, Ep Attachment Theory 101 with Silvy Khoucasian - 26 Aug 2021

12/31/2021

Happy final day of 2021. As I reflect on the past year, a theme that I’ve noticed circling around is the feeling/sentiment of loneliness. Loneliness can mean so many things to different people, and you do not have to be physically alone to experience it. In the spirit of a busy holiday time, I will again be sharing a quick meditation podcast episode that you can use in the morning or at night to connect with your own emotions.

In this episode, meditation teacher Oren Jay Sofer explores how to cultivate a sense of connection and belonging inside. Enjoy!

‎Show Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris, Ep Loneliness & Belonging | Bonus Meditation with Oren Jay Sofer - 17 Apr 2020

12/23/2021

This week’s podcast highlight is a quick 6-minute medication episode from the Ten Percent Happier podcast with Dan Harris focusing on the importance of allowing our difficult emotions to exist. Especially during this time of the year, emotions can run high, and it can be extremely helpful to pause and recognize the relationship you have to your emotions. This applies to the emotions that arise in therapy as well.

Meditation teacher Joseph Goldstein states, “We often notice difficult or challenging emotions in our lives, but not necessarily notice that we are in conflict with them. “It’s ok” can be a magic phrase for settling the mind into an acceptance of whatever the emotion might be. And this acceptance becomes the foundation then for appropriate response."

‎Show Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris, Ep How Not To Be Owned By Your Emotions | Bonus Meditation with Joseph Goldstein - Nov 19, 2021

12/10/2021

These past two years, many companies have been forced to adapt to a new way of communicating and connecting with one another which was unlike anything most of them have experienced before. Because of this, it is more important than ever for companies to find innovative ways to ensure that their teams feel supported and heard as well as able to effectively communicate and connect in order to thrive in the workplace.

Last week I had the pleasure of leading the wonderful managers at Lululemon in El Segundo through a team building workshop focusing on communication skills and improving teamwork through the identification of individual role strengths and opportunities. The team left feeling more connected to one another and developed clearer understanding of their individual communication strengths and roadblocks as leaders, as well as ideas for how to improve overall team communication as they move into their busiest holiday season.

If this sounds like something your company or a group you know might enjoy, feel free to reach out CarrieRutmanTherapy@gmail.com.

12/03/2021

This week’s podcast spotlight is an episode from the Ezra Klein Show titled “This Conversation Will Change How You Think About Trauma.” In the episode, Ezra sits down with Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, author if The Body Keeps The Score, to talk about the relationship between the mind and the body, the different approaches one can take when working with trauma, and much more.

When speaking about Internal Family Systems as a way of understanding trauma, Dr. Van der Kolk states, “But only the people who know you best know that there are other parts of you that people don’t get to see, and there may be part of us that we may not be aware of sometimes. So that we have different ways of reacting, or engaging, that can be quite different regarding the circumstances. And what I.F.S. particularly showed us is that when terrible things happen to you, you create ways of being in the world, personalities, that help you to cope. For example, if you get chronically humiliated, you may say to yourself, “Nobody is going to ever humiliate me anymore,” and you become this staff bully who put people down before they can put you down. You may go home and be a very sweet and gentle person to your kid, but when you deal with a guy in the office, you may become a bully. That doesn’t mean that all of you is a bully. That means that a part of you is a bully that comes out under certain circumstances. So we never know other people until we live with them for a long period of time, because there may be very hidden parts of themselves that we may have developed back then in order to cope with particular challenges that we face growing up.”

‎Show The Ezra Klein Show, Ep This Conversation Will Change How You Think About Trauma - Aug 24, 2021

11/20/2021

Happy Friday! Today's podcast spotlight is from The School Of Greatness: Episode 1190 Dating Is Hard: Why Forgiveness Isn't Always The Answer w/ psychotherapist Lori Gottlieb. In the episode Lewis and Lori discuss how to benefit most from couples therapy, the importance of being understood, how to make sense of and work through childhood patterns that resurface in adulthood and much much more.

When speaking about couples work, Lori states, "I think that you need to learn how to listen, and you need to learn how your partner wants to be listened to. And people don't bother to ask. So we assume that the person wants in that moment what we would want if we had that exact same problem in that day. So when your partner comes to you and says "oh my gosh you need to hear what happened to me today," you might say to them "How can I help right now? Do you want to just vent right now, do you want a hug, do you want me to help problem solve with you, what would be helpful right now?"

‎Show The School of Greatness, Ep Dating Is Hard: Why Forgiveness Isn’t Always The Answer w/Lori Gottlieb EP 1190 - Nov 17, 2021

11/11/2021

Today’s mental health podcast spotlight is an episode from the Rich Roll podcast featuring psychiatrist and neuroscientist, Dr. Jud Brewer. In the podcast, Jud and Rich speak about ways in which Covid-19 has changed our relationship with anxiety, and discuss habit changes we can make to help us manage anxiety in a healthier way.

Around the one-hour mark, Dr. Brewer begins speaking about the idea of being more curious about your emotions… “The key component in the process of unwinding anxiety is learning to be curious. By observing you are gonna affect the results. If we are very identified with our thoughts and emotions, it’s hard to change them. But if we can observe them... by observing we are less identified, so we can start to see, oh there’s anxiety, oh, it's more on the right side or the left side of my body. So we can start to see it more clearly simply through that awakening process and its truly fostered by curiosity. It helps us step back and observe more"

‎Show The Rich Roll Podcast, Ep Unwinding Anxiety With Dr. Jud Brewer - Mar 8, 2021

10/29/2021

Excited to share this week’s mental health (related) podcast episode spotlight from the Almost 30 Podcast, episode 323- How To Overcome Anxiety with Ryan Weiss. The episode begins with Ryan speaking about the importance of listening, including how little of it we actually do in our daily lives, followed by a thought provoking and insightful conversation about the way he has come to understand anxiety (starts around 23:25). This episode is a great way to start your day, perhaps on a morning walk, as Ryan provides actionable ways we can start shifting our relationship with anxiety.

Insight moment (29:10): “So we were then raised in a household by parents who, god love them, and so grateful, but didn’t necessary do all the healing work. So when I as a young child who was born into a world that is steeped in the thought systems of fear, and competition, and not enough-ness, and scarcity, when I was born into that world as a young, feeling, empathetic curious child and I had an outburst of emotion, I didn’t have a parent that sat next to me and held me, and said you get to feel whatever you feel right now, tell me about how you feel, I’m here to be with you to hold space for you to feel how your feeling.”

‎Show Almost 30, Ep How to Overcome Anxiety with Ryan Weiss - May 12, 2020