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Author: Nancy Loeffler

  • Saturday, August 4, 2018: Intro to Self-Samyama Workshop

    Saturday, August 4, 2018: Intro to Self-Samyama Workshop

    Saturday, August 4, 2018
    10:00 am – 12:00 pm

    Are you ready to stop agonizing about your life and why you aren’t accomplishing what you tell yourself you will accomplish when wake up every Monday morning?

    Are you ready to heal your old emotional wounds, the past, and everything that is keeping you stuck where you are? Are you ready to live from love rather than fear?

    Do you want to be in touch with your deepest wisdom and your intuition without the endless mind trip?

    If you answered yes to even one of these questions, then Self-Samyama is for you!

    In this Introduction to Self-Samyama you will:

    • Learn the 3 levels of awareness of Samyama.
    • Learn how to bring awareness to your heart.
    • Be led in several guided Samyama meditations so that you can begin to practice Self-Samyama on your own.

     

    Space is limited:

    Click here to register. 

  • Holidays and Milestones

    As I look at my calendar, July 4th is just around the corner. One of the things I talk about often is how holidays and milestone days can bring up associative memories that remind us of our loved ones who have died.

    The 4th of July may not be a holiday that holds those kinds of memories for you, or it may. One thing to remember is that everyone has his or her own unique memories. Your family may have had a reunion each July 4th, and this year everyone is reluctant to bring up the fact that a family member has died since last year. Maybe some family members are even reluctant to attend this year because of their discomfort. This is how family traditions change when family structures change.

    What if the family member who died is your mother, or grandmother? How do you feel about attending the yearly family gathering, whether it is around a holiday or not? Are you looking forward to remembering your loved one with other family members who share your memories? Or do the memories cause too much pain?

    Whatever your answers to these questions, remember that there are as many different responses to them as there are people in your family. What would it be like to have a conversation about everyone’s feelings and allow each person to feel like the way they are processing their grief is okay? If this isn’t a practice that is common in your family, you can take comfort in the fact that most of us have no idea of how to have these kind of difficult conversations.



    Here are some thoughts to help you. These are applicable to any holiday or milestone.

    What is difficult about this holiday?

    • Take some time to write your thoughts and feelings about this holiday. Get in touch with your thoughts. Sometimes, as a holiday or milestone day approaches, we are caught up in the anticipation and we can lose sight of our feelings.

    What do you need this year to navigate this holiday with a little more ease?

    • It may be a change of scenery for a few years, or not participating in certain activities. It’s important to ask this question every year, as your feelings may change from year to year.

    How can you honor your loved one during the holiday celebration?

    • Do you want to include their favorite food or drink in the celebration? Or will that be too hard?
    • Is there an activity you would like to include to remember them? Do you want to take time for everyone to share a memory?

    What do you want to tell your loved one this year on this occasion?

    • You can write a letter to your loved one, and invite anyone else attending to write one as well.
    • Decide what you want to do with the letter.
    • Do you want to read them aloud, or burn them in a fire?
    • Everyone may have a different answer to that question.
    • You can also share your thoughts in smaller groups. Find something that works for you and your family.

    How can you share your thoughts with other family members?

    • You may want to communicate some of these ideas with family members before the gathering.
    • Let everyone know that you acknowledge everyone’s wishes.

    Having difficult conversations may allow your holiday traditions to change in a way that keeps everyone connected. How many times have you heard a story like this? “After mom died, there was no reason for us to stay connected, she was the glue that held us together.” That doesn’t have to happen in your family. Yes, your traditions may change, but you can create a change that meets the needs of your family, and pave the way for deeper family connection. If there’s a family member who is not ready to be a part of this kind of conversation, you can keep the door open for them to join you when they are ready. You may discover new bonds forming as your family navigates difficult changes.

    You are opening the door for blessings and grace to arrive and assist you on your way.

