Estimated reading time: 14 minutes

An ode to small towns, to the places we once belonged — to homecoming, rediscovery and living in communion with land

—

I would be remiss in telling you how two suburbanites found home at our farm, ‘Oakhaven’, without first sharing our motives. There were a few. We had been watching the steady decline of the small towns we love for some years now, especially since the late 90’s.

One of my favorite childhood memories is riding with my parents across the back roads of Georgia to visit my grandparents for Christmas. The dark country roads would suddenly brighten with strings of twinkly lights against the cold night sky. Fuzzy tinsel outlines of candy canes, Santas, and gold and silver bells hung from lampposts along the street. I know it sounds idealistic, but that’s how the world is supposed to be when you’re a child – full of magic, wonder and stardust.

But now, during the day, the sun outshines the strung lights and the truth is laid bare: small towns are drying up.

Historic main street buildings sit vacant, slowly crumbling, waiting on investors. They are like their elderly, forgotten in local nursing homes, quietly living out their last days staring out the window at the parking lot.

Tides turned on small town America and somebody, somewhere, somehow decided that they were no longer fashionable — and left them to dwindle and starve. Swarms of people and industry packed their bags and moved away. It’s a harsh reality, but there is still time to turn things around.

There are a growing number of us who have seen through the trappings of easy city living. Our memories from childhood are calling us back to these small towns we once escaped from. We are rediscovering our true values, understanding that a successful life is one of simplicity, humility, and close relationships — of belonging. We recognize small towns as the jewels that they are, for it’s in community that human beings thrive, not isolated and anonymous in a city.

It was my grandmother who called me to come back here. She’s been gone for 17 years, but I feel her with me every day.

My grandparents are the ones who knitted my spirit into the land during summer visits to their farm. Memories of standing barefoot with her in the garden, eating tomatoes off the vine and lazy afternoon pond fishing have had a boomerang effect on me in my empty-nesting years.

I found Oakhaven while daydreaming and perusing a real estate website. It consisted of an 1870’s farmhouse on 100 acres with a stocked 2-acre lake, a chicken house, and a few old barns. My soul was aflutter. It was the perfect setup to lead a more self-sufficient lifestyle and to be in better relationship with the land as the provider of our food. After following the listing for over a year, we decided to visit it in person.

Stepping onto the land for the first time in May of 2020, we knew Oakhaven was special. So many places in the world have their history covered up under layers of concrete and ambition, but out here in rural Alabama, the stories of the people are alive in the soil. We felt it. The towering oaks, magnolias, and pecan trees were heavy with thick, leafy branches as it was almost June. The pear and lemon trees were beginning to bear fruit, and in the distance, we could just see the pond at the base of several sloping hills.

The house had stood unoccupied for years but remarkably hadn’t yet fallen into disrepair. It was stately but not ornate, a balance of 1870’s Italianate style and farmhouse function. Entering the front door, my husband, Neil, and I both felt we had been transported back to our grandparents’ generation, when time was marked by seasons, and families lived in harmony with the land. Our connection to this place was instantaneous, and we knew by the end of the day it would be our home.

The house had waited for us.

Neil and I were both born in Alabama — Birmingham and Dothan respectively — but our lives had taken very indirect routes around the globe to bring us back to this part of the world. His interest in martial arts led him to study with a grandmaster in the mountains of Japan. Later, a career in the military opened a door to even more adventures in South America and the Middle East. I, on the other hand, had lived abroad in Europe and Africa, studying art and raising children. We met later in life and found our way back home together. They say that life eventually comes full circle, and for us that is happening on a farm in Eufaula, Alabama.

As we would come to discover, Oakhaven was rich in history and had been home to three families over the past 150 years. Colonel Hiram Hawkins and his wife Louisiana headed south after his regiment in Kentucky surrendered at the end of the Civil War. They relocated to Eufaula with his mother and built the house, living there until Colonel Hawkins was the last to pass in 1914. For some time after his death, the house was vacant and fell into disrepair.

An historical article reports that in the early 1930’s, much of the rare wrought iron had been scattered across the yard. The prominent Comer family purchased and completely restored the home, caring for it for the next 60 years. When we found it, Oakhaven was being used as a hunter’s weekend getaway, and it hadn’t been fully occupied by a family in decades. In August of 2020, it was love at first sight, and we became the fourth owners. Once again, the home was in need of a major restoration and love.

We were excited to spend our first weekend in the empty house before restorations began. During the day, we would take walks and sit in different parts of the property. The views in every direction were intoxicating to us. On more than one occasion, I’ve been moved to tears by something I can’t quite put into words. The feeling hits me at the spirit level. My attention skips from pine groves to sweeping skies to tiny wild daffodils.

Reorienting to the land and to open spaces is like traveling to a foreign country.

The senses are alive and awake to everything that feels unfamiliar. Over the course of two days, I spotted a black widow spider, the remains of a timber rattler, and caught sight of a family of wild boar in the front yard. At sunset, the coyotes performed their chaotic evening serenade just over the ridge. For the first time in my life, I felt what it was like to live among the untamed. It was both thrilling and unsettling at the same time — writhing in aliveness.

Out in the country, the absence of people is heard in the silence and seen in the darkness. When the moon and stars disappear behind clouds, the black night becomes one thing and takes up all the negative space. It’s surprising to learn how living remotely brings life back to simple truths that are millennia old.

Living on the land makes me understand how traditional roles make sense. In the city, a woman feels confident in the order of things, but in reality, she is heavily dependent on systems to organize life and play the role of the protector. Out here on the farm, my illusions of control were shattered in one weekend. Not only did I experience the need to feel safe, but also the sheer workload ahead of us made me realize my reliance on my husband’s physical strength. Add to that the fury caused by rousing a long-dormant septic system from its sleep, and I had to surrender my feminist card.

Dependence is a difficult thing for the modern woman to admit, but there is something profound in this kind of partnership with each other and with the land.

If Oakhaven is our Eden, then paradise will sooner or later reveal a snake. That first night in the house, I decided to take a shower and wash our two little dogs at the same time. The three of us piled into the tub. I was shocked at how dirty the dogs were. The water turned a filthy brown and made its way toward my knees. Next, I heard a guttural belch from the toilet. The sink chimed in. I yelled for Neil, who appeared with a plunger, and heroically began pumping, first the shower, then the toilet, and then the sink.

After several minutes, the swampy water receded back down the drain and we were saved. I buried the thought that anything more than dirt had come out of the pipes. It had probably been years since anyone had taken a shower in that house. My mind flashed to the bathtub scene from the movie, “The Money Pit”, and I felt sick to my stomach. The three of us emerged from behind the shower curtain, dirtier than when we entered. Tired, we dried off and headed for the blow-up mattress. What had I gotten us into?

Fall was approaching, so the nights began to offer some reprieve from the heat. Little did I know that the slight change in temperature would have such a dramatic effect on the house. At night, when we settled onto the air mattress with the dogs at our feet, the house came alive.

Loud bangs and groans of what sounded like metal ships hitting icebergs pierced the contrasting silence.

As I lie awake, I heard the scratching of an animal under the floor. By morning, the air had leaked out of the mattress and the four of us woke up in a life-size taco. Groggy and irritable, we sat in our beach chairs in the kitchen. Just as I was about to take my first sip of life-giving coffee, Neil turned to me and said, “I think we have a poltergeist.”

Of course, he was only kidding, right? Ghosts don’t actually exist. Everyone jokes that an old house has a ghost or two, that’s just part of the charm. But on the off-chance ghosts are real, I rationalized, has anyone ever been murdered by a ghost?

Neil proceeded to tell me that at some point in the middle of the night, he heard not only what sounded like footsteps, but also the crashing of dishes in the kitchen. He had jumped up, pistol drawn, and searched the house, including the dirt floor crawlspace underneath, but found nothing. When he shared this story, I got angry. It’s hard to sell a haunted house. We were stuck with it. I yelled out to no one, “Get used to us, we’re not going anywhere!” Then I looked at Neil seething with anger and told him to never say that again.

If this line of thinking sounds irrational, please know it happened pre-coffee. I did come back to my senses, and after a little research online, I read about the settling noises old houses make during the change of seasons. A new friend and fellow historic homeowner assured me that this was normal. As a matter of fact, she told me old homes that had been vacant for a while had the most to say when new owners moved in. She reassured me that the house would settle down once it got to know us and learned our habits and patterns.

Once she explained this to me, the way I saw our house shifted. We were less homeowners and more caretakers now. Oakhaven had its own personality, formed by a history full of families with stories that had accumulated into the walls and floors.

Everyone says that old houses are special because of their character and the quality of their materials. I think they are special because they are archives of memory, silent witnesses to the passage of time.

Over the course of this first weekend, Oakhaven initiated us as stewards. Now it was our turn to add a chapter to its story. For all my concerns about safety and being out in the middle of nowhere, I couldn’t wait to come back again. The unknowns of country life were beginning to take the shape of adventure in my mind. With these realizations, I began to settle into a kind of peace that only comes from a deep knowing.

We had finally found a home to belong to.

I have always tried to live by the old adage, ‘To whom much is given, much is expected’. We have always known that Oakhaven was not meant to be our private escape from reality. It is a place of peace to be honored and shared with others. We intend to share its beauty and historical significance by offering art and writing workshops, homestead learning experiences, as well as advanced martial arts and wilderness survival courses. It is bursting with inspiration for creative endeavors.

More than anything, we hope to reach back and help the younger generation to reconnect with the spirit of local community and traditional ways of being with the land. This knowledge is their spiritual birthright as human beings no matter how far and wide they may travel. We are betting on a bright future for our children, and that starts with a foundation of wellbeing, harmony and connection with nature.

To see more of Christie’s artwork, you may also enjoy reading In The Service of Art.

The post There’s No Place Like Home: An Artist Reconnects to the Whispers of Her Past appeared first on BEST SELF.

Estimated reading time: 11 minutes

A treasure trove of letters from the early 1900’s becomes fodder for an author’s book that will inspire today’s women and activists

—

In 1892, when my great-grandmother Mary Davies was 20 years old, she took a trip from Topeka, Kansas, to Pontardulais, the village in Wales where her immigrant father had grown up. In 1976, when I was 21, I traveled from Poughkeepsie, New York, to Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India, to teach English and study meditation.

After four months in Britain, Mary returned to the U.S. and found a job in New York City with the publisher Dodd, Mead and Company. After a year and a half in Asia, I moved to Manhattan and worked for Springer Publishing.

You can see why, in my fifties, when I started digging into her travel diary and discovered the many letters she saved, I felt a kinship with Mary.

I often get the spooky feeling she saved these items for me, so I could write about her. Not that she knew her great-granddaughter would be a writer, but I feel her words have been entrusted to me. 

That’s why I am anxious about having used her as the model for a character in To March or to Marry, a historical novel about suffrage and women’s clubs. I believe I have accurately depicted her pluckiness and practicality in the face of such challenges as dealing with her dreamy, romantic husband, who barely made a living as a violin teacher. But in my quest to write about the crises in women’s lives that inspired the early feminist movement, I have introduced events that I am pretty sure did not happen to her.

For instance, it’s unlikely that she met Margaret Sanger, who took on the mission of making birth control available to all women. I shifted the birthdates of Mary’s daughter and twin sons by eight years so Abbie, the character Mary is based on, would be investigating birth control during the period of Sanger’s early activism (1911-1918). I felt justified by a 1932 letter Mary wrote to her daughter, Helen, at the time Helen learned she was unexpectedly pregnant with her second child (my mother). Mary’s comment suggests that her own second pregnancy came a bit earlier than hoped: “You did your best. Only don’t have twins!”

From that brief but feelingful remark, I constructed a plot device revolving around the Comstock Act, which made it illegal to send “obscene, lewd or lascivious” publications through the mail—including information on birth control. The law was extended to prohibit possession of a condom or a pessary (a device similar to the modern-day diaphragm).

In later years, Sanger took an interest in eugenics, espousing racist attitudes that have made her persona non grata nowadays, but in the nineteen-teens, she was courageous in challenging the Comstock law. Although Mary came from a background so conventional that I don’t believe she was a keen supporter of suffrage, I do think she would have been in favor of birth control. In 1905, when her husband was making enough money to hire an Irish washwoman to help with the arduous task of doing laundry, Mary wrote to her mother, “This will be her tenth child, and so unwelcome! Isn’t it awful? Then I look at our own little baby and think of the care and love we bestow on her, and how other little babies get just enough attention to enable them to live, it seems awful.”

Both for herself and for lower-income women, surely she saw the value of what was then called “family limitation.”

I have no evidence that Mary ever made friends with someone like Louise, the book’s other protagonist, whose attraction to the suffrage movement disrupts her friendship with Abbie. After her parents’ divorce, at the age of fourteen, Mary taught herself typewriting and shorthand and found a satisfying job despite being unable to vote. I’m guessing she didn’t see what the fuss was all about, and Abbie adopts the same attitude. That is, until she realizes men are unlikely to change a law that’s inimical to women’s wellbeing—unless women can vote. 

Louise, who is completely fictional, springs out of my extensive research on the suffrage movement. Many suffragists were educated and articulate, and several of them wrote memoirs about the period leading up to the passage of the 19^th Amendment. I found detailed first-hand accounts of women marching, picketing, getting arrested, and going on hunger strike, so I am confident in my characterization of the bold, quick-tempered Louise and her immersion in suffrage activities. But then I don’t have to worry about her opinion of me.

With Mary, I am on firm ground in regard to her women’s club. In 1904 and 1905, she wrote to her mother almost daily, filling her letters with baby Helen’s antics, household duties, sewing projects, and details of Athenaeum Club meetings. I had never heard of the women’s club movement, although I soon learned it numbered 1.5 million members by 1916. The letters show that Mary’s weekly club meetings were integral to her sense of wellbeing. I believe she would be happy to know I have brought her club back to life, while showing how women’s clubs were a critical, if undervalued, strand of early feminism.

Radical suffragists derided the conservative, largely middle-class clubs, and clubwomen did indeed idealize marriage and motherhood.

It’s understandable that suffs who were out lobbying legislators, speaking on street corners, or serving prison terms, would dismiss the sedate activities of the clubs as unimportant, even pathetic. But a study published during the Second Wave of feminism pointed out the vital role of the clubs. In The Clubwoman as Feminist (Holmes & Meier, 1980), Dr. Karen J. Blair showed how clubs not only changed men’s views of what women were capable of but also trained women in skills that later fitted them for jobs in business and government.

The clubs took the position that a housewife’s values and talents were just what the world needed in the period when the Industrial Revolution was creating professional jobs for middle-class men even as the immigrants who worked in factories and sweatshops were living in poverty. Men were too busy earning a living to devote attention to culture, so one popular type of club engaged women in the appreciation of literature and art by selecting a yearly theme (French culture, for example) and assigning topics to members, who researched and wrote papers to be read aloud at meetings. Other clubs focused on social reform and community service, instigating such projects as citywide trash collection, free kindergarten, the creation of public parks, the establishment of local libraries.

It’s clear from Mary’s letters that the Athenaeum was a literary club. (“Mrs. Flint had a paper on [William Cullen] Bryant, the poet, and then she wanted to discuss a certain poem of his, so she asked someone to read it. No one volunteered, of course, so she asked me. I think I have a reputation for being a good reader in the club.”) The novel’s version of the Athenaeum is similar. However, Mary had been out in the world as a working woman until her marriage to August Wingebach, and documents show she served as club president and as Bronx Borough Director of the New York City Federation of Women’s Clubs. I have portrayed Abbie as the leading edge of her club, nudging the members towards addressing social issues as they become problematic in her own life.

I don’t have Mary’s letters from the period after the birth of the twins, which is perhaps fortunate, since I was free to send Abbie on adventures that advance the action of the novel while revealing the brutal realities of women’s lives. I pray Mary’s forgiveness for stretching her character farther than she went in real life.

I have always admired my great-grandmother. It was such a pleasure to live with her for a year while writing To March or to Marry. Now we continue to keep company as I reach out to share our book with the world.

You may also enjoy reading Soul-Voice, by Meggan Watterson

The post Feminism for the Ages: How My Great Grandmother Became a Character in My Novel appeared first on BEST SELF.

Estimated reading time: 12 minutes

After navigating the loss of her terminally ill child, Joyal Mulheron sets out to change the landscape for bereaved families

—

Grief has been an integral part of my life and identity ever since the sudden death of my father, when I was fifteen. After losing my mother this past summer, I learned about Joyal Mulheron from a mutual friend. Joyal’s story and the work she and her non-profit are doing around grief and bereavement care moved me profoundly—enough to write this article. In the midst of our nation’s current grief epidemic, I felt compelled to share this extraordinary journey and one  woman’s determination to change a broken system.

Joyal Mulheron has a warm smile, a hint of sadness behind her eyes, and a steely determination to bring about a seismic change in bereavement care. 

Her passionate dedication to helping make grief and bereavement more manageable for those who have lost loved ones is rooted in her own family’s experience. After becoming parents to two healthy daughters, one adopted from Ethiopia, Joyal and her husband had a third daughter.

Eleanora’s birth — and death — changed her family’s life forever.

Eleanora was born with a chromosomal abnormality that affected her entire body. It was so severe she wasn’t expected to survive for more than a few hours. She ended up living for almost five months, thanks in no small part to Joyal, who had a background in science and took on the monumental task of orchestrating and administering her care. “Honestly, she would have near-death episodes frequently, sometimes multiple times a day — it was very intense and so incredibly complicated. I was doing her drug compounding. I was figuring out her caloric intake. When she died, we had 23 medical and home providers. I was the care center. I knew everything she needed and how much she could manage.”

