The Catboys are (in alphabetical order at their request) Alvin, Atticus, Jasper, and Tobie. Jasper transitioned two years ago, and is just as insightful and sassy on the other side as he was while here. This article is an excerpt from a recent conversation, or as we like to call it, a Talking.
How Do We Regain “Normalcy?”
Covid has shown us many things that we didn't fully see or appreciate before: how over-scheduled we were, different ways to do business, that we really are all in this together, to name just a few. Now we stand on the cusp of another change. We are getting the message that those who are vaccinated can go without masks.
Beyond The Beans: A Conversation With Coffee
Coffee traces its heritage back centuries to the ancient coffee forests on the Ethiopian plateau. The story goes that a goatherder named Kaldi noticed that after eating the berries from a certain tree, his goats became so energetic they did not want to sleep at night. Kaldi told the abbot of the local monastery, who made a drink with the berries and found that it kept him alert through the long hours of evening prayer. The abbot shared his discovery with the other monks, and knowledge of the energizing berries began to spread. (Thank you to motifcoffee.com)
Everything Has a Voice, Even Tattoos!
Recently I bought a book on tattoos at an estate sale, which I intended to sell on eBay. Back at home, I was looking through the book and suddenly heard: "Each tattoo has its own energy, as an expression of creativity." To my surprise, the tattoos themselves started to chatter, and I was writing as fast as I could to record their comments.
Helping Our Children in Distress
By Sheri Stankorb-Geiselman
One of the hardest things parents experience is seeing our children in distress. We want so much to take away the hurt! And now more than ever, with all the turbulence in our world, we are seeing our kids with big upsets. Whether it’s the economic impact of the pandemic, grieving the loss of a loved one, missing classmates, activities curtailed, or not understanding why parents are home so much more, but are available so much less, our kids are experiencing a trying time.
And what myriad ways kids show us their upsets! Tears, low frustration tolerance, unreasonable demands, unworkable behavior, aggression, and even tantrums (at any age). This challenge parents face—seeing our children in distress—is so hard that we often find ourselves in the moment reaching for ways to make it stop. We leap in to soothe, to fix, to solve. We fret about what it means to see our child’s intense feelings, and we try so very hard to get them to use words. In our tightest moments, we send them away (“Go to your room this instant!”). And if we were raised in an environment where emotions made grown-ups uncomfortable, we may hear old voices in our head (“I’ll give you something to cry about!”).
But what if it was all so much simpler than that? What if, in the moment, you and your child actually had everything you needed to heal their hurt? Parents have a lightbulb moment when they realize that there is actually very little that needs to be done when their child or teen is navigating an emotional storm. I say “very little” because it’s not nothing. It’s not sending them to their room to fight the emotional battle on their own. In fact, it’s drawing closer and offering connection that will allow them to metabolize their emotions so they can think again.
In a recent article for The Crazy Wisdom Community Journal titled Focus on Connection, I touched on some Hand in Hand Parenting tools to help parents connect with their children. Straightforward tools that can make family life flow more smoothly—even during a pandemic. Especially during a pandemic!
One of these tools is called Staylistening. In a nutshell, it means listening to your child’s upset all the way through. When a child’s behavior is off-track, they are sending a signal that they need our help. But why the heck can’t they just calmly tell us what’s wrong, and talk about their feelings? How about saying—Mom, I miss my friends, and when I see them on Zoom it reminds me of that? If only! More often it comes at us straight out of left field—pow! We wonder what hit us—sometimes literally!
When a child or teen is feeling disconnected, they cannot think. The limbic system is a part of the brain that, when it’s unsettled or disconnected, interrupts the ability of the prefrontal cortex (the “thinking” part of the brain) to function optimally. In reverse, when the limbic system perceives that they are safe and all is well, the prefrontal cortex can be fully online, and the child can think, focus, better control their impulses, cooperate, and have a more generous view of themselves and others.
So, what does this mean in a real-life situation? One dad described listening to his nine-year old son’s strong feelings in a way that, in the past, would likely have ended up quite differently—with dad missing his son’s cues, getting frustrated himself, yelling, sending him to his room, and neither one feeling good about any of it.
What happened was this. They were waiting to hear the plan for the boy’s soccer team during the upcoming season. The coach had sent an email about various possibilities for the months ahead, and as dad read it through with his son, the boy became more and more agitated until finally he shouted, “Stop it! Stop reading it! It doesn’t make sense!”
