I know this year has been a challenging one for all of us. Never before has there been a year when our collective experience had such a powerful shared experience connecting us. It gives me a small bit of solace to know on my hardest days, that I am not alone in the grief of all that has been upended, lost, and missed. 

I grieve almost daily the ways in which my children's childhood has been forever impacted by this pandemic. And yet, I feel grateful that this is a shared experience for them too. They are a generation growing up in quarantine.

My deepest hope for them is that this shared experience will shape their generation in a way that binds them with a deep sense of love, caring for one another, and being willing to sacrifice for the greater good. This is, in fact, my deepest hope for all of us. 

Further, our nation has seen so much pain, suffering, and division brought to the surface, leaving many of us questioning some of our most grounding beliefs about humanity. We’ve been here before, an abundance of pain, suffering, and division.

It may not be typical to bring these discussions into the therapy space, but it has become clear that

when we don't speak about racial and economic inequalities and the divisions that create loneliness and "otherness," we miss out on a deep and necessary layer of growth. It is not my job to talk politics. It is my job to make you feel safe to explore the impact of the political landscape on your (and your community's) personal experience. 

 

Personal IS political, as Feminist Theory teaches us. 

Know that this door is always open to you, and that I am also doing this work in my own personal time and space. 

So, as we move into the week of Thanksgiving, we have so much more we are wrestling with this year, not the least of which is the history and origin of  racial oppression in this country we share and the grief of not being with families this holiday season. With fewer hours spent cooking, cleaning, perfecting, and/or mentally preparing for being with our families, there will be extra time, energy, and emotional space. There will hopefully be less holiday-tiered stress and repeated patterns of our families of origin. How we choose to use this "excess space" can be an act of self-care. I hope you'll join me in filling your SELF up, resting, reflecting, and loving.