IMPORTANT UPDATE
As of April 2024, my blog has moved over to Substack where I’m co-hosting A Tender Space (together with my business partner at Centre for Holding Space). You can find my new writing plus podcast episodes there, or sign up below to get them in your inbox.
Here’s some of my earlier writing…
What’s revealed by the pain
I was reading something this weekend about pain and how it's the body's way of telling us there's something we need to pay attention to. And then I thought... it works for the heart and the mind too. I've had a few pain points lately. Learning to adjust to this new...
Who am I and why am I here? (And other existential questions about identity)
“So... what made you move to Shawnigan Lake?” It’s one of the most common questions I get from people I encounter in the tiny village I moved to at the edge of a lake on Vancouver Island. “It was time for a change,” I say, or “I’ve been wandering since I sold my house...
Who am I? What it means to have an external locus of identity
When you have an external locus of identity (or at least primarily lean in that direction on a spectrum), you tend to rely heavily on validation from others and on your ability to meet the standards set by your culture/career/family/religion/etc. Without much capacity for internal validation and self-worth, you feel insecure or inadequate when external factors don’t validate you.
Pausing to let joy in
Listen to me read the post... “You need to pause to let joy in.” Those words popped into my head one day last week while I was sitting on the couch, weary after a long day of book-launch-related tasks, which followed several long days of gathering the things I need to...
Music as a reflection of life: What I learned from jazz drummer Jerry Granelli
Listen to me read the post... “By the end of the week, we’ll have turned you into a blues band.” Gulp. I could feel the anxiety rise when I heard those words. A blues band?! Me?! I have no musical talent and my Mennonite body is rhythmically stunted from all of those...
Becoming part of the landscape
Listen to me read the post... I had a dream once, that my body had become part of the landscape. The curve of my belly was now a hill that people and animals were walking across. Small children were playing on my forearms and trees were growing in the soil between my...
Personal Responsibility or Systemic Injustice: holding the tension in a complex world
Listen to me read the post... “He was a poor man in a criminal justice system that treats you better if you are rich and guilty than if you are poor and innocent.” - Anthony Ray Hinton For nearly thirty years, Anthony Ray Hinton was in solitary confinement on death...
Remembering how to pray
Listen to me read the post: I wake up among the treetops. I peek out the window near my head and I see the shadowy lake below, surrounded by the shadowy trees. Across the lake, I hear the train that was probably the reason for my waking. I close my eyes and a smile...
A love letter to the woman at the lake
Listen to me read the post: I came here, to the lake, feeling discouraged and a little burnt out from putting so much free content into the world. This is the time of year I have to be the most active on social media because we are marketing our Fall programs, both...
The vulnerability of being a parent, especially when our children fall apart
photo credit: Unsplash Listen to Heather read the post: I can’t fix it. I want SO BADLY to fix it. My daughter is in distress, she’s far away, and all I can do is be here, listening, at the other end of a FaceTime call. I feel so helpless. My words feel empty and void...
Shawnigan Lake, B.C.
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