The physical trauma was only one part, though. As Joyal was carefully managing her daughter’s health care, she also was preparing for the inevitable. “I can remember holding her on one side and the phone on the other, negotiating the rate for her cremation. And I’m thinking how wrong it is that I cannot be fully present for my baby when she needs me most.“

That was the beginning of Joyal’s conviction that something was terribly wrong with the bereavement system. 

She talks about appalling phone calls she got from her insurance caseworker, asking, “Do you think she’s going to live for ten days? Or do you think she’s going to live for more than ten days? Because I have to fill out different paperwork.” 

The broken systems and trauma that Joyal experienced — before and after Eleanora’s death, fueled her drive to bring about change in bereavement care.

After Eleanora died, Joyal experienced the dysphoria that affects many bereaved family members. She couldn’t remember if she’d showered or eaten.According to a 2015 New England Journal of Medicine review, newly bereaved individuals experience: “dysphoria, anxiety, depression, and anger…physiological changes such as an increased heart rate or blood pressure, increased cortisol levels, sleep disturbance, and changes in the immune system.” Neighbors found her wandering outside in the cold with no coat. She lost her ability to focus on self-care and had no idea how to look for a therapist or a support system to help her through the intense fog. 

In time, the pressure to get back to “normal” was mounting. When a health policy advisor position at the Partnership for a Healthier America came Joyal’s way, she initially rejected it. Eventually, she accepted the opportunity to further healthy eating and end childhood obesity. Despite the familiar pull of work’s intensity, she was still struggling with her grief and achieving some semblance of normalcy after losing Eleanora.

Ultimately, following a flood of traumatic national events that stunned the nation, Joyal decided to leave her job.

“Trayvon Martin… and the Sandy Hook massacre and the Chicago homicides. I just remember thinking something has to exist to support people. It’s too much. So many families need help.”

After she stopped working, Joyal got very ill for about six months — which is not uncommon for bereaved parents. In retrospect, she knows it was essentially a delayed reaction. Scientific evidence indicates that bereaved parents are more likely to suffer more depressive symptoms, poorer well-being, less purpose in life, more health complications, marital disruption, psychiatric hospitalization, and even premature death.

When she came out on the other side of her illness, her husband and family encouraged her to focus on researching and transforming bereavement care. “When I started exploring the idea,  I put on my sneakers and walked around different communities, and people invited me into their lives. At the police station, at the church, at all these places, people were sharing their stories. Very quickly, the scope of this problem became abundantly clear to me.”

In 2014, Joyal founded Evermore, a nonprofit dedicated to making America more livable for bereaved families. “At first, I was only going to focus on the implications of child death on American families — it was what I knew best. But it was impossible to ignore all the concerning data around sibling death, around the long-lasting effects of premature death of any kind.”

Research shows that bereavement causes significant health declines, even early death among some survivors, including bereaved parents, siblings, and spouses. Yet, our nation spends little to no funding to support the health of family members in the aftermath of the loss of a loved one.

As Joyal learned more about death and its fallout on surviving family members and America’s failure to support them, she began compiling data on grief statistics and resources. She established a platform for the bereaved to connect and share their stories.

The staggering statistics and personal stories on Evermore’s website powerfully detail the emotional, physical, and sometimes economic toll of losing a loved one and myriad ways in which the nation’s systems fail to help the bereaved cope. An estimated 18 million Americans have experienced the death of a child, 10 million American children have lost a biological parent or sibling, and black Americans are at least twice as likely to lose a child or sibling. And this was before the Covid pandemic. As Joyal explains, “A significant bereavement event for an individual threatens their health, their well-being, their economic solvency, and the family stability.” Evermore began to highlight the need for revolutionizing the way our society handles death and bereavement — from supports for the bereaved to training for law enforcement, medical staff, first responders, teachers, insurance caseworkers, death investigators, friends, and neighbors.

Compartmentalization was and is sometimes a brutal challenge for Joyal — still grieving the loss of Eleanora while dealing with the facts, and figures, and faces of bereavement — along with the challenges of getting a nonprofit up and running.”The first three years were so challenging.  I had to be careful — I’ve gotten much better at it — there are times when I must put up the guard rails because I know — I’m going to have this conversation — and I can’t jump into an accounting meeting afterward. There have been a couple of times I’ve almost walked away because the pain is just too great.”

Eventually, besides supporting grieving family members and consolidating data around death and bereavement, Joyal put her policy background to work. Evermore began examining American society’s systemic shortcomings surrounding bereavement — and imagining the possibilities of policy reform to enact meaningful change. 

“One of the things that I’ve learned in doing this is people don’t even realize that they have rights when it comes to losing a loved one. Shifting the public conversation, getting to that realization, ‘Oh, I had a right not to lose my job’ or ‘I had a right not to be treated in a certain way’ is paramount.”

When it comes to death and grief, the impacts disproportionately affect communities of color, exacerbating the health and healthcare disparities that marginalize our nation’s most vulnerable children and communities. “I often say we’ve made strides in palliative care and hospice because that’s where white people die. Families share astonishing stories, and the status quo is unacceptable,” she says. When she meets with Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle, she walks them through a series of alarming statistics. 

Grieving kids have more school failures, lower attainment, increased challenges academically. They have drug abuse issues, violent crime involvement, youth delinquency, suicide attempts, suicide completions, premature death to any cause, and sometimes psychiatric episodes. Black children are three times more likely to lose a mother and twice as likely to lose a father by age 10 when compared to white children. More than half of bereaved and orphaned children in the US are not receiving their social security benefits. And only a tiny percentage of bereaved children receive food assistance. Those are substantial social failings with long-lasting ramifications.

One study reported that 90 percent of juvenile justice detainees report a loved one’s death before being incarcerated. Policymakers are beginning to realize that suicide, juvenile justice, substance abuse — may be outcomes of an event that no one is even examining.

Addressing the racial inequities surrounding bereavement care is one of the most important things that could come out of Evermore’s advocacy. Calling, writing, and meeting with Members of Congress and other leaders on both sides of the aisle, Joyal and Evermore’s robust advocacy efforts resulted in considerable success — the addition of bereavement care language to the FY21 Appropriations budget. 

“We got on the House side last March, and then the Senate released their companion bill later in the fall. Then those two bills were woven into an Omnibus. We were very fortunate — our language got in — it’s the first language that directs Health and Human Service agencies to report what they’re doing about bereavement care. There’s no price tag attached to it right now, but in the future, we hope the federal government recognizes bereavement care as important as other pressing social issues. This year, we’re beginning to work on setting a national benchmark around what Bereavement Leave should look like and following up on the language from last year.”

Joyal Mulheron speaks out on the case for Bereavement Leave

The case for Bereavement Leave made by Evermore is both compelling and timely. As they report, the unexpected death of a loved one is the most common traumatic experience for Americans. Many say their loss is their worst life experience. Employees who need time off work to grieve and cope with a loved one’s death have no legal right to take leave, with narrow exceptions in two states and two localities. Bereavement is not acceptable grounds for taking unpaid leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act, despite recent efforts to add bereavement to this law. While many employers offer bereavement leave, it is often only a few days, which is insufficient time for most employees to return to work and productivity after a family member’s death. As our nation faces the coronavirus pandemic, drug overdoses, suicide, and mass gun violence events, employers are having to acknowledge grief and its implications for families while staying solvent and productive. It is a difficult balance for employers to strike. To address these needs and set national standards, Evermore recommends employers institute a bereavement leave benefit.

Joyal says that most employers do what they can to help, but a few have only extended leave under the threat of public opinion.

As she works to enact Bereavement Leave legislation, Joyal has a more immediate goal. “My hope is that we can establish a White House Office of Bereavement. To me, that is one of the most urgent public policy calls. The White House office is an executive action, which doesn’t require Congress to act. It’s a fiscally wise move since, with a few staff members, you can begin marshaling the full power and authority of the US government, and it provides a coordinated and centralized response immediately for the American public.”

President Biden’s personal experiences with grief and bereavement could heighten the opportunity to advance bereavement care during his administration. At the end of April, Biden’s American Families Plan included a three day Bereavement Leave. A heartened Joyal says, “the measure still needs Congressional approval, but this is a HUGE step forward for America’s families.” But as she points out, “Grief and bereavement know no party — and shouldn’t. No one is immune. Yes, there is leadership experience, and I also think about the sheer time we’re in — the concurrent epidemics of Covid, suicide, homicide, mass casualty events, and overdose. It certainly helps to have that lived experience because once it’s personal, you understand it differently — just like anything else.”

Evermore’s mission is rooted in emotion. But Joyal must still face the logistical challenges that come with running a nonprofit.

“It’s largely a volunteer effort, so we’re starting to do fundraising. I’m out there and talking to key people in a targeted way, but now I must bring the funding. I’ve got to build the organization in a way that allows for Bereavement Leave and law enforcement response, and data systems, among other things. And we don’t want to lose sight of how to help people with grief — a whole other set of necessary supports.”

The issues surrounding bereavement have never been more universal.

Amid this year of unimaginable loss, society has focused on collective experiences of grief in unprecedented ways. Model, actress, and social media sensation Chrissy Teigen started a national conversation about society’s aversion to publicly acknowledging death and bereavement when she posted hospital photographs taken of her, her husband John Legend, and their son Jack, who died as a baby prematurely. While some reacted negatively to her incredible transparency throughout the process, Teigen beautifully defended her position — and her decision to share her experience gave grieving moms throughout the world the chance to connect and commiserate.

Kaye Steinsapir recently tweeted the experience of losing her 12-year-old daughter, Molly, following a traumatic brain injury. The outpouring of support helped sustain her. “When I’m sitting here in this sterile room hour after hour, your messages of hope make me feel less alone,” she told her followers. Her story cut through the noise and negativity of Twitter, bringing grieving parents together as they sought to support Steinsapir.

The recent Netflix film, Pieces of A Woman, is a raw portrait of a mother navigating grief after her daughter dies minutes after being born. Writer Kata Weber based her wrenching screenplay on her tragedy. Vanessa Kirby’s vulnerable portrayal of the bereaved mom earned her Golden Globe and Oscar nominations. Much like 2016’s Manchester By the Sea, Pieces of A Woman ruthlessly depicts the emotional upheaval that comes with loss. The film’s stars, Kirby and Ellen Burstyn, recently spoke with Joyal. In an incredibly moving conversation, the three discussed the importance of movies like this — their potential to educate the public while allowing those grieving to feel they are not alone.

Most importantly, Joyal wants bereaved individuals and their families to understand that they are not at fault. “There’s validation that this tragedy has many tentacles that influence their life. We don’t have the right responses as a nation. Compounding traumas can send individuals and families into tailspins that today they believe is their own doing or fault. It’s so overwhelming. All of them need to know — this isn’t your fault — our society needs a social paradigm shift.” She takes a deep breath. “It means so much to me to get this right for families.” 

—

You can learn more about Evermore and their initiatives here — and find out how to donate here:  https://live-evermore.org and can follow them on Instagram or Facebook

You may also enjoy reading Life After Death: Healing Grief, Redefined, by Sarah Nannen

The post Space to Grieve: One Woman’s Courage to Take On a Broken System appeared first on BEST SELF.

To reclaim our rightful autonomy and make sense of the world’s crises, injustices and destruction, we must understand the true drivers of human dysfunction

—

Centuries ago, we lost something very precious.

It radically changed the course of our evolution, progressively disconnecting us from our humanity and bringing us to the brink of destruction. Deprived of this vital nourishment, we have fallen prey to manic marketing, fear-mongering, tantalizing smart tech, seductive social media and addictive mobile connectivity…seeking to reconnect. Instead, we find ourselves in the midst of a moral, mental, emotional, spiritual, social and planetary breakdown…and we urgently need to reconnect with the truth.

When Emperor Constantine made Christianity the ruling religion in the Roman Empire in the early 300s, he made life hell for those who refused to convert, using torture and intimidation. Those who submitted were afforded tax breaks and social ‘acceptability’,  but they were also forced to accept the idea that they were sinful, innately unworthy and in need of a religious intermediary to plead their case before a judgemental God (while paying dearly for the privilege). In the process, they lost their connection to their inner spiritual selves.

But religious dictatorship dealt an even deadlier blow to humanity.

Throughout the Middle Ages and beyond, it crushed all opposing philosophies and innate spiritual wisdom, especially the ancient teachings that celebrated our spiritual essence, profound connection with our living planet, and capacity for spiritual evolution — a tradition that would have taken us in entirely the opposite direction to our current digital dependence. Many of those versed in ancient wisdom were burnt at the stake to deter other dissenters and to obliterate their powerful knowledge. Forced instead to be ruled, condemned and do penance for whatever the Church deemed to be sinful, politically expedient or just plain lucrative, we lost our pathway to conscious evolution.

The Split from Innate Knowing

Thus began the Split — humanity’s divergence from innate intelligence, spiritual sovereignty and natural balance, towards a self-serving hierarchy imposed by man. The quest for self-knowledge and enlightenment was brutally quashed by a religious construct designed to dominate and disempower. Over time, stripped of our own spiritual guidance and awareness of natural phenomena, we increasingly disconnected from our divinity and Mother Earth.

Now, centuries later, with many more religions requiring servitude, the Split continues to widen. We have lost touch with the need for symbiosis with nature; our spiritual access to universal intelligence; our awareness of how cosmic forces affect us; our creative and healing powers; and the truth itself.

When our ancestors lost this vital connection, their enforced beliefs got handed down through successive generations, with newborns automatically becoming a certain religion the moment they popped out of the womb. The programming continued throughout their upbringing, deepening the disempowering doctrines of unworthiness and the need to atone. Even atheists could not escape the fumes from the religious engines revving all around them. They were in the air they breathed, the words they heard, the superstitions they picked up, the sainted names of schools, hospitals and institutions, the religious garb worn by adherents, the legal and political infrastructures, and the judgements made if they were not part of the same religious club.

Stuck in Self-Destruct Mode

Imposing religious dogma didn’t just force the early converts to kowtow to the Church; turning to this new god meant turning against themselves. On the dial of human consciousness, the needle got stuck on self-destruct when our hearts and souls were hijacked for political gain.

Believing ourselves to be inherently unworthy breeds self-rejection, which promotes self-sabotage and destructive behaviour, which has led to the progressive degradation of our planet. This destructive programming has become so deeply embedded in our psyche that most people are completely unaware of it running — and often ruining — their lives.

At Least 60 Degrees of Separation

The Split has caused a progressive separation from — and destruction of — key aspects of life. Denatured foods; drug-based healthcare; dysfunctional relationships; polluted environment; depleted natural resources; corrupt governments; profit-driven industry; harmful, exploitative technologies; and the irradiation of our entire planet…we are endlessly creative in the ways we sabotage our own survival.

Our denial of the obvious is an integral part of the programming designed to derail our empowered evolution. It is our most potent form of self-sabotage, undermining our self-image, relationships, health, career, finances and fulfillment.

Our subconscious self-rejection also manifests itself in our bodies, with disease proliferating worldwide — especially auto-immune diseases, which are the direct result of the body attacking itself. Largely due to emotional neglect, we have become a cancer society, consuming ourselves from the inside out. If unresolved, the self-destruct software programmed into us at the cellular level causes our cells to attack themselves.

In the grip of global PTSD, driven by our unmet emotional and spiritual needs, we compromise our values, integrity and health, distract ourselves from our pain and trauma, and do whatever we can to feed our empty hearts and souls. Social media helps fill the void, but it fails to provide a cure. Instead, it keeps us distracted, unfulfilled and desperately seeking…something.

Few are conscious enough to confront the causal core, and our programming keeps us from perceiving our diminished sense of self, our negative beliefs and the reality upon which our lives are built. If our sense of self is founded on a lie, we won’t want to hear the truth (and may not recognize it if we do).

We have been sold a bill of gods…but will we buy the truth?

When we remove all constructs founded on fear and punishment, we realize they are designed to disempower us. They keep us from recognizing that our power lies in not being bound by limiting beliefs, but in understanding where all true power is born, bred and propagated: in our own hearts and minds.

Our self-reject, self-destruct programming is now so deeply engrained, its reach so pervasive, and its impact so catastrophic that we fail to see the bigger picture. We think disease is normal; political corruption is inevitable; environmental destruction will be cancelled out by job creation and a booming economy; and the irradiation of all life on earth is necessary for global advancement. Yet, no matter how bad things get, our subconscious programming will always override logic, science and even the most compelling arguments for saving our planet…unless we consciously change it.

Changing our minds changes everything…and brings us back together

Consequently, the Split has caused a cascade of dysfunction that has brought us to the current gaping chasm between our atrophied hearts and today’s ruthless tech takeover.

Science won’t fix this — and hard-core scientists won’t touch spiritual stuff. Lawsuits won’t fix it — and they only further divide us. New laws won’t fix it — and existing protective laws and human rights conventions are being violated by the very institutions that created them. Blaming others won’t fix it — because the problem is not out there. Religion certainly won’t fix it — and seeking comfort there is like paying protection money to a Mafia that’s harming us. While we must push back against oppression, that won’t change the programming that drives our dysfunction.

Programming: How We Got from There to Here

The indoctrination of our ancestors caused certain pivotal beliefs to become so deeply embedded in the human psyche that they now pervade the collective mindset without anyone making the connection or realizing what’s really going on.