     

  • Another Turn Around the Sun

    As I write this, we’ve entered into my birthday month;

    by the time you read this, my birthday will have passed. There was a time when I didn’t look forward to my birthday; a time when my birthday didn’t live up to my expectation. The problem was, I didn’t really know what I wanted my birthday to be, I just knew that I always felt a sense of dread as it approached and disappointed when it was over. Somewhere along the line I decided to take the responsibility for enjoying my birthday into my own hands. It took a few years before I got it right, until I could ask for what I wanted and truly plan and enjoy my birthday. I did it though, and found joy in simple pleasures, finally looking forward to that day instead of dreading it.

    And then Leah died.

    How could I celebrate my birthday without my daughter’s physical presence? There were many years that I didn’t celebrate. My birthday became the third event in a black hole that began with Mother’s Day and included Leah’s birthday in April.

    My 50th birthday celebration was a bittersweet day that included dedicating a mediation spot in our yard to Leah, as well as being surrounded by family and friends with good food and live music, exactly the kind of celebration that I treasure. I began to see that it was possible to be with the full spectrum of feelings on my birthday.

    I could feel sad and feel joy at the same time, one feeling not diminishing or superseding the other.

    Every feeling could have its place in my heart. After that I began to plan my birthdays again. Each year finding something that honored where I was at the time and making space to feel the feelings that missing Leah on my birthday created.

    This year I am 64. I’m still not quite used to the fact that my age starts with a 6, and sometimes that means I think I am too old, or that it’s too late for me to live my life fully as me. Most of the time though, it means that I stay true to what I’ve come to call Leah’s Legacy, that losing her is too high a price to pay to not be who I am. I’ve done a lot of work to excavate my true self as a part of my grief journey and the writing of my book.

    This year, on my 64th birthday, I am embarking on a yearlong quest.

    My intention is to arrive at age 65 with intention, releasing and surrendering anything that I am still clinging to, or is clinging to me, that no longer serves me. I will be asking to be shown whatever I need to step fully into my Truth in each moment. I will be fully claiming my Queen, Wild Woman, and Priestess. I will reclaim my health and know my vibrant and radiant self. I’m very excited to begin this quest, yet I know that there will be trials along the way. That’s the way it is with every quest. There will be initiatory moments, as well as triumphs. I am entering this next year willing to be in the unknown. I will be recording my journey and will share it with you as I am called.

    In the mean time, here are some strategies for navigating a difficult birthday.

    • Take some time to write down what you want this particular year. It’s important to do this each year because you may feel differently from year to year.
    • Plan your celebration exactly as you want it to be.
    • Be true to your own heart. Don’t feel pressured to meet someone else’s expectations, even if it’s something you’ve always done. Let them know that this year you need something else.
    • If you are missing a loved one during your birthday take some time to honor your feelings.
    • If, during your birthday, you are in a new situation, a new location, etc., find something in your new circumstances that speaks to your heart.

    Remember to be gentle with yourself. Grief changes us and you may still be discovering how it has changed you. Allow yourself time to find what you need now in your new reality.

  • Claiming My Voice

    2017 was the year I claimed my voice.

    It was the year I began to tell my story at my book events. Each time I spoke my story I felt more and more like myself. It felt like I was breathing life into a part of myself that I was never quite sure would ever see the light of day.

    As the year went on, I began to work with a voice coach, I began to get comfortable seeing myself on video, I began to look more deeply at my signature presentation.

    I realized I had a signature presentation.

    What do I mean when I say that I felt more like myself? Well, for most of my life I felt like I was a fraud, that I was pretending, and that I wasn’t enough. I didn’t feel comfortable in my own skin. In early 2017 I began using my voice like never before. I voiced the story of my grief journey, but also learned to tell my story, to speak my truth whenever I had an opportunity. Not in a boastful or self-important way but in a way that was life saving, in a way that connected me to my soul, in a way that kept me in the present moment like never before, and in a way that helped connect to the person I’ve always been, but had been trying to “get rid of” for so many years. It was subtle and unrestrained at the same time. It felt so freeing!

    It was another level of inner work that was happening just by being scrupulously devoted to the present moment and all that it held for me.

