Finding Connection through Loss and Love

Dear Deep Soul,

July is the beginning of carrying out summer plans for many, and perhaps like many of you, I will be embarking on my own adventure to visit relatives — in Norway and the East coast.

I look at the summer season as a beautiful expression of our earth’s expansive beauty and fertility — from plants and their fruits to new human babies, one of whom I just got to hold in my arms for the first time (our grandnephew)! Travels and connecting with others is of high importance for myself and maybe for you during these active summer months.

I also feel an undercurrent of anxiety and tension beneath the excitement layer and anticipation of these refreshed connections. Can you relate? It’s helpful for me to address this in what I call a framework of loss and transition. Anxiety is often felt when we are going through shifts and changes, big or small. It just comes with the territory when we don’t know what’s next or when we don’t feel in control. A lot of the time these days, right?

Recently having a small group of powerful decision makers overturn a half century of reproductive rights for women and families in the United States is just one thing along with so many others from everyday unabated gun violence, climate change and extreme weather, and the dislocation of people due to that and unstable social and economic conditions.

If we think beyond our own lives and families, giving attention to the bigger picture that ultimately affects everyone, what are we as individuals to do? To read more about this and the thoughts and actions I am taking click here.

Cosmos and Nature – The Really Big Picture

This month we will experience a full Thunder Moon (July 13th) and it will be the second supermoon this year. A supermoon is when the moon is closest to the earth and often looks dramatically larger.

Here in the US Southwest my whole body vibrates with the resounding thunder during the Monsoon summer months with the towering, magnificent clouds and relieving rain. We had none this past Spring, so are grateful it finally arrived to help quell huge and historic wildfires.

On July 28th we will experience the new moon and be gifted with seeing the Delta Aquariads Meteor shower. Look for these stars shooting through the sky during these darkest nights.

Always look for and savor these wonders as a balm to the soul.

The Power of Healing through Loss

One big professional transition for me is…drum roll please…I’m releasing myself from being Director of the Passion Test programs officially in July. Yes, after 13 years it is time to move on from this administrative and coordinating position. This transition is done with loads of respect for my teachers, mentors, and colleagues.

I will be focusing on training, coaching, and facilitating groups, along with doing even more speaking engagements than I am currently now, live and on podcasts.

These are the activities I am most passionate about these days. And as the teacher living my teaching, I need to stay true to my passions in life and work. It feels great AND any transition can feel like a small death, (practice before we really die!). I find myself in this mix of profound mystery with its excitement, fear, joy, and loss.

For some a transition might be heavier on the anxiety or fear. I have noticed that whenever I or someone grapples with change, they often do one of three things. They feel like crap and feel sad, or completely tune things out and binge on whatever crutch is most familiar and accessible. This could be eating more sugar, binge streaming TV, drinking, habitually checking social media feeds. You get the picture.

Alternatively, we may see a therapist or hire a coach. Or thirdly, take classes and learn something new that inspires and motivates you. The first step is just to notice your response and see if it serves whatever transition you are in that allows you to grow and help you integrate the old with the new.

In the past year I’ve been participating in several powerful trainings with master teachers on grief and loss. Last December I enrolled in and completed an in-person Death Mid Wife training. This year I am exploring the full range of experiences that wake us up, from loss to living our passions more fully. With the sudden passage of a close family member in my own generation, this work became even more personal and relevant for me.

To better understand the full breadth of the grieving process, I joined hundreds in an online community training with therapist/author Francis Weller to dive deep into the body of work based on his book, The Wild Edge of Sorrow.

I just recently began a grief educator course with David Kessler (a protégé of Elizabeth Kubler Ross) who has written many compelling and compassionate books, the latest, Finding Meaning: The 6th Stage of Grief.

I’ve come to learn over time that some of the most powerful transformations in our life are triggered by some darkness or loss. There is healing medicine in the pain or suffering when we face our full experience, as painful as it may be, and welcome it so that we can then move through it, not wallow or feel ungrounded. Doing this in community with ritual and ceremony can be vitally important for connection, honoring and feeling solidarity with those that have gone through some loss. Francis Weller and others provide these beautiful opportunities to learn how our modern society has shut down connection to healthy grief, while weaving new communities of choice that support the many aspects of the grief journey.

Also in alignment with these interests and activities, I’m excited to begin a new journal creation project in collaboration with a brilliant therapist, this time focused on addictions and trauma. Using the journaling process in a structured way can help us face what is hard through a deeper reflection and contemplation. This assures a sacred time and space to honor what comes up and to honor ourselves. New insights and shifts often happen while committing to a practice. Over time we begin to embody a new awareness and develop a growing capacity to hold the pain or anxiety in a new and more enlivening way instead of being swallowed or feeling overwhelmed by it.

The Power of Healing through Journaling

If you’re starting to feel the pull to journal, I’ll be offering a free 3-day Journal Challenge at the end of August to invite you back into deeper reflection and connection to yourself. Look here for more info

This September 12th I’ll begin two Journaling Wisdom Circles. One as a women-only group in the morning and a group of men and women in the evening. Journal Wisdom Circles start Sept 12th. For more info click here

These circles provide support for your deeper dive into knowing yourself using the nature’s guidance to move through your own cycles of life. You get to Illuminate and share your wisdom with other deep souls to gain greater clarity for yourself. You learn to identify and express your feelings in a safe space with structure. I always add simple ceremony to foster a community experience. These circles inform your own understanding of personal transitions, losses, and grief in a way that leads you home to your own joy and love of life.

The Power of Healing through Strength-building Exercise in Community

If health and feeling balanced physically, emotionally, and spiritually is important to you – read on here.

My Exercise for Health community is now in its third year! I am grateful for all our participants and word of mouth referrals that help us grow stronger together.

I know that feeling good in one’s body can be a catalyst for getting out into nature, exploring the world even in your own backyard, and making it more possible to be with friends and family this summer. You deserve that and more.

Blessings on all your connections and adventures this summer!