Regardless of whether we are religious or not, we have all (through schooling, religion, upbringing or society) been programmed to varying degrees to believe that:

• we are sinful, unworthy, unacceptable or not good enough
• we must defer to an external authority and no longer have faith in ourselves
• we are powerless to create or orchestrate our own lives
• we need a system to fix things for us
• spirituality is lightweight/invalid and only rational, measurable scientific processes count
• we must compromise in order to be accepted/approved by others, or otherwise pay a price

Programming creates sustained unthinking conformity. Changing it creates resistance — objections, denial, anger and defensiveness — even in the face of the truth, and the depth of the programming reflects how much of a person is being suppressed. The deeper the programming, therefore, the greater the resistance to seeing it for what it really is…and the greater the payoff for transforming it.

A Crescendo of Crises — the Hallmark of a Symptomatic Approach

When we fail to understand the true cause of our crises, the symptoms get progressively worse, pulling us even further outside ourselves. We blindly react to the chaos this creates, caught in the spin cycle of our own unconscious making. Disease, climate change, addiction, corruption, depression and despair — the growing symptoms of the Split cause emotional and physical burnout that further erodes wholeness and health. No longer conscious of our essential interconnectedness, we squander our most precious resources.

We seek solutions to climate change, when it’s our emotional climate that must change.

But when we understand how our beliefs define our reality, we begin to see that our circumstances reflect what is going on inside. Global crises therefore serve to graphically illustrate the power/nature of our collective programming (subconscious beliefs), pushing us to address that root cause, rather than focusing on the increasing fallout. Unless we choose to consciously evolve — by embodying beliefs that elevate consciousness and honour all aspects of life — we will be consumed by the chaos we have subconsciously created…and palliative care will be all that remains.

If, instead, we open up to those higher dimensions to regain what our ancestors lost, we will ultimately realign with our innate wisdom. We will also realize that the early Church State, having bred subservience, self-rejection and spiritual disconnection, set the scene for a soulless tech takeover.  

A Wireless Wake-up Call for Humanity

Now, with 5G (the fifth generation of wireless technology), we are seeing the deadly effects of that disconnect. This technology threatens to annihilate life on Earth by irradiating us from space and everywhere in our environment, with billions of antennae broadcasting destruction. We blame governments for harming us, yet it is our programming that has disrupted the natural order of things.

That natural order was understood by the Gnostic teachers of ancient wisdom,[i] who saw the cosmos as a living entity interacting and co-evolving with human consciousness. With their profound knowledge of sacred geometry, physics, cosmology, astronomy, mathematics and holistic medicine, they understood that humans were capable of godlike creations and enlightenment through the study of natural phenomena and planetary intelligence.

Echoing that ancient wisdom, quantum physics is now demonstrating how our thoughts and emotions generate physical outcomes, how we are all connected via a unified field of energy, and how consciousness creates our reality. We are mentally, emotionally, neurologically and spiritually designed to create; by elevating our consciousness, we can literally change our world. If we wish to thrive — or even survive — as a species, we must reconnect with the truth, nature’s magic and our own creatorship.

Instead, we berate and condemn each other for the many terrible things we are doing — calling ourselves losers, selfish, blind, worthless and greedy. Yet our actions are not evidence of us being terrible human beings; they merely demonstrate how staggeringly good a job the early Church did in programming us. It judged and condemned us first, and we have been perpetuating that condemnation ever since — condemning ourselves and everyone else who fails to recognize and embody their true humanity.

Betrayed Beyond Belief

This vicious betrayal continues to pervert the human psyche and derail our evolution. It represents the greatest ever desecration of the human spirit and it stems from this brutal fact: our ancestors were persecuted and burned alive because they believed in themselves. They believed in their own wisdom, their inherent divinity, the vital importance of communing with nature and our capacity for co-evolving with the living cosmos. They vehemently opposed the vengeful alien god being forced upon them, knowing that it was the very opposite of what humanity needed for consciousness, harmony and prosperity to prevail.

We have been conned and turned against ourselves at the deepest possible level. We urgently need to reclaim the ancient wisdom that was taken from us, and to start telling ourselves and each other how truly extraordinary we are. We must start believing in ourselves again — having faith in ourselves and in each other, rather than continuing our robotic rituals in a blind search for what is missing within.

The Plot Thickens…Paradoxically

There are many other parallels between ancient and current times, and many tragic ironies.[ii] 

The Church has gained immense power by preaching lies and crushing the human spirit — just as the trillion-dollar wireless industry has gained power by suppressing the truth about wireless radiation and violating humanity by irradiating us without our informed consent.

Ancient wisdom promoted conscious evolution, which is precisely why the Church suppressed it. In its place, it bred shame, self-rejection and the notion of a vengeful god that condoned the slaughter of heathens — in reality, those who fostered self-love, unity and cosmic understanding. Today, those exposing destructive political agendas and speaking the truth are blacklisted and censored on social media; some are silenced permanently.

Much of today’s scientific knowledge — including the basic principles of computer science, without which the digital age would not exist — came from our ancestors’ esoteric knowledge, which directly inspired discoveries made by Plato, Newton etc, yet is rejected by most scientists today. Nature and our bodies’ innate intelligence protect us from illness, unless weakened by fear/punishment.

When the Church stripped science of its esoteric elements, it led to the current deadly imbalance in our spiritually bankrupt modern society and technologies. The push for pharma-driven ‘solutions’ has undermined our natural immunity and our faith in our innate healing powers.

The brutal eradication of esoteric/spiritual wisdom bred such terror that we are still, today, afraid to challenge religions…so the sin spin goes on. Under the guise of a pandemic, fear-mongering has turned much of the population into sheep, blindly allowing themselves to be ‘taken care of’ by the governments intentionally harming them.

But the most devastating irony of all is this: those who have been deeply programmed often fiercely defend the religions that told them they were unworthy, while often attacking those who try to tell them the truth. They do this because religious programming in our formative years becomes so deeply enmeshed with our sense of self that challenging it is tantamount to challenging our existence.

The Real Original Sin

It would be impossible to adequately convey the profound schism caused by centuries of religious dictatorship, although some experts have documented its tragic trajectory.[iii] In his extraordinary book, Not in His Image, John Lamb Lash chronicles how the Church massacred, tortured, persecuted, lied and terrorized its way to supremacy…and then wrote its own version of what happened. Lash also shares the true origins and nature of our immensely wise and earth-loving ancestors, exposing the Church’s distortion of concepts such as heresy (which actually comes from a Greek word meaning to freely choose) and Paganism —  a culture that deeply respected the land and sensory experience as a spiritual pathway.[iv]

In reading that shocking history, we can glimpse the enormity of what the Church has done…and covered up. But no one has calculated what it has cost us — or challenged the current perpetuators of that original sin against humanity. Two thousand years is a long time to get away with murder, yet the deadly programming continues unchecked, while our world descends into unconscious, chaotic self-destruction.

The Church and the wireless industry now run on parallel lines of programmed de-humanization, with one having paved the way for the other, and both now costing us the Earth. Big Pharma has joined the party, now running its own parallel drug line, with all three helping each other take control of humanity. 

Yet they jointly also represent a deeper calling.

Digital Superhighway or Divine Super-Human?

Derailed on our evolutionary path, divested of our divine birthright, and degraded in our self-image, we now stand at a crucial crossroads in our existence. We can continue speeding down the superhighway of digital denial, dementia and destruction, or we can take the scenic route to super-human creatorship and a universe of infinite potential. But can we become conscious enough to see the deadly virus that infects human software? Can we uninstall and reboot?

Paradoxically, there is a divine—digital interplay that holds a potential breakthrough for humankind. If we once again become grounded in the truth and in the Earth itself (and if we ground/hardwire our wireless devices), we can simultaneously reconnect with our innate spiritual wisdom and universal consciousness. Connecting with the Earth and our higher faculties fosters enlightenment and conscious evolution. The digital age can then serve humanity, promoting true global awareness, infinite growth and spiritual fulfillment.

Becoming conscious and healing our emotional dysfunction is the most powerful thing we can do to restore personal and planetary health.

It’s not our leaders that we need to change; it’s our minds. It’s not about understanding politics, the law or human rights; it’s about becoming conscious of just how deeply we have been programmed, how far we have strayed from our humanity and how disconnected we have become from our own divinity, our living planet, and the phenomenal power of our minds.

Negatively programmed, our minds create hell on Earth. Positively programmed, our minds can elevate us to the highest echelons of human consciousness and evolution — infinitely more enlightening, empowering and life-enhancing than any killer-‘smart’ technologies.

We must snap out of our tech-driven stupor, regain full consciousness and wake up to the truth.

[i] Gnostic: one who understands divine matters/is an initiated teacher in the Mystery Schools (spiritual universities and educational centres of antiquity).

[ii] See: The Forbidden Universe: The occult origins of science and the search for the mind of God, by Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince; and Not in His Image—Gnostic vision, sacred ecology and the future of belief, by John Lamb Lash.

[iii] ibid.

[iv] A heretic is therefore one who chooses what to believe, rather than succumbing to the Church’s doctrines; and Pagans were systematically eradicated by the Church because their independent, nature-based culture posed a threat to its supremacy.

Olga Sheean’s latest books; click an image to view on Amazon

You may also enjoy reading Politics: Palliative Care for a Curable Disease? by Olga Sheean

The post The Split: Why We Lost Consciousness and Need to Wake Up appeared first on BEST SELF.

Ditching the over-commercialization of holiday madness in lieu of a practice for connecting to the sacredness of the solstice season

—

My mission (in creating The 13 Holy Nights Oracle Deck and companion book) is to take the over-commercialized winter holidays back from the makers of materialism, and to return the focus of the solstice season to the Sacred. Instead of being swept away in the yearly avalanche of commercialism and materialism, this beautiful practice supports us in slowing down and tuning in; reconnecting us to our own inner light…to the mystery and magic of something greater.

I learned about The 13 Holy Nights practice many years ago from my qigong teacher. This ancient, nature-based ritual, has since completely changed the way I move through winter and the holiday season (and truly, the way I move through my life). Rather than just being dark and cold, the winter season now holds the promise of a tangible connection to the infinite, the mystery…the world of Spirit. I still participate in the usual holiday traditions, but I’m not nearly as consumed by it all as I once was. There’s a sacredness that I swim in during those 13 short winter days and long dark nights regardless of what is happening around me. Every year, the magic gets deeper, more profound and more tangible. As the years pass, I fall more and more in love with The 13 Holy Nights.

The practice begins on the winter solstice (December 21^st 2020), the longest, darkest night of the year. What is the natural world doing at that time? The trees have dropped their leaves; animals and plants are quieting down, conserving energy; everything is drawing energy inward. We humans in the northern hemisphere, on the other hand, are at our most frantic: shopping compulsively, over-indulging in sugar and alcohol, and jam-packing our December calendars with social activity.

The chaos of the holidays is the exact opposite of what is natural to our bodies (and energy bodies) during the peak of winter.

What’s more, the overwhelming stress and chaos of the holidays distracts us from the true and potent magic available if we were to quiet down, simmer down, and tune in.

So, how is the 13 Holy Nights practice actually done?* Each day of the 13 Holy Nights corresponds to a month in the coming year (with the exception of the first 24-hour period which corresponds to the entire year to come). On the first night, three oracle cards are drawn  — one animal card, one herb card, and one mineral card.

These three cards will be your constant guides throughout the coming year and represent the overarching themes you will be working with. For each of the following 12 nights, one card is selected, providing further and more particular insight into each of the 12 calendar months. In addition to drawing oracle cards, the idea is basically to be present and record everything that you experience, notice, intuit, feel, think, dream, etc. into a 13 Holy Nights journal. The information that you gather into your journal represents an imprint, a blueprint, a foreshadowing, a ‘sneak peek’ of the year to come.

By simply paying attention during this magical 13-day window you receive, directly from Higher Mind (the World of Spirit, the Mystery, God, the Field or whatever language you like), the spiritual tools and guidance you will need to navigate the upcoming adventures and challenges of the new year. You also have the precious opportunity to plant YOUR dream seeds, YOUR intentions and inspirations, in the fertile soil of the darkness so that they may sprout in the spring, bloom in the expansiveness of summer and be harvested as the fruits of your labor in the fall…before diving back in for another cycle of seasons.

It is the co-creative process AMPLIFIED by aligning yourself with nature.

The dream seeds you plant in the rich darkness of the 13 Holy Nights are like turbo-charged New Year’s resolutions. Rather than simply writing down a list of intentions you actually do the things, activities and practices you want to strengthen or develop in the coming year; you actually see or otherwise connect with the people you would like to have in your life; and you actually engage with the world in ways that bring you joy and happiness. A very real energetic imprint is created and stamped into a riptide of energy that is literally swept right into your future. It’s legit magic.

As you make your way through your year, the synchronicities that unfailingly unfold from your 13 Holy Nights journal will give you waves of goosebumps, will make you laugh out loud in disbelief and will fortify your faith in the unseen world of energy and Spirit. The wisdom jotted down in your journal will be like your own personal crystal ball, astrologer, psychic, therapist and guide. I’ve had countless 13HN journal entries manifest word for word in the exact month that corresponds to the Holy Night in which I wrote them down.

For example, one year — it was a sunny afternoon in June — I received an unexpected phone call: a dear friend who lives on the other side of the country happened to be passing through town. We had a delightful meal together before he made his way to the airport to fly home. After he left I had a nagging feeling that there may have been something written about him in my Holy Nights journal. When I pulled it out to check, I discovered that I had written down a fragment of a dream on the 7th Holy Night (the night that corresponds to the month of June). These words were scribbled in my journal, “A surprise visit from Tommy, so much kindness and connection there.” Whoa.

The 13 Holy Nights opens a portal into the potent, dark, quiet, still magic of deep winter. It is the most powerful time to re-connect, receive, replenish, reset and co-create. When we practice the 13 Holy Nights, we align with the rhythm of the seasons and are enfolded in the stunning intelligence of nature — an intelligence which, if we could only learn to follow it, could lead us out of the downward spiral of chaos we are now experiencing across our planet.

Nature is brilliant beyond our comprehension.

I am reminded of this daily by my cactus and succulent gardens: the exquisite natural design is so clear in their geometric fractal patterns. I believe that by aligning ourselves with that natural design and intelligence we discover our own natural human potential. This is what the practice of the 13 Holy Nights is about: tuning into the rhythm of the seasons, aligning with the intelligence of nature, reclaiming the true magic of the solstice season… and reclaiming a part of ourselves.

In so many ways our modern industrialized, technologically-dependent culture has rejected, abused and turned away from Mother Nature. We spend the majority of our time indoors, out of touch with the earth and her seasons and cut off from light of the sun, moon and stars. Poisonous chemicals pervade our air, water, food, homes, clothing, medicines, etc. We live and breathe in an invisible soup of man-made electrical frequencies.** We are now entirely submerged in a world filled to the brim with manmade toxins.

I wonder: Who would we be? How would we feel? How would these bodies and minds function and what would we be capable of if we lived in the pristine and natural environment we lived and evolved in for eons? We don’t know.

Historians and researchers question how certain ancient civilizations (the ancient Egyptians, Incas and Mayans etc.) accomplished unbelievable architectural feats or attained seemingly impossible knowledge without access to machines, computers and technology. What if we are capable of much more than we know? Every single person alive today knows only how it feels to be human while slogging through an environment cut off from nature and saturated with synthetic chemicals and poisons.

Lara Day discusses the 13 Holy Nights

In this moment, as I sit outside in my backyard writing, I smell my neighbors chemically fragranced dryer sheets permeating the air. I can actually taste the overwhelming synthetic fragrance in the back of my throat. What if ancient peoples were capable of such brilliance simply because their bodies and brains were in sync with nature and were not overloaded with, and dumbed-down by toxins? What if the poisonous ways of our modern industrial high-tech culture are keeping us from accessing higher levels of consciousness that would otherwise be quite natural to us all?

Currently, in the New Age movement, there is a lot of talk about a ‘Great Awakening’ that is in motion. It can sound fairly intangible, esoteric and far out to many, including those of us who speak woo. I’ve been thinking lately…What if this ‘Great Awakening’ isn’t some far-out sci-fi awakening to Buddha-like enlightenment and Yoda-like super powers, but instead, a here-and-now awakening to the corrupt power structures of our current global culture that are spewing toxicity into our environment and thus into our bodies, hearts and minds? And…wait for it…here’s where it comes full circle…because if we weren’t so absurdly toxic and cut off from nature maybe we would be more Buddha/Yoda-like with a greater capacity to utilize more of our brain power and thus access higher levels of consciousness. And perhaps levitate space ships out of soggy bogs with just the firm command of our thoughts.

This year more than ever before, I am fervently looking forward to aligning with nature by diving deep into the womb of winter.

With the world out there feeling more and more toxic and chaotic and the promise of a winter quarantine fast approaching, there has never been a more auspicious time to engage in the practice of the 13 Holy Nights. I am holding a vision of families and individuals all over the world soaking in the quiet stillness of the dark nights of winter and bringing back, from this place of primordial magic, inspired visions of a beautiful new world.

I am holding a vision of the quiet inward dive of the Holy Nights replacing the yearly maniacal surge of holiday madness and materialism gone wild. I am holding a vision of the 13 Holy Nights re-aligning us ALL with the intelligence of nature.