This dad had been learning about how to offer connection in such moments to help a child shed the feelings that keep them stuck. So, when his son ran up to his bedroom and slammed the door, instead of letting him go off by himself, or chiding him about he didn’t appreciate being yelled at when he was just trying to help, he gently knocked on the door, cracked it open, and could see his son with his face buried in the pillow, half-crying, half-screaming. As he slowly entered the room the boy shouted, “Go away!” but dad knew that his presence could help his son release the tension that was keeping him stuck. So, he stood there and breathed. He let his face soften (even though he knew his son couldn’t see him because he was still turned away), and let himself feel the confidence that his warm presence was enough. What a relief! He didn’t need to do anything except offer his attention, and his trust that what his son was doing was actually really smart. He took a few steps toward his son, and slowly sat down as his son writhed and cried some more. His son even had a few choice words for him, but he was able to simply listen without getting distracted by the content of his offloading. “For once it didn’t feel like something I needed to correct or control. It used to feel like I was letting him get away with something, that I needed to teach him that it wasn’t okay to say those things, no matter how mad he was. This time, I was actually able to just hear it for what it was—him dumping the frustration and disappointment he had about soccer being so different this year.”
After a few minutes, he could see his son calming down. This dad and his partner had spent so much time trying to teach their son how to take deep breaths when upset, and it was amazing to see that his little body knew how to calm down all along! It just needed dad to warmly listen all the way through. Once the storm cleared, he suddenly leapt up, gave his dad the tightest hug, and asked a question about the coach’s email. Dad wondered if this was going to touch off another big wave of feelings, but he found that he wasn’t worried that it might. He answered his son’s question, and his son, whose brain earlier could not process the information because his prefrontal cortex was offline, said, “I get it.” Then with a huge smile on his face he asked what was for dinner, and if they could kick the soccer ball around later.
Once you see the offloading of big feelings as—not the hurt itself, but instead the healing of the hurt—your work as a parent becomes much simpler. Much simpler, but at times not so easy, because what happens when your child goes nuclear with her emotions…and you’re ready to join her there? The key is staying reasonably calm yourself while Staylistening. Next time I’ll write about Listening Partnerships, the tool that helps parents do just that.
Hand in Hand Parenting, based in Palo Alto, California, has been supporting parents around the world for over thirty years. To learn more about Staylistening and other parenting tools, check out the book Listen, or go to handinhandparenting.org for resources (many free or low-cost) including articles, podcasts, videos, online courses, consultants, Parent Club, and more.
Sheri Stankorb-Geiselman, LMSW is a therapist in Ann Arbor who works with people and families throughout the life span. She can be reached at geiselmanpsychotherapy@gmail.com.
A CONVERSATION WITH THE WHITE HOUSE
A conversation with the White House.
Being OK with Not Being OK – Medusa Redefined
Earlier I described a process whereby parts of us stay behind and argued that our psychological wellbeing requires all parts of the psyche to be anchored within the home-body. That was a call to reunite our many parts in service of living in the best and fullest way possible, which can only happen in the present. I want to repeat Rilke’s words that the point (of life) is to live everything, and build on this idea by inviting contemplation on how to navigate our negative emotions, which are the hardest to feel.
Importance of Honoring
We honor ourselves by honoring not only the past, but the present, and the future as well. Honoring the past includes people, places, phases of life, and memorable events. Honoring the present includes the good, the bad, and the ugly. And we honor the future through making space for our hopes, dreams, and wants.
Societies throughout history and across cultures have grasped the importance of honoring through the creation of an innumerable variety of ceremonies that facilitate it. Let’s contemplate the concept of honoring further.
Astrologically Speaking....Meteors and more in December 2020!
Celestially, the time period between December 13th and December 21st promises to be one of the most interesting and jam-packed of the entire year. The events taking place bring good luck and will have global reach. Do take the time to look up, there’s going to be plenty to see!
It begins Sunday and Monday, December 13 and 14, with the peak of The Geminids meteor shower, so named because the meteors appear to come from within the Gemini constellation. This will give anyone in the world an opportunity to witness up to 120 meteors each hour due to the new moon enhancing visibility. December 14 at 2 am will be the best time for viewing, no matter where you are.
