Skills In Breaking Free

May 20, 2013 Read 17 comments and add your own

recaliming your soul healing from sexual abuse retreatI talk much about taking action in life and acknowledge that we all take action towards a conscious purpose. To illustrate this today I share the skills and knowledges document created at the Reclaiming Your Soul Retreat last month.

All of these skills were experienced, named, and described by the participants. It needs no introduction.

Skills In Breaking The Cycle Of Abuse

We are people who have chosen to participate to the Reclaiming Your Soul: Healing From Sexual Abuse and Sexual Assault Retreat in April 2013. Continue Reading →

Resilience of The Human Spirit

May 13, 2013 Read 20 comments and add your own

How do they do that?

resilience of the human spirit

Having worked with so many people who have undergone unspeakable trauma, I’ve heard stories of amazing survival skills. It is surprising what we can endure and survive. I think many of us agree that we can’t imagine what it was like to be kept as prisoners in a house for 10, or almost 10, years. We let our minds go there for just a moment, it becomes overwhelming and we skirt away.
We know that so many people who have walked this earth endured horror beyond our worst dreams and within that space, figured out how to live the unlivable. Survive 17 days in a crumbled factory. Survive a concentration camp. Emerge whole and full of light after being sexually, emotionally, or physically abused. Keep alive during combat.

Continue Reading →

Making Dandelion Vinegar: From Mom To Mom

May 4, 2013 Read 8 comments and add your own

Just wanting to be the first to wish you all Happy Mother’s Day!

And I am talking to anyone, of any gender, who have raised children or not. Everyone is included because we all have some mothering skills at our disposal that we use to care for our loved ones and to care for ourselves. Or how else would we surivive?

What better way to celebrate mother’s day is there than celebrating our Mother? Spring is marvelous! Through the flowers and fresh greenery we are reminded of the bounty of the earth. The sun, tree blossoms, bright green grass, and long days lighten our souls after the cold, dark winter. Everywhere I look it is breathtaking!

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What Chokes You Up? Why We Cry And Why It Is Helpful

April 29, 2013 Read 34 comments and add your own

I wish I had a dime for anytime someone apologized for crying in front of me. As if they were offending me. (More likely, offending themselves.) Why do we shame ourselves for something that can be such a biological relief to our parasympathetic nervous system? Why do we–all too often– hold back what energetically frees us of heavy emotion?

I wonder.

Too many times being told, “Crying is weak” I guess. Or a fear that once you start you can never stop. (Keep in mind this has never happened in the history of the world. Everything is impermanent.)

When I worked in a preschool for kids who were at risk of being removed from their homes because of maltreatment, we noticed an interesting phenomenon. When one child cried, it made the other children nervous. Some had learned early that vulnerability was not OK to show, and this might prompt them to go over and hit the crying child. As if saying, “stop crying.” They were not trying to be bullies in this situation, they were trying to remind him to toughen up, lest he be worse in trouble. Continue Reading →

Who Is In Your Corner, And How Do You Keep Them There?

April 22, 2013 Read 51 comments and add your own

Last weekend, a strange thing happened when I drove on the throughway toward Syracuse. I was just driving along minding my own business, listening to my book on CD, and I looked up just in time to see the 329th mile marker.

This strange phenomen happens almost EVERY time I make this drive. (In both directions!) 3/29 is my birthday. It is curious that I would never notice any other ones, but always look up just in time for this one. who is in your corner

It surprises me, because I make the drive so infrequently that I forget to anticipate it.

But, then again, I’m not really surprised. Continue Reading →

Crisis: A Time Of Danger; A Time Of Opportunity

April 16, 2013 Read 17 comments and add your own

The loneliness in any crisis can be the worst part. I am grateful that crisis  brings with it opportunity to come together. To show compassion, love and strength. We can do and be exponentially more in collaboration than we ever can be alone.

crisis opportunity

We see the nation coming together in the face of tragedy in Boston. Sending prayers, money, and donating blood. Facebook is plastered with heartened messages of people seeing the helpers coming forth so prevalent from the first moment. Bridget says it well in her post last night on Twinisms: Love Always Wins. What will this tragedy give you an opportunity to do (or to be)? What (or who) supports you to do this? Continue Reading →

How Not To Keep Up With The Joneses

April 7, 2013 Read 38 comments and add your own

How Not to Keep Up With the Jones

Sometimes the extraordinary is within the ordinary.

Two quotes struck me this week:

“Healing is always a collective experience, just as abuse is always a collective experience. Tragically, our culture has become more skilled at collective trauma than it is at collective healing. It is up to us, you and I to change that pattern.” Stephanie Mines, PhD

and Continue Reading →

Everything Belongs, Everyone Belongs

April 1, 2013 Read 43 comments and add your own

*Everything Belongs by Richard Rohr is an excellent read. He says that everything is divine. Everything, equally.

When I said Friday to include everyone, I really meant INCLUDE EVERYONE. Not “leave some people out.”

marriage equality

Facebook profile pictures that showed support for same-sex marriages.

 

If we are all connected, then what hurts someone else, hurts all of us. Being left out hurts. It is lonely. If people in power are afraid of losing their power and this fear creates an “us-them” mentality. To have an “us” that is OK, they think they need to have a “them” that is not. This always excludes some one.

Continue Reading →

Spring Is A Time For Renewal

March 29, 2013 Read 34 comments and add your own

For many reasons, I am feeling a huge weight off this week. I think it is because Spring has sprung. The worst of the winter is behind us. And this winter seemed like a cold and heavy one. With so much on my plate, it didn’t allow for my usual daily walks in the woods which help me face the darkness and cold.

There was also lots of grieving among my close friends and community. For all of them, the Spring will bring more good memories and more hope that love is still present and did not go anywhere.

Plus my counseling business has been in transition, (I am still counseling full-time, but the structure of the office changed). Finally the deconstruction of the old way is complete. Now it is time to build anew. My helper has been sick for a few months and now there is good news and returned strength. I am so happy she is OK. Worry for her was heavy on my heart. And not just because having her back next week means less paperwork for me!

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How Do You Know You Are Happy?

March 25, 2013 Read 33 comments and add your own

Why is it that people know sadness more than happiness? Why do the negative stories of our lives stand out so much more prominently in our minds than the good stuff? Why do we hear all of the no’s and take the yes’s in stride barely registering them?

When we learn that emotional pain is a state of mind, why isn’t that good news? Why do we go right to judgment, either of self: “If I can’t change this, what is wrong with me?” or judgement of others: “They must not understand how bad it is.” And let that stick us to the negative place even more.

Last night someone said to me, “It is going to be hard.” I said “Why?” He said, “I don’t know, I just made that up in my head.”

Yeah, you did. Who knows how it is going to be? How do you think that will effect you to think it is hard? What if you go through the whole event saying “This is hard, this is hard.” Could fun even find you in that state of mind? Continue Reading →

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