Posted by in coaching, compassion, death, dying, forgiveness, parents, somatic, Uncategorized I knew when my father started to die, because I felt the morphine run through my own body, 3,000 miles away. Waves of nausea and that narcotic kind of calm came and went, covering over a rising panic one moment, and laying it bare the next. At the time, I was shopping at Target and…Read more »
Posted by in Uncategorized When I was 15 years old, walking to a bookstore in Boston, I was followed by 3 white guys in a pick up truck. They called me a dyke and a cunt. They spit at me and threw their almost-empty beer cans at me, splashing me with beer. One of the guys stood up in…Read more »
Posted by in Uncategorized “I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.” –James Baldwin–
Posted by in Uncategorized Sisyphus, My Father and Me The truth is, I’ve barely been getting through the day. For over a year now, in between clients or errands or chores, I curl up in my bed, or on the couch as if I’m convalescing from a long illness. But I am not sick, nor have I been. I…Read more »
Posted by in Uncategorized Being a teacher in the field of Somatics is one of the most vulnerable things I can imagine doing. Our students deeply learn from who we are, from what we embody, and not as much from what we tell them. This is why I have always skirted around the edges of teaching, not really wanting…Read more »
Posted by in Uncategorized “On Wednesdays, we wear Pink.” –Mean Girls I am sitting at the dinner table at my best friend, Annemarie’s, house. Annemarie and I are in the third grade and have been best friends since kindergarten. Tonight we are eating spaghetti and meatballs with her mom, dad and two little sisters, and I remember a joke…Read more »
I have been playing hooky from meditation, checking in for credit and then blowing off the learning. I have been doing the mindful equivalent of sneaking into the movies and smoking behind the 7-11 until it’s time to go home.
Posted by in Uncategorized Two days before I turn five, my mom is driving us home from school and my sister, Anya, is squeezing my hand in the back seat of the station wagon. “She’s not going to have these cute little hands anymore, when she turns five,” my sister laments to my mom. My mom laughs, looks at…Read more »
Posted by in Uncategorized “…I don’t know exactly what a prayer is. I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, which is what I have been doing all day. Tell me, what else should…Read more »
Walking with Eggshells I am consistently struck by the leap of faith—the courage—it takes to be a client working on healing from trauma. My clients reveal things to me that are precious, raw, sometimes spoken in my office for the first time after a lifetime of silence. That part of working with clients feels…Read more »
i am under-grounded 