A Conversation With The Oversoul Of Hawaii
When Hawaii became a state in 1959, I was too young to understand what all the excitement was about. Decades would pass before I realized that my fascination and heart-connection with this ancient land was the result of past lives spent in Hawaii and elsewhere in Polynesia. I perceive the essential energy of Hawaii as JOY combined with love, abundance, benevolence and beauty. It gives me great pleasure and satisfaction to present this interview.
On Courage and Resilience
Rollo May was the first to introduce me to the idea that there are different types of courage. I was reminded of this idea through a Facebook meme I came across recently which listed six types of courage. All of us are naturally courageous in some ways, and not so much in others. All of us could increase our resilience with different types of situations requiring courage, should we want to. Keep in mind Aristotle’s golden mean idea, which views too much courage as recklessness, and too little as cowardice.
In The Company of Rain
Let's play with free association for a few minutes. What do you think of when you hear the word Rain? Sprinkle, pour, drizzle, washing, cleaning, clearing, replenishing, soothing, refreshing, nurturing, restoring, splashing, lakes, ponds, puddles, Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head, shower heads, floods, monsoons, deserts, rain forests, aquifers, mud slides.
This list reminds us that no matter who you are, or where you live, or what you do for a living, RAIN MATTERS. Rain—and its absence—has been hugely important to humans from the very beginning. And our spiritual, emotional, and physical relationship with rain goes far beyond scientific facts and figures.
When Parts of Us Stay Behind
An interesting thing happened to me when I returned from a long awaited and wonderful summer vacation back home. I didn’t even recognize what was going on until after some time passed and I noticed I wasn’t quite myself, I needed more time than usual to adjust to my everyday life; it was as if I wasn’t all here.
A Conversation with the Oversoul of Bread
I've been making bread since I was a child. I love the process, the possibilities, the traditions, and the history. Since the stay-at-home situation has encouraged many people to experiment with home-made bread, interviewing the Oversoul of bread seemed a natural choice for this article.
When Life Is Cut Short
Few among us get the privilege to bypass the experience of a premature, untimely loss of a loved one. The pandemic of 2020 has added to already existing causes of mortality, making it harder than usual to deny death as an organic part of life. I recently lost two junior high/high school friends as we all turn 50. They were not my closest friends, and yet their untimely death, one due to a prolonged battle with cancer and the other to a suffering-free sudden death during sleep, was impactful nevertheless.
Say Something Nice
Overall, I am a better therapist than I am a mother. My love for my children is unquestionably larger/deeper then my care for my clients, and yet when it comes to communicating it, I do a better job as a therapist. Being a therapist is by far less messy then being a parent, and also quite a bit less vulnerable. My ego functions are often triggered as a parent, whereas I can easily keep them out of the picture in my role as counselor. I so cherish the concept of good enough parenting. That, I can do.
A Conversation with the Deva of the Mighty Mackinaw Bridge
The Mackinaw Bridge opened on November 1, 1957; and my parents couldn't wait to try it out for another camping trip Up North! I was only four years old, but I remember the excitement of that first crossing vividly, the glorious beauty of a sunny day, and the song of the car's tires on the roadbed. I've taken that bridge many times since then, and it never fails to work its magic. July is the perfect month to connect with this Michigan icon!
Shapeshifting
What resides in our unconscious is as much a part of who we are, and how we behave, as what makes up our consciousness. The language of the unconscious is imagery. The rules by which it functions are mythical. Science seems to lag behind the arts in its grasp of the paradoxes inherent to humanity. The psyche expresses itself through symbol and metaphor that can best be understood through stories, as stories allow for the unknown. Stories tolerate mystery.
A Conversation With The Deva Of Cannabis
In the mid-1960's, my mother thought someone had planted marijuana in our old back pasture. She told me to yank out all the illegal weeds -- a whole acre of them! Fortunately, I found someone who confirmed that the plants were innocent wildflowers called Cinquefoil. I know how to tell the difference now, but that long-ago experience remains in my memory whenever I see cannabis or marijuana mentioned in today's headlines. That's why I thought this would be a good time to chat with the Deva of this intriguing plant.
A Glimpse into the Psyche
A Chinese proverb goes something like this: What is right and what is wrong, need we ask anyone else these things? We have all been bestowed with an internal sense of justice. The more aware we are, the clearer this sense of justice becomes. It is equally true, however, that we face overwhelmingly complex decisions living in energy dependent, growth and productivity driven, increasingly digitally connected while simultaneously disconnected from nature, lifestyles.
