Solutions Through Compassionate Communication.
Like Paris, Washington, DC is a city of outdoor cafes. One of my favorite things to do while sipping a margarita at Guapo’s is to make up stories about the people passing by. It’s fun to do with a friend.
Recently, for instance, a clean-shaven, neatly dressed brown-skinned man with straight hair walked by. He wore a blue dress shirt, open at the neck, with his sleeves rolled up. He looked 30-ish, serious, focused as he entered Starbucks next door. [Read more…]
There’s no sugarcoating it: losses hurt. Whether it’s “aging out” of favorite activities, loss of meaningful work, or even the death of a person you loved, slogging through the pain and grief and anger of loss is hard!
But there’s another way.
Acceptance may come slowly and feel forced. We greet it with tight lips and a closed fist. We resonate with Ann Lamott’s, “Everything I ever let go of had claw marks on it.” Our fist is being pried open. We feel like victims.
Relinquishment is acceptance-plus. It’s an active, intentional attitude of letting go. We open our fist and freely offer whatever is being taken away. We may not be able to avoid our loss but we can control our response to it. We meet it with an open hand, an open heart, and a free spirit. [Read more…]
Sometimes the holidays throw us together with people who we find hard to like, much less love. What to do?
My wise and compassionate friend Patty Wedel runs Joseph’s
House, a hospice for formerly homeless men and women with AIDS and other terminal illnesses. Many of her guests have a history of drug addiction, mental illness, or prison. Relating to them is not always easy. I want to share some words from Patty’s Christmas letter about meeting others where they are.
“At Joseph’s House we sometimes say to each other, ‘Don’t wait!’ When we say this we mean don’t wait for a situation or a person to be otherwise in order to bring ourselves fully to it or to them with loving kindness. This reminder helps so much! In an ordinary, everyday way it helps us gradually to learn to love as is, with no conditions. We bring our whole self to this person, this situation – just as it is, as we are – and it’s enough. It’s good. ”
Famed psychotherapist Carl Rogers said “Total attention feels like love.” Simple presence, deep listening transforms both speaker and listener. This holiday season “Don’t wait.”
Carolyn
I’m looking out from the deck of my beach house in Delaware at the wild wetlands behind, struggling to digest an enormous dumpling of grief.
A week ago today (on Saturday, July 23) my vibrant, fit, generous friend Kate fell off her bike in Rock Creek Park and woke up in the ICU of Washington Hospital Center, paralyzed from the neck down. Unable to speak but fully conscious, she could only blink yes or no.
On Thursday she died.
Kate was a leader in my faith community, and we’re all stunned. Any death is disorienting, but one so random and unexpected is especially hard to absorb.
One of my personal mottoes is “Plan ahead. Work your plan. But always have a Plan B. And C.” It’s a way to try to exert some control over the future.
Kate planned ahead. She wore a helmet. She was an experienced biker. Last Saturday she chose to ride early in the morning before the sun was too hot or the traffic too thick. She was riding on a bike path, not the street. But an obstruction in the path forced her (and other bikers) to go on the grass. She hit some kind of bump in the ground and it killed her.
At Tough Conversations we advocate planning ahead. We still think that’s important. But we all need the humility to recognize life is fragile. Sometimes we simply have to acknowledge that we’re not ultimately in charge. Our best plans can be swept away by a tsunami or a nuclear meltdown or a bike accident. Tragedy strikes and it’s nobody’s fault.
Sometimes simple acceptance is the only path to a measure of peace.
Carolyn Parr