Resources

Essays, Blogs, and Vlogs

Emergency Phone Numbers:

Children’s Aid Society of Toronto: 416-924-4646

Domestic Abuse and Sexual Assault: 1-800-521-6004

Youth Distress Centre Toronto: 416-408-4357 (416-408-HELP)

Kids Help Phone: 1-800-668-6868

CAMH – Emergency line: 416-535-8501 ext. 6885 (24 hours)

Books That I Have Found To Be Interesting

Inner Child and Subpersonalities

Inner Bonding by Dr. Margaret Paul

Discover Your Subpersonalities: Our Inner World and the People In It by John Rowan

Subpersonalities: The People Inside Us by John Rowan

Healing the Child Within: Discovery and Recovery for Adult Children of Dysfunctional Families by Cardwell Nuckols and Charles Whitfield

Fear

Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway by Susan Jeffers

Freeing the Soul From Fear by Robert Sardello

The Places that Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times by Pema Chodron

Love Is Letting Go of Fear by Gerald Jampolsky

Shame

Healing the Shame that Binds You by John Bradshaw

Letting Go of Shame by Ronald Potter-Efron and Patricia Potter-Efron

Shame and Guilt by Jane Middelton-Moz

Shame and Grace by Lewis B. Smedes

Dreams

Understand Your Dreams by Alice Anne Parker

Dreamscaping: New and Creative Ways to Work with Your Dreams by Stanley Krippner and Mark Robert Waldman

Relationships

Getting the Love You Want: A Guide For Couples by Harville Hendrix

Codependent No More: How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring for Yourself by Melody Beattie

Partnering: A New Kind of Relationship by Hal Stone

Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You by Amir Levine and Rachel Heller

Chakras, Energy Work, Past Lives

Wheels of Life: A User’s Guide to the Chakra System by Anodea Judith

Eastern Body Western Mind by Anodea Judith

Sacred Contracts: Awakening Your Divine Potential by Caroline Myss

Anatomy of the Spirit: The Seven Stages of Power and Healing by Caroline Myss

Animal Speak: The Spiritual & Magical Powers of Creatures Great and Small by Ted Andrews

Nature-Speak: Signs, Omens and Messages in Nature by Ted Andrews

Psychic Protection by Ted Andrews

Life Between Life by Joel Whitton

Many Lives, Many Masters: The True Story of a Prominent Psychiatrist, His Young Patient, and the Past-Life Therapy That Changed Both Their Lives by Brian L. Weiss

Other

How To Get What You Want and Want What You Have by John Gray

On Death and Dying by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Grief Counseling and Grief Therapy: A Handbook for the Mental Health Practitioner by J. William Worden

Raising a Teenager (and other books in the series: family, daughter, son) by Ellium & Ellium

Nature and Soulwork: How Nature Can Support Healing and Wholeness

by sabine | April 29, 2026 | essays | 0 Comments

It’s a Sunday morning in late April. It’s nice outside: about 14°C, sunny, no wind. I sit outside, balancing my computer precariously on my lap because I wanted to catch a few minutes of sun. Around me, I hear lawn mowers and leaf blowers. People are out with their...

What Makes For An Effective Training? (Supervisor Training, Part 2)

by sabine | March 16, 2026 | essays | 0 Comments

Yesterday I had a conversation with a colleague. We are both supervisors, and we had both been looking at the supervisor training programs currently offered in Ontario — albeit for different reasons. When we compared notes, we discovered that we agreed on one thing:...

Who Trains the Therapist? (Supervisor Training, Part 1)

by sabine | March 8, 2026 | essays | 0 Comments

On April 1, 2026, the College of Registered Psychotherapists of Ontario (CRPO) will introduce a new training requirement for supervisors who guide new and developing psychotherapists. Why does that matter — for therapists and for clients? To understand the...

I Like Me, I Like Me Not

by sabine | January 12, 2026 | essays | 0 Comments

When you were a child – or a teen – did you ever play this game, where you pulled off the petals on a daisy to see if the person of your dreams likes you or not? Somehow, when we were younger, those little games held a lot of power. The result of this one...

