Category / communication / stress
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Writers Block? Maybe Burnout? Or Persistent Drive for Autonomy?
I loved blogging. I did it most Thursdays for over 15 years. Blogging taught me to write and gave me an audience. It led to me offering workshops and becoming a professional speaker. Then I fell off a wall and just couldn’t do it anymore. Read more here. Read my 2019-2024 Season Recap here. I have tried everything to get back to it. I have cleaned my house, transplanted all…
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Thanksgiving Rehash-2019
You are extraordinarily blessed if you spent the day with people who pissed you off and hurt your feelings. Remember that. Those opinionated, loud mouthed, obnoxious people are your family by birth or marriage or by choice. You will either have to face the enormous pain of their passing or they will be the ones left when you go. This is good. It is the whole point of life- to surround ourselves with people that matter, people that we love and keep working on and struggle with. Do they see things differently than you do? Is their experience something you can learn from, be open to? That is their gift in your life.
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Will Summer Ever End?
I know- it is 82 degrees out as I sit here writing about fall and back to school and finally being able to focus…but instead I took a walk over lunch and am heading out to have happy hour on a patio…again!
School did start. The nights are longer and cooler. The colors are starting to turn. And I am back to work- I even posted my fall workshop schedule.
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Creating Security in an Insecure World
We humans need security. We want to know we are safe and we are loved and it is all going to be ok. And yet… it isn’t all ok, it isn’t always safe and it sometimes isn’t going to be ok. And even being loved can be taken away. Enough good news? I certainly wouldn’t blame you for walking away about now.
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How did the internet make parenting so freaking hard?
I have a complicated relationship with Facebook. I suppose this whole “internet thing” still confuses me.
In 1984, I was at the U studying psychology and women studies and became a single mom.
My parenting philosophy was developed at the library. The actual building kind with paper books. I found “The Family Bed” which gave me permission to let my baby sleep right where he already was. I subscribed to the subversive Mothering Magazine. I decided not to spank and researched nutrition and discipline and sexual stereotypes and worried about the impact of raising my son surrounded by strong women but without a father. And deep down I knew that if I loved him and did my best, we’d be ok.
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A Growth Mindset Can Change Everything
The year ahead is full of uncertainty. I plan on making a ton of mistakes. I plan on being surprised and disappointed and hurt and frustrated and worried. I plan on aiming high and falling on my face. I aim to get it oh so wrong, and making it right. I will get older but maybe just a bit wiser.
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Something Bad is Going to Happen
Our Lives Under Constant (Perceived) Threat We live in a world where the perception of threat is out of proportion to the risks we face. Our brains are super suggestive. We can watch a movie and be terrified one moment, moved to tears the next knowing they are actors telling a story. We choose to play in the world of terror or heartbreak or gruesome or humor. How many murders…
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In Times of Stress- Add Connection
When my boys were little, they went to a daycare center that had a great reputation but when they moved from the baby room to the toddler room, something started to rub me the wrong way. The teachers just weren’t as patient, weren’t as nurturant. They started bragging about how well the kids handled things on their own- from pouring their own juice and washing their hands using some weird…
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A World at Half Staff
How are we supposed to feel? Each day, on my drive to work I watch the seasons change in the colors of the trees. I see the beauty of letting go, of summer losing out to fall and know what comes next. Because I get to cross the river on Cedar most days, it is common for me to see bald eagles. I understand how throughout time, people have chosen…
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Wonder and Delight- inoculate against stress
Anxiety is on my mind this week. Professionally I consider it the common cold of mental health- shows up a lot and responds well to treatment. Lately I have been considering the bigger picture of the huge increase in anxiety we are seeing in both parents and in our kids. Some facts- research shows as much as five to eight times as many high school and college students who meet…