    I also began to separate the me before my experience of grief and the me who grieved. The me before my grief was a part of the everything that helped my along the dark spiral of my grief journey. The one emerging from that darkness was the one who benefited from the way I met my grief journey. Everything began to make sense. My whole life came into focus in a way it hadn’t before. The inner work I did after I wrote my book allowed me to develop the capacity in my body to be able to hold the story and feelings so that I could bring it into the world. This first year of speaking about my book provided another level of inner work that brought me to the realization that claiming and using my voice is the key to truly loving myself — all parts of myself — unconditionally.

    Wow! I feel like I can relax in a way that I never could before.

    If my journey has taught me anything it’s that as long as I’m willing to do the work I’ll continue to evolve. I have no doubt that I will continue to become the best version of myself and, that in this moment, I have no idea what that will look like. I thought when I was helping my clients thrive after loss that I was done, then when I wrote my book I thought I was done. Now I realize I’ll never be done.

    As I use my voice in ways I never have before, I realize I’ll continue evolving into the person I am meant to be in this world. That excites me like nothing has for a long time!

    I’ve always wanted to live my life as the wild and outrageously messy person that I am.

    My instinct right now is to explain to you exactly what I mean by messy, because it’s not what you might think it is, but another thing I’m over is the need to constantly explain myself in order to fit into a perception of reality that never existed.

    I always thought that to be loved and accepted I would have to tame my wild heart and let her out in small measurable quantities, always on the lookout for the tsk-tsking of other people’s judgments thus reigning myself in to be loved and accepted. No more.

    Today I claim my right to take up all the space I need to take up and to unapologetically stand in my Truth, however that shows up from moment to moment.

    How about you? Are you willing to stake a claim for yourself?
    Are you willing to let your own wild heart fully participate in your wondrous life?
    I hope so, because together, we will have so much fun!

  • Lessons from 2017

    As this year winds to a close, I’d like to share with you what I’ve been reflecting on for the last few weeks. At this time last year I was preparing for my book to be published and starting to think about how I was going to market it. When I revisited my musings from the end of last year, I made the intention to be more present in 2017. I knew presence would be especially important as I moved from writing my book to sharing it with the world. I was in the middle of a year of embodiment work that was clearing out remnants of old wounds and making space for me to hold my story in my body so I could speak it. I knew that I would be taken outside of my comfort zone, as my vulnerability was visible for all to see; those who read my book and those who heard my story. At the beginning of the year I still identified myself as a stutterer and I didn’t identify myself as an author.

    Through the year I listened to my own voice like never before and I found my voice; the voice I use to communicate my work. I get chills and tears as I write those words. These are just some of the things that happened this year.

    I did over 10 book events and practiced many hours for each one.
    I joined Video Mojo Toastmasters thus becoming more comfortable speaking in front of a camera.
    I took part in a workshop to develop my signature presentation.
    I began working with a voice coach and focused on bringing even more vulnerability to my signature presentation.
    I held several Samyama Circles and a Holiday Grief Workshop.

    I now identify myself as an author and when I speak from my heart, I speak fluently.

    All of these things came from presence and intentional deep listening,

    from my inner knowing based upon sacred questions I asked myself. Each of the things I listed above are all things I previously resisted or refused to do earlier in my life. As the capacity in my body expanded, as I released old stuff, my own yearnings were allowed to be there. For some reason, maybe because I had released the wounds that made me resistant in the first place, as each one of these things arrived in my life I welcomed them with an open heart. That doesn’t mean there wasn’t still some apprehension, there was, and because they all arose from my intentional inquiry, I trusted that each one was the right step at the right time. My accomplishments this year far exceeded what I wrote down in my journal that I hoped to accomplish.

    It feels like another experience of alchemy; entering this year with an open heart,

    willing to do whatever I was moved to do from my inner guidance, and receiving so much more because I trusted the process. I never expected to ever get comfortable talking, let alone talking about the most vulnerable experiences of my life. As I entered the darkness of the solstice, I continued reflecting on where I have been and asked for guidance for where I am going next year, and what my focus will be.

