Dear Reader, We've recently subscribed to Showtime again, and are finally able to catch up with one of my favorite TV shows, Couples Therapy. In case you're unfamiliar, it's where a real psychoanalyst (Dr. Orna Guralnik) talks to real couples (so many) about their issues. In Season 3b, there's a particular one that caught my interest, Josh and Natasha. I may have started watching this show purely for infotainment, but the more training I've been receiving, the more I pay attention to Orna's...
about 1 month ago • 8 min read
Dear Reader, Last week I wrote about a question I’ve been having about whether Type preferences might have evolved in part as a response to childhood trauma, or to what extent our innate preferences influenced how we developed and dealt with that. My friend Cindy emailed me a paper about whole Type and the archetypal Self in response, and that helped put some shape around something else I’ve been noodling on. So this week, I’m going to go a little further “out there” and ask, what if the...
about 1 month ago • 8 min read
Dear Reader, What if your Psychological Type was more than a set of predispositions? What if it was a collaborative response, crafted by your psyche in the earliest years, to meet the demands of love and belonging? This idea has been quietly circling in my mind for some time, and I want to try and wrap my head around it. How are the patterns of how we show up, our go-to ways of thinking, relating, making sense of the world, related to the psyche’s way of protecting us when our relational...
about 2 months ago • 6 min read
Dear Reader, this is it, next week I'm unlocking level 50! 🥳 Turning 30 was wild and wonderful. My plan for that decade was to "stop playing" and "start taking life seriously." In a word, LOL. 😂 Turning 40 was difficult and depressing. Thank God for cognitive therapy, creativity, and co-working. In a word, Friends. 🍍 Now, about turning 50... Did you see the meme about how what 50 looks like has evolved from The Golden Girls to Jennifer Lopez doing a show? Source unknown to me, but would love...
about 2 months ago • 3 min read
Dear Reader, after a six-month hiatus, I finally published another video on my YouTube channel! 😅 I had a great time putting this one together - it's a reply to a lovely ENFJ viewer's questions about communication styles, and how to get their ESFP partner to pay more focused attention while they're out and about. You can watch it here: Although I don't mention them in the video, it was also a useful reminder that I've had all 178 variations of "Your Love Profiles" reports saved on my...
2 months ago • 1 min read
Dear Reader, I published my “Who Are You At Your Core?” quiz almost five years ago. Since then, it gave over 5,000 people a glimpse into the basics of Dr. Linda Berens' Essential Motivator(TM) model. Proof or it didn't happen - screenshot from my quiz dashboard, May 2025 Many of you signed up for this newsletter on the basis of that quiz - thank you so much for continuing to be interested in Type and Relationship insights! ✨ In case you were wondering, more than half of you probably have an...
3 months ago • 2 min read
Dear Reader, last week I was quiet, because I was fully concentrating on my "Happier, Healthier Relationships with Type" session for the APTi (more on that below), and this week I was almost going to be quiet, because life was life-ing... but I want to get better at sharing whatever comes up, so here we go. As you may have heard, Monday saw a major power outage in mainland Spain, Portugal, and parts of France. I didn't even become aware of it until later in the afternoon. But I soon learned...
3 months ago • 3 min read
Dear Reader, when I first started getting certified in MBTI(r) and interested in Type, I was looking for a community where I could learn from others and exchange ideas. At the time (2010), we were living in Texas, and the Association for Psychological Type International (APTi) had a chapter in town. I started attending meetings and eventually began volunteering and even served as the DFW-APT President for a while. It was such a privilege to organize programs, invite excellent speakers, make...
4 months ago • 2 min read
Dear Doris, I knew having a baby would change my body, my sleep, my priorities - but I wasn’t prepared for how it would kill my sex drive. It's been 8 months and I'm still not feeling desire in any way! I love my partner, but by the time the baby is finally asleep, the last thing I want is to be touched. I really miss sex, but my body doesn’t seem to cooperate, and I worry my partner thinks I don’t care anymore. How do I get my desire back when I barely recognize myself these days? Frustrated...
4 months ago • 4 min read