John Hawkins, Licensed Professional Counselor

06/18/2026

You have a responsibility to treat people with honesty, kindness, and respect.

You do not have a responsibility to ensure that everyone approves of your choices.

Sometimes the most ethical thing you can do is disappoint someone rather than betray your values, your commitments, or yourself.

06/17/2026

✨ Growth and improvement require the willingness to fail over and over until mastery and success comes. ✨

Failure management is the difference between perseverance and quitting.

The weight of failure crushes some people.
They treat failure as a verdict about themselves, their ability, their talent and their identity.
🔹Success = I'm good.
🔺Failure = I'm bad. I don't have what it takes. I'm a loser. I should quit.

Others can step back, acknowledge any negative thoughts and feelings, and ask;
1. What worked?
2. What didn’t work?
3. What did I learn?
4. What needs more practice?
5. What should I repeat?
6. What should I change?

Notice that these questions assume growth is already occurring. This shifts your attention from verdict to feedback.

🌟 Focus on the trajectory rather than the single result, because growth is often visible only across time, not in any one attempt.

🌟 Success rarely comes from avoiding failure; it comes from repeatedly extracting lessons from the feedback (failure), making adjustments, and re-engaging with the task.

🎯 In the recipe for growth and improvement, failure is not the opposite of success, but one of its primary ingredients.

06/15/2026

🎯 Before fixing the world, work on yourself.

The easiest person to manage is someone else; the hardest person to manage is yourself.

Many people spend enormous energy:
🔺Complaining about politicians.
🔺Complaining about coworkers.
🔺Complaining about family members.
🔺Complaining about “people these days.”

Meanwhile, they neglect:
🔹Their health.
🔹Their relationships.
🔹Their finances.
🔹Their character.

However, some criticism is necessary. We live in a world full of other people, and none of them are perfect.

🔸If a friend is drinking himself into ruin, criticism may be an act of care.
🔸If a company exploits workers, criticism may be an act of justice.
🔸If a government abuses power, criticism may be a civic responsibility.
🔸If a therapist is harming clients, criticism is ethically required.

The question isn’t whether criticism occurs; the question is whether it is constructive, informed, and proportionate.

Moreover, we must be willing to examine ourselves and accept criticism when it is valid, even if it's not offered in a kind, considerate way.

🌟 Self-improvement is developing oneself for participation in life and community. We have responsibilities not only to ourselves but also to others.

🌟 A life devoted exclusively to personal improvement risks becoming narcissistic, even if it looks virtuous.

06/14/2026

✨ SUNDAY SERMON ✨

⚠️ Life is uncertain.
⚠️ Suffering is unavoidable.
⚠️ Death comes for all of us.
⚠️ Cosmic justice and ultimate meaning aren't guaranteed.

Camus' answer is not certainty. It’s action.

Despair says:
🔺Nothing matters.
🔺Nothing will change.
🔺Why bother?
🔺It’s hopeless.

Action says:
🔹Maybe all that's true.
🔹But I’m going to do this next thing anyway.

The action itself is a refusal to surrender.

Reality has a way of cutting through abstraction.

Action doesn't solve the human condition.
Action keeps us moving through it.

“Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create the fact.” ~ William James

We all belong to the Fellowship of the Transcendental Traveler. Relational awareness and action soothes suffering in the world, heals humanity, and gives meaning and joy.

06/13/2026

Dialectical Behavior Therapy effectively helps people with various psychological problems, including Borderline Personality Disorder and complex/developmental trauma. However, every human needs these skills for effective living.

06/13/2026

Live in such a way that your relationships and community become less about proving and more about discovering.

Develop these related capacities:

🔹Perspective-taking — the ability to understand another person’s experience.

🔹Emotional regulation — the ability to do so without immediately protecting one’s ego.

⚠️ Many conflicts escalate not because people disagree, but because they feel threatened by disagreement.

The moment another perspective feels like an attack, curiosity gives way to defensiveness, and learning gives way to winning.

🔺Imagine a marriage where each partner says, “Help me understand how you see this" instead of “Let me explain why you’re wrong.”

🔺Imagine political opponents trying to understand what fears, hopes, experiences, and values led someone to a different conclusion.

🔺Imagine parents who could tolerate hearing a child’s criticism without immediately justifying themselves.

🔺Imagine children who could disagree with their parents without fearing rejection.

🔺 Imagine workplaces where people could admit mistakes without humiliation and offer criticism without contempt.

None of this would eliminate conflict. In fact, there might be more honest disagreement. But the disagreements would be less likely to become personal battles over identity, status, or worth.

🎯 The deeper shift is from certainty to curiosity.

Curiosity says:

“I may be missing something.”

Defensiveness says:

“I already know enough.”

🌟 Curiosity is often easier when we have a secure sense of self.

If my identity depends on always being right, then every disagreement becomes a threat.

If my worth is not on trial, then I can afford to listen.

06/12/2026

✨ Happy Weekend! ✨

Make your psychological, emotional, social, spiritual, and physical wellbeing a priority.

Aspire to
🚴‍♂️🏋️‍♂️✍️🧘‍♂️🏡🌻🏃‍♀️🙏🎉💃🕺

More importantly, create routines that support your aspirations.

06/11/2026

Which of these words do you need to eliminate from your vocabulary and life?

Someday. Busy. Fine. Just. Should. The words we use every day carry assumptions that shape our choices. Here are 12 worth letting go of.

06/11/2026

When you link your worth and identity to what others think, you take everything personally.

Humans are social creatures. You're wired to care what others think. Criticism, rejection, exclusion, betrayal, and praise all affect you because relationships matter to your survival and well-being.

If you truly took nothing personally, you might become detached, indifferent, or unable to learn from feedback.

You can learn to take fewer things personally by not making everything about your worth.

When something hurts, pause and ask:

“Is this a fact about me, or a story I’m telling myself about me?”

Psychological flexibility means feeling the sting without letting it define who you are.

“Can I acknowledge the hurt without turning it into a definition of who I am?”

That’s a lifelong practice.

🌟 To take fewer things personally, hold your worth more lightly in the hands of other people.