    What I know for sure right now is that I will complete my new signature presentation. After I returned from my books tour in Chicago, I was moved to bring more of my own story into my presentations. A part of my story that is even more vulnerable because it brings up some unpleasant memories from my childhood. It’s important because without those experiences, I would not be able to bring my work into the world in the way I’m being called to do so.

    I’ll also be planning and offering some exciting new programs and workshops in 2018. These came from a compilation of all of the lessons and experiences that I learned this year.

    I continue to be grateful and astounded that I can participate fully in my life, holding so much joy in one hand, and an equal amount of sadness in my other hand. That may be the most profound lesson of 2017. I can be joyful and sad at the same time and neither one takes away from the other. They are both valid feelings and can coexist.

    I invite you to reflect on the lessons that are yours this year.

    Is what are you pushing away exactly what you need to invite into your life to grow? What needs to be released to make room for something else?
    Welcome everything and see what happens.

  • Why I Don’t Live a Balanced Life

    I used to endeavor to live a balanced life.

    I used to think that if I controlled and managed everything in my life just right that I would be happy. If I could carve out the exact right number of hours for family, work, health, recreation, etc. that I would have the right formula for success. If I didn’t get angry, if I didn’t get sad, if I didn’t get in situations that brought up my “negative” emotions I could stay in a comfortable place. I could avoid confrontation. I could avoid criticism. I could avoid disapproval. I worked hard at this, trying to stay on an even keel at all costs. And the cost was huge.

    I found that striving for balance was a constant inner struggle.

    I found that in order to be perceived as being balanced and in control, my inner battle with myself raged. I confronted myself when I couldn’t control my anger. I criticized myself when I ate the wrong food, or too much of it. I disapproved of myself when I did not meet the standards of perfection that I thought would guarantee a happy and balanced life. I was miserable, yet I kept at it convinced that if I was able to live in the narrow bandwidth I could accomplish my goal. I was still working as a Project Manager in construction at the time. We were doing start up on a new building, and we were trying to get the set points on the building’s control system to work properly. The set point spread was 4 degrees on the heating and cooling system. If the temperature went 2 degrees higher or 2 degrees lower than the set point the heating or cooling would come on, depending on the season. I wanted a set point. I wanted an automatic setting that would ramp my emotions up or down if they got 2 notches away from my ideal state of tranquility.

    Another way to look at it is to imagine a teeter-totter. I loved going up and down on one at the park when I was a child. It wouldn’t be much fun if it stayed in one place. Or imagine standing on it in the middle and balancing it. Think of the struggle it would take to get it to stand still.

    The harder I tried to live a balanced life, the harder it became to try to stay in the place that I thought would give me balance. Staying in that place also assured that I didn’t have to be seen. I thought it would be a comfortable place to be, an invisible, calm, small place to live.

    And then my daughter died. I found out that I couldn’t control anything.

    My life was thrown into a chaos that was beyond anything I had previously been trying to avoid. I didn’t have the strength to figure out how I had let this happen. I knew at some level that it was not my fault, yet for a while I blamed myself. I was tossed into an inferno of devastation.

    When I began to emerge from this place and looked around at the destruction that was my life I had a choice. I could continue to try to put my life in an order that resembled my former life, or I could open my eyes wide and ask, what now? That’s what I did.

    I had already been to the depths of despair, the place I thought I could manage myself with enough control and force. That had me struggling to be perfect and beating myself up when I couldn’t reach my idea of what perfection was for me in any given moment. Instead I chose to live an unbalanced life.

    Living an unbalanced life means that I get to live fully as myself. I get to feel the full spectrum of feelings in all of their messy glory. I choose to live here, without a set point to regulate my emotions. Yes, it means that sometimes I am sad, fearful, or feel down. I’ve found that when I allow myself to engage with those feelings fully, I can move through them and feel exhilarated, excited, and joyful. So these days I choose to live an unbalanced life, a life that is messy, chaotic, creative, inspired, and imperfect.

    It has freed me up to feel the glorious magnificence of my wild heart.

  • What do Gratitude and Self Care Have to do with Grief?

    In the last two weeks I’ve had conversations in both our Dinner Party group and our Meetup group about grief at various stages. As I listened to others experiences of grief I was struck yet again by how taboo talking about it is in our daily life.

