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Articles by Barbara Berger

on InnerSelf.com

For many years, Barbara has been a regular contributor to InnerSelf.com, one of the leading online sites in the fields of personal development, psychology and spirituality. Below you'll find all of Barbara’s articles on InnerSelf.com. Just choose a topic that you would like to know more about - click on the link and sit back and be inspired!

 
 
 
 

Writing the Truth and Allowing the Emotions to Flow
Writing things down is a good way to practice truth telling.

Our Mental Health and The War In Ukraine
Never before have we been able to see, feel and experience up close the utter devastation and horror that is unfolding in the lives of so many of our fellow men and women right now.

Our Mental Health and The War In Ukraine (Video)
Never before have we been able to see, feel and experience up close the utter devastation and horror that is unfolding in the lives of so many of our fellow men and women right now.

Freeing Ourselves by Telling the Truth
It's hard to make any real progress on the journey of self-discovery, self-realization, self-empowerment and healing without telling the truth. We have to tell the truth to get the energy moving. We h...

Your Voice Matters – Vote For Decency and Democracy!
Today, in October 2020, the horrific situation in the US is breaking my heart... the divisiveness, the lack of basic respect and common decency, the breakdown of basic democratic principles and instit...

Sitting Quietly, Doing Nothing, Letting Everything Be Without Resistance
Sitting quietly, doing nothing. But what’s the point, you ask? Why should I do this? Why should I waste my precious time sitting quietly doing nothing when there is so much to do, so much to accomplis...

Contemplating and Integrating the Power of the Force
The more you observe, the more you allow yourself to experience the infinite field of energy swirling in you and around you, the more you will discover that orderly patterns exist everywhere in Nature...

A Mind-Boggling Discovery: The Mystics Were Right
We live in exciting times because Science—more specifically quantum physics—is proving what the Mystics and Metaphysicians throughout history have long proclaimed. We are bundles of information and en...

The Power of Releasing and Letting Go
We're all carrying around such incredibly heavy loads of excess baggage, stuff we don't need, stuff that's weighing us down and preventing our Good from manifesting. One of the best ways to feel bette...

Focusing on the Good in People: The Power of Praise and Blessing
In every interaction with other people, we are always making choices consciously or unconsciously as to what we dwell upon. We can make a conscious choice to focus on the positive in people or situati...

The Power of the Vision: This Is A Time of Great Awakening!
What is the next step? Where are we all going? We are witnessing... and participating in... great events, extraordinary events. Nothing less than a planetary transformation is taking place, right he...

Can Black And White Thinking Make You Happy?
You know that you are indulging in black and white thinking when you use words like “always” and “never”. Or when you generalize about something or someone and say “everyone” or “no one”.

Is It Good or Bad? Are You Happy or Unhappy?
An emotion is something we attach to an event and it arises as a result of our interpretation of the event. This emotion is not inherent in the event but is always the result of our opinion or interpr...

Where Do Our Stressful Thoughts And Beliefs Come From?
The moment we can ask ourselves “Does this thought have anything to do with reality?” “Is this thought true?” we are starting to wake up. This understanding breaks the bondage, which is our total iden...

The Shocking Truth About Happiness
Looking back, I see how much of my life I spent worrying about stuff or being nervous and insecure about stuff or not really enjoying the fullness and richness of my life. I had to admit that to mysel...

Lost Contact With Yourself? Start Listening To The Signals From Within
We have been trained to, and have become so used to, focusing on other people and on trying to please other people. Most of us have learned from an early age to try to tune ourselves into what other p...

Why Your Negative Emotions Are Your Friend
Your Inner Compass is constantly sending you signals, but what happens when you don't listen to the signals and act accordingly? Well, the signals don't go away, they simply get louder and more powerf...

Not In Contact With The Inner Compass?
The shocking truth is that many of us have lost contact with our Inner Compass – with our connection to this Great Universal Intelligence – and so we have lost contact with our own internal guidance s...

How To Go From Chronic People-Pleasing to Empowered Assertiveness
What if your Inner Compass tells you to do something that goes against the wishes of your family? What then? What do you do? Give up your dream? Don't listen to your Inner Compass? Grit your teeth and...