Th 13 Holy Nights practice is a return to the light within the darkness, to the sacred and stunning design of nature and the intelligence of the Universe. The 13 Holy Nights is a 13-day practice in being present, in tasting what is possible when we truly tune in to the energy within us and all around us, that is us. If we can practice plugging into the Mystery, during this magical 13-day window, when the elements and energies all around us are in cahoots with our inward dive, perhaps we can begin to let that feeling bleed out into the rest of our year. Perhaps we can learn to awaken within the dream. Perhaps we can usher in the ‘Great Awakening’.

Join me this winter. May we all dive deep!

(One of my intentions for the Holy Nights this year is to gaze into the unfiltered light of 13 sunrises and 13 sunsets…aligning with the light, aligning with nature!)

—

*For complete details, please visit: 13holynightsoracle.com

**See The Invisible Rainbow by Arthur Firstenberg for more on this topic.

You may also enjoy reading Rewilding: Revealing Winter’s Gifts of Impermanence and Connection, by Micah Mortali, M.A.

The post 13 Holy Nights: Reclaiming the True Magic of the Solstice Season appeared first on BEST SELF.

Standing at a critical technological crossroads, we have become oblivious to our own demise in body, mind and spirit

—

Have you realized your unique creative potential? In living your precious life, how much have you evolved emotionally, spiritually or ecologically? Have you enhanced your personal responsibility, autonomy, relationships or custodianship of the planet? Are you fulfilled and happy with who you are?

If we look beneath the virtual reality of our tech-driven world, we see a deep yearning for connection and meaningful fulfillment.

Something fundamental is missing and many of us are trying to fill the void. While wireless technologies promise mobility, convenience and freedom, they have instead compromised our humanity, while distracting us from what we have lost and keeping us stuck in a perpetual loop of unmet emotional and spiritual needs.

With endless information at our fingertips, we may feel more in charge of our lives than ever before, but we have never been less free. We have become mobile databases, generating masses of personal data used to track, control and exploit us.

We have lost an essential part of our humanness — the part that relates to compassion, caring for others and seeking heartfelt connections. Our humanity matters more than any inanimate gadget, and if we deny the proven dangers of wireless devices, harming ourselves and others while disengaging from the natural world around us, it shows us just how dehumanized we have become…and it means we no longer care.

I call this social greedia — not caring how much we harm people, the planet or society, in our need for social-media sustenance.

Absorbed in our digital world, we lose touch with nature, our inner wisdom and the higher faculties designed to keep us true to ourselves. We fail to see that we have been masterfully played by those with a vested interest in keeping us emotionally disconnected, socially seduced, stressed, insecure and burnt out.

Focused outwards on the symptoms of our dysfunction, we distract ourselves from our pain, blaming others for not fixing things, while failing to take responsibility for the way we live.

Our choices matter. They affect everyone, and the increasing demand for an easy wireless lifestyle is making life hell for those feeling its effects. Not caring or taking the appropriate action for our planet or each other is part of the syndrome of dumbing down and emotional detachment caused by wireless radiation. This is what makes the current technological takeover so masterful. On top of the logistical, physical and emotional dependence on mobile technologies, the loss of empathy, emotional intelligence and consciousness really seals the deal. That’s not just tragic; it’s deadly, because not caring means we give in and don’t fight back.  

A wake-up call… or the big long sleep?

Right now, if you are relatively healthy and you use a cell phone or other wireless devices, you are taking your health for granted. But you can expect a wake-up call very soon. I’ve had mine, in the form of a brain tumor, so I may be a little bit ahead of you. But it won’t be long before you get it…or it gets you. Then you will realize just how much you have lost and that the human rights you also took for granted are no longer respected or enforced. Wireless technology has taken over, increasingly pulling us away from what is healthy and natural for our bodies, minds and spirits. In the process, we are losing consciousness, surrendering our own personal evolution to the evolution of inanimate technology.

If technology runs our lives, we no longer do.

And if the evolution of technology overrides the evolution of humanity, we will have eliminated ourselves from the equation.

We urgently need to get back in the driver’s seat and steer things in a healthier direction. Consciousness is the very antithesis of the tech takeover — and the only true antidote to it. But how do we regain consciousness if we do not realize we have lost it? How do we become conscious of not being conscious?

We must find stillness and give ourselves the opportunity to feel, process and integrate what is happening in our lives. We were never intended to process so much information, to be so mentally over-stimulated, to be spiritually and emotionally disengaged, or to have so many things clamouring for our attention.

Many people are in overwhelm, their brains on fire, their hearts empty, and their lives a non-stop juggling act. We must separate ourselves from our ‘upregulating’ gadgetry in order to reconnect with our deeper selves…or even to simply be present.

In most cases, smart phones serve as the delivery device — a virtual umbilical cord — that keeps us co-dependent. Only by switching them off and opening our eyes and hearts to what is around us can we start to see what we are losing. As precious trees are cut down to facilitate the delivery of 5G, as more and more children get cancer from wireless radiation, and as smart devices increasingly run our homes, choices and every move, consciousness is the only thing left inside us that we can fully own and control…and that no one else can control.

Evolution is about finding a higher way, and we can only evolve if we are conscious of what we are doing. We are being pushed to reclaim our hearts and humanity in the face of a heartless, predatory technology. As technology evolves, so does disease, due to the deepening separation of head from heart and our focus on symptoms versus underlying cause. We now have more epidemics of disease, more social dysfunction, and more mental illness then ever before in our world. The frequencies being beamed at us are changing the way we behave, think and feel, controlling us without us even knowing it. This is the price we pay for not consciously evolving — for having surrendered our personal autonomy, our spiritual sovereignty, our emotional integrity and our physical functionality to gadgets that promise to do it all for us.

‘Social greedia’ or conscious evolution?

Being human is about being truly present, compassionate and wise, and making simple, healthy choices that promote our collective survival and prosperity. With every choice we make, we have the capacity and the option to evolve to a higher plane of existence. We can collectively feed the machine that will ultimately render us almost obsolete, or we can feed our hearts and spirits, broadcasting our own healthy frequencies and starving the predators that are leaching the life out of us.

This means reconnecting with our humanity, which is what keeps us connected to what matters most. It also keeps us connected to what is right. If we lose touch with our humanity, we lose our moral compass…and we can’t use GPS to find our way home.

We stand at a crucial crossroads in our evolution: stripped of our humanity, subsumed by wireless gadgets, we are pliant puppets in the tech takeover, oblivious to our own demise.

Conscious evolution is an active choice. We can choose long-term viability over short-term gratification; we can choose enduring spiritual connection over instant wireless connectivity; and we can choose to feed our own healthy neural networks rather than feeding data-hungry online networks that exploit our every move, friendship, purchase, weakness, need, emotion or desire.

Only by choosing to consciously evolve can we hope to outwit the predator that stalks us. Disguised as our friend, it seduces us with the promise of an exciting futuristic life, while scrambling our brains and weakening our bodies with its invisible irradiating waves. The stealthy wireless stalker makes us forget who we really are, feeding our needs and getting us hooked on its addictive offerings.

It is human trafficking of the most tragic and insidious kind. The only escape lies in conscious self-awareness, withdrawal from our addictions, and an active commitment to being fully human. We must return to love, engage our true nature, reclaim our personal autonomy and choose to evolve for the sake of every precious beating heart.

Olga Sheean’s latest books; click an image to view on Amazon

You may also enjoy reading an interview with Olga Sheean, Innate Wisdom: Reawakening Our Truth, Reclaiming Our Power, Changing Our World, by Alison Main.

The post Social Greedia: Has Our Evolution Been Derailed? appeared first on BEST SELF.

A provocative dive into the body politic in search of meaningful change and results, requiring the active participation of us all

—

How many politicians do you know who are actively committed to their own personal growth? How many do yoga, meditate or invest in healthy behavioural change? How many have resolved their own dysfunction, limiting beliefs, insecurities, unmet needs, poor boundaries and personal conflicts? Precious few, would probably be the answer. Yet politicians are tasked with resolving the crises that result from all of those issues… without addressing a single one of them.

They grapple with the symptoms of our collective dysfunction — not the root cause — which is why they so seldom fix things.

It’s not that there are no good politicians left or that none of them wish to truly change things for the better. The problem is the negative programming that has conditioned us to think and act in certain limiting, self-destructive ways, regardless of what others might try to do to change things. For as long as we fail to address this fundamental driver of human dysfunction — and of every problem on the planet — politics will never work.

Via religion, schooling and parenting, most of us are taught that we are unworthy, unacceptable or just plain not good enough. Our distorted self-image and low self-worth breed deference to others, a lack of faith in self, a failure to take personal responsibility for our lives and, consequently, a tendency to blame the authorities for not fixing things for us. Profoundly disempowered, we are unaware that our subconscious self-rejection creates havoc in our lives, producing human dramas that keep us focused on the external symptoms of our dysfunction rather than its internal drivers.  

Because of this programming (as deeply rooted in themselves as in the general population), politicians face an impossible task: solving our problems for us.

While ostensibly addressing key issues, they instead become the scapegoats for our dysfunction, the indicators of our subservience and the enablers of our crippling co-dependence. They are excellent mirrors of what is not working, but they are profoundly misguided in their mission. 

Are you leading your own life?

The true purpose of any political leader is to inspire us to become leaders in our own lives, since we are the only ones with direct control over our circumstances. 

Unless leaders fulfill that role, they merely serve as figureheads for our collective failure to understand how life really works. They may introduce new policies, change some laws or promote certain initiatives, but unless they address the human dysfunction that drives every single problem on the planet, they can only provide political palliative care. And, since most politicians are so ensnared by their own dysfunctional psyche, they can hardly even do that.

How can a politician solve these problems?

How can a president resolve unemployment when the subconscious beliefs and self-worth of individuals determine what they create and attract in life? 

How can a leader build a thriving economy if the people have a poverty mentality or do not believe in their right or ability to prosper? 

How can an elected official create meaningful lasting change if the people don’t believe in their own ability to make a difference… and don’t even try? 

How can a politician create unity when mass programming promotes divisiveness, self-rejection and intolerance? 

How can any leader instill a sense of ownership and pride when its people have surrendered responsibility for almost every aspect of their lives, blaming governments for their problems and expecting someone else to fix them?

Every leader is a reflection of its people — how empowered or conscious they are and to what degree they have surrendered their personal autonomy in favor of being led, healed, fixed or bailed out. 

Every president reflects what is missing in the psyche and self-worth of the people. A president’s failure to fix things reflects the people’s failure to take charge of their own lives. Sickness and disease reflect individuals’ failure to adjust their lifestyle or embrace their own healing powers. 

Why politicians can never win

Politics usually addresses symptoms, which is why it never ultimately changes anything. Instead of holding political leaders responsible for the state of things, we the people must be accountable for our own lives — which, in turn, affects the economy and the prevailing mindset and direction of a nation.

Whatever is currently wrong with our world went wrong in our minds long before we ever voted. Debt, disease, depression, crime, addiction, wars and poverty are the glaring symptoms of a race that has failed to fully understand or empower itself. We are missing a crucial piece of the human puzzle and we are ‘driving blind’ through life, failing to master our relationships, emotions, economies or minds. 

Globally, we are in a state of ongoing crisis and collective post-traumatic stress disorder, with no real game plan and no framework for masterful living. We grapple with the symptoms of dysfunction without understanding the underlying cause. 

Weapons of mass seduction

We are putty in the hands of political players… and we have been played. Lured by technologies that give the illusion of freedom, we have been seduced into subservience and the surrender of our personal data. Due to our unresolved dysfunction and unmet emotional needs, we are addicted to invasive, pervasive, harmful technologies that have transformed us into human databases. Because we have failed to recognize and resolve our disempowerment, technological evolution has superseded human evolution, hurtling ahead with our tacit consent, leveraging our co-dependence, ruling by default, and leaving our humanity in the dust. 

In politics, issues are mostly addressed in isolation, with no understanding or consideration of the big picture or the underlying dynamics. As with conventional medicine, it is a symptomatic approach that never gets to the core of the issue. That would involve examining how the human psyche and our electromagnetism affect our world — not how particular policies work. Policies don’t change people, although they may provide opportunities. Only people can change themselves and thereby change everything else.

To create balance and harmony, we must understand how human dysfunction creates the scenarios we call life.

Only when leaders address that dysfunction and inspire individuals to take responsibility for their own lives will things change in a meaningful way. Failing that, we go round and round. New presidential players, same old pajamas (and some truly appalling hairdos). 

Disease is exploding out of control, our environment is polluted, suicide is on the rise, gadgets are running our lives, we’ve sold our souls (and all our personal data) to commercial interests, technology has hijacked our humanity… and no leader will ever resolve these issues unless he/she addresses human dysfunction (starting with his/her own). Addressing climate change, adopting sustainability policies, levying carbon taxes — none of these things will change us, the perpetrators of the damage that prompts such inherently futile efforts. 

Who is running the party?

Ultimately, the collective loss of personal autonomy creates political anarchy, which is what we are currently witnessing in the U.S. and elsewhere, with the collapse of solid values, morality, integrity, honesty, compassion and basic human decency. 

In this supposedly free world, how many people are truly free? How many are free of debt, disease, stress, conflict, prejudice, emotional issues, stigma or pain? For as long as the sources of our dysfunction remain unaddressed — and embodied by our leaders — we will never be free. We cannot even freely choose what we want, since our choices are determined by our dysfunctional beliefs, which affect the outcomes. 

Effective leadership has less to do with political savvy than an understanding of healthy human dynamics. 

While it is crucial for leaders to promote real change, they cannot lead anyone anywhere good unless they first empower themselves, resolve their own dysfunction, and become conscious of our interconnectedness. 

What’s your policy for powerful living?

True leadership means leading by example, embodying self-responsibility, healthy boundaries and choices, respect and compassion for self and others, an awareness of our creative capacity, and a genuine commitment to excellence in how we live our lives and in our reverence for the planet on which we all depend. 

We do not need — and cannot rely upon — a president or any other leader for that. We must become leaders in our own lives if we truly want to create the kind of world that we expect elected leaders to create for us.

Creating a happy, functional society is not their job. It is ours and ours alone. 

If we take on that all-important personal responsibility, there is nothing we cannot do — and we will, as a result, generate leadership partners who support us in this endeavor. Rather than exploiting our dysfunction, manipulating our weaknesses, seducing us with ‘smart’ technologies or taking advantage of our low self-worth (as governments currently do), they will be champions for our greatness, cheerleaders in our collective successes, and co-creators in the conscious evolution of our species. 

When we address our own dysfunction by transforming our limiting beliefs and behaviors, we can turn our weaknesses into strengths and embody the kind of healthy self-worth that generates true freedom, prosperity and fulfillment — far beyond what any president or leader could ever do for us.  

True governance does not come from the White House, 10 Downing Street or anywhere else. It comes from within.

The author’s latest books; click an image to view on Amazon

You may also enjoy Brendon Burchard Interview | Live, Love, Matter with Kristen Noel.

The post Politics: Palliative Care for a Curable Disease? appeared first on BEST SELF.

Once locked away in a prison cell for 25 years — one extraordinary man discovers how to heal his own pain through the service of others

—

Usually, people think that I’m a strong, happy person…but behind my smiles they just don’t know how much I’m in pain and almost broken…”

—CoolNSmart.com

Pain. How can a person understand life when life was crushed before living it? And what about the crude impact on the development of such a person? To answer this, I have to go back to ask my 7-year-old self this very question. He remembers.

I’m a curious life observer. I have learned to witness and read others. I have tried many times to study and understand the mind of others — in an effort to understand my own. I have tried many times to visualize this feeling of happiness or elation that others may feel; yet in the end, I still come up with the same conclusion: The grass is not greener on the other side.

And this coming from a man who has spent 25 years in prison, means something.

I wonder if there is such a thing as everlasting pain or sorrow. I truly want to believe that the answer is No. That it can go, fade, become something else. Yet, I can attest firsthand that there is such a thing, that there is such a space where pain is felt. It resides, thrives and creates indelible scars.

At the age of seven, I was taken from my parents and placed in a foster home. Before this, I lived in countless environments that were not beneficial to any child. I lived in a shelter with my parents and my brothers, I lived in a hotel, I lived in a tiny apartment — and I also lived on the streets.

So, at the mere age of seven, when police and social workers told me that they were taking me from all of this and placing me in an environment that was deemed productive for my growth and development, one that would be safe — I was confused and unsure of what any of that really meant.

Some part of me felt grateful to be taken somewhere safe; a home with a warm bed to sleep upon, hot meals to eat and a notion of comfort I was unfamiliar with. However, the very ‘comfort’ that I was given also quickly revealed the price I would pay for that. Survival became crucial. And this same home where I was intended to be ‘safe’ and cared for was the same place where innocence was removed and molestation wore a face that smiled.

Now I know what pain is.

I learned that pain exists both physically and mentally. My young mind was left to navigate the pain and the choices before me. This small boy must decide; Do I stay and face the pains of molestation in the name of ‘comfort’ or do I leave and go back into the abyss of the unknown? And between the ages of 8-10 I would be confronted with that very choice over and over again. That young, vulnerable self concluded that the unknown was worse than what I was enduring. Besides, who could possibly understand the unspeakable dilemma — a choice between abuse or discomfort?

From the age of seven to sixteen, I remained in foster care. 9 years. During this time, I lost my grandmother and my uncle — the only two people in my family who had helped ease the pain of my young life. My grandmother was able to pull me from the system and adopt me — though that didn’t last long. When she died, my uncle did the same…and then he died.