Anger

by sabine | March 4, 2024 | essays | 0 Comments

Anger. An emotion that seems to engender fear and fascination at the same time. These days, it seems that signs of anger are everywhere, from international politics to the smallest family unit. We can meet it in the grocery store or in the bedroom, in the workplace or...

The End of the Difficult Year

by sabine | December 19, 2020 | essays | 0 Comments

December 2020. What a year it has been. From unprecedented wildfires to a global pandemic and the resulting economic and social uncertainties: we’ve been on a quite a ride. ...

Vulnerability in Changing Times

by sabine | June 7, 2020 | essays | 0 Comments

“Vulnerability sounds like truth and feels like courage. Truth and courage aren’t always comfortable, but they’re never weaknesses.” ~Brené Brown The arrival of spring, although brief, seemed to change the world in a matter of hours. Each year I am amazed to witness...

Finding a new Balance Finding Balance anew

by sabine | March 28, 2020 | essays | 0 Comments

Photo by Aziz Acharki on Unsplash During the last couple of weeks many people have struggled with feelings of anxiety and imbalance as we are constantly adjusting to new requirements and realities of everyday life. During times as these, we all need...

Care In The Time Of COVID-19

by sabine | March 15, 2020 | essays | 0 Comments

As I am writing these lines, the world seems to be shutting down: schools are being closed, concerts and sports events cancelled, people arriving home from travels abroad are being tested and asked to isolate. Fear seems to be spreading faster than the virus itself,...

Reflections

by sabine | February 12, 2020 | essays | 0 Comments

It is the year 2020. Somehow this seems to be a big date. When I was a child, this was the kind of date that would have created visions of flying cars and energy beams transporting people from a spaceship to a planet in no time. Now it is 2020, and we have...

Michaelmas, Celebration of Will

by sabine | September 29, 2019 | essays | 0 Comments

September 29, 2019. It’s a beautiful Sunday in (very early) fall. The sun is out, the cats are lazing on the sun-warmed deck, some bees are buzzing around the fall flowers. It’s a peaceful picture that is showing itself outside my deck window. And yet, inside me I...

In The Hands Of My Friends

by sabine | March 23, 2019 | essays | 0 Comments

At the start of the year I felt the need to go into a more formal process of emotional exploration again. Every once in a while it is prudent for psychotherapists to go beyond the self-processing that comes so easily to many of us. However, as a therapist I find that...

Attached and Connected

by sabine | February 17, 2018 | essays | 0 Comments

This morning, while washing my favourite cup, I looked up at the other cups and mugs in the shelf and wondered “What am I doing? Why ain’t I just taking one of those?” A stray thought popped in: if I had to leave for a cabin in the woods today and I could just take...

Our Symbiosis with the World

by sabine | November 15, 2017 | essays | 0 Comments

“To truly know the world, look deeply within your own being; to truly know yourself, take real interest in the world.” Verses and Meditations, Rudolf Steiner As some of you know, I have been studying biography work for the past year or so. It is fascinating work that...

Change and Choice

by sabine | September 7, 2017 | essays | 0 Comments

A while back I found this quote: . (If nothing ever changed, there’d be no butterflies.) It’s a simple statement and one that is beautiful in it’s utter truth. Nothing says “transformation” or “change” quite as clearly as the life stages that result in a butterfly....

“To Choose One’s Attitude”

by sabine | February 28, 2017 | essays | 0 Comments

We are living in interesting times. Heads of state are declaring war on the media. Lies and “alternate facts” are becoming everyday occurrences, making it difficult to determine whose “truth” is the true truth. Aggression and violence on a state level have become...

Supervision as Apprenticeship

by sabine | December 21, 2016 | essays | 0 Comments

A long apprenticeship is the most logical way to success. The only alternative is overnight stardom, but I can’t give you a formula for that. Chet Atkins Once upon a time … learning a skill, including in the healing arts, was a task that was taught by a master...

