k0lk3r

 Hey there ole buddy, whoever you are ;)  I'm thinking about grief as I often do. My therapist recently asked me a question I'm constantly asking my clients: how have you grieved in the past? What supports your grief process?       Both of my parents are jewish. I  went to hebrew school and was b'nai mitzvah'd at a reform temple that loved Israel and lacked spiritual depth. I hated hebrew school and felt no connection to judaism.  In undergraduate college, I went where many of us jews have gone; a buddhist temple. Through buddhist philosophy, meditation, and community I found practices that continue to help me relate to loss.   As I  entered adulthood and found community with other anti/non zionist jews, I began to feel more at home in jewish ritual. I now find comfort and connection in reciting the mourners kaddish.  But when I look into my past, my most supportive acts of grief were not conscious; my body just did them. ...

Here's my take as inspired by many of my favorite texts: Our western dominant culture characterizes healing as an individual attempt to cure or fix one’s internal malady. What if instead anxiety, grief, illness, etc don’t live inside of us, and rather move throughout our world as symptoms of disconnection?  What if healing is a lifelong process of interdependent and ecological balancing? We need each other to grow; we need healthy plants to nourish ourselves; plants need one another’s roots to thrive and our human exhales to photosynthesize. (love an accidental rhyme) In other words, healing cannot and does not happen in a vacuum or in one direction.    Since  we don't individually "own"  healing, we also don't own the things that desire healing. These things we call anxiety, depression, cancer, OCD, ADHD, exhaustion...(whatever!) are co created through culture. I so don't intend to imply that theses things don't profoundly affect us even to the point of ...

 My mom was a social worker. Her sister is a therapist in private practice. I am a therapist and work at a private practice. What does this mean? It means I had a private convo with Aunt J about my mom. What did we do? Diagnosed my mom, of course! Do I diagnose my clients? Fuck no! oops! For the past decade, my mom has fallen deeper and deeper into unreasonable-ness. She lashes out, she sounds paranoid, she can't remember things, she thinks everyone is against her. The list goes on. When I hear the things that come out of her mouth, It baffles me that she was once a social worker. I'll leave it at that. (yes she has been tested for dementia, no she doesn't have it)  I'm not very close to my aunt. In fact, this evening was the first time we have ever had a one on one phone conversation, and I haven't seen her in person in seven or so years. Nevertheless, the hours swiftly passed by as we bonded over my mom. Before I could say it, she took the words out of my mouth: ...

1. What you might want other blog folks to know about you: I currently live in New Orleans! I love mountains and water and green stuff! I love my dog Luna! I am a therapist and a hospital clown for money and am thrilled to say that I really enjoy both of these things! My favorite food might just be maple syrup!  2. Your existing relationship to journaling/blogging: I spent many a middle school day  trying to be funny on xanga and livejournal. My blog posts perfectly encapsulated my desire to be a cool and mysterious 12 year old. Since this era, I journal privately in a book with a pen like it's the 90s. I love journaling, but struggle to keep up with it in a way that feels nourishing. Instead it often feels like a chore. My recent solution to this dilemma is to draw and watercolor as journaling. I'm a terrible artist and I love it and It's going great. I'm thrilled to add this weekly blog journey to the mix.  3. Why you're blogging this year and what you're hopi...