As we've faced quarantine, anonymizing face coverings, and starvation from touch, there is a combination of collective and personal darkness brought out from the edges of awareness. At the same time I see moments of opening and great creativity. For some it’s a system reboot. For some it’s like the engine has been running in the red zone too long. Perhaps it’s all of the above for each of us in different shifting moments.

 Gendlin’s philosophy extols the principal that body and environment are not separate. We are in inseparable interaction with our world. We feel one another’s pain. One day several weeks after a friend of mine had surgery I found myself inexplicably having pain in the very same part of my body. I did not initially make the connection. Several days later, I had my Focusing partnership and decided to explore it. As I dipped into this pain my body brought my friend to mind, it showed me its sadness at their pain and expressed deep empathy and caring. It prompted me to reach out and shared my feelings and as I did so I found my pain resolving itself. I believe one of the essential balances for the collective grief and loss we feel in life is the sharing of our collective love and empathy through community.

Wherever you are at now, please know you are welcome and wanted in this community. This is a place of safety and you can bring yourself wherever you’re at with whatever you’re feeling.

I understand there is also exhaustion with being on screens. I joined a listening group a couple weeks ago and shared my need to be “voice only” during the listening exchange. It was not only well received by the group it was facilitative for the person I ended up partnered with. I showed up at the beginning and end by video just to say hello and goodbye, but turned the video off and covered my screen for the rest. When you come to a changes group, supervision group, or one on one mentorship session, please know you are welcome to take care of yourself this way or in any way you need to that feels right!!