This was an unimaginable series of losses for me. I didn’t question their love. That love made me feel that there was light at the end of the tunnel. It gave me connection and a sense of belonging to something, someone. It was someplace I could bury my pains and find my smile. But losing the only two people in my life that I loved more than anything or anybody only added to the pains that I thought I once buried.

I thought of my pain almost as the ‘Internal City’ described by Plato in The Republic where men build cities on top of cities.

Those cities were my wounds — new levels were being reconstructed upon them, compartmentalized. I couldn’t fathom just how deep pain could go. Yet, I wasn’t quite done adding layers.

At the age of sixteen, I was headed to prison for a crime that my misguided mind helped commit and I was being sent away for a very long time — longer than I had been alive. What do you mean that you are charging me for the murder of a man? This cannot be right because I know to my core that my actions did not cause the death of anyone.

When you are locked away in the cell, all of your days begin to look the same; the dreams you once had begin to fade quickly.

The memories that you try to hold onto begin to crawl away, and the only thing that remains is the pain — a constant companion. My cell wasn’t big enough to contain it all.

In the novel The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, the protagonist was locked away in a dungeon. He had no friends. He had no visitors. He heard no words. He saw no faces. He dreamed no more — all the protagonist knew and had was pain. It was the solitude that made him decide that life within these circumstances was simply not worth living.

When the day came to finalize his plan and end his life because it had all become unbearable — he heard a sound. The sound told him that he was not alone, and it was this belief that gave him the will to want to live again. He needed to know where that sound was coming from and by whom. That sound is the recognition needed for a person to understand that humanity still exists, that humanity is still alive even amidst the darkest hopelessness.

The prison cell resembles that solitude; resembles that space where thoughts of humanity have faded. It was in these prison cells that all I had was my pain, and my pain became the noise; became the thing or the element that made me want to live; the pain became the force that guided my body; the pain transformed into something totally life-saving. I lived and slept with pain.

Pain became my best friend because it stayed with me every day; each day I cried on the inside, but no one would ever know because on the outside I smiled — something I learned to do a long time before.

But what do we do with it? How do we contain it and carry it? More importantly, how do we transform it? I wasn’t sure it was even possible…but I knew it was worth a try. Like the Count, I heard a whisper; my soul.

As the years passed in prison, I began to observe the younger generation of inmates coming in and listened to their complaining about how hard life was or how they just wanted to give up because they were not able to do so much time — I knew what it was. I knew what they were experiencing like a familiar ghost. They were filled with anger and rage they didn’t know what to do with. They wanted to fight the system because they were mad. I knew that it was their pain that they wanted to let out; they wanted to remove it, but they couldn’t — they couldn’t identify it and didn’t know how to release it.

I understood the signs because I saw them as clear as day. I lived them. I was them. I understood these young men so well that every time I saw them show up I would try to tell them, “I know the road that you’re traveling and it’s not a good one. This path has a fatal ending and sucks your humanity, leaves you numb and unwilling to love, unwilling to trust ever again. It will close you down. Harden you and make you forget your heart. And for this reason, I ask you to leave your pains with me. Give them over to me because I can bear them. I know what it’s like at the end of this road, and I’m willing to take your pains as long as you are willing to make changes — and are willing to witness happiness.”

You should’ve seen some of their faces when I muttered these words. It wasn’t your typical prison chatter. But I know them to be true to the core of my being. We all need a place to lay our pain down.

Do I tell people who complain or think that life is unfair, that they really don’t understand what’s unfair? Of course not. Life can be hard and I’ve certainly learned that the hard way. I promise you, few would want to walk a mile in my shoes. So, when you think that life is killing you, is so unfair, or unfavorable — I want you to understand that there is a man who saw and lived more traumas and witnessed more pains than I hope you ever see in a lifetime. But it is possible to allow yourself to heal from it all — to lay it down.

Healing is a choice, a hard choice.

I don’t want people to be driven by sorrow or by an ocean of anger — or all the things that have happened to them along the way. I want them to understand that pain exists in this human experience. However, we can do something with it. We can use it instead of being used by it. And mark my words, it can crush and crumble us.

We are not weak because we can’t handle the pain. We become weak because we relinquish our power and allow the pain to destroy us.

And this is what I try to help people see — we can remove ourselves from the equation of everlasting pain. I know this. I stare pain down every day, so give yours to me and be and live free. And perhaps one day, you too will shoulder the pain of another and help set them free. When we see each other’s pain, we see a reflection of our own. Imagine the world if we could just shift our relationship to pain and each other. Imagine how nice that would be.

Never underestimate the pain of a person because the truth is everyone is struggling.It’s just some people hide it better than others.

—CoolNSmart.com

—

Author’s Note:

In March 2020 I was released from prison after 25 years and have begun the healing journey of releasing my own pain. My broad shoulders have held the pain of my life and that of others — it has been a part of my calling, but I am allowing myself to receive right now. I like to believe that in learning to heal my pain, I am a part of healing that of the collective. I also had my very first birthday party. Pain still whispers to me, but you know what? Life is good and I am free in more ways than one.

You may also enjoy reading Life After Death Row: How Magick Saved my Life, by Damien Echols

The post Give Me Your Pain: One Man’s Quest to Bear the Pain of Others’ and Heal His Own appeared first on BEST SELF.

What’s happening beneath the tears we cry? Whether they are tears of joy or sorrow — they connect us to pieces and even forgotten parts of ourselves.

—

“I love to cry — as long as it’s not about my life.” It was a simple statement, a line I’ve said a thousand times before. But when your dad is a shrink — like mine — you never know where a conversation might take you. 

A few months ago I was visiting him down in Destin, Florida. We were sitting outside, having coffee and breakfast while we read our separate books. Mine was a tearjerker — my favorite kind to read. 

I don’t remember exactly what prompted me to share the thought, but I remember his response. 

“What exactly makes you cry,” he asked. “What doesn’t?” I laughed. 

By the tone of his voice, I knew what was coming next: he was going to find a way to psycho-analyze me. 

It’s true. I’ve been known to shed a tear over anything and everything. Movies, books and TV shows, of course. But I’ve also lost it over a sad song or even a commercial. I always thought it was because I was really empathetic to the pain and suffering of others. 

But according to Dr. Randy Hammer, also known as my dad, it’s more of an egocentric concept. 

My first reaction to this was to get defensive — I don’t think of myself as egotistical. But he went on to explain that even when you think you’re crying about something else, you’re really projecting that emotion from yourself. 

I was intrigued at this breakfast-table-analysis of my psyche, and asked him to explain. 

He said when something makes you cry, it’s because whatever you’re watching, reading or listening to triggers a moment or a memory in your life that has significant emotional energy attached to it. 

He asked the question again — what makes me cry  — and I tried to think about it. To look back on all the times I’ve cried and see if there was a common denominator. I couldn’t put my finger on anything specific, so I tried to think thematically. The things that came to mind were stories of friendship and family, of loss and love. 

I thought back to one of my favorite movies of all time, Beaches. A story of two best friends who are nothing alike, yet have a bond that makes them almost like sisters. The movie spans three decades of the ups and downs of their friendship.

All these years after the movie came out, and even though I know how the story ends, it still makes me cry the ugliest kind of tears. 

Prompted by my dad’s theory, I thought back to the close friendships in my life…

and my middle-school best friend, Amy Rae Wilmot, came to mind. 

I was short and round with brown hair, and Jewish. She was tall and skinny and blonde and her father was in school at a Lutheran Seminary. But we were BEST friends. We signed every note we passed in class with LYLAS, love you like a sister. 

The summer after eighth grade, Amy’s dad graduated from the seminary and moved their family all the way from Missouri to North Carolina. I was devastated. And a lot of tears were shed. 

I remember the week after she left, I had an appointment at the eye doctor. They were about to do some sort of test that involved poking my eye with a strip of paper to check my tear ducts. I laughed and told the doctor that I knew with certainty my tear ducts were A-OK.  

If my dad’s theory was right, then maybe all the times I’ve cried over scenes or songs that deal with the loss of a friend, I was recalling how it felt when I was thirteen and suddenly alone. Not sure who I would sit next to during lunch, who I’d have slumber parties and inside jokes with. 

My dad gave me another example, one that related to his life. He told me that he always gets emotional when he sees a father-son reunion. The reason — it triggers all of the emotions tied to the loss of his own father over twenty years ago. When my dad sees those happy reunions, it reminds him, sometimes on a subconscious level, of something he can no longer have. 

But it’s not only sad memories that bring us to tears. He said positive memories can have the same effect, flooding us with the emotional energy tied to different moments in our lives. 

The more I thought about my dad’s theory, the more it made sense, especially in the context of my life. You’d think that as often as I cry about things that happen to other — even fictional people, I would shed my fair share of tears about things going on with me. 

But I don’t. 

I know it’s not the most healthy habit, but I tend to avoid dealing with my own negative emotions. I either push them down or channel them onto a page. I’m not a journal writer, but my debut novel, You and Me and Us, is definitely a tearjerker. People cry while reading the book, and I cried a lot while writing it. Which was unfortunate on the days I wrote in public at a coffee shop!  

Whether my tears are brought on by something I’m reading or something I’m writing, I usually feel better after a good cry. According to my dad, there’s a reason for that. He explained…

Crying can be cathartic because it releases endorphins — feel good chemicals that can help ease physical and emotional pain. 

So go ahead and pick up that sad book, play that sad song and watch that sad movie. Especially now with so much uncertainty in the world, we could all use a good cry. I know I could! 

And the next time I try to explain to someone why I’m drawn to tearjerkers, I might have to modify my answer. Because even when I think I’m not crying about my own life, it turns out, maybe I am. 

You may also enjoy reading Emotional Intelligence: What is it and Why Should You Care? by Shawn Mike

The post What Are You Really Crying About? appeared first on BEST SELF.

Personal musings and an excerpt from Mark Nepo’s latest book guide us through darkness and life’s messiness — to emerge with meaning and connection

—

Since books arrive like children, after months of labor, the timing of their arrival is well beyond us. And so, in the midst of this profound, painful, and transformative time, my new book, The Book of Soul: 52 Paths to Living What Matters is arriving this May. As with all my books, they are thresholds of inquiry and so, are my teachers. I’m still learning from this one. And I am grateful that it offers pathways to living what matters, because we need that now more than ever, to reveal and strengthen our kinship of being. That web of relationship will help us heal and emerge from this pandemic in new and ancient ways. For love must move as quickly as disease, light must move as quickly as darkness, and give must move as quickly as take. I hope it feeds your soul during this trying time.  ~ Mark Nepo

An excerpt from The Book of Soul:

The Agents of Kindness

The fundamental challenge of the twenty-first century is to help each other stay awake, by being who we are and staying in relationship. To do this, we need every single tradition. For as the sun causes every plant to grow, the one unnamable Spirit causes all forms of belief to enter the world. And just as we need all plants to have a vital incarnation of nature, we need all forms of belief to have a vital incarnation of humanity. 

This acceptance of the many ways we can journey toward meaning and grace is essential to our survival as a species. The turmoil or peace of the world depends on whether we repel what is unfamiliar or treat it as our teacher. So the nature of belief is not limited to what we choose to believe in, but is more about being students of the diversity of life as manifest through relationship.

By living our life and playing our part, we hold the Universe together. To climb with a loved one to the summit of their suffering will soften our judgments and introduce us to joy. In climbing together through our pain and joy, we come to a timeless place where truth in all its forms comes to rest. It is kindness and suffering that bring us to that timeless place that everyone knows as home, once what is unnecessary is loved out of the way.

It’s the silken threads of care woven through the brutal storms of time that hold everything together.

A loved one’s picture carried through a war and delivered to a grandchild thirty years later. The seed that isn’t washed away that takes root, arriving in the world as an orchid whose beauty makes a young girl become a painter. The memory of the moment we met twenty-five years ago overwhelming me as I watch you sleep this morning. The laughter of my father while planing a piece of mahogany, which kept me believing in the love of work and the work of love while going through cancer. These silken threads are everywhere — a web of barely visible connections that infuse us with resilience when we’re forced or loved to find our way through what we’re given. 

In the midst of great turmoil, in the cascade of human catastrophes, these threads of care seem obsolete — artifacts of a gentler time. But they wait under all the breakage that overcomes us. These fine threads of care can be lost but never broken. They wait for the devotion of a single soul, daring to stand up for life in the midst of cruelty, daring to love everyone in the face of prejudice, daring to step out of the drama that says we’re strangers or enemies, daring to help those in hiding come out into the open.

One silken thread of care held onto and followed, sometimes for years, can repair the world.

It was my grandmother who taught me to be kind, who, with the weary faith of a sturdy immigrant, taught me that life opens for those who dare to give. Once living in the open, there is no career but being kind.

So let’s keep each other company, which means let’s be companions, which goes back to the French, meaning “one who breaks bread with another.” It always comes down this…

Our willingness to walk together through the storm and share what we have, so we can create a path to all that matters. 

—

This excerpt is from Mark Nepo’s new book, The Book of Soul: 52 Paths to Living What Matters, which is being published this month by St. Martin’s Essentials. Mark is offering online webinars and retreats. Please visit www.MarkNepo.com for details.

During these trying times, Mark is offering a 3-session online webinar in June 2020, as a way for us to deepen and strengthen our roots as we endure this storm. 

You may also enjoy Podcast: Mark Nepo | Entrainments of Heart by Best Self Media

The post Living What Matters: Reflections, Prose and 52 Prompts for Self-Inquiry appeared first on BEST SELF.

Times of disruption can provide opportunities that serve us — allowing us to transform challenge into meaningful new choices

—

As we move more deeply into this time of global quarantine, many people are feeling out of control, frustrated, trapped and unsure about the future. We are all being faced with situations none of us have learned to navigate in our lifetimes.

With a constant stream of negative images and statistics on our devices, an interruption of so many jobs, all combined with the knowledge that there is no cure available at the moment — it is all too easy to become overwhelmed, fearful and eventually even angry. Some people have been hoarding, while others have been shutting down and distracting, simply hoping that things will somehow return ‘back to normal’.

No matter what circumstances you may find yourself in at the moment, I have some good news.

With a little help, we can all learn to dance with life more effectively.

One of the most immediate ways we can do that at the moment involves evaluating the choices we have been making in our habitual lives most recently, followed by introducing some proactive, nurturing alternatives. If we develop a healthy approach, we can all utilize this time of challenge to set ourselves up for a ‘new normal’ — one that is more balanced and meaningful.

Quite often, the quality of our journey is determined by the specific perspectives that we choose. For instance, if our perception about challenges is that they are “difficulties which impede and diminish our life experience,” then we will likely find ourselves resisting, fighting and struggling through the challenges we are presently facing. 

If that perspective is familiar to you and you are finding yourself in and out of fight, resistance and confusion, I look forward to guiding you into some healthier alternatives.

One of the most important starting places will be revealing how our challenges actually serve us. 

First, let me introduce myself. I am Ron Baker, and for over twenty-five years now, I’ve been a Self-Mastery Coach. Having had the opportunity to nurture thousands of people through a distinct process of personal transformation, my impression is that most people around the world have been moving through their lives without an empowering education about Self, without understanding how crucial nurturing is in our lives — particularly in times of challenge — and finally, without a clear trust that there is real power in the individual choices that we make.

To set up our exploration well, I encourage you to begin with a few questions:

• How have you been doing so far with this interruption? 
• Do you already have a nurturing approach that has allowed you to respond proactively to everything that is taking place? 
• Have you been using this time as an opportunity to deepen your connection to your inner Self? 

I don’t know about you, but growing up, I was never taught how to nurture myself or to use the events of my life as opportunities for developing Self — and I am grateful beyond words to now understand how important these skills are in our lives.

If we want to make this a time of real enhancement, rather than one more struggle that we merely endure, it is important that we prepare to make some empowering adjustments.

The 3 Levels of Self

Let’s start by considering that there are three different levels of Self held inside you: child, adult and Soul. And perhaps surprising, those three levels refer to much more than stages of chronological growth.

For instance, most people have never been taught that there are core qualities and gifts that are held as potentials in each of those three levels:

The innocence, wonder and trust of a child; the empowerment, clarity and passion of an adult; and the wisdom, greatness and sacredness of a Soul.

All of which are awakened most powerfully through nurturing.

Even though this may be a lot to consider at the moment, I find it helpful to have a list of healthy, core qualities that we can reference. Even if this is the first time you have considered some of these elements, each one has the power to deepen the personal fulfillment you will be able to create in your life. Just as important, each one requires an inner investment in Self. 

In my early life, I was only taught to focus on outer goals. And it was quite a journey for me to realize that approaching my life in this way didn’t create true fulfillment. Instead, that approach generally leads us into overly busy lives. 

Having generations of people who have been taught to focus most fully on outer goals, without a balance of nurturing investments in the inner Self, is the main reason most of us didn’t emerge from our childhoods feeling true wonder about life or a solid trust in our value as individuals.

Self has simply not been a typical priority in the world, as strange as it might sound to see it written in such simple words. 

Just see how it sounds if you take the time to say it out loud. “Self has simply not been a typical priority in the world.”

At the same time, I am thrilled to share that when any of us learns to make a more nurturing investment in Self, we put ourselves on a much clearer path to fulfillment. I know this is true, because even in times of challenge, I still maintain a sense of peace and clarity most of the time, which is exactly what I wish for you. 

Important side note: I will be suggesting some specific exercises as we continue to explore. Keep in mind that it is only when you take a moment to do the exercises that they will have the power to have any real impact.

