What shape waits in the seed of you to grow and spread its branches against a future sky? ~ David Whyte 2020 has been a difficult and unprecedented year. 2021 offers the promise of some relief through both the vaccine and the changing political landscape. As 2020 ends, it's worth taking some time to reflect on how you dealt with this year's challenges. Were you able to stay afloat? What internal and external life preservers did you discover when you needed them? What did you learn about yourself, your resillience, your strengths and vulnerabilities? Pema Chodron's quote comes to mind: Only to the extent that we expose ourselves, Again and again to annihilation, can that which is indestructible be found. What lessons, joy, sorrow, losses, insight, appreciation, sadness, gratitude will you take forward with you into 2021? What seeds have been planted this year that will grow and spread their branches against the 2021 sky? Ontact me if you you like to explore the seeds within you that want to grow
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Life changed drastically in March when shelter in place began in the Bay Area. Our lives continue to be impacted in multiple and ongoing ways since then. One of those ways is that psychotherapy is now conducted via video ( or by phone). In many ways therapy is the same, and in other ways it is different. We are still two people having a confidential and evocative conversation about your life. And yet meeting on video has literally altered the way we see each other and the ways we are able to interact. There is a certain intimacy about meeting in our homes, seeing bits and pieces of our lives outside the office. There may be interruptions: children, pets, doorbells, partners, roommates. Privacy and good WiFi may be issues at times. Video platforms are not perfect and there can be interruptions, poor quality video or audio, or wavy Zoom wallpaper. Rituals have changed. Beginnings and endings of sessions are no longer punctuated by being met in the waiting room, walking to and from the office door, sitting down, getting up, the information that comes from being physically in the presence of another. Instead we both log into Zoom and you wait to be admitted to the call. There is often a hand wave at the end of the call, a poignant new ritual to end a session instead of walking out the door. There is no longer time spent getting to and from the office, or in the waiting room before sessions; this was often a time to muse, think, feel, to be with yourself before and after your session. Now you have to purposefully make transition time, which I highly recommend. We are now literally talking heads to each other. I had a newer client comment recently that she has never seen more than a portrait view of me! Our faces are life size on the screen, much closer than we would be with each other in the office. There is often more eye contact than there might be in the office, where you might look away more frequently for various reasons . Recently I have begun going into the office a couple of days a week to work virtually. Clients who previously met me in my office have commented happily "You are in your office!" It is a familiar place, formerly as much a part of the therapy as the two of us were, a place that holds their secrets, sorrows, joys, hopes and fears. And thankfully we are adaptable beings! Video psychotherapy is a different experience in many ways, yet also still the same two people connecting in whatever way we have available during this strange and unsettling time. I am grateful that psychotherapy is still possible, even more important and essential during these times. Contact me if you would like to try video psychotherapy
And people stayed at home
And read books And listened And they rested And did exercises And made art and played And learned new ways of being And stopped and listened more deeply. Someone meditated, someone prayed Someone met their shadow And people began to think differently And people healed. And in the absence of people who Lived in ignorant ways Dangerous, meaningless and heartless, The earth also began to heal. And when the danger ended and People found themselves They grieved for the dead And made new choices And dreamed of new visions And created new ways of living And completely healed the earth Just as they were healed. - Kitty O'Meara What shape waits in the seed of you to grow and spread its branches against a future sky? David Whyte Nature is in full bloom as we move through Spring into summer Might there also be something within you that is trying to blossom? Is there an internal seedling that is trying to push through and take shape in your life? We are a part of nature as much as any plant or flower, so it makes sense that at this time of the year there would also be something within that wants to come into being.
This is a good time to follow a creative impulse, a new activity, something you may have thought about during the inward seasons of fall and winter. Or you might be called to expand and grow in some desired and perhaps feared way. Maybe you could spend some time with yourself and imagine, feel or intuit what wants to take shape, what wants to come alive in your life right now. What seed wants to sprout, be watered, fertilized and tended to that will enrich your life now and possibly in years to come? Let difficulty transform you. And it will. In my experience we just need help in learning not to run away. - Pema Chodron No one likes it when life feels scary or hard or when a situation arises that seems insurmountable. Many of us end up in flight, fight or freeze mode when we are overwhelmed or anxious. Our brain's natural survival instinct is to get away fast! As children we may have been in precarious, inescapable family situations where we learned to run away emotionally or mentally to survive.
This survival tactic served us as small, dependent beings. But as adults, running away usually compounds the difficulty in multiple ways. If we can find ways to face them head-on, these experiences CAN be transformative. If we can hold on to our mind and not lose it to paralyzing fear or flight, we can find a deeper, stronger place within ourselves that we never knew existed, a place that is paradoxically indestructible in the face of something that may feel annihilating. But how, you may ask.... having the courage to take a deep breath ( or many) and be with the feelings that arise from the difficulty. Breathing into and fully experiencing them, separating them the anxious thoughts that perpetuate these feelings. Meditating, drawing, journaling, singing, dancing, spending time with trusted others and in nature, listening to your dreams and the messages they may send you. Knowing you don't have to go through this alone, that there are others who can and will support you in a variety of ways. |
AuthorPeggy Handler, MFT, is a psychotherapist in San Francisco's Noe Valley Archives
December 2020
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