Throughout my career, I have marveled at the preoccupation in our culture with narcissism. Every day, you can find articles about which politician, celebrity, or athlete is “narcissistic” and why. And while that can be interesting to read about, I often wonder if it would be more helpful to look within before we judge others. In this article, I present an overview about narcissism, with particular focus on becoming more self-aware of narcissistic traits in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Over the course of twenty five years in clinical practice, I estimate 60% of the patients I have evaluated have said they have problems with their memory. In this article, I will highlight a few techniques to improve your memory that have been around for thousands of years.

When you think about melatonin what do you think of? Chances are you think of a dietary supplement for sleep that 3 million people in the U.S. take in any given month. In this article, I will highlight some take away points from current research that you should know if you are taking melatonin including very recent studies on how there appears to be an adverse effect of taking melatonin with food.

When I started my psychiatry career in the Navy in the mid-1990’s, I was advised to always tread carefully with patients on three topics: sex, religion, and politics. Twenty-five years later, I find that talking about sex and religion is not so challenging, but politics is a different story.

I attended my first virtual national psychiatric conference and by far my favorite session was called Me2/Classical Music for Mental Health. The session started out with about 12 musicians who were all string players. This was not an ordinary orchestra; in fact, it was quite extraordinary because about half the musicians live with the diagnoses of Bipolar Disorder, Schizophrenia, depression, anxiety or addiction. We all know the power of music to heal for the listeners but it is also healing for the people playing too.

As we enter the sixth month of this pandemic, it’s pretty clear that we’ve all been affected on some level by the quarantine and social distancing.

When it comes to this topic, a part of me is afraid to speak, for fear of saying the wrong thing. My sense is that most people will assume this article does not apply to them, and they would rather not explore the topic too deeply within themselves as it’s uncomfortable. And yet, I really want to share what I hope is a healing message.

Are you wondering how you are going to make it emotionally through this pandemic? In this current article, I will use a case study to illustrate how you can shift negative feelings into positive ones by using a visual “emotional map”.