Life in Balance

by sabine | December 7, 2016 | essays | 0 Comments

Don’t avoid extremes, and don’t choose any one extreme. Remain available to both the polarities – that is the art, the secret of balancing. Rajneesh Lately I have been thinking about balance. Work-life balance has become a popular...

Hygiene for the Soul (and Mind and Body)

by sabine | October 27, 2016 | essays | 0 Comments

A few weeks back, in a conversation with acolleague, she used a term in passing that I hadn’t heard in a long time: “mental hygiene”. We were talking about the different depth-levels of therapy and she was making the point that sometimes before getting deeper into an...

The Linden Tree

by sabine | October 11, 2016 | essays | 0 Comments

Last weekend, on the Thanksgiving weekend of 2016, my husband and I planted a Linden tree in our front yard. My husband had promised me one when we moved to our new home last year and after taking care of the most necessary renovations inside, this was the weekend to...

Loose Ends

by sabine | September 15, 2016 | essays | 0 Comments

A few weeks back, during one of the first cooler and rainy days that heralded the nearing end of summer, I decided to clean up. Every summer there is a small pile of things that grows bigger as the weeks pass. The pile is usually marked in my mind something like this:...

In Times of Change — Summer Solstice Full Moon 2016

by sabine | June 20, 2016 | essays | 0 Comments

June 20th. Summer Solstice; also a full moon, both symbols for change, of starting something new, planting new seeds. Traditionally the light of the full moon has been seen as an energy of enhancing the potency of healing remedies and herbs — as well as those of...

Change, Perfectionism and Burnout

by sabine | March 27, 2016 | essays | 0 Comments

I am a psychotherapist, a teacher and supervisor. I have been most of those things for over ten years, some of them for closer to twenty. I know that every client, every class, every therapist is different. I also know that some things stay the same in principle and...

Abundance

by sabine | June 22, 2015 | essays | 0 Comments

June 21st, summer solstice. I’m sitting in the yard, watching butterflies tumble by, listening to a robin singing out his little heart. The cats are curled up in the shade, the water by the pond is gurgling gently, a breeze is stirring the leaves, the air is warm. The...

Time Out

by sabine | March 6, 2015 | essays | 0 Comments

These past weeks I have seen a few clients who suddenly got ill; some of them quite ill, ill enough to have to take a lengthy time off work. Others found themselves in situations that required their full attention and often lead to them having to take time off work,...

Deepening Skills

by sabine | February 24, 2015 | Thoughts and Reflections | 0 Comments

In my last blog I spoke about competencies and their importance. When we look at solidifying our competencies, the question arises: How do we deepen and expand our skill set most effectively? For someone who by nature is more withdrawn, introverted, and intellectual,...

A Question of …

by sabine | November 20, 2014 | Thoughts and Reflections | 0 Comments

Over the past few years there has been a lot of discussion in the Ontario community of psychotherapists about competencies and their value. The newly forming College of Registered Psychotherapists of Ontario (CRPO) has developed standard entry-to-practice competencies...

Living True in Times of Change

by sabine | November 15, 2014 | essays | 0 Comments

It is Sunday, November 9th. I am sitting in my living room in Richmond Hill, reading German news online. There is a big celebration happening in Berlin, where I was born. Twenty-five years ago on this day one of the most positive and life-changing things of the 21st...

Limits and Limitations

by sabine | August 31, 2014 | Thoughts and Reflections | 0 Comments

Have you ever paddled alone in a canoe? I did lately and have found it to be a good way to ponder – and experience – my limitations. First there is a trick to getting even a semblance of control: sit were you usually wouldn’t sit. Then there is the work:...

Past Lives, near and far

by sabine | August 30, 2014 | essays | 0 Comments

I am sitting by a lake in central Ontario. I am 200 km away from my home in Canada and about 6,500 km away from the place of my birth. Yet, sitting here at this lake I could also be in another country or time altogether. When I was growing up in Berlin, Germany, going...

Busy-ness And Friendships

by Sabine Cox | June 21, 2014 | Thoughts and Reflections | 0 Comments

Being self- employed can make life very busy: between the actual work of providing client-sessions; the administrative work or record keeping, book keeping, advertising, communicating, etc.; and the important work of staying up-to-date through reading, training, and...

