What Have You Been Learning Lately?

Shame is such a sticky, deep, murky feeling. I'm struggling to write this because I'm wrestling with a sense of shame. I feel embarrassed to share the things I'd like to share with you because it means coming clean about ways I've failed and things I've been learning that feel so obvious, but for me have been a revelation. One thing I know to be true, though, is that it's important and worthwhile to be honest, even if it isn't easy. Last month I spent a couple weeks in a bit of a hole. It wasn't a deep well of sad , but enough of a hole to derail my focus and certainly my enthusiasm. Truth be told, it's been a really difficult year for me. My living situation has been extraordinarily stressful, and activating to my deepest core wounding. Out of desperation, I crawled back into therapy and because of this have at least been able to make good use of some of the more painful moments. This chapter has been highly uncomfortable, and also clarifying, heali

The most difficult aspect of adult life for me is understanding that our societal identity is formed around a bunch of agreements which mask as Absolute Truth yet tend to shift over time so they often feel extremely arbitrary. Interracial marriage was still illegal in parts of the US until 53 years ago, and it took a Supreme Court ruling to overturn those laws, but sure, everything we believe now is totally moral and true. Of course we won't look back 53 years from now and shamefully shake our heads at all those people who refused to wear masks during a pandemic. Surely not! It's not that we've hit upon some perfect way to live. It's that, as a species, humans tend to fear and mistrust what's foreign, and nothing thrusts us into the Great, Foreign Unknown more expediently than change. And yet we do change! There are innumerable agreements which we have reevaluated and reformed. In the US, discrimination on the basis of race or sex is unconstitutional. Slavery is ill

Is it a boy? Is it a girl? Is it puppy? No! It's a Business! Ladies and gentlemen, boy and girls, please join me in welcoming to this world my brand new pride and joy...  School of Self-Study Weighing in both feather light and heavily substantial, this baby has been gestating for well over a dozen years. The shape of it began to come together when I was a university student participating in a valuable personal and professional development program called Community Involvement Center (CIC). CIC's curriculum was centered around helping students learn to critically reflect on what they learn in order to make the most of their experiences. I participated in the program for a year as a student, then spent the next two years instructing CIC seminars. To this day, teaching at CIC is my favorite job and I've sought to recreate that in different professional formats with varying degrees of personal satisfaction. I have been a Kundalini yoga teacher, lead meditatio

Not Your Beatific Goddess The Netflix/Spike Lee Joint, She's Gotta Have It , opens with a third-wall-breaking monologue by main character Nola Darling. She faces the camera and states: "I would like you to know, the only reason I'm doin' this is 'cause folks think they know me. They think they know what I'm about, and the truth is, they don't know me." The series goes on to chronicle Nola's explorations of Self through her art and relationships. I love a lot of things about this show (the soundtrack alone! oh man.) but what I love best is how nuanced the characters are, particularly Nola. You can't help but root for her and her success, even while wincing a bit as she sometimes unskillfully fumbles her way through sticky interpersonal moments. She is imperfect, and she's allowed to be! She gifts herself the space and grace to try things and make mistakes as she learns herself in new, deepening ways. This has been a strong source of

Human relationships are both what give life so much of its rich meaning and also hazardous minefields of difficulty. Most of us are walking around with wounding we can be unaware of, and when someone rubs up against it, it's easy to interpret something innocuous as a major offense. It's common, we've all reacted in this way before. Life is full of let downs, and humans are some of the guiltiest culprits of each other's disappointments. We persist in living among one another because our kind wasn't built for solo cave dwelling. Even as we age, we continue to have  healthy attachment needs to meet in order to remain optimally well; we need to feel safe, to be seen and known, to be comforted when we're in pain, to feel valued, and to receive support for our best selves. Ideally, all the relationships in our lives would provide that kind of presence, but I've learnt that it's a rare enough occurrence that when you find someone with whom you can share a

The sad that lives in my body waxes and wanes, but it's never left me. Even when I'm at my most happy, calm and clear, sad is just beyond the edge of the horizon, out of view and still as much a part of me as anything else. When others learn this, it tends to come as a surprise. The way I present and the role I play is most often the cheerful, bright light. It's a large part of the story, but of course it's not the whole story. No one is just one way. The picture on the left was taken at the end of the year, at the point of deepest pain I recall ever feeling. I had been crying everyday for awhile, and I would stand on the train platform fantasizing about leaping. I used to volunteer on a suicide crisis hotline  and I still remember my training. I told people close to me how I was struggling, and made promises not to hurt myself. I knew the intent wasn't really there, but I was aching so badly that it was impossible not to desire its alleviation. I was at the bot