When is the last time you got angry at someone treating you with respect?
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We all want the same thing: simply to be valued by somebody else. Think about every person you have ever met. They just want to feel valued. I want to feel valued, and so do you. By someone. Right?
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I think this universal human need has very ancient roots. Millions of years ago we were not the fastest animal, not the strongest, not the biggest animal. We were isolated mammals scurrying around trying not to be lunch. We were prey.
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And then we formed these small social groups, and our survival potential increased so dramatically that human beings are everywhere. But to stay protected by the group you have to contribute: you have to have value.
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My name is Joseph Shrand. Some of you may remember me from the 1972 WGBH TV show Zoom. I’m Joe. After a career in theater I went to Medical School, and am now Board Certified in Adult Psychiatry, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and Addiction Medicine. I have the honor and privilege of working with people in their time of need, with the goal of doing one simple thing: reminding them of their value.
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Every person who has come to me on some level has felt they had less value. At that moment in time the best they can do is see themselves as less-than, broken, not doing as well as they can. I teach them the I-M Approach, the basis and foundation of this website.
I am suggesting a radical idea. What if everyone actually is doing the best they can, at that moment in time, with the potential to change in the very next second to another best I can. What I am suggesting is that each is doing the best we can, bending, adapting, to the world. Who am I to say that the way you bend is wrong? Who are any of us to judge each other like that? We each may have a preference, but if
we judge each other we will just get angry and defensive. When we change the paradigm from incredulous to inquisitive, we encourage an opportunity to explore the others perspective. That is how I use my I-M Approach. To wonder with a patient who they are and why they do what they do. For all of us to wonder who we are and why we do what we do.
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Sincerely,
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