The stories we tell ourselves

A few days ago, I came across a fantastic post about narrative, and how easy it is, given that we’re narrative creatures with storytelling in our DNA, to tell the same stories over and over about things, even when they aren’t true. The title of the post is “‘We Have Always Fought’: Challenging the ‘Women,

A safe space to speak your truth: how do we cultivate safety?

Many of my readers will likely have heard the term “safe space.”  This phrase is sometimes used as a term of art in therapeutic circles, referring to a place where people can speak freely and honestly without fear of judgment or ridicule, but it is also often used in communities organized around oppression – i.e.,

Double Edge, again: becoming one with presence

Yesterday, I spent more time with the wonderful folks at Double Edge Theatre, out in Ashfield, MA.  Their highly physical Open Trainings, as I’ve described here before, are rigorous, inspirational, and transformative, and I would encourage anyone who is not mobility-challenged to try one. Here are some moments from this one, particularly as they relate

“What can I expect to get from this?”

I saw a new client last week, a lovely woman who was really primed for the work.  She was ready to make a change in her life, and hadn’t found psychotherapy to be all that helpful to her.  She was looking for some other way to heal, connect, and shift her life in the right

[Re-run] When will it be safe to be a girl?

This week I stumbled across two posts about gender that really resonated with me.  Gender is a tangled and complex subject, and there are people who can speak far more eloquently about trans issues, the intersection of gender and sexuality, and breaking the gender mold than I can.  But I wanted to highlight these two

How Rubenfeld Synergy helped me work with actors

Back in 2009, I worked on a production of The Winter’s Tale that was my first full-length production in years.  I was 34 years old, and I found out two things that were amazingly helpful.  One was that I still had a sense of all the technical skills needed to do the job of directing:

[Holiday Rerun]…And what is “energy” anyway?

Last week, I posted a question as to whether Rubenfeld Synergy Method is energy work.  Ultimately, I think it is not, though sometimes what some call “energy” enters into it.  The problem, I posited, is that what energy workers call “energy” is not something that can be proven to exist, or quantified by science.  Therefore,

[Holiday Rerun] Is Rubenfeld Synergy “energy work”?

This work that I do tends to attract the interest of, and yet fall just outside of, two major groups of practices.  One, and the one that I tend to try and cultivate more, is the psychology/therapy side of things.  I think of RSM as a kind of body psychotherapy, in fact, and group it

When will it be safe to be a girl?

This week I stumbled across two posts about gender that really resonated with me.  Gender is a tangled and complex subject, and there are people who can speak far more eloquently about trans issues, the intersection of gender and sexuality, and breaking the gender mold than I can.  But I wanted to highlight these two

Sometimes, the things that make me smile are the simplest

Today I stumbled across this post, titled simply, “The mind/body connection thing? Believe it.” It’s a brief meditation by an older man who started exercising late in life (at 57) and has found that it has improved his overall happiness profoundly. I’m a little in love with this paragraph: My old, existential, pessimistic brain probably