Practices for Recovering Resilience
Tired of Your Inner Critic? – Here’s How to Retire It
I have just about had it with my inner critic – the irritating self-critical remarks I hear so often when I’m just trying to live my life – “Oops, that wasn’t very smart, was it?” “Are you kidding? Now they’ll really know you don’t know what you’re doing.” Maybe you have an inner critic, too. […]
Peace in the Midst of No Peace
The 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center is this weekend. There will be many reflections and many retrospectives from many different points of view. I’m offering the perspective of American poet, environmental activist, and farmer, Wendell Berry. The Peace of Wild Things was written in 1968, as turbulent a […]
Labor Day – Valuing Good Work and Hard Working
Labor Day was a holiday celebrated in my family as an actual day to remember and respect the legacy of hard work that had allowed my immigrant grandparents to gain a toehold in the American dream. My Irish grandfather digging sewer ditches for the city of Chicago. My Polish grandparents farming the rocky soil in […]
Loving the Worry Part
My friend Elizabeth was asked to comfort her 9-year old grand-daughter Amy who had suddenly become afraid to go to sleep at night. Afraid something would happen and she wouldn’t wake up. Elizabeth is an experienced therapist as well as a loving grandmother, so she and Amy scheduled a FaceTime session, and a few days […]
Complaining – A Cue for Compassion
A simple new practice, in the larger framework of: Compassion – caring for and acting to relieve suffering – is one of the two wings of the dharma in the Buddhist contemplative tradition. Wisdom and compassion – seeing clearly and responding with loving concern and wise action – are the practices that allow us to […]
Life Beyond the Fish Tank
The beloved poet and spiritual teacher Mark Nepo recently celebrated the 20th anniversary of the publication of his New York Times best-selling The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have by reading some of the most moving and enlightening poems/meditations/essays in a recent webinar. Inspiring enough […]
Me…We…and Thee – Experience Creates…and Shifts…Our Relational Identities
In Life Is in the Transitions: Mastering Change at Any Age, Bruce Feiler offers an interesting conceptualization of relational identities: me, we, and thee. ME is a focus on one’s self, an individual’s goals and aspirations and efforts to achieve/fulfill them. He suggests folks focused on the unfolding of their individual story, the particulars of […]
Updated Practices for Resilience for Right Now…and For the Long Haul
When I began posting practices for Resilience for Right Now…and For the Long Haul at the beginning of the pandemic (March 2020), I had no idea, none of us had any idea, how long, how longer than long, this pandemic would be impacting our lives, our resilience, our well-being. I last updated the website page […]
Life Is in the Transitions
My friend William retired from his position with the San Francisco Department of Building Inspection just before the pandemic, no one yet knowing a shut-down of such long duration was coming. When the shut-down did occur, he was asked to return to the department part-time as a consultant to shepherd the new staff through a […]
The Tree That Survived 9/11 – A Poignant Symbol of Resilience and Hope
I’ve posted about trees as the iconic metaphors for our own resilience before. Just as we’re coming up on the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, I discover a beautifully illustrated children’s picture book, This Very Tree: A Story of 9/11, Resilience, and Regrowth. It’s a true story, beautifully told, of a Callery […]