Letting my daughters go: On learning to hold space when little birds leave the nest
(photo credit: Maurice Schalker, Unsplash) (Listen to me read the post) It all starts months ago. Whenever I consider that two of my daughters are planning to move out at the same time (each to cities more than 2000 kilometres away in opposite directions), I find...
I’m back from sabbatical and I’m feeling so many things…
(selfie taken on the ferry, just after leaving my daughter at university) Friends, can I level with you for a moment? I’m feeling sad this week… and tender, with my emotions very near the surface. If you dare to ask me, when I’m having a tender moment, how I’m doing...
When you’re afraid to get in the boat, who soothes your fear?
(image credit: Mael Balland, Unsplash) The boat launch was busy, so I sat on a park bench a short distance away instead of my favourite spot near the end of the dock. In the parking lot behind me, a small boy in a life jacket was flailing and screaming “I DON’T WANT...
Embracing Laughter
(from the Holding Space Card Deck) Recently I learned about the Navajo ceremony that honours a baby’s first laugh. Whoever is the first person to make a baby laugh is expected to throw a dinner party on that baby’s behalf. In one account of this tradition, the person...
When the rapids come, adjust your posture
When you go white-water rafting, if you’re a novice, your guide will spend some time teaching you how to sit in the boat, how to hold your paddle, how to adjust your centre of gravity, and where to plant your feet so that there’s less chance that you’ll get tossed out...
You don’t know what you can’t see until you see it
I got glasses recently. I’ve been lucky enough to make it to fifty-five without them (and still only need a weak prescription), but apparently my eyes are aging with my body. When I first put them on and noticed how clear the road signs and TV screens suddenly were, I...
Mothering myself (a new journal practice)
I adopted a new journal practice this Spring, after reading the book Discovering Your Inner Mother. I wanted to nurture all of the parts of me that are connected to old stories, and I wanted to learn to mother myself better. Each morning, when I sit down with my...
Whose voices are you being influenced by? (And when is it time to silence those voices?)
On a news program recently, I heard a judge being quoted as saying that, in deciding the sentence for someone who’d been charged with a crime, he was influenced by neither emotions nor public opinion. And my response was… REALLY?! Is such a thing even possible? I...
Velcro membranes
(from the Holding Space Card Deck) When I talk about holding space for ourselves, I often introduce the concept of psychic membranes – the container in which we can protect, nourish, and support ourselves. The cell membrane serves as a metaphor for what it means to...
Three men and a leaky boat
I was sitting on the dock on the Red River at the local park. It’s my favourite place to sit with my journal on these pleasant Spring/Summer mornings. I can usually sit there uninterrupted, but sometimes I have to share the dock with people launching their boats. One...
Winnipeg • Manitoba • Canada
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