Does Everyone Have An Inner Compass?
How do I know that everyone has an inner compass? To answer this question, let's start by taking a look at what’s really going on. Let's take a look at the world, at reality.

3 Questions to Ask Yourself When You Feel You Are In Crisis
Sometimes I like to say what would we do without our crises? Or – who would we be if we never met a good crisis? Just think about it. Without our crises, most of us would never grow or develop! We’d j...

Dealing With The Fear Of Disapproval And Other Challenges
Many people mistakenly think or fear that their choices and behavior will displease others and be the cause of another person's displeasure or unhappiness. It could be their partner, their parents, th...

Why It's Important To "Be Selfish" and Keep Your Energy High
When I coach people to find and follow their Inner Compass, they often ask, "But isn't it selfish to follow my Inner Compass?" So here's my answer. First of all, it is important to understand that if...

The Inner Compass, Human Evolution and Democracy
The understanding that each individual has their own connection to the Great Universal Intelligence is the basis of our democratic way of life. Democracy is a social system that is based on the right...

Your Teenagers Shouldn’t Make "Mistakes"?
Teenagers, teenagers, teenagers!! Oh how we rack our brains trying to be the best possible parents. And no matter what we do, it seems we can never get it quite right!

Learning To Communicate Honestly With Others
What does it take to communicate honestly with other people? First of all, it takes knowing your own mind. But when it comes to communicating honestly with others, knowing yourself isn’t enough. Commu...

How To Deal with Your Nervousness, Anxiety, and Fear
If you sometimes experience anxiety that gets very intense, you may not be getting the help you deserve because you are ashamed of feeling anxious or having panic attacks. This is unfortunate because...

I've Discovered The Fast Route To A Happy Life
Are you suffering from what I call the ‘never good enough’ syndrome? Are you always wanting more than what is? And are you beating yourself up because you don’t have it? Are you convinced that what yo...

Who Is Setting the Standards for Your Happiness?
Things just happen and then we judge them and react to them based on what we believe is good or bad. In other words, our reactions to events are determined by our ideas of what reality should be like...

Are You Sure It's Anger That You're Feeling?
Many people who are striving to be tolerant and loving and kind suppress their own personal power because they mistakenly perceive the energy of personal power to be anger.

Some Sane Self-Talk About The Body
The reality for most of us is that sometimes the body does hurt. We can make it a lot easier for our bodies to do their wonderful job if we could just get ourselves out of the way.

What Is Preventing You From Being Happy Right Now?
Ask yourself what is actually preventing you from being happy right now, right this very moment? If you are honest with yourself, you will probably say it's because you don't have what you want. This...

Mind Your Own Business and Enjoy The Holiday Season!
Minding other people’s business is a surefire way to make yourself unhappy. That’s why if you want to enjoy the coming holiday season and live a happy life, I highly recommend you take a close look at...

You Can Manage This Moment -- One Minute At A Time
No matter what challenges or difficulties you are facing, it can be a big help to remember that if you can only do one minute at a time, there's nothing to worry about. One minute at a time. That’s al...

Reality Checklist for Psychological Maturity
Did you ever wonder what characterizes a psychologically mature person? I’ve thought about it a lot – both on my own personal inner journey of awakening and because I work as a therapist and coach on...

The Power of Your Words – A Little Reminder
I am quite sure we would all be much more careful of what we say if we were aware of the power of the spoken word. If we understood that every word we speak or write is an affirmation. To affirm liter...

How You Can Take Care of Yourself and Make Good Choices
You can only take care of yourself if you know yourself. You can only make good choices for yourself if you know yourself. You can only set limits if you know yourself. But to know yourself you have t...

Children, Ground Rules, and The Inner Compass
Since everyone has an Inner Compass, this means that children do too. But what does this mean in practice for parents and teachers? How do we respect the fact that each child has an Inner Compass with...

How Can I Know What's Best For Me?
One of the biggest things I've discovered working with clients everyday is how extremely difficult and challenging it is for most people today to know what is best for them to think, say and do in the...

Plugging Into Your True Power Through Silence
Silence is often the doorway to an ever deepening understanding of this thing called Life and our own true power. Silence is a wonderful place where wonderful things happen... Silence is food for the...