    These are some of the things I heard;

    My family or friends wonder why I’m attending a meeting about grief, isn’t that morbid?
    I’m feeling stuck, or unsafe, or I want everything to go back the way it was before.
    My family expects me to be over this by now.
    I’m grieving “wrong.”
    I’m feeling hopeless.

    As we gave space for all of these stories to be voiced, I sensed a shift in the energy of the room. We gave them permission to grieve in their own unique way. Tears flowed, memories were shared, and there was even laughter. Those who may have felt hesitant to attend visibly relaxed.

    The road through grief can seem scary, treacherous, and not worth the effort of even starting on that rocky road, so when you wonder if it’s worth it to go through the pain without any guarantee of a pay off, here are two places you can start: gratitude and self-care.

    Gratitude

    When you don’t feel like you have anything to be grateful for, start with what is right in from of you. Be grateful for good clean water to drink, for the sun shining on you, for the rain, for good food to eat, for a nap, for a smile from a friend, or for a hug. We think gratitude has to be grandiose before we can start to be grateful but instead start where you are. Gratitude can be a game changer.

    Write down three things you are grateful for everyday. It’s important to write them down! At the end of the week, read your list. Your capacity to appreciate even the small things in your life will begin to make a difference in how you see everything in your life. For example, one of my clients was grateful for clean underwear.

    Self-Care

    I talk about self-care, lots. In the early stages of your grief journey, self-care may mean attending to your basic needs like getting enough rest and eating nourishing food. Having the courage to go to a grief group is also self-care. Simple things like that can give you a glimmer of hope, even a willingness to keep going.

    We often don’t feel like we deserve to take care of ourselves, or we believe we are being selfish. That’s why starting with the basics is important. This is true whether you are grieving or just discovering the importance of self-care for the first time. Self-care gives you a greater capacity to cope with your feelings. When you have greater coping skills, your willingness to move through the grief continues to grow.

    Before I continue, consider this. If self-care is a word or concept that makes you cringe because of the way it’s portrayed, or if it triggers an old wound, I give you permission to change it to something that resonates for you. This was the case with one of my clients. Self-care felt more like a block than a benefit. This client changed it to soul-care. Choose a word that works for you.

    Self-care changes and evolves as you do. Revisiting your self-care rituals regularly can help you to fine-tune yours. I take a look at my self-care rituals whenever I start to feel burnt out or stressed. That usually means I’m neglecting what I call non-negotiable self-care rituals. I get busier and I think that skipping yoga class for a couple of weeks won’t hurt, or I think I can eat just a little gluten. I find out why they are non-negotiable. When I’m attending to self-care I have a greater capacity to handle the stress, and when I am getting busy but am doing self-care rituals then I recognize the activities I am participating in that are not serving me.

    I also take a look at my self-care rituals as the seasons change. For me, it’s a good time to see if anything needs to be refined, or added. Here is a blog I wrote about Radical Self-care. (link to blog)

    Discover What Nurtures You

    What are your non-negotiable self-care rituals?
    Make a list of everything that nourishes you; body, mind, and soul.
    How do you like to have fun? Put it on your list even if you haven’t done it but have always wanted to try it.
    What people, places or things inspire you?
    What stirs your soul?
    What adds beauty to your life?
    Continue to add to your list.

    Now I’m going to suggest something that may sound radical to you, schedule your self-care, all of it. Things like massages, haircuts, or acupuncture are scheduled for obvious reasons. I’m suggesting that you schedule an appointment with yourself and give self-care the same worth as you do your massage therapist or the person who cuts your hair. Your list will come in handy when you schedule a self-care break, and don’t know what to do. Look at your list and choose something!

    Here are a few more ideas:

    • Take walk outside.
    • Step outside barefoot and connect with the earth.
    • Have a cup of tea or coffee without looking at your phone.
    • Pick or buy yourself flowers.
    • Do nothing.

