Life Development Counselors

05/12/2024

As I continue my "therapy" of art my collection continues to grow. At the same time I am thinking about trying to decrease my accumulation of stuff. Therefore I am selling some of my original pieces. These are not prints so no one else has a match to any of them. If you are interested in purchasing any of them private message me.

10/14/2022

10/14/2022

04/17/2020

During this time of upheaval and uncertainty we are invited to practice mindfulness. If we are focusing on “what if” and “if only” we will probably experience more depression and anxiety. By mindfully practicing “The Truth of the Moment” we can decrease the depression and anxiety. The truth of the moment is just noticing, in a non critical way, what you ARE experiencing through your senses, thoughts and emotions at that moment. It grounds you in the present moment rather that chasing the what-ifs or the wish-I-hads.

Another way to deal with the present crisis is to send love and care in your attitude, thoughts and prayers to all in your house, your neighborhood, your city, your state, your country and the world who are suffering. At the moment that includes almost everyone. Sometimes the people we are encountering on the phone, the internet or in the grocery store are anxious and irritable. Offer some compassion and kindness. We are all in this together and this is hard.
It’s encouraging to see the many ways people are celebrating life during this trying and uncertain time. Spend some time each day being grateful and celebrating life.

02/25/2019

Too often, we refuse anything that is different from us or different from what we think or feel. Why? Because sometimes we feel so insubstantial, so insecure and without foundation, that we fear that anything different, if let in, will erase our identity... But sooner or later, life teaches us, through great love and suffering, that the diversity of the world is there to complete us, and then we can inquire into all that is not us with curiosity and wonder. This is how we begin to discover Wholeness. This is how we begin to be informed by other life.
From “The One Life We’re Given “ by Mark Nepo

02/05/2019

As I think about my life stories they include loss and discovery - loss of dreams I had for certain relationships and discovery of deeper parts of life, discovery of the depth and richness of life without it being what I thought it would be.
When I was a child we used to sing a song at church called "Deep and Wide". It was about God's love but I didn't really get that. I just enjoyed singing it and doing the motions while we sang. But as an adult I certainly understand that Life is deep and wide as well as fun, terrifying, calm, disruptive, etc. While I don't enjoy all of it I do understand that it is the "all-of-it" that makes life deep and wide.

01/21/2019

If we can stay awake when our lives are changing, secrets will be revealed to us - secrets about ourselves, about the nature of life, and about the eternal source of happiness and peace that is always available, always renewable, already within us. Elizabeth Less in Broken Open.

01/14/2019

I am not in charge of the process. I am not in charge of life. These truths remind me to stay in the present experience and accept what is. When I find myself in the "what-ifs" I change it to "what is". It helps me let go of the frustration that comes when I think I know what needs to happen and it isn't.

01/07/2019

"Because like a worm that eats the soil to aerate the earth, the soul must eat experience, must have it move through its bowels in order to be cleansed and renewed, and to make spaces in this life so that Spirit has a place to enter, the way rain will reach further into the tiny worm holes, feeding the nearest root." Mark Nepo in "The One Life We're Given"

01/02/2019

January 2019 - Welcome to the new year. My intention is to write more often on this page for this year. The last 2 years have been stressful times for many people and we need words of encouragement and comfort. It is my intention to post those kind of words. I will start with a quote from Elizabeth Lesser in her book Broken Open: "When we descend down all the way to the bottom of a loss, and dwell patiently, with an open heart, in the darkness and pain, we can bring back up with us the sweetness of life and the exhilaration of inner growth. When there is nothing left to lose we find the true self - the self that is whole, the self that is enough, the self that no longer looks to others for definition, or completion, or anything but companionship on the journey."