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title: More and better friendships create a more healthy and joyous life
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    # More and better friendships create a more healthy and joyous life

   Details    Category: [Psychotherapy and Recovery Work](https://eatingdisorderrecovery.net/blog/psychotherapy-and-recovery-work/)  ![conversation 400590 480](https://eatingdisorderrecovery.net/images/conversation-400590__480.jpg)  
Psychotherapy is personal and private. Yet we also need companionship and friendship for healing our eating disorders and our lives. Let's communicate better with each other. Let's heal wounds that maintain rifts between one another and befriend people we thought we could never befriend. Look at the people you ignore or bypass or eliminate from your activities. Look at the people who stimulate unpleasant emotions in you. Who are the people in your friendship, work, academic or family circles you'd rather not have anything to do with?

We all can identify such people. Let's look at what we don't know about them this year.

Let's draw these people out with kindness. I wonder what we'll discover when we learn more about them and their experience? It's possible that we might discover our own hardened hearts softening. We might even discover a friend.  
*"when it comes to understanding one another, we must focus on what we don’t know, not what we think we do know or should know.*

*"We must resist the temptation to shut down, to react reflexively or to judge others. We must overcome our fear of causing offense and find faith in the power of benevolent intentions.*

*"It is a discipline that is difficult to achieve — but one that is well worth the effort."* [Isaac Lidsky](https://www.inc.com/leigh-buchanan/orlando-decorative-concretes-founder-built-a-70-million-dollar-empire-he-will-never-see.html)

1. Who comes to mind in your life?
2. How might you open an exchange with them?
3. What don't you know about them?
4. How can you learn more and maybe heal something?
5. Are you willing to try?
6. Even a little bit?

My little essay is inspired by [The Pitfalls of Trying to Read a Co-Worker’s Mind](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/29/business/the-pitfalls-of-trying-to-read-a-co-workers-mind.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0) in the New York Times.

For information about Joanna Poppink's private psychotherapy practice click the below link or e-mail

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.[Psychotherapy with Joanna](https://eatingdisorderrecovery.net/therapy-with-joanna)



 

 

 

 

  

 

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#### Healing Your Hungry Heart - the book

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