Category Archives: Featured

When windows get smashed

The window of tolerance after Cyclone Gabrielle is shifting. Here’s what it means for response and recovery.  In Dan Siegel’s book, The Developing Mind, he describes how everyone has a range of intensities of emotional experience that they can comfortably experience, process and integrate. This is the ‘window of tolerance’, and it varies widely. For […]

How will 3000 counsellors fit into a new National Mental Health System in NZ?

There is a new pathway for about 3000 counsellors to be accredited to work in publicly funded mental health and addiction roles. Until now, counsellors haven’t been able to work in publicly funded clinical roles, because it’s a self-regulated profession in New Zealand. A new accreditation pathway has addressed this concern. This has raised hopes […]

My 30,000 Days Project

My heart has beaten almost 2 billion times. I have burned 1378 candles on all my birthday cakes. I have travelled around the sun 53 times – that’s about 50 billion kilometres. The moon has circled around me 706 times. I’ve been on the internet for over 31 years. And today, I am 19,301 days old […]

Two years later: Review and pivot

It’s been two years and three months since I started working to support people through the pandemic. Through this I helped to set up the pillars of the United against Covid-19 campaign, consulted to three Government Departments and many other public and private organisations, delivered so many webinar sessions I’ve lost count, written many Twitter […]

Omicron incoming

Prepare for surging case numbers over the next days to come. It will take some time for us to come to terms with this changing reality. Already, people are coming forward to be tested in greater numbers in Auckland – this will probably increase the number of identified cases in days to come. What can […]

Omicron: What Now?

Omicron is making its way around the world, and this is hard. Hard for everyone who has been looking forward to engaging with life again, everyone who is tired, and everyone who just wishes this was over. I hear you, I see you. It is difficult to think about this, but we must. We won’t […]

Shelf Life

It’s been a tough couple of years. I’m writing this at the start of November 2021, just to get some thoughts down on paper. I have noticed that my motivation has crashed over the last few days, and I’ve been wondering why. I’ve been feeling periodically tired for months now. But most of the time, […]

We need to talk about humiliation

The Government’s rhetoric about getting vaccinated has hardened. The conversation started with relying on intellectual arguments to convince people that getting vaccinated is the right thing to do through presenting data. It then moved to a persuasion stage, trying to understand the influence of emotions, and working through trusted connections to have conversations designed to […]

The New Covid Protection Framework: Initial Thoughts

The Prime Minister outlined the new Covid Protection Framework this morning. Here are some of the key points from a psychological point of view Outlining the new structure and how it will work will be helpful for most people. And it clear that the goal is to carry on vaccinating at speed and scale to […]