Besides, when you begin to make proactive choices — such as taking the time to do these exercises — you begin to feel more in charge, based on investing in something you decide is important. This can be particularly helpful in a time when so many people are feeling out of control and unsure how to create tangible solutions. 

Finding out that you can impact your own experience will also inspire seeds of courage and clarity.

Lastly, whenever you make nurturing investments in Self, you send a clear message to your inner Self that you matter.

On the other hand, when you move through any of your challenges without nurturing, you tend to build fear and self-doubt instead — qualities of what I like to refer to as a wounded child versus a wonder child.

All of that leads me to more good news: it is never too late to invest in claiming Self. As a matter of fact, what better time than now, while many of us have some unexpected time on our hands, to make an initial investment in some nurturing alternatives?

Taking Inventory of Your Life

One of the most powerful tools we can use to set us up for healthy change is an inventory. So for instance, if you take a really honest look at your recent life, you will begin to discover which of your choices have been setting you up well and which ones have not. 

Without any need for judgment, it is helpful to become clear — no matter what you discover. Besides, it is only when you are clear that you can identify where you need healthier alternatives.

Exercise one. Ask yourself:

1. What have your top priorities been in recent years? 
2. How many of your day-to-day choices have supported those priorities?
3. If you had to start over today with a clean slate, which of those familiar choices would remain clear priorities?
4. Are there areas of your life (inner Self, work, family, relationships, fun, rest) that have been neglected and need to become a greater priority moving forward? 

Please take some time over the coming days, if not in this moment, to write down your answers. Don’t just do this in a random way in your head.

Putting something on paper makes the impact much more powerful. 

Once that is done, do the next step on a new page. 

Exercise two. Now that you are clearer about what your life has been, make a current list:

1. What do you choose as your current priorities?
2. What are some of the choices you can make that will set you up well to support those priorities day-to-day or at least each week?
3. Name a few NEW choices that you realize you need to introduce that set you up better than before / creating more balance.
4. Name ONE new choice that you are willing to begin practicing today.

Rescripting Challenge

Another important skill that we all need to learn, in order to truly enhance our lives, involves shifting old, limited perspectives into wiser approaches. For that, let’s return to the subject of ‘challenge’. 

In order to get clearer about what you might want to choose moving forward, let’s compare some the more typical perspectives of a wounded child with those of an empowered adult. 

The un-nurtured/wounded child part of us sees challenges through the fear of failure, afraid that we are not capable of taking effective steps or creating acceptable solutions. 

Without nurturing encouragement, the wounded child is afraid of affirming the doubts about Self that we carry. Instead, this part of us endures challenges alone, fearing we are not safe to ask for help and support. 

“I am alone. I don’t know how. It’s all too much for me. I don’t deserve support. I feel pressured to prove myself and I’m afraid to make a mistake!” These are all common perspectives of the wounded child. I know, because these are some of the wounded myths that I carried for many years.

On the other hand, once we begin to show up and nurture ourselves through our challenges, we begin to inspire pieces of the empowered adult potentials instead.

The empowered adult approaches life as a series of learning curves, with constant opportunities to develop Self along the way. 

The empowered adult sees challenges as an opportunity to explore new areas, with constant opportunities to discover new potentials and facets of Self. 

The empowered Adult learns from their inevitable mistakes and failures, grateful for the clarity that each brings, imbuing them with more effective approaches and a deeper awareness of what works well and what does not moving forward.

Hopefully some of the adult perspectives resonate as tangible possibilities. If so, a helpful choice you can begin to practice as we continue through this time of global interruption is to create reminders for yourself. You might create a sticky note or a reminder that you ask Siri to pop up on your smart phone each morning at a certain time. This is particularly helpful in a time of challenge, when the habitual perspectives of the wounded child fears try to suck you in.

To begin a clear negotiation, evaluating which choices come from the wounded child versus the empowered adult, is crucial for recognizing which of your choices set you up well and which ones do not. 

With that in place, I have even more good news. We still haven’t explored the deepest, wisest part of Self — the Soul.

While the Soul may never have been part of your typical conversations, it is extremely helpful to consider. Most of us have never been introduced to the Soul in any practical ways. I would like that to change. The Soul is a very real, practical part of us, that encourages us into wisdom, greatness and sacredness. 

What may be surprising is that what is most sacred to the Soul is the development of Self — ultimately learning to love and value Self as the foundation for our greatest fulfillment. 

When we consider that we have been living in a world which has not been encouraged to prioritize the inner Self, we can see how much we need to begin considering the Soul.

If we continue with our exploration of challenge in our lives, it is helpful to understand that our Souls actually set up our challenges. 

That is because the process of facing challenges is what encourages us to grow the most fully. Encouraging our growth and development is how our challenges truly serve us.

Let’s simply look back to our very first years to become clearer. From the very beginning our lives are structured with challenge, like learning to feed and dress ourselves. If we are nurtured through those initial challenges, we learn to claim the first levels of our personal potential in a sense of safety, love and value. If not, then we develop some important skills, but we don’t develop trust and a sense of safety.

From that point forward, our lives continue to be structured as a series of progressively deepening challenges. Beginning in first grade, we are challenged to learn how to read, how to work with numbers, to share with other children and to be away from home for more extended periods of time. By facing those circumstances, we develop skills and claim various capacities that we will need to thrive in the next levels that we reach. 

It is through the process of facing challenges that we gradually develop Self-confidence, building more and more trust that we are capable and have the power to impact our own lives and the lives of those around us, determined by the choices that we make. 

When that process of facing challenges is nurtured and encouraged, we even learn to trust that our development as an individual truly matters. 

Another gift of the Soul is that it encourages us to focus on teaching the collective, encouraging whatever serves the good of the whole — which is often done by introducing shared obstacles. Our present situation is a perfect example. The Soul recognizes this global interruption as the first time in history that so many people have been able to see firsthand the whole world facing the same challenge at the same time. 

In other words, the Soul understands that all things are there to serve us. From that perspective, we have the opportunity to allow this broader challenge to inspire us to recognize that we are all in this together — embracing our shared humanity and moving beyond our habitual barriers and separations. 

The coronavirus doesn’t care about race, religion, gender, culture, political party, continent or someone’s perceived status in society.

Just consider for a moment that on a Soul level this pandemic is trying to teach us to come together, helping and learning from one another.

The bottom line is that if we are willing to evaluate our challenges as opportunities, instead of roadblocks and pains in the butt, so much more becomes possible. 

More good news. There is an endless list of opportunities that we can all construct that will allow us to make forward moves and healthier choices — such as respecting, honoring and valuing one another in deeper ways than we might have considered in the ‘old normal’ of our lives. I deeply encourage you to continue exploring, and then share some of your inspirations with others. This is another proactive choice that you can make which makes a difference. Again, remember that we hold tremendous power in the choices that we choose to make as individuals.

What Now?

As we prepare to close, let’s do a recap of some highlights.

Facing challenges is an immediate opportunity to make powerful choices, starting with evaluating which ones work well and which ones do not. We all have learning curves and the need to make mistakes in the process of making forward progress. We can all relate to the process of facing challenges and we all have shared needs. All the while, we have Souls that are encouraging us to learn how to love and value in our lives — starting with Self. And there are some core qualities of the child, adult and Soul that will set us up brilliantly to create a more fulfilling dance with life — IF we allow that and choose that as our ‘new normal’.

Remember that even in a time of quarantine, you do not have to be alone. It is so important that we learn how to communicate and share what we are going through. In this way, we can all become allies for working through our challenges — even if that is only via video chat at the moment. 

Over time, it is so important that we don’t forget the lessons of this global challenge.

If we prepare well now, we can begin to invest in relationships that are based on mutual value and nurturing encouragement.

No matter what you choose as your starting places, take it one nurturing step at a time, acknowledging with each choice how much better nurturing feels than separating yourself or spending time blaming others for what you are going through and haven’t chosen to nurture… yet.

There is nothing like a global interruption of our habitually busy lives to give us some extra time to evaluate and make some new choices. The ones I have suggested are just the first of many practical suggestions I would love to make.

In order to provide you with more practical perspectives and nurturing tools, I have created a series of 5 FREE videos for that very purpose. You can easily find those to sign up for at the home page of my website below the opening picture. 

I have already had tremendous success in helping people from around the world to claim more of their personal potentials over these twenty-five years. And I am more than happy to show up during this time of shared challenge to help in any way that I can. Now the ball is in your court. 

Show up for yourself. Reach out. 

If you do, you will be well on your way to a beautiful new normal — one that is filled with meaning, value and purpose. If that is what you choose, you might even turn this time of challenge into one of the most meaningful times of your life. That is my wish for us all.

You may also enjoy reading Amazing Grace: Experiencing the extraordinary within the ordinary by Adyashanti

The post Dancing with Life in a Time of Global Challenge appeared first on BEST SELF.

A soldier discovers his true mission and the power of nature as he heals deep psychic wounds inflicted by war — and the survivor’s guilt that followed

—

I never thought I would live this long. 

This past Veterans Day, I realized that was both a conscious and an unconscious thought that had ruled the last couple years of my life. I’ve doubted my successes. I questioned my choices all in the context of the belief that I simply wasn’t supposed to be here. I felt like I was cheating and stealing from those for whose living was more justified.

When I first came home from Iraq 12 years ago, I questioned why I lived and others with more to live for — kids, communities, careers, and lovers — did not. Why did I — a single man without a partner, kids, career, or community to call home (or so I thought) — survive when others did not? 

This feeling I now had, however, was not that. I was over the initial shock of survival a few years after my return home.

Now, I was questioning why was I still alive? 

Cocaine had come and gone, as had alcoholism. I had a long run of personal and professional success. I had outlived most of the worst statistics of my generation of veterans, but now what? Why was I still here when I felt unwanted, unneeded, and unable to fit any more? 

Two years ago, I felt like the top of the world was just over the next rise. After being recruited away from my job to be an executive for a company whose values felt closely aligned with my own, it seemed that I was taking a step up the career ladder. Research I had been a part of — about the power of the outdoors to support healing from trauma — was received with great fanfare… I had success with my second film project — Skiing in Iraq — that had me returning to places I had been during war or cleaning up after war. I was confident that the next film project I’d tackle would find funding easily and give me enough time to film it and still leave me enough time to be with my family.

I was nearing 40, but as I excitedly told my wife, I felt like I was just starting. A few months later, this train got derailed. My new job and I were not a good fit. I left to pursue other goals. I set up shop as a ‘consultant’ in my extra bedroom. I wrote half-hearted emails to potential clients. I jealously watched my friends and peers accept positions of increasing responsibility, get projects funded, achieve great things, and acquire impressive titles. I mythologized their grandeur as I stared out the basement window to the base of my backyard fence. I promised myself that my situation was just short term.

I surprised myself by landing a few clients. I was excited about my work helping organizations with similar values as my own, do their work better. A few other friends were hanging out shingles of their own and a few joint projects made the future feel bright once again. Together we could make a bigger impact in our freelancing / entrepreneurial exercises than we could on our own.  Recruiters kept calling. I figured it couldn’t hurt to keep interviewing. After preparing for hours and putting on a shirt and tie, I made it through to a few final interviews, excited about the prospect of full-time work at someone else’s organization. I played the conversations over in my head about how I’d tell my fellow freelancers goodbye. Inevitably though, I’d wait a couple of days and get a phone call that started off positively, “We think you’re great…” before shifting to a “but…” and end with, “we can’t wait to see what you do next.” Meanwhile, my collaborative partners shared with me they were moving on as they collected full-time jobs.  

I got depressed. I acted like a jerk to my wife and to my close friends. Nobody, I told myself, wanted what I had. What was wrong with me?

What was wrong with other people? How come everyone else could find a fit in government/corporate/non-profit America? To answer these questions, I needed to look back on my life.

The War

My Mom reminded me the other day that when I was five years old, I told her I wanted to be in the Army or Navy. My Grandpa, a first-generation American whose parents were Czech, served in the Pacific Theater with the US Navy in World War II. My great aunt, the sister of my Grandpa’s wife, also served in the Pacific Theater as part of the Women’s Army Corps. My uncle was a Green Beret in Vietnam as well as my pediatric dentist and orthodontist; he was skilled at torture. Each of these relatives were great role models, but Grandpa was the winner — so if he was in the Navy, I was going to be in the Navy. Unfortunately, at my tall height (just over 6’4” at the time — I’d max out at 6’7”), the Navy required a medical waiver. The Army, however, was delighted to have me without any extra paperwork, so a soldier I’d be!

At the age of 17, I enrolled in an ROTC program at the University of Mississippi. My Dad had to sign my paperwork since I wasn’t legally an adult. After four years of college, I had a guaranteed job in the Army and a philosophy degree to show for my intellectual bravery when, on a steamy day in May 2000, I headed to Ft. Huachuca, AZ before a permanent duty assignment in Darmstadt, Germany. 

The next four years flew by in a blur. Prior to 9/11, the worst deployment one could get was Kosovo — Bosnia being the preferred choice — but fewer and fewer soldiers were getting deployed at all. We sang cadences in training and on long runs that begged for ‘somebody anybody start a war-eh!’ 

Then finally, somebody did.

I didn’t question why the United States wanted to invade Afghanistan. I assumed our engagement in Afghanistan would end quickly. I was most excited to finally be a soldier at war. This was what I had wanted since I was in kindergarten. This was what I had been training for the last five years.

But when the U.S. mobilized forces and invaded Afghanistan, I was left behind through no fault of my own. My unit was strategic intelligence. There aren’t any great books written about it because it didn’t participate in any of the cool battles or wars I read about growing up. Some of our unit got farmed out to other units. Most of us however, stayed at home in our highly protected, secure, containerized, intelligence facility (SCIF) in a rural area at the edge of the suburbs of Darmstadt. Our biggest threat seemed to be an angry dog that would sometimes break free from one of the local Germans out on a walk in the trails around the fenced-in facility.

Nonetheless, I tried hard to get myself deployed to Afghanistan.

I spent my lunch breaks calling around to other units begging other commanders to get me attached to the deploying unit. I needed orders from another unit so I could be released from a job that entailed what seemed like an obscene amount of time spent crafting PowerPoint presentations. No luck.

Later, when we made plans to invade Iraq, I was leading the one platoon that spent a good amount of time in the field within the larger Intelligence group. I figured I’d be a shoe-in for getting to go to war by invading Iraq through Turkey. The Turks, however, never gave us permission. As a result, half of my unit made it to Turkey, while the rest of us stayed home and eventually drove everyone back from the airport. I assumed Iraq would be a short war as well.

I was 0 for 2 for fighting the wars of my generation before getting a six-month deployment to Bosnia. 

This was an incredible opportunity and a challenging assignment — a combat zone, according to the hazardous pay I received — but I felt like I was cheating those who had been asked to fight a ‘real war’ in Iraq or Afghanistan. In 2004, I tried to extend my tour in Sarajevo, but the Army said no. So I said no to the Army. I quit.

I felt guilty leaving. Especially since many of my friends and colleagues were coming home with things like PTSD, Adjustment Disorder, missing limbs, or numerous other physical and mental aches and pains. But the dream I had hoped for when I finally got my commission did not match up with the reality of service. 

No doubt, I met a lot of great people during my time in the military, especially my fellow soldiers and NCOs. There were definitely some special cases in the junior ranks, but most of the shitbags were a few rungs up the ladder from me. I had a few leaders that seemed intent on crushing morale, confusing their subordinates, and peacocking around the office mandating endless changes to reams of PowerPoint slides that, while full of information, told the viewer nothing.

I knew it was time to leave the military, but I had no idea what I was going to do next. The Army was supposed to be my dream, and my dream was supposed to last 20 years. It did not. 

In a last-minute bid to stay, or rather return to Sarajevo, I did an internet search for land mine clearance organizations and applied to the first three companies that popped up in my search results. Surprisingly, I got a job. Instead of a trip back to Bosnia, I was sent down to Angola. After nine months, I experienced some medical complications. That’s when I was moved to Abkhazia, a breakaway province in the Republic of Georgia nestled between the Caucus Mountains and the Black Sea. 

Nine months into my stay, with a promotion glowing in the future, I got an email from the United States Army welcoming me back to service. My reaction was both sad and nervous. I had grown to love the life I was living. I was about to receive a promotion. I was dating an incredible woman. All of that was going to be taken away if I went off to fight in a war that, upon further reflection (or first reflection to be honest), I wasn’t sure I supported.

Stronger than those emotions, however, was a sense of relief. Relief that I would have a chance to go fight in my generation’s war. Relief that I would be able to make, or at least offer, the same sacrifice my friends and colleagues were making. My friends in the international community who had not served did not understand why I felt this way. I did not blame them. One friend with connections high up in his home country, made me an offer of political asylum. I knew I’d never take it. It was, however, one of the kindest gestures anyone has ever offered me. “Don’t let them take your life for an unworthy cause,” he pleaded.

But I was puffed up with pride as I prepared to return to life in the military. The dream I had at age five was going to come true… again.

After a few weeks of leave, I signed into Ft. Bragg along with hundreds of other men and women who had been recalled to service out of the Individual Ready Reserve. I was asked if I needed to delay my urinalysis to prove I was drug-free.  During our first physical fitness test, we were all told not to push ourselves too hard. Apparently, the Army was desperate for bodies.

Just after Easter, we flew to Baghdad. My first five months in the country were primarily staff work — everything I feared I would have to do in the Army when I left the first time. I took in reports from the five Civil Affairs teams assigned to cover the entirety of Western Baghdad. I did my best to create a cohesive picture for my commanders of how the United States Army was winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people.

