-
Crisis Coaching
-
Dance Like No One Is Watching
Oh my, fasten your seatbelts. This may get a little bumpy. Sometimes my thoughts are so jumbled that I start one place, go another, and then hopefully finish up tying the whole thing up in a bow. Well, that’s where I am tonight. So, please bear with me. My 13-year-old granddaughter is an eighth grader in junior high/middle school. She loves ballroom dancing, and is on her school team. When I went to her Christmas recital, I saw some girls dancing with themselves in dances where others were with couples. It was explained to me that there are not enough boys, or boys flake out and don’t show up and…
-
Of Lamp Shades & Other Finds
“One man’s trash is another man’s treasure” is a cliché. Most of us are familiar with. Yesterday, as I got lost looking for a patient’s home, I saw something interesting in a trailer by the roadside. After a closer look, I realized it was an old upright piano lying on its side, more or less intact. After I completed my patient visit, I stopped back by the roadside piano and walked around it. Once upon a time, it had been a real beauty. Made of oak with real ivory keys now stained by age lay beached in the trailer like the carcass on animal left behind because it no longer…
-
People Like to Help
People like to help. Besides the scientific feel-good endorphins that are released, there is a goodness energy that expands into the world when one person helps another. For five and half years I worked with a clinical psychologist. In the waiting room at his office, there was a bronze sculpture called The Assent prominently displayed in one corner. Two Native Americans are struggling on the face of a jagged cliff. The one above reaches out and extends himself, grasping for the one below. The one below looks up and also reaches out to receive the hand of safety and strength. Sculptor, Gary Price says of his creation: “Climbing the mountain…
-
Home Office, Far From Homely
Several years ago one of my favorite people Ann McIndoo, invited me to guest-blog. The topic was writing space/office space. Some topics just take time to percolate. Others are questions where the answers must be lived into. Here’s what I found about organizing my space; organically, it emerged, that I require three areas for creative activities. One is my client office. It consists of my mother’s bookcases, a loveseat and an overstuffed chair for me. The second space is my general office area. And the third-place is my dining room table. It affords me large surface space where an entire project can be laid out. There is room on the…
-
Pulled by Purpose
The burnout rate for hospice work is an average of 2 to 3 years. I’ve been a hospice chaplain for over 15 years, but I took a five year hiatus in the middle of this time to care for both of my parents who were on hospice. I think that gave me a chance to recharge my batteries. I know for sure, it gave me depth perception. I found out what it was like to “stand on the other side of the bed”, and be the caretaker, not a professional team member. It is apparent to all who know me, how much I love my job, in spite of its…
-
Marketing or Miracles
Three months ago, Erica one of the marketing directors for the company I work for, came to me with another one of her great ideas. She was assigned to visit a high end care facility with services for independent and assisted living. As a hospice chaplain, I had seen patients in this facility and the residents were typically well educated and had lives before retirement, that were usually professional and productive. Because of that, it’s no surprise that these people would continue to that same kind of life after retirement. It was Erica’s idea, based on conversations she had had with residents during her visits, that there was a need…
-
The Sundance Experience
When I was teaching communication workshops, I would make the point that even giving directions revealed our frames of reference. Architects would describe various buildings between landmarks to reach a destination, shoppers would talk about stores along the way, and, I would direct you to the destination by telling you about every restaurant and burger joint. Yesterday, my daughter was giving me directions by stating that the location was near a Nordstrom Rack. I was shocked to realize I had no idea where it was. There was a period in my life when I could not only give you precise driving directions to every Nordstrom location in Utah, but, for…
-
Hodgepodge
This may be a bit of a hodgepodge tonight kind of an Irish stew with salt bread– I think that’s what they are advertising it neater for St. Patty’s day. I’m going to go get some on Monday with my friend Christa. Wow, what an amazing person she is. Escaped a polygamous marriage with her three kids and was able to keep them healthy, mentally and emotionally. She met the most fabulous guy a year later and married him a year after that. She is brilliant and beautiful a redhead in all of the best ways imaginable about redheads. Her husband, Al, is as beautiful as she is, but he…
-
Grief 1.0, The Gift
Tonight was the first class of an eight week series of bereavement meetings. The company I work for makes them available to families of our hospice patients, and, anyone in the Salt Lake Valley who is grieving the loss of a loved one. This is the fourth series of eight week get-togethers. I’m reluctant to call them classes, because that insinuates that something is being taught. There is a format, handouts for each week, and assignments such as journaling or activities for self-care. It’s just that to call this a class somehow diminishes the alchemy of what takes place each week. The classes have been small, less than 10 participants. …