My Summer Solstice

by sabine | June 18, 2014 | essays | 0 Comments

I am typing this on June 17th as the rain gently taps a summer melody on the pavement outside the open window. It is humid and warm in spite of the rain. It is midsummer, almost. Midsummer, time of the longest days and the shortest nights. Time of socializing on long...

Connecting Soul and Nature (2)

by sabine | April 20, 2014 | essays | 0 Comments

Connecting to nature has many benefits for body, mind, soul, and spirit. But how is one to do that with so little time and so many things already to be done? Simple answer: with a little bit of will and some creativity. Seriously though, connecting to nature does not...

Connecting Soul and Nature (1)

by sabine | April 8, 2014 | essays | 0 Comments

Lately I have been doing a lot of reading and thinking about the connection between Soul and Nature. It seems to me that the further we as human beings get from our connection to the natural world and Mother Earth, so bigger the problems in the natural world turn out...

The Winters of Life

by sabine | March 10, 2014 | essays | 0 Comments

I am a gardener. Well, let me rephrase that: I like being out in my garden. I like it because it calms me to dig my hands into the dark, rich soil and to observe the changes that are constantly happening. There is a clear and noticeable rhythm in nature and I have...

Journey Through Psychotherapy — Changing Our World

by Sabine Cox | March 5, 2014 | Thoughts and Reflections | 0 Comments

Throughout the process of psychotherapy we are still living in a world that is attuned to the old patterns. While we are looking inside and learn new things about ourselves, we have the same family dynamics to deal with, the same friends and work to attend to, the...

Journey Through Psychotherapy — Going in Cycles

by Sabine Cox | December 22, 2013 | Thoughts and Reflections | 0 Comments

The psychotherapeutic process works in roughly three phases: 1. Discovery: Before any healing can happen, before change can be attempted, we need to find out what really lies at the core of the problem. Sometimes what creates pain in us now isn’t really about our...

Mid-Winter Reflections

by sabine | December 21, 2013 | essays | 0 Comments

Sunrise Prayer – A Sunrise Prayer for Yule By Patti Wigington The sun returns! The light returns! The earth begins to warm once more! The time of darkness has passed, and a path of light begins the new day. Welcome, welcome, the heat of the sun, blessing us all...

Journey Through Psychotherapy — The Ups and Downs

by Sabine Cox | November 11, 2013 | Thoughts and Reflections | 0 Comments

Have you ever had one of those amazing realizations that are earth shattering and sure to change your life forever — only to find that a few days later things are right back to where they were before? Or have you noticed that sometimes after the week from hell life...

Transitions

by sabine | September 7, 2013 | essays | 0 Comments

September; beginning of fall and time of transition from the activities of summer to the stillness of winter. Time for nature to die to its outward expression and move back into its own depth to rejuvenate and gather strength. Time for kids (and the adults connected...

The Way We Connect

by sabine | July 24, 2013 | essays | 0 Comments

These past weeks have been difficult for many people around the world: floods killing many people while leaving 1000s others homeless for at least some time or without electricity or clean water supplies; heat waves that contributed to energy problems, health...

Soul-Places

by sabine | June 11, 2013 | essays | 0 Comments

When the same thing or idea comes into my life in different forms at the same time, I know that it wants attention. Synchronisity like this can be subtle and needs some observational awareness, but it is usually worth it. This time around, synchronisity introduced a...

History Lessons — living with our roots

by sabine | January 22, 2013 | essays | 0 Comments

These past few months I have been contemplating my rootedness in life and how it has served or hindered me over the years. I also have seen this question arise in my clients’ work over the years and I know that there are blessings as well as some traps in being deeply...

Change

by sabine | November 21, 2012 | essays | 0 Comments

2012 to many has been a year of awakenings and changes. Some of those awakenings have been painful, being forced upon us through loss, illness, or road blocks. Others have been easier and happier: unexpected recovery from long-term illness, old friends resurfacing, or...