The Power of Focus: Learning to Use the Power of the Mind
It's so amazing to discover the power of our minds! It's probably the most fabulous, wonderful, liberating discovery that any human being can make! Barbara Berger tells about an important milestone on...

Are You Sure You're Really Feeling Anger?
So many women are still afraid of being called angry, still afraid of owning their own power, still of afraid of being called a “bitch” or not being feminine or not being spiritual. Which in reality t...

The Inner Compass: Your Emotions are Your Magnetic North
We all have an Inner Compass that gives us guidance about what is the best way forward for us. But the big question is how does the Inner Compass give us this guidance? And the answer is that it does...

Is It Selfish To Listen To Your Inner Compass?
You have an amazingly accurate and reliable Inner Compass that is working all the time. An Inner Compass that is constantly giving you guidance and information as to what is best for you and whether o...

Follow Your Passion and Accept the Consequences
In my book “ Are You Happy Now? 10 Ways to Live a Happy Life ” I describe the 10 ways I discovered one day when I was lying on my sofa thinking about my long, dramatic life and I asked myself what I n...

What To Do When You Love Your Family But Dread Family Get-Togethers
Many people dread family get-togethers even if they really do love each other. We see this happening often – maybe you’ve even had this experience yourself and wonder why it’s so difficult. You really...

The Power of Right Seeing and Bringing Forth the Goodness of Life
A great way to raise your energy, increase your power, and improve your life is to practice what I call ”right seeing”. By ”right seeing”, I mean focusing your attention on the Good that is already pr...

Why Not Give Yourself A Break About Trying To Be Perfect?
In my daily work as a therapist/coach I've discovered there is one thing that we all have in common. We are all, everyone including me, so amazingly unkind and hard on ourselves. The truth is, I have...

Follow Your Passion and Stop Limiting Yourself
We all know when we are following our passion or our heart’s desire because it feels right. Everyone has experienced this feeling of ‘rightness’ at some time in his/her life. It’s called integrity. An...

How Do We Measure Happiness?
Our happiness depends on whether we believe something is good or bad. But most people are not aware of this important mechanism and they believe that it is outer circumstances and what they have or do...

Our Children Belong To The Universe, Not To Us
Some parents think it’s their job to make their children happy and to think for them – but this is not true. It’s not the parents’ job to think for their children or to make them happy. It’s impossibl...

Resisting, Repressing, and Ignoring Unpleasant Emotions Doesn’t Work
Life teaches us that we cannot be released from powerful, stressful emotions by resisting, ignoring, or repressing them – no matter how hard we try. In fact, life teaches us just the opposite. We lear...

The Secret to Good Relationships is Healthy Boundaries
If we want to make the world a better place, we need to work on having healthy boundaries! And by this I mean… we understand that I am me and you are you and that each of us has a right to be here and...

How Old Would You Be If You Didn’t Know Your Age?
How old would you be if you didn't know your age? It’s an interesting thought isn’t it? Why not test it for yourself. How would you feel if you didn’t know your age? Would you be 20, 17, 95 or 5?

You Can Make Other People Suffer or Happy: Reality or Make-Believe?
Here’s a basic belief that many people are having trouble with. It’s the idea that we can actually make other people suffer or that other people can make us suffer. This belief is really a gem. But le...

One of the Secrets of a Happy Life is to Become Your Own Best Friend
One of the secrets of living a happy life is to become your own best friend. But you can only do this when you know who you are, when you honestly and truly know yourself. Because what does a best fri...

It's Not Your Job as a Parent to Make Your Children Happy
Sitting with clients every day makes me realize that so many people are confused when it comes to the parent-child relationship and what their responsibility is when it comes to being a parent. Some p...

Why You Aren’t Happy Right Now
Besides our worry thoughts about the future, there is another type of story we are telling ourselves which gives us a lot of anguish. These are the ‘if only’ stories: ‘If only he’d listen, I’d be happ...

Looking for Success? What Are You Really Seeking?
What is it you want more than anything else in the world? Ask yourself and answer truthfully. Answer as if it was the night before Christmas and you were a little kid and could have whatever you wishe...