A few times I got to go off base — ‘outside of the wire’ — to actually visit the people I was there trying to help. One of the missions I had recommended to my boss, and that he signed off on, was to support a group of farmers who did not have access to sorely needed vaccines for their livestock.  I had originally received permission to go on the mission with the veterinarian and team. I wanted to go to see if what I was thinking was helpful both to US goals as well as Iraqi’s. Unfortunately, I ended up staying behind because, no lie, I needed to update the color of yellow I had used on a PowerPoint presentation. As I walked to the gun rack where LTC Daniel Holland, VD was putting on his Kevlar helmet and grabbing his rifle, I said, “I can’t go Colonel. More PowerPoint for the boss.” “No worries,” he said excitedly, “There will be plenty more vaccinations!” I shook his hand, told him to be safe, and sat back down to more PowerPoint.

Two hours later his vehicle, which I was supposed to be in, drove over an improvised explosive device that was planted in the middle of a bridge.

The explosion killed all five people in the HMMWV. There were not enough recognizable pieces of bodies to be put into the caskets that would be draped with flags and sent home empty. 

In the aftermath of this deadly explosion, the sergeant in charge of that team decided to not go outside the wire again. The team leader decided his best course of action for the remainder of his tour was to stay in his room and play video games. I heard later he returned to Iraq a few more times.

I blame neither man for their actions after the explosion. With a team leader slot now open, I was able to negotiate a transfer out of my job and into the vacant position. I was 28 years old. After 23 years of waiting, I was finally going to war.

I loved my job in Iraq. I loved my team. I loved the people we met every day on the streets of Baghdad. 

Yes, we got shot at and blown up. But yes, we also got to work with people who, every day, despite the myriad threats on their lives, showed up to do good work for their community. 

On one of my last patrols, my team got blown up. Had the individuals who attacked us timed the blast a little better, I may not be here today. Instead, our truck’s tires took the bulk of the damage along with the front of our HMMWV. We saw four Iraqis killed by our team returning fire from the ambush zone. Later that day, at a meeting with the neighborhood leadership council, the council leader told me he was glad I was okay. He encouraged me not to take the attack personally. I wish there was a photo of the look on my face after he said that.I was simultaneously dumbfounded and furious.

Years later, I understood what he meant. The young men who attacked us were not necessarily trying to kill us. They may have even loved what they knew of America. Someone gave them a good enough reason to risk their lives in the attack, just like someone had given me a good enough reason to risk my life in Iraq. It is those ‘someones’ I wish waged wars, the ones who do the convincing, not the convinced.

A couple of days after we got blown up, I took my last patrol in Baghdad. My last act of war was giving up on replacing the dried-out gauze covering burns that had consumed about 90% of a young girl, maybe four or five years old. She lived in an internally displaced persons camp in view of a hospital. The skin underneath her gauze was necrotizing. Our attempts to help her only caused more pain. One of my soldiers took out his patrol cap and passed it around to collect hundreds of dollars for her medical treatment. After giving the money to the girl’s mother, we got back into our HMMWVs and drove back to base.  

Seven days later I was back at Fort Bragg. A few hours after landing I ate dinner at an Outback Steakhouse, got shit-faced drunk, and closed down a strip club. Four days later, I called the government travel agent to tell them I had to get home because my girlfriend was expecting. I got on a flight that afternoon, but not before I stopped at a dumpster as I left base to throw away my military gear I didn’t have to return.

I did not have a girlfriend.

I was glad to be out of the Army, but I still felt guilty for coming home. I felt like I had abandoned my friends, Iraqi and American. 

I was afraid I would not live up to the expectations I placed on myself for getting to live when many of my friends did not. If things happen for a reason, this one was a bad one and made no sense. I never heard my Grandpa or Great Aunt, even my Uncle, talk about any of this.

The Shift

After a few weeks of traveling around the States and overseas visiting friends and far flung beach towns trying to surf I moved to Philadelphia. I settled into life as a hard-partying graduate student… I was the only veteran in my cohort of fifty students. I remember one classmate expressing surprise that I had been to war. “The only other person I know who fought in a war was my grandpa,” he said. Graduate school provided me with an easy identity. I knew what to do each day and every night and a lot of mornings. I was able to drink copious amounts of booze and inhale piles of cocaine to get through the day. My life was burning down, but I did a good job hiding the worst of the fire from everyone I knew.

I graduated with an Urban Design degree at the height of the last economic meltdown in 2009. I found a job with a start-up non-profit working to get veterans into ‘green’ careers. Alone in Boulder, CO with few friends and the woman who would become my wife, I routinely called a friend, Chuck, I had served with in Baghdad who lived in nearby Colorado Springs. Our conversations centered around my discontent in my post-military existence. As happy as I was to have left the service, I was now ready to go back in because that is where I knew who I was. It was either that or end it all: suicide.

As happy as I originally was to have left the service, I was now ready to go back in because that is where I knew who I was. It was either that or end it all: suicide.

After a few phone calls, he encouraged me to do something, anything, that would move me away from this mindset. “But what?” I whined. “Come climbing with me. Get yourself the gear and we’ll meet up on the 20^th.” If I was going to die by suicide, waiting a couple of weeks was inconsequential, so on a weekday, I didn’t call in sick or ask for the day off. I just went climbing.

I was scared and nervous. My ego was in fits because I didn’t want to look like an idiot. Turns out though, I didn’t want to die, or even fall too far. So every opportunity I had to tumble down the rock, I clung hard to whatever hand hold or foot hold was available. Long before I even felt a fall coming, I yelled to Chuck to take up slack on the rope. Then we climbed on.

When I got to the top of the climb, I was exhausted, but amazed! What had I just done? I looked into the Rocky Mountains beyond the Front Range and down to the prairies in front of me. I was awed by the beauty I had been missing. As I tied into the rope to rappel down, I lost it. I began to shake and cry. All the pain and stress of the last two years of addiction, my year at war, perhaps even my years of feeling guilty for not going to war — all came coursing through me.

I know now I had a somatic experience. At the time though, after Chuck calmed me down and got me to the ground, I realized it was the first day in two years that I had not been fearful of my past or guilty about my future. 

That climb saved my life. It gave me a reason to be. If it could be this good for me, I thought, how good could it be for other veterans, especially those who fared far worse than me? 

This realization changed the course of my life. 

Eight months later I’d quit my full-time job to found Veterans Expeditions. My co-founder, Nick Watson, had a guiding job with another company, Colorado Wilderness Rides and Guides, that supported our work as best they could. The rest of VetEx was paid for by a small grant from my brother’s high school ex-girlfriend’s little brother’s company along with a combination of my credit card and a few odd jobs I picked up along the way. I hauled furniture. I was an administrative assistant for a company that did insulation and energy audits. I hawked concert and sports tickets. I planned events (did you know there’s a difference between an eight- and ten-person round table? I do now). I did whatever I could to reach my goal: to get as many veterans into the outdoors as possible.

Ultimately this experience led to a position with the Sierra Club, first as the director of their military outdoors program, and later overseeing the entire Sierra Club Outdoors serving veterans, service members, and non-military youth, and adults.

I came to realize that the power of time outdoors was not only an intrinsically healing experience for the mind and soul, but also a catalyst for deeper, more meaningful personal exploration — not just for veterans, but for all.

That’s why in 2014 I launched the Great Outdoors Lab with Dr. Dacher Keltner to put scientific data behind this transformative idea. That same year, I began to think about how time outdoors could be used to augment my personal experiences in war-torn nations. This led to the media project, Adventure Not War, which has resulted in a climbing project in Angola, skiing in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Surely this was all building to something bigger, something better, something more sustained. Only it wasn’t, or at least wouldn’t. Not in the way I wanted anyway.  

Changing the Narrative

The phone calls and emails for client work kept coming in. Small projects, sure, but enough to keep the mortgage paid. My next film project after Iraq, documenting the ski culture in Afghanistan, got funded by the family foundation of the fiancé of a friend I served with in Iraq. Small brand partners filled in the gaps after large brand partners, many of whom I’d been with for several years, walked away. My approach was too different; my films too intimate and dark, they didn’t “want to be associated with an American getting kidnapped and beheaded,” but they were “excited to see the project if I finished it.”

At the time, I couldn’t see the value of all the ‘yeses’ I was getting. The ‘nos’, from larger and more prestigious pocketbooks, were what reverberated in my head.

The irony of this was that the reason I went back to Iraq, and wanted to go to Afghanistan in the first place, was to reshape my own narrative and interactions with each country into something more positive than conflict, war, death, and explosions. Rather than going into these countries with a gun in hand, my goal was to find the spaces that remained beautiful and to seek out joy. 

It was a small team that went to Afghanistan. Myself and two filmmakers. Western military contractors stared aghast as we moved through airport security with ski and snowboard bags and the Afghans who became our guides for our nearly three weeks there. I had no Kevlar vest to put on, no assault rifle to manage, but we did have video cameras, outdoor gear, a healthy swivel on our heads, and plenty of smiles. 

Our mission was to capture the beauty of these nations that too often are only remembered for the horrors that defined them in existing media narratives.

In Angola, Iraq, and Afghanistan, I was amazed at how generously we were welcomed as adventurous travelers with nothing more to give than our time to their landscape and culture. 

Beauty exists everywhere — even if our global leadership at times seems intent on stamping it out. By shifting my own narrative about these places, I was also able to help shift other’s narratives about these locations as well. If nothing else, these expeditions and the films that we created encouraged viewers to stop and consider the positive in both the people and landscapes of war. 

The Struggle

But back in my basement, I was stuck in a negative feedback loop of my own design. Perhaps the belief, or even the belief I thought others had that I would die, should have died, or even the fear that my life wasn’t worth saving after war, persisted deep in my psyche. I wrote off as mere coincidence or inconsequential any good news or positive reinforcement I received. I discounted the belief others had in my work and person. They weren’t the people I wanted to believe in me. They didn’t have the status, the funding, the cache in my mind, to bring me what I thought I wanted. In short, I was a selfish, self-centered, entitled asshole.  

Yet, despite my best efforts to prove otherwise, many people continued to offer me a hand up, an open door, an introduction, enough funding to make the next project happen. But I couldn’t let go of that persistent thought: Shouldn’t I be dead anyway? After war, drugs, alcohol, and a pattern of poor decision-making, what right did I have to still be here?

This past Veterans Day, this swirl of doubt and confusion came together in one sweeping revelation. I was headed out to get a free oil change, thinking about the Afghan Ski Trip. I was thinking how much a friend who had died during our year in Iraq would have loved that trip, when the tears came. I pulled over onto a residential street in a suburb just south of Salt Lake City and cried ugly tears. I sent streams of viscous, thick snot all over my face and down into my beard in heaving sobs of tears.

That is when I realized that I had outlived every conscious and unconscious thought I had about surviving after war. 

I had completed a significant part of my journey and done so with my health relatively intact. I had a wife I loved who loved me a back, a kid I adored who adored me back, a cat that slept on my chest just like a cat in Baghdad, a dog who wagged herself sick with excitement when I came into the house. For nine years I hadn’t had a single dangerous relapse with drugs or alcohol.

But for the last 12 years after returning from four years of war, I was so convinced that if my life wasn’t all perfect, it wasn’t all worth it. I had been fighting so hard for survival, so hard to prove I was worthy of the life others did not receive, that I didn’t know to even define success before those tears came. 

Maybe all those ‘nos’ came because of my selfish entitlement. Maybe they came because I wasn’t the best candidate or my idea was really bad. Or maybe they came because I was simply too afraid. Or maybe, it had nothing to do with me at all. But on the other side, what about all those ‘yeses’? All those people who saw the spark, got a glimpse of the vision, felt the potential sliding into a glorious reality? Were they all lying or misguided, or were they able to see clearly what I could not?

The Awakening

As the sobs began to subside, I decided it was time to lean into those who believed; to try to match their belief in me with my belief in myself. I figured those who had shown time and time again that they wanted what was best for me were making sense. It was time to go back and ask for the help that had been offered but never accepted.

It was time to accept that when the help came, I had to do my part as well. I also had to recognize that I was committed to keep living.

No matter who you are or where you are, it can all be taken away in a moment’s notice, but that is not a reason not to work to create something big, bold, and beautiful. Doing that is hard and almost always necessitates copious amounts of failure, no’s, setbacks, and ‘not quites’, before yes is found. And that, I think, is the crux of it all. 

Yes, I survived. It was a vainglorious effort and the odds were stacked against me — as they are stacked against each one of us to varying degrees war or not. But the privilege was also stacked in my favor, even if I tried to ignore it, was angry I had it, jealous that others more deserving of me didn’t get it, or because it didn’t show up in the package I wanted.

So how did I shift from a survivalist mindset to one of thriving, or at least living? 

The first step is a reminder that past success, just like past failure, doesn’t determine the future.

There’s a good chance I’ll be back hawking tickets or moving furniture or something else, but this time with a sense of joy to be living. As for what needs to come next, it’s the same thing it has always been from that first climb: To promote the transformative power of adventure by building a community around that goal, without having to know what the journey, or even the destination will be moving forward. 

Second, I get to define what success looks like in my life — no one else’s — though it’s nice to collaborate with family and loved ones.

I’ve also had a lot of success. I need to embrace the lessons learned from the real failures, without tipping the balance to live in those failures and shortcomings (or successes), as if they are the only thing that defines me.

Third, I need to set priorities that allow me to move through my life with purpose.

Plenty of other amazing things out there could await me, but they all start by focusing on the act of not just everyday living, but everyday living through my purpose.

Fourth, I need to celebrate the lives of those I’ve lost, not just in Baghdad but in the years before and after the war.

I don’t need to feel guilty if a day goes by when I don’t remember everyone. But when I do, I need to remember their smiles and their gratitude for the time they got. It could all end tomorrow regardless of my success or failure since life is mostly, but not always, out of my control.

I’m so happy my life fell apart — even though it did take the better part of a day to get all that snot washed out of my beard. 

You may also enjoy watching Interview: Brendon Burchard | Live, Love, Matter with Kristen Noel

The post At War…With Myself: A Soldier’s Story of Spiritual Survival appeared first on BEST SELF.

Question Bridge White Women, a social experiment, seeks to bridge the gap between the diversity of thought in one demographic, white women — and to initiate honest civil discourse

—

A question is a powerful thing, a mighty use of words.

~ Krista Tippett

In an age of competing certainties, where we are both more interconnected than ever but also more polarized — how do we build bridges of understanding across the great divides of race, politics, class, and religion?

If you ask Taylor Swift, she’ll counsel us all to just, “Calm Down,” which isn’t bad advice (it’s also a great song and video). But there’s a more active and engaged response, and it’s embedded in the very structure of an ongoing multi-year transmedia project I’m a part of called, Question Bridge: White Women in America.

White women are not often asked how their skin color frees or confines them.

What does it mean to be a white woman in America today? What gives us hope? What keeps us up at night? How do we feel about the state of our bodies, our lives, our families, our communities, our nation, and the planet?

The project aims to help shape a civil national conversation, one that respectfully shows great diversity of thought within a single demographic while also highlighting the points of surprising convergence. 

And we chose white women, in particular, because we want to explore the forces that resulted in a voting pattern that split this group almost cleanly in half in the 2016 Presidential election — a great divide that mirrors the ideological rift in the nation as a whole.

The Question Bridge format is simple and straight forward: Once a white female signs up to participate, we invite her to sit in front of our camera, imagine a white woman different from herself in some way, and then ask any questions she wants to. She is then invited to answer pre-filmed questions from previous participants.

To date, more than 70 ideologically diverse white women from 7 different American cities have asked all types of questions — environmental, political, personal, religious, and more. Life and death, caregiving and childrearing, President Trump, climate change, abortion, immigration, faith, body image… nothing is off limits.

Our team of four white women, two journalists and two filmmakers — does not intervene. We never tell the women what to ask or how to answer (other than, at times, to encourage concision). We are there to facilitate a safe and inherently intimate dialogue in a judgment-free environment. Most importantly, we are there to listen.

It appears to be a revolutionary concept to not only ask people what they think, but to give them the opportunity to ask questions of others.

We begin by encouraging them to ask meaningful questions. We give them the platform, the space, and the respectful quiet that allows them to grow comfortable with the camera and the process. As they speak we glean a sense of their aspirations, obsessions, and political bent. Then we choose the appropriate recorded questions for them to answer in turn. Every single time, a little bit of magic happens.  Having begun with their own questions, they are uniquely open and thoughtful when they answer the questions of others.

During a filming in Phoenix, Arizona, a mid-aged Republican woman asked a provocative question that has been fun to take on the road: “In our political discourse we talk a lot about diversity. Do you think diversity of opinion is as important as diversity of race, gender, sexual orientation, or some of the more standard diversity markers we see? Why or why not?”

Her question touches a bruise without aiming to hurt. More, it invites exploration and conversation rather than defensiveness. It aspires to the kind of generous inquiry championed by Krista Tippett, journalist and host of the public radio program and podcast, On Being. In her book, Becoming Wise: An Inquiry into the Mystery and Art of Living, Tippett writes:

“We want others to acknowledge that our answers are right. We call the debate or get on the same page or take a vote and move on. The alternative involves a different orientation to the point of conversing in the first place: to invite searching — not on who is right and who is wrong and the arguments on every side; not on whether we can agree; but on what is at stake in human terms for us all…

“There is value in learning to speak together honestly and relate to each other with dignity, without rushing to common ground that would leave all the hard questions hanging.”