Thank you

by sabine | October 12, 2012 | essays | 0 Comments

It is fall in Canada. The leaves on the trees are colourful; the skies are clear and blue; the air is cool and crisp. Thanksgiving weekend is just past and in the stores the bounty of a northern harvest are piled high: squash, potatoes, beets, leeks, kale, turnips,...

Grieving – A Soft Opening of the Heart

by sabine | August 30, 2012 | essays | 0 Comments

Anodea Judith names grief as the “demon of the heart chakra1”. She states that the frequent disappointment of our striving for love and connection — with others and the world at large —results in loss of hope, and perpetual, suppressed grief. This grief turns in on...

The Power of We

by sabine | May 22, 2011 | essays | 0 Comments

I have been a psychotherapist for over ten years. During my time working with people I have noticed a gentle yet persistent movement away from self-focus to something else, something broader; an other-focus or better a We-focus. This movement is not only evident in my...

Crossroads

by sabine | September 5, 2010 | essays | 0 Comments

‘The human biography is a symphony which each individual personally composes.’ Bernhard Lievegoed Moving through life on earth means moving through time. Each step we take, each moment of growth and understanding we experience, each crossroads we pass take us...

Considering Love

by sabine | June 14, 2010 | essays | 0 Comments

Of all the emotions we feel, love is probably the one that most of us would say they could identify. Yet probably few of us would actually agree on what exactly it is and how it feels. Love is many things to many people: a mother’s love or a father’s...

The Inner Garden

by sabine | April 5, 2010 | essays | 0 Comments

Many a great philosopher and religious man (or woman) has asked the seemingly vital question “What is reality?” Some have attempted an answer, inevitably using their own perspectives, observations, and conclusions and thus – arguably – really...

Stepping Forward On An Old Path

by sabine | March 9, 2010 | essays | 0 Comments

If you have ever had an opportunity to re-visit a place of your childhood after many years of absence you may be familiar with a strange sensation: a feeling of being thrilled about re-discovering those little things and moments that had been forgotten; being...

The Warm Glow Of Imagination

by sabine | December 7, 2009 | essays | 0 Comments

A few days ago in the subway, tired from a long day and yet revved up by all the things still to do, I switched on my new little constant companion, my iPod, and flicked through my options: playing a game, re-scheduling my week, listening to music or a lecture,...

Loneliness: Stepping Stone On Our Path

by sabine | April 29, 2009 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

In the last few weeks I have heard a lot of my clients speak about feeling lonely. This is not that unusual in spring, a time that traditionally stands for change and transition as well as for love and connection. However, the frequency and depth of that feeling made...

Busy-ness And Friendships

by sabine | November 3, 2008 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

Hello Everyone, It has been well over a year that I posted the last essay on this website, and I am sure many of you forgot about me. I can’t blame you. Truth is: I just got so busy that I couldn’t fit in writing essays into my schedule. Today, a...

Turning Your Energy Around

by sabine | July 3, 2007 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

Summer time. July 1st. Canada Day. Sitting in the backyard, listening to music and children’s laughter in the neighbouring yards, taking in the scents of roses, lilies and barbeques, feeling the cool evening air on the skin. Life is beautiful! It is in moments...

Simple Pleasures

by sabine | May 1, 2007 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

It has been a long time since I sat down to write an essay for this website. My new endeavour, The Living Bridge- Centre for Social Evolution, required a lot of attention. We went to the Total Health Show in Toronto in March and the preparations for this took up most...

The Law of Attraction and The Law of Destiny

by sabine | February 28, 2007 | essays | 0 Comments

Since the release of The Secret many people are striving to work with the Law of Attraction – and that is a good thing; a helpful thing; something that, if done properly, will change life as we know it. However, often people also get confused, worried, and even...

Change Happens – And Resistance Is Futile

by sabine | January 22, 2007 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

It’s the end of January and I’m finally getting my monthly essay posted. It feels too late to say “Happy New Year” but it is never a bad time to wish you all good luck, good health, love, success, and beauty in your life. Lot’s has...

