Safety, clarity, and connection are qualities that create a grounded experience in the nervous system. When confusion and disorientation are corrected (clarity), the body and brain feel safe (safety), and the ability to connect is freed up (connection). Over the many years I’ve been exploring attachment work and supporting clients in developing a felt sense of safety in their bodies, these are the aspects that have resonated most.
Read MoreI hope you’re enjoying early springtime. Here in the mountains of Western North Carolina, so much is already blooming and I’m soaking it all in on my short walks (waddles?) with my dog. I’m 37 weeks pregnant and even though our initial plans were to have a non-surgical birth this time around, it looks like we are headed that direction after all. This sweet baby is happy to sit head-up in their cozy uterus hammock and just like with my first, seems to be asking us to come get them. So my mantra lately has been “okay love, I hear you. Stay put. We are coming for you. We will be there so soon.”
Read MoreThe Pay What You Please Online Course Sale is happening NOW through Sunday, April 24!
Read MoreI have been dreaming about sharing some big news with you for months, and I am finally able to tell you! I’m just going to get right into it:
I wrote a book!
I am soaking up these last few weeks of winter, taking pleasure in my cozy clothes, evening fires (Nico has been very interested in this process so it’s a sweet opportunity to slow down!), sipping hot tea, and eating homemade baked goods, and the invigorating feeling of a walk in the sun on brisk days. Soon we will be outside running and playing and socializing, and I am charging my batteries as much as possible before then. There is a lot to love in the slowness of these late winter days.
Read MoreI recently returned from a short trip back to where I grew up—southeastern Michigan, the suburbs of Detroit. I don’t know about you, but when I visit the place where I spent my childhood, I have an intense emotional experience. As I walked around my undergraduate college campus, I was flooded with feelings of grief. I wish I had known and understood certain aspects of my identity when I was younger. I wish I had been more self-confident. I wish I hadn’t stayed in those terrible relationships (if you could even call them that) with people who didn’t respect or appreciate me. I wish I didn’t try to control people. I wish I didn’t try to convince people to love me. I wish I loved myself more. I wish I understood my worth and potential and was able to relax and enjoy my life instead of chasing people who didn’t recognize it either.
Read MoreI’ve been thinking a lot about healing our attachment wounds in the context of community. I am so lucky to have an amazing network of people in my life who are fully on board with doing the work—our individual work, our collective work, and everything in between—and in conversation with these people, I am reminded of not only my care and love for them but of my responsibility to them. My life does not exist in a vacuum. The actions I choose to take and how I show up in the world directly impact my family and my community, and our communities are all connected.
Read MoreIf you’ve been doing attachment work in any capacity, you already know that our collective goal is to work toward a greater sense of security. Even those of us with secure attachment have the opportunity to bring more awareness to our interactions and be the safe, secure base for many people in our families and communities.
Read MoreI have some updates for you this week!
Read MoreThis post feels important to me. I hope it lands for you, too—and as usual, I am open to your feedback and thoughts. I appreciate you so much. Thank you for reading.
As a white woman creating material to support folks who are interested in healing their early attachment wounds and creating healthy adult relationships, I want to emphasize that I am not the end-all-be-all when it comes to this work. I approach attachment theory in a very specific way (one that I hope brings a lens of compassion and justice through relational health and fulfillment) and there are many other approaches that are just as valid and important.
Read MoreThe themes of flexibility and patience have been up for me lately. Do you ever notice how the same lessons keep coming up over and over again until we finally learn them? For me, the lessons related to flexibility and patience usually have to do with reworking all of my big plans, pivoting last minute, WAITING (the worst!), and soooo many deep breaths.
Read MoreI used to be a person who would lose herself in romantic partnerships. And to be honest, over the past 14 months of being a mother and experiencing a global pandemic, I’ve felt whispers of those times in my life. Who am I anymore? What do I like? What is it like to maintain some of my energy for myself rather than constantly investing it in others?
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