      One of my favorite self-care rituals is doing nothing, absolutely nothing. Try it for five minutes and see what you think. When you start to feel guilty for doing nothing remind yourself that it’s five minutes. Everything you need to do will still be there when the time is over, and you may be a little more relaxed.

      Self-care helps you to relax, reduces stress, and develops a greater capacity to feel your feelings. Self-care is the fuel for your tank. When your car has no gas, you can’t go anywhere. The same is true for you. When your energy reserves are depleted, you don’t feel like doing anything. Self-care brings abundance back into your life so you can be your own best self.

  • Should I Put My Grief on A Shelf and Have Some Fun?

    I was asked the other day if I get tired of talking about grief. If I’d rather put down my grief and go do something fun. These are really good questions.

    There was a time that I wanted all of my feelings of grief to go away. I didn’t want to remember that my daughter was dead. I didn’t want to remember the feelings that were unresolved when my mother or father died. I wanted the feelings to go away so I could get on with my life. But how could I really get on with my life when I had so many painful issues, old stories, and constructs that lived in my body as both pain and restriction that kept me immobilized both emotionally and at a deeper physical level? We think that if we muscle through or soldier on all of our unresolved pain will step aside and let the real us through.

    I found out that it is called unresolved for a reason. By finding a way through my difficult feelings, I found out that some of my pain and body and eating issues were connected to my grief. Because I said yes to excavating the life I was meant to live, I discovered my true self, what I call my Nanciness. It meant being scrupulously devoted to following the bread crumbs of my grief journey, what I call today my grief spiral, no matter where it lead me, no matter where it continues to lead me.

    Just what does a grief journey look like almost 17 years in? I no longer feel like I’m actively grieving my daughter’s death. Her death affects me daily, for sure, but now there is a different texture to my days. Yes, there are still days that I feel sad, that I feel the pain of losing her in the car accident, remember those days in the hospital, especially as the milestone days of the anniversary of her death begin to get close. Today I use the resources available to me which brings me to a new level of understanding, or integrates a certain feeling in a new way.

    Grief is a Doorway.

    Grief opened a door to the greatest transformation of my life, and it can for you too. When I was completely broken open and on my knees in my darkest hour, I didn’t realize that my loss provided the perfect condition for new growth; open fertile ground to nurture the seeds of my soul’s purpose. I didn’t see it at first because I was holding on to what I lost, hoping against hope that I could stay the same and that I wouldn’t have to change.

    Grief Changed Me.

    If I had resisted that change I would have been trying to hold on to a life that was no longer the same as the day before her death. The fabric of my life no longer held the same threads, and if I tried to hang on to my former life it would have fallen apart anyway because the old stories would keep wrapping around a structure that was no longer there, it is an illusion that had no substance, no form.

    Today I know that I would not have the capacity to have fun if I had not followed those breadcrumbs almost 17 years ago. Having fun, being connected to my creativity and to the things that make life meaningful for me are the gifts and blessing of my grief spiral. So no, I don’t want to put down my grief so I can have fun. I want to walk my life’s path so I can be connected to what is important for me these days: to my ability to make meaningful connections, and have meaningful conversations, to listen to my body’s wisdom and feed her and move her in a way that truly nourishes her, to share my life with a life partner who has experienced the same loss, to be able to meet each other where we are and still have fun together, to appreciate my sense of humor, to find pleasure in the simple things like bringing in a bunch of zinnias for my office, and gratitude, always gratitude, for everything and everyone who has brought me to this day in my life.

    What are some of the things that make your life worth living these days?

     

  • A Good Death

    Last week at the Raleigh Death Café  a participant’s question about what constitutes a good death prompted much discussion.

    As I listened to the interesting conversation I flashed back almost 17 years to Leah’s hospital room.

    I remembered holding on to every thread of hope as we conferred with her doctors.

    I remembered Dan helping the scared sparrow fly free in the parking garage stairway.

    I remembered holding Leah’s hand and stroking her cheek, telling her that she too could fly free if that is what she needed to do.

    I remembered inviting her friends and our friends, who had been camped out in the waiting room with us for five days, to say good-bye to her when we knew she would not be returning to us physically.