Life-Changes

by sabine | December 25, 2006 | essays | 0 Comments

Last week I was sitting at a lecture with a friend, watching the speaker and the other participants in the room, when it hit me: every single one of the 200+ people in the room was there because they longed for change in their lives. The lecture was on finding...

Grieving Heart – Healing Heart

by sabine | November 1, 2006 | essays | 0 Comments

It is fall. As the trees get barren and the air is cool many people experience stronger feelings of sadness, distress, or depression. With the decrease of sun-lit hours comes an increase in dark thoughts for many. And as the air gets colder we withdraw into our own...

Michaelmas

by sabine | September 29, 2006 | essays | 0 Comments

As I am writing this – on September 29th – the sun is illuminating a slate-gray sky. Through a veil of gently falling raindrops I can see a rainbow forming before my eyes, framed by the blood-red foliage of the maple in front of our house. The air is cool,...

The Quest for Harmony and Peace

by sabine | September 25, 2006 | essays | 0 Comments

The warm – and sometimes lazy – days of summer are almost over. We had some weeks with fewer (if any) deadlines and meetings, less people to get out of the house in the morning, and less traffic on the trip to the office. We might even have spent some time...

Relationships and Personal Growth

by sabine | August 25, 2006 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

“Every person, all the events of your life are there because you have drawn them there. What you choose to do with them is up to you.“Richard Bach. This past month I have been focusing on relationships a lot. Obviously, there is the global issue of the...

Life’s Progression

by sabine | July 25, 2006 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

Lately I have been doing a lot of Past Life Work with a colleague of mine. Both of us seem to be going through phases of change and questioning and so it was only natural to exchange skill sets and work together on finding some answers and direction. Now, I have done...

The Healing Powers of the Inner Child

by sabine | June 25, 2006 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

There have been many studies by now that show that our emotions influence our physical well-being and the healing process of the body. It has also been shown that many of our emotional problems originate in moments of neglect, abuse, abandonment or simply loneliness...

Soul-Spirit Integration

by sabine | April 25, 2006 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

There are many ways to understand the soul. For some people the soul is the seat of our emotions and passions. Others see it as the never-dying carrier of the spirit. And yet others may see in it an equivalent of the self, our higher self, the essence, or an...

Life As A Dream

by sabine | March 10, 2006 | essays | 0 Comments

As an individual working with my own dreams and as a therapist working with the dreams of others it has often struck me how careful we are with the details of our dreams. We note down every shade of colour we remember. We explain the flowers on the trees and pay...

Information Shortage – Why It Is Important To Listen To Intuition

by sabine | January 25, 2006 | essays, linkedin | 0 Comments

Did you ever have this feeling that you did something wrong – the moment you did it? Not that anything happens or that someone starts howling in despair. It’s just this gut feeling saying, “Well, maybe I should have thought about this a bit...

Dreaming Your Life

by sabine | December 25, 2005 | essays | 0 Comments

Dreams! We all have them. Some of us dream of peace and quiet, others of riches and fame. We dream of cool waters and whispering winds, of wealth beyond comprehension, of love, care, joy, health and happiness. In our dreams we fly, are young and energetic, meet fate...

Foggy Times

by sabine | November 15, 2005 | essays | 0 Comments

Have you ever got caught in a fog? You may have been driving in the mountains and have suddenly found yourself “in the clouds”. Or maybe you were hiking near a stream or a swamp and slowly the fog gathered around you. Being in the fog can be frightening....

Welcome

by sabine | September 1, 2005 | essays | 0 Comments

This is the first of what I hope to become a long line of essays you will be able to read on this website. They will vary in style and topic: some will reflect my love for and respect of nature in all her incarnations; others will be inspired by conversations,...

Check out all my blogs, vlogs, and essays

Sabine Cox, RP

If you have questions, send me a message - or set up a free first meeting of about 30 minutes, so that we can meet, talk about your goals for your work, and see if we are a good fit for it.

(416) 889-5291

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(The phone is not monitored regularly)

Get in Touch

7 Selby Street, Cookstown, ON, L0L 1L0

By Appointment Only.

sabine@sabinecox.com

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Sabine Cox, RP

(416) 889-5291

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