“The best part has been the content of the class. It is all so relevant! I like the way you have created an organized pathway through the workbook. DBT is truly not a “do it yourself” program. I very much appreciate the weekly page numbers for relevant handouts and worksheets. The structure you’ve created is one of the best parts of the class. I love that each class includes guided meditation.” M.M., New York, NY
“I was slightly surprised that the DBT group tends to have several participants who are a bit reticent. Group dynamics are always unpredictable. I thought the participants would be much more dramatic and self-aggrandizing. I expected them to be aggressively talkative or domineering. I also thought Lisa would have had to be very hands-on in managing that. Instead, the group is rather quiet, and everyone seems so delightfully ordinary. It’s been a relief, frankly. I’m not a weirdo for having intense emotions and struggling to manage them. I’m just an ordinary person and so are the other group members. I also didn’t expect so much humor. Your sense of humor has been quite welcome. It adds levity and makes the class feel less burdensome or “heavy.” C.S.E., Cambridge, MA
Up next: Virtual DBT Distress Tolerance and Mindfulness Skills, June 10 – September 9, 2025. Tuesdays, 7:30 – 9 PM EST. There are still a few spots open. To learn more, visit Summer DBT Group.
Eating dessert is one of the pleasures of life, yet I don’t want to hurt my body by eating inflammatory foods that weaken and compromise my precious instrument…so finding desserts that contain super nutrients is definitely part of my JOYFUL experience.
I did make this recipe over the past weekend, and it’s wonderful.
Modifications: I used almond milk (instead of oat milk), Stevia instead of Agave, skipped the salt, and I mashed it in a bowl. Came out superb! (I also made it a second time using a hand-held blender, and that works really well too, plus easy clean up.)
Serenity is not freedom from the storm, but peace amidst the storm…
Hi,
Thank you for your continued interest in my work. I know I haven’t posted frequently enough here – but that will change soon!
For today, I’m excited to be teaching the next 14-week semester of Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills (DBT). This semester we will cover Mindfulness & Distress Tolerance Skills.
With the Distress Tolerance curriculum, your will learn valuable skills and interventions to help yourself reduce your intense stress and harsh feelings in the moment – to lower the volume on your anticipatory anxiety and catastrophic thinking. These DBT skills significantly help to reduce the escalation of your inflammatory emotions, and reduce the painful, polarized and perfectionist thinking that often cause your meltdowns. You will learn to find your peaceful “Middle Path” here.
There are many powerful skills included in this semester’s work. It is the hope of this process that you will put together your own personal Distress Tolerance tool kit with the techniques that work the best for you.
Unfortunately, there is no “one size fits all” with these various techniques, so you do need to be a good scientist in the laboratory of your life and try them all out. You will eventually find the ones that you love, and that will work quickly and effectively for you.
Yes, I am looking forward to continuing this exciting journey towards wholeness with this next group. I am also deeply honored to be sharing this transformative and useful educational process with you.
If this is not for you, but you have someone in mind for this next DBT Group, please have them contact me soon at my web site – currently www.MirthMaven.com – and fill out the Contact Form which helps them briefly tell me the best times to reach them (by phone) and guides them to check out their insurance (for the Out of Network benefit). Otherwise this course is private pay, $980 for continuing students, $1215 for new students (includes one Intake session.)
Onward and Upward✨
Lisa Wessan
“If you can recognize and accept your pain without running away from it, you will discover that although pain is there, joy can also be there at the same time.” ~ Thich Nhat Hanh, No Mud, No Lotus
Lisa Wessan, LICSW, CLYL, RM Psychotherapist, Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Trainer (DBT) Life Coach, Author, Speaker, Consultant
Voting super early in October…Here’s gratitude galore to artist Sam Durant (b. 1961 – ), for this powerful piece, Like, man, I’m tired of waiting, 2002. It’s currently on display at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum in Hartford MA. (The Wadsworth is definitely worth a trip!)
So here is my Cultural Appropriation du jour…I hope Mr. Durant does not mind me borrowing his racial justice motif for these politically toxic times…Mea culpa, mea culpa, I just can’t resist.
I know that learning to live in ambiguity with any measure of peace — even joy — is a clear marker for how healthy I am inside.
To improve your mental state, I ask you to find ways to feel more useful. To that end, I think it’s ALWAYS more effective to replace the WHY questions with the HOW questions. Let me unpack this a bit…
When you ask WHY IS THIS HAPPENING, you never get a satisfying or truly acceptable answer. Plus, no one really knows exactly WHY harsh things happen. Oh yes, there are tons of theories, but ultimately, it’s never quite known for sure. There are too many complicated, multi-dimensional issues to pinpoint “The Reason Why” something – or someone – is in such a negative state.
That’s why I think that asking the HOW questions is going to give you a big payoff. For example, asking “How can I be helpful? How can I be useful? How can I make this better?” in your micro world, at home, work, school, will shift you into taking positive actions. Then you will start to feel as if you are part of the solution, as elusive as it may seem to be at times.
Plus asking “How can I help?” takes the focus off of you…dare I say it? So much mental anguish comes from the Pity Party we have for ourselves. Moreover, too much self absorption leads to the impulse issues being activated, such as drinking, drugging, food binges, shopping, gambling, porn and so on. As I’ve heard it said, “Poor me, poor me, POUR ME A DRINK!”
In sum, compared to sitting and watching the news on your digitals, having a depressing Pity Party, marinating in fear and anxiety, asking the HOW questions is surely a better path.
Here is the beautiful and amazing 5D Flow…Peace in your heart can bring peace to the world. Yes, as you feel more peaceful and useful, you radiate that energy out and it definitely has a ripple effect.
As it is written:
Peace in my heart brings peace to the family. Peace in the family brings peace to the community. Peace in the community brings peace to the nation. Peace in the nation brings peace to the world. Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me. ~ Author Unknown ~
Best of all, when you ask HOW questions, you are no longer feeling like a victim! When you ask “Why is this happening [to me]? ” “Why don’t they just blah blah blah?” You feel powerless, impotent, ineffective and probably a tad depressed or anxious.
Ideally, with good inner work. you could become bulletproof to the news. At your best, you want to feel all the feelings in the grief-rage-sadness spectrum, and then move on quickly to what you love. Why? Because as I have learned from many teachers, what you focus on INCREASES…where your attention goes, your energy flows. If you focus on hate and all the haters, you will feel more hateful and angry. Simple, but not easy.
Finally, you’re probably tired of people reminding you to cultivate an attitude of gratitude, but truly, that is a big part of the solution here. Learning to ask How can I be useful, coupled with a daily — even HOURLY – gratitude list, could carry you a long way during these challenging cockalocka poo poo slinging times.
❤Here’s to learning to live in the WAITING ROOMS of life with more peace and joy❤
The Lighter Side of Transformation 