Beginnings 2015

There are many traditional times for beginnings. Mine has come at the New Year, 2015, coincident with moving into my new office.

It came about because my old office was on the second floor with no elevator. When I began to offer groups, A Change of Mind: Neuroplastic Tools for Healing (formerly Tools for Healing), I was able to use ground-level disability-accessible rooms, but only through 2014.

Skipping over the trials of finding a new office, I can report that my new office is a wonderful place. It is large enough for groups. I was able to choose new paint and new carpet, it has a lovely large window which looks out on trees, and I am enjoying the pleasure of full artistic control.

The Power of Community

I was thinking about healing on Yom Kippur, a holy day of reflection that comes every year in the fall, a time for evaluation of our experience and actions in the past year and redirection, hope and personal dedication for the coming year.  We do this as a community during services, in which we collectively take responsibility for the past and the future.  It is an acknowledgement that we do not really live alone, isolated from others, and that our actions affect more than just ourselves. 

When we live with illness, pain, anxiety and depression, the struggle feels personal, isolating, and sometimes overwhelming and without hope.  We each do the best we can to care for ourselves, sometimes supported by a medical team and, if we are fortunate, a partner and family.  We might feel or have been told that there is “nothing that can be done.”  Some of us may know a few techniques (“tools”) which can help us to feel better, but it is often not enough.

An Invitation to Our “Tools for Healing” Groups September 2013

I am very excited about the “Tools for Healing” groups that my associate, Dr. Jan Chambers, and I have created to help people who live with illness, pain, anxiety, or medical conditions. Our new sessions begin next week, and we are offering Monday evening and Tuesday morning groups to accommodate different needs.

A Question of Value

The killing of Trayvon Martin was not an isolated incident of violence.

On the 8th day of January, my daughter told me that a seventeen year old boy, known by most of her friends, had been shot and killed a few days before in Oakland. She said that this was the second death in her peer group since the beginning of the New Year just 8 days earlier.

Two months ago my daughter’s friend called her at 3 a.m. to tell her that there had been a shooting at a house party after the prom. My daughter reassured me that she and her friend would never have gone to a house party in that section of Oakland because there are so many shootings.

Independence Day

Last night I sat with my family around the table, already hearing sounds of firecrackers.  The conversation wound its way to focus on who lives here, in the United States, and in what conditions.  My daughter pointed out that there is a huge immigrant population, and many are living in poverty. Both my son and daughter went on to talk about poverty, in the United States and in the world, with the statistic that 80% of people in the world are living on $10 or less each day, many on less than $2 a day. There is significant poverty in this country, generally not to that level, largely because of minimum wage laws for people who are able to find jobs.  However, in this country, homelessness is increasing.  We went on to talk about different levels of poverty, and that in this country, most people do have sanitation and clean water, whereas that is an enormous problem in other parts of the world, making a big difference in complications of illness and death.  Per UNICEF, 22,000 children die every day because of poverty.

Generations of Mothers — Mother’s Day 2013

This week my youngest brother and his son arrived from Florida.  They were here primarily to visit my 86 year old mother, who recently declared “I’m not getting any younger” and demanded that my brother and, separately, my sister, come visit and spend time alone with her.  Steven picked up Jono and his son Charlie from the airport and brought them to our house, and my mother arrived about an hour later via her helper.  As she carefully descended the few stairs inside the front gate, she kept looking up to see her son’s face as he waited for her.  Her eyes were shining.  She is very little, even shorter with age, and my brother is tall.  He carefully bent over to hug and kiss her, his son standing just behind him, and I could feel her overwhelming joy in the moment of reunion, mother and son.

Last year, at the end of June, my son returned after spending 10 months in Israel (The Summer of Impending Loss, He’s Gone). The day of his return, my husband, our daughter, and I went to the airport and waited in the baggage area. I kept looking for him… and then I spotted him. The first to reach him, I was the first to encircle him with my arms and be held by his stronger ones. During that long hug, I surprised myself crying for joy, for the breathtaking feeling of a mother reunited with her son.

Growing Life

I have had a “dry spell” in my writing – a time when my metaphoric pen ran out of ink, and I couldn’t replenish it.  My ideas were all focused on family needs and transitions, my counseling practice, and more recently, learning the personally and professionally exciting field of neuroplasticity, how the brain changes itself, and how that can be applied to eliminating persistent pain. 

Now my thoughts and desires turn, again, to the traditional preoccupations of spring.  I am planting my garden, choosing plant starts and seeds, following the sun through the day to see where it lingers most, and planning where each plant will (hopefully!) be able to grow and produce its vegetables, fruit, or flowers. 

Examining Our Lives

This is the time of year when, in the Jewish tradition, our lives are examined. We bring the previous year to mind in order to find its truth. What is the truth about myself? Were my words and actions what I meant them to be last year at Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, when I made resolutions for the New Year?  Were there times my words were not as kind and compassionate, as patient as I wanted them to be (ask my teenage daughter!)? Could I have done more for the community, for the earth, for my mother?

Questions such as these are always answered in the affirmative. We could always do more, do better.  No archer, not even Robin Hood, can hit the center of the target every time.

The truth, however, is greater, and also requires other questions. Did my words make a difference for another person? What were my deeds that supported others and made the world a better place? What did I say or do that nobody else in the world could have done? How did I keep the promise that I made to myself last year?

Sometimes it is very hard to acknowledge the truth of misdeeds, and make amends. We do so in order to “clean the slate” and make ourselves ready to do better in the coming year. However, it can be even more challenging to acknowledge the truth of our good deeds, and thus accept ourselves as complete human beings.

Every culture has its own system of social rules. In ours, politeness dictates that we do not focus on our accomplishments or good deeds. When we speak of them, we don’t want others to think that we are “bragging.” We are taught that the highest form of giving is that which is anonymous. Similarly, it is expected that we will do the right thing without the expectation of praise; however, our mistakes are routinely criticized. In time, this is internalized, and we hardly notice our successes, while criticizing ourselves, sometimes repeatedly, for our mistakes.

And yet, it is the knowledge of ourselves as good people which allows us to understand when we have missed the mark and gone astray. In some way, the more we are aware of the times we have gone out of our way to help, the times we have made a difference, of when we have acted in accordance with our own ethical principles, we create a conscious pattern of good deeds.

So how has this last year been for you? How did you “hit the mark”? Can you remember when your words made a difference to another person, when your actions helped someone, when you did something to make the world better? Is it possible for you to accept your truth, and from the wholeness of self-knowledge, make choices for the coming year?

Focused on the wholeness of our beings, we awaken to another year, rededicating ourselves to strengthen the pattern that we create out of compassion, kindness and love, commitment to social justice, and our intention to make the world a better place for all life.

Shana tova – have a happy and healthy new year.