Harvey D. Cottrell

Some things cannot be fixed, controlled, or cured—not even by loving harder. Perhaps the work is learning what is ours to carry, what is ours to release, and what remains ours to do.

The Things We Cannot Cure: The Limits of Love and Control

A reflection on acceptance, suffering, ACT, the wisdom of recovery, and finding meaning without insisting there had to be a reason.

The Things We Cannot Cure: The Limits of Love and Control Harvey Cottrell, LCSW author of, “The Inner Room.”

I am excited to announce that I am now fully licensed in the Great Commonwealth of Massachusetts

Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker

Commonwealth of Massachusetts

Credential ID LICSW1121630

Happy to announce that I am expanding my practice once again. I am now a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in the great state of Oregon.

There comes a point in every life when we are forced to confront a difficult truth:

We do not have control over other people.

Not over the ones we love.
Not over the ones we try to help.
Not over the ones we desperately wish would choose differently.

As a therapist, I have watched people heal in extraordinary ways. I have also watched people continue down paths that led to suffering despite every conversation, every recommendation, and every opportunity to choose another way.

As a son, I have watched addiction take someone I loved.

As a human being, I have learned that powerlessness is not failure—it is reality.

And strangely, accepting that reality has become one of the greatest sources of peace in my life.

When we stop trying to control what was never ours to control, we are finally free to give our attention to what has always belonged to us: our character, our response, our capacity to love, and our willingness to remain present.

The wonder of powerlessness is that it asks us to surrender the illusion of control without surrendering hope.

Because even when life feels uncertain, even when grief is close, even when the future is hidden...

there is still something beautiful unfolding.

— Harvey Cottrell, LCSW
*The Inner Room*

The Wonder of Powerlessness: There Is Still Something Beautiful Unfolding Harvey Cottrell, LCSW, Author of, "The Inner Room."

What if love isn't something we create, but something we uncover?

My latest *Dating in the Wild* essay explores a question I've been wrestling with for years: What is love?

Sometimes the greatest barriers to connection are the ones we carry within ourselves.

Dating in the Wild: The Person Is Never Just the Person Harvey Cottrell LCSW, Author of "The Inner Room."

Many people enter dating hoping to be chosen.

Many people stay in relationships hoping not to be abandoned.

Few people ask whether they are abandoning themselves.

My newest Inner Room reflection explores congruence, fragmentation, and why the deepest forms of love may begin when we stop performing and simply allow ourselves to be known.

Dating in the Wild: Can you remain in a relationship with yourself while loving another? Harvey Cottrell, LCSW, Author of "The Inner Room."