    All of these memories were in my head, swirling around; I brought them to my heart.

    In that moment, sitting in the midst of a discussion about what constitutes a good death, I knew.

    Leah’s death was a good death.

    My head wanted to slice and dice the discussion and make an argument against the possibility of a good death, but my heart knew in an instant. I took a deep breath and let the knowledge of Leah’s death as a good death take up some space. I spoke it out loud, in that moment, without thinking about it. It felt like a new level of peace. I let the tears come and felt myself witnessed in this new awareness. The moment passed and the discussion moved on.

    As I reflected on this moment in the days since it happened I realized that I was not capable of considering that hers was a good death at the time of her death. I was many chapters of my story away from even knowing the concept of a good death as it referred to my daughter. Nothing about her death was good, at least at the time. As I began my grief journey I excavated the gifts of that journey and yet, I still had not contemplated a good death.

    If you were to ask me what a good death is, I’m not sure I could give you a finite answer. Before that discussion last week, it never even occurred to me to consider a good death for anyone I knew.

    I’d like to think that it came into my consciousness at precisely the right time.

    If I did come across the concept of a good death earlier, maybe I wasn’t able to really hear it.

    If a good death feels like an unspeakable concept for you, trust where you are right now. If it intrigues you, bring your feelings to your heart and allow them to rest there. All of our perceptions about what death is and isn’t hold a mystery that cannot be understood by all of the analysis of our heads.

    Our hearts can understand what our heads want to hold on to for dear life. Bring everything to your heart and breathe.

  • Tails From the Road

    In the past month I have traveled to two book events, one in Boulder, CO, and one in Minneapolis, MN. I’ve begun to write about each of them several times, but it took awhile until I was ready. Even though the content of each event was similar, I received unique gifts from each of them.

    The Boulder event was my first on the road.

    I was well prepared and found myself feeling none of the usual anxiety I experienced when I was faced with previous public speaking experiences. The participants and I created a space for grace and vulnerability to be present for each of us. When I suggested a short break, the group as a whole wanted to continue so as not to disturb the energy. It was a sacred circle that allowed for each of us to witness each other’s vulnerability in safety. Our conversation throughout the evening was poignant and moving. The date of the event was April 28th, which is Leah’s birthday. When I was offered that date as a possibility, I immediately knew that was the perfect date. We felt her presence.

    The Minneapolis event was held at Modus Locus, a beautiful art gallery space that our son Peter’s friend operates. The audience was full of Peter’s friends and some of our family from Minnesota. Again, it was a warm and welcoming audience who appreciated hearing my story and my particular way of walking with grief.

    Talking about my story and bringing my work into the world in the way I am being called to do so, brings me to a vulnerability that sometimes takes my breath away.

    My stories come directly from my heart, and sometimes they are different each time I speak. I have a deep abiding trust that the stories that need to be told in each moment will be there for me to share. Preparing to do this work has brought me to my knees many times. Each time I speak I am brought to a new edge, challenged to grow in a new direction, and I don’t always know what direction that will be. For this reason, I am again learning a new nuance to the present moment. When I stay in the moment, I receive everything I need to share my journey, to answer a question, and to integrate the lessons that are present at that edge. I’ve learned how to use embodied movement to assist me to move through any feelings and emotions, either new or old, that I meet at these edges. Because of my experiences at my book events, I am learning a new way to be in the world on a daily basis. I am learning the importance of creating a strong structure to hold the organic transmission of my intuition and to provide a strong place for it to reside and flow.

    After I returned from Minneapolis I was deeply drawn to silence.

    I wanted to write about my experiences yet my guidance was directing me inward. As I sat each day and listened I discovered deep feelings and shifts that were calling to be heard. I let them be there as they were, moved gently when movement was called, and shed a few more layers that were ready to go. I am still emerging from that place, meandering through my days, listening and being with what is here, writing when I am called.

    It is in these places that I continue to do my own inner work, to grieve, to move, to feel, to care for my self and my soul. I emerge from that space nourished and energized so I can continue the work I am called to do. It is a dance, always changing, always evolving.