I was cleaning out a desk drawer yesterday and came across this piece of paper I had tucked away with a printed (copied) quotation on it. It said, "More people would learn from their mistakes if they weren't so busy denying them."
No kidding.
Speaking of quotes, I just published my first book to do with quips and quotes I have created after nearly 25 years in practice as a mental health clinician. It came out earlier this month (August 2026) and it's called Resilience: Quips & Quotes to Change Your Life One Truth at a Time. It's available for purchase in either Kindle e-book or paperback formats through Amazon.com. I wrote it because people are often challenged by remembering truths presented as part of any general conversation. Let's take the difference between genuine fear and anxiety for an example. It's one thing to say: "Genuine fear is when you are at risk of imminent life-or-death danger, given the immediate circumstances. Anxiety is when you imagine "what if" that terrible thing is going to happen and then worry about it." In my book, I put it this way: "Genuine fear is when your pants catch fire; anxiety is when you worry about them because they're your favorite pair." On healing, "Healing is when you realize you were never too much, you were merely surrounded by people who preferred less." Like that.
I have categorized my quips and quotes into sections by topic: Fear & Anxiety, Pain & Suffering, Courage & Change, Control & Surrender, Hope & Healing, Gratitude & Grace, and The "G" Word: God. This is the first book in my series on Resilience and resilience-based living. My second book Living Between the Fault Lines Poetry Then. Wisdom Now. (1996-2026) will be available sometime before mid-September, 2026. That book presents seventeen poems I wrote when I was 40 years old and believing my healing and recovery work was all "behind" me. How mistaken I was. I found those poems 30 years later as I was cleaning out my office. Since becoming an LLP Psychologist in 2003, re-reading those poems made me realize how much further I had come in my healing as a lifelong "work in progress". My insights appear in the book next to each poem, along with more of my "Mary sayings" to introduce each poem and the lesson(s) learned from them since 1996. I hope you will consider checking it out as well once published.
So, back to the front here about why living in the truth is so important for all of us.
Many of us grow up fearing truth. That's it. Plain and simply stated. When we get in "more" trouble for telling the truth than we do for lying about it, do you have to wonder why we deny so much while we are here living life on Planet Psych Unit? I don't. Going back to my opening (and borrowed) quotation about mistakes and denying them; of course it's easier to deny what we would rather not face and then work to solve ourselves! That's true for anyone and everyone.
As any adult child of an alcoholic will tell you, life is very hard being raised in an alcoholic household when everyone in the family has to walk on eggshells to make certain the alcoholic either (1) remains in the background of everyone's life within the family, (2) is "watched" and/or "protected" to ensure he/she/they don't say or do anything that could impact the family name/image/reputation in a negative manner, (3) is treated like royalty so as to hope he/she/they will remain "stable" (whatever that means!) often enough, and/or (4) doesn't die/kill/seriously injure someone else as a result of his/her/their drunken antics. Double that when physical and/or sexual abuse is part of that package involving the other partner/parent and/or their child(ren). I didn't mention verbal and emotional abuse just now because it's already going to be present when being raised by and/or exposed to an alcoholic adult on a regular-enough basis as a child.
What a way to live, right? But millions have anyway. When the children grow up, they are left with some major choices: don't ever indulge in alcohol and/or drugs, drugs o.k., but no alcohol, don't "be" with anyone who drinks or does drugs, and/or drugs are o.k., but no alcohol. There is another choice. Repeat the pattern without realizing you're repeating the pattern, and then find someone else who is just like you—or only does drugs and doesn't drink—or who lives a clean and sober lifestyle.
So—more people really would learn from their mistakes if they weren't so busy denying them.
End of.
Until next post..
Yes, I created the artwork for the cover. (Acrylic pour painting) ;-)