Hard questions are welcomed on Question Bridge. Women have asked: “What does white privilege mean to you?” “Why do you hate me? Is it because I’m a Republican or because you think I voted for Trump?” And, “Why don’t you worry about climate change when it will likely have devastating effects on your children?”

Yet, because the temperature of our current political climate has been lowered here — and because the women are not physically confronting each other — defensive or angry responses to these and other questions have been the exception. Almost all the answers are revelatory and heart felt.

“White Women in America” is the third in the Question Bridge series. The original concept and product, “Question Bridge: Black Community,” was created by conceptual artist and photography professor Chris Johnson, who is the Executive Producer for Question Bridge: White Women. Chris, an African American male, found early on that by limiting the project scope to a specific demographic, participants were less defensive and more vulnerable and willing to state their views.  

This was a genius discovery, and it’s propelled the goodwill and intimacy that accompanies each encounter on the current Question Bridge. Join us. Questionbridgewhitewomen.com

You may also enjoy watching Interview: Congressman Tim Ryan | America 2.0 with Kristen Noel

The post Building Bridges of Understanding One Question (and Answer) at a Time appeared first on BEST SELF.

After being contacted regarding a #MeToo article, a former fashion model revisits her own story and finds inspiration to shift the bigger picture narrative

—

I don’t talk a lot (if ever) about my former modeling career. It feels as if it’s a distant and closed chapter, long tucked away like the heavy portfolio I used to tote around on ‘go-sees’ as they were called, which were appointments to see clients. Yes, this was long before the digital era, long before selfies, mobile phones, social media and iPads and constant connectivity by virtue of our electronic devices. Calls were made from public payphones. Modeling was real. Very little, if anything was ever retouched. Photos were shot on film and carefully rushed by nervous assistants to photo labs to be developed at the end of the shoot day. There were no filters and there was actually something raw, simple and pure about it. Unlike today.

But within that purity and that lack of digital interconnectedness, lay a world where information was hard to come by and deviant behavior could go unknown. There were no online forums, no cross-referencing and researching — no way for young models to warn each other about smarmy photographers or agents or any other number of predators aside from the good ol’ fashioned way: word of mouth.

When I ended my career promptly after my 30^th birthday, the tides were changing and so was I. The ‘waif’ look was in and I was far from a waif or a wannabe. My heyday came in the glamourous early 90’s — make-up, big hair, curvy bodies. It was a celebration of womanhood. Until it wasn’t — and heroin chic was all the rage. Even though an emerging new market celebrating real women of real sizes was coming around the bend — I wanted out. Next chapter.

It’s interesting how seemingly ‘random’ things can pop up in our lives (and our inboxes) that we can summarily dismiss as being either insignificant or perhaps even irritating. Note to self: These are always the things to pay attention to.

I’ve recently been contacted a few times ‘out of the blue’ by reporters from reputable media outlets inquiring about my experience as a fashion model in the 1980’s – 90’s in Paris (and in particular, my interactions with certain modeling agents). Let’s just say this inquiry isn’t about celebration, but rather of questionable conduct…of which there was much. But that’s no new story. Yawn.

So why now? Is it a piggyback upon the #MeToo movement?

These inquiries made me both roll my eyes and get a bit frustrated. It was a long time ago. I quit modeling 20 years ago after a 15-year career. That chapter is closed.

Besides, what’s the objective here?

Yes, there are countless stories I could tell about sleazy European modeling agents who were entrusted with the lives and careers of young innocent models from around the globe who arrived bright-eyed, naïve and with a suitcase full of dreams. I could share the tales of physical and emotional abuse, and unscrupulous practices. I could uncover the ugly underbelly of the seemingly glamorous image-making industry. I could tell stories of rich playboys, drugs and even an American model in Milan who was sent to jail for killing an Italian playboy I knew. But those really aren’t my stories to tell. They aren’t my experiences. They weren’t my abuses. My abuser, my Paris agent, died several years ago. I still squirm at the memory of his groping hands, his emotionally abusive tactics and his nightly attempts to visit my bedroom when I was only 16 years old.

And yet, still, the journalists reach out leaving me messages on all my phones (I’m surprised at their resourcefulness) and by email.

Walking one morning with a friend, I mentioned the outreaches. I told him how I was being pursued by phone and email…and how I deleted messages and left emails un-responded to. This long-winded set-up is simply because he turned to me on our walk and said, Well, what if you could spin the story to serve others? Instead of feeding into the exposé nature of the inquiry, what if you got to express the things you do feel positive about sharing?

That stopped me in my tracks. Those words spoke to me.

Those sentiments gave me back my power and even made me contemplate the possibility of tip toeing back into that old chapter to take a peek — and connect to a forgotten piece of myself.

Like reaching back to hold the hand of my younger self, I could share things not motivated by being a part of a salacious article, not by jumping on the band wagon and commiserating for commiserating’s sake — but rather sharing because it could potentially be a part of shifting a narrative that needs to be shifted.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t believe stories shouldn’t be told and wrongs shouldn’t be ‘righted’ — that abusers shouldn’t be called out and held accountable. But if I’ve learned anything along my own life journey, it’s that there is always more to the story. Far too often we move through the chapters of our lives like checking to-dos off our lists. Done. However, that’s not how healing works. That’s not how we use our experiences and feel what is necessary.

It makes me question how I can parent myself better, how I can nurture feelings I may have suppressed and wounds I have left raw and untended. Shoving something to the back of the closet and declaring it as ‘the past’, doesn’t make it go away. Shaming, guilting or beating up ourselves doesn’t make them disappear — if anything it prolongs unnecessary agony. Our life chapters unfold as they do for a reason and they have led us to here, in this present moment.

So, why they are reaching out to me isn’t the only question. What am I going to do with it, is really all that matters. Like catching fireflies, the moment can slip through my fingertips or it can be seized. Encouraged by my friend, I chose the latter.

Of course, hind sight is 20/20. Of course, I wish I had made some different choices. And surely,   one-off abuses happen. However, there are industries like modeling, acting, performing — where abuses are pandemic and built into the fabric of their very foundation. Why is that an accepted norm? Why do we laugh about the ‘casting couch’, yet become outraged with the #MeToo movement? We can’t have it both ways. Are we in or are we out? Do we read about the perpetuation or do something about it? And even outside of those industries, abuses take place in work spaces everywhere. The big question isn’t is this happening…it’s why and what do we plan on doing to shift it?

How, where, when are we going to show up differently for ourselves and others?

Maybe just maybe, when we nurture our own wounds we can do the same for others and we can show them how to do it for themselves.

We can empower young people to trust their guts, to listen to the wisdom of their bodies and help give them voice. We need to talk to them and we need to protect them. We need to do better.

It’s kind of ironic that our technological conveniences have actually complicated life, interactions and our connection to our emotions. The information is there and yet, detachment still thrives.

It took me almost 3 weeks to respond to the one email I must’ve forgotten to delete. As I stared at it on my computer screen, I danced between the quick press of the delete button (making it and all its stirrings disappear into the ethernet) and a thoughtful response. And btw, of course, the skeptic in my did a quick Internet search on the reporter just to make sure he was legit (because in 2019, I am availed of that privilege). But it finally dawned on me having been sparked by the conversation I had with my friend, deleting didn’t feel empowering. It felt like I was stepping away from being the change I wanted to see in the world.

When we don’t show up at the table, we can’t shift the needle and impart change.

We don’t need more stories. We know the stories. We’ve all heard the stories. We need to explore the underbelly of why so we can change the stories. We all need to look at the societal role here and our part in the production. Where are our priorities — on celebrity, the Kardashians, on the insatiable desire for acquiring more stuff? Where were and are the parents in this equation? Why weren’t young girls telling anyone what was happening to them in the 1980’s – 90’s and clearly still aren’t?

We can also empower ourselves by doing something about it — not just by calling it out, but by leading a different way. Yes, changing the trajectory of any narrative requires showing up and telling our truth. Years ago when I was first sparked to begin writing my inspirational memoir, an epic phoenix-rising-from-the-ashes tale — a close editor friend, Nina, encouraged me to write more story. The notion made my skin crawl. I didn’t want to tell more. I wanted to share ‘just enough’, and tell others what to do and move on.

Oh how the Universe must’ve been laughing. Today, I fully recognize and guide authors to embrace the golden thread that weaves through Best Self Magazine: story. We hear and learn differently, in a much more impactful and authentic way via story. Good story transcends whether it’s yours or mine — it enfolds us all. It speaks Universal truth and connects us in unimaginable ways. It reconnects us to our power and to what is possible no matter the circumstances.

Of course my friend Nina was right. Of course I needed to tell more, but the timing was all wrong. I wasn’t ready. I wasn’t healed. I wasn’t making the connections. I was still partially asleep…and most of all, I was still in it. I was still stuck in the weeds of my own healing. And that’s ok. It’s just not the time to tell others what to do.

Chapters are meant to be traveled through. We aren’t meant to get stuck in one. They are fluid and evolving. But when we are wounded, we seek refuge and hide — unless we have the tools to nurture ourselves back to health, we often try to tuck them away, out of sight out of mind. That’s not how our healing works, and yet we are surprised when things pop back up in our lives and transport us to a forgotten land.

The irony isn’t lost upon me. And as I have picked my own memoir project back up after tabling it for years — suddenly, this chapter emerged again in real time.

Now, that doesn’t mean I’m going to pull out the old portfolios, but the timing is poignant for me. While I once hid (not even having any social media accounts), I now have reconnected with many model friends from back in the day. I’m no longer hiding, I’m going to use my voice to do something productive and empowering with my experiences.

I didn’t delete the email from the reporter; instead, this is what I sent him:

The abuses of the modeling industry is not a new story of which I honestly have little more to contribute than I ever did. I have been out of the fashion industry for 2 decades now and essentially have no interaction or connection to it any longer.

That said, what does interest me is a different twist…

What do we do to change it? Why is it still going on? Is it still going on? And if so, what does that say about society and the role we all play within it?

When I first went to Paris as a 16-year old, I didn’t have a mobile phone to text or call anyone. I didn’t have a computer to email or do a Google search. Life by virtue of the digital world (or lack there-of) should be playing a contributing factor in this equation.

I don’t have any salacious personal stories to share. I never experienced the degree of abuses being reported about. But what I am interested in is the other story — not just the ‘me too’, but rather the ‘what now’.

Perhaps your story is long written by now, but if you ever want to delve into the other story, let’s talk.

I never heard back from him. Clearly, this wasn’t the story he wanted to tell. But that’s OK. I don’t need him to tell it, I can speak for myself. It takes a village to lift one up, and yet that same village can also turn a blind eye. At some point, we need to decide what kind of village we want to be.

The chapters of our live are filled with proverbial forks in the road where we were faced with taking one path or another, choosing to go this way or that. Sometimes we may have regretted it. Perhaps we’ve beaten ourselves up about those choices. Sometimes we can’t let it go. But each and every one of those choices has informed who we are and how we got here despite the bumps, bruises, derailments and growing pains.

We are where we are…so now what? I always try to remind myself, Are you going to be used by the events of your life or are you going to use them?

Meaning is made. What can you do with the pieces and parts of your life that has been hidden away?

I don’t know if I’ll ever hear back from this reporter. It doesn’t really matter. His outreach reminded me of who I am and how I want to show up in life for myself, my son and others. It’s an awesome opportunity, one we are each availed of every time we’re challenged.

Let’s tell new, empowering stories. It’s not about revisionist history…it’s about seizing the meaning from the history we’ve had and consciously paving the path ahead. That’s how we shift the tides and create real legacy.

The post From #MeToo to #WhatNow: A Former Fashion Model Puts The ‘Self’ Back In Self-Empowerment appeared first on BEST SELF.

Inspired by those locked away and too often forgotten, one woman shines light on incarcerated men through education, poetry and hope

—

I remember the first time I shut the classroom door behind me in a maximum-security men’s prison. I don’t remember it because it was frightening — it wasn’t. I remember it because I felt at home. I was in the right place. 

Between the chalkboard and the barred windows, I found 15 college students waiting for me. They opened their notebooks and we began our discussion. About five minutes later, there was a voice on the intercom. Somehow, two and a half hours had passed, and it was time for me to leave. I didn’t want to.

Those students wrote me papers about Erich Fromm’s ideas on disobedience, Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s deft use of Thomas Jefferson’s work, and MLK, Jr.’s rhetorical choices. One of my students started his college career writing about Plato’s cave in my class. He finished his coursework with a 100-page senior project about feminism and Shakespeare a few years later. 

That first class met almost 15 years ago. I’m still teaching in prison. Most people who do that will tell you what I’m about to:

Once you have engaged with these students, you don’t want to teach in a traditional college classroom. In prison, college propels powerful life changes that are hard to quantify.

When you have worked with students as mature and driven as these, students with this much torque on their education goals and this much commitment to the process, you don’t want to go back to students who enrolled in college because that’s “just what you do” (I count myself in that category).

We outside the barbed wire can forget that those within it are individuals with names, pasts, quirks, talents, families, emotions, bodies, transformations, futures — just like every other sentient being on this planet.

The notion that everyone behind bars is a monster; that they are all the same; that justice is being served by each unique person’s placement there; that they would never be productive/positive members of society; that they don’t wish to grow and change; that they don’t follow what’s going on in the world outside — these are dangerous myths. 

We like to believe that anyone we subjugate, human or non-human, is part of a nameless, faceless group that deserves what it gets. That lets us not care about injustice. It lets us be lazy. It makes it easier for us to continue ineffective, inefficient, oppressive systems.

I’m a poet, so to put it poetically: What a bunch of crap.

For many years, people would ask me if I was writing poems about prison. I wasn’t. I wasn’t there for writing fodder. But during a hiatus between one teaching gig and another, inspired by my many incarcerated and formerly-incarcerated friends and in homage to them, words began to flow. Of course, I draw on the experiences and philosophies of people I have known, but I could never speak for them: they are men who can speak for themselves. So, I created a fictional world, an imaginary prison populated by the voices of imaginary men. From that world, Visiting Days was born in April 2019. 

Visiting Days was published by Willow Books, a wonderful small press started by the Detroit-based Renaissance woman Heather Buchanan. Its poetry editor, Randall Horton, solicited the manuscript because he felt it was timely in the way it cast incarceration in poetry. Randall is a brilliant poet, and he’s also formerly incarcerated and understands as much as anyone does the damage that de-individualizing men and women does to them, their families, and society. Truthfully, I didn’t think I’d be a candidate for Willow because it has historically only published writers of color. I’m proud to be part of their roster.

I’ve had a wonderful time launching Visiting Days outside prison walls, but the most satisfying feedback has come from inside. I’ve sent the book to several men I know who are still incarcerated, and they in turn have shared it with others. The comments have been profoundly moving. One man I don’t know who borrowed the book wrote:

“It is enriching to know that there are still people who take the time to listen to us. We are often forgotten in here, with no outlet through which to express ourselves. I think that poetry is a great vehicle of expression, but there is often a traffic jam preventing any real communication. Seeing this book being published caused me to feel whole again, as if my voice could one day be worthy of being heard.”

Another commented:

“I ran through many emotions as I read Visiting Days because it seemed that I was reading my own thoughts and emotions put down on paper for me. There are just so many frustrations that I go through from not being able to express how I feel being in here for so long. Then here comes this book expressing those things.”

No responses have been more satisfying than these and ones like them, responses that connect these poems from an outsider directly to the voices inside. We feel each other’s individuality, which is of course how it should be. In the words of another Sing Sing reader:

“It’s about time that people stop forgetting about us and throwing away the keys. We are not all monsters. Some of us are good people who just need a second chance. We hurt and we feel happy. We fail and excel. We are vessels of potential, and that’s forgotten. Hopefully now it’s not.” 

I wish this didn’t need to be said, but it does: no one is more individual than anyone else, wherever they reside, whatever their pasts or contexts or stories or families.

What a world we’d have if we created societies with that in mind.

— 

Poems from Visiting Days

Prison labor is deservedly controversial. Several poems in the collection deal with this subject, including one that sees the desk welded by an incarcerated man in a prison workshop placed in the Freedom Tower — this is our ironic 21st century reality. Here’s one in the voice of someone working in a prison mattress shop: 

Ernest (Vocational)

“The materials produced by the Mattress Shop are standard items used in state and local facilities and universities throughout the state.”  — NYS Department of Corrections

Education is part of this. For instance: I had to get my GED.
And for instance: my work will lie under a student 
at Buffalo State. On my clothed buttons lie students 
about to get laid, students dreaming of books
and getting laid. Dreaming of stories and science. Never 
of their mattress. Never of its tufting machine operator, 
or tape edge operator, never of its felon. Its spring mattress 
assembler. Its twenty-to-life adhesive operator, cutting 
machine operator, conditional-release-2023 mattress 
sewing machine operator, its GED-2012 stuffing machine 
operator, its man. 

The poem “Knowledge” is inspired by someone I met who, like me, is an activist on behalf of non-human animals. This man, Intelligent, developed an anti-violence philosophy while incarcerated as part of his rehabilitation, and in doing so “extended his circle of compassion to include all living things,” as Albert Schweitzer urges. To Intelligent, violence is violence, whether it is to a man or a hen. He maintained a vegan lifestyle within prison walls, an enormous challenge. He’s since been released and continues his vegan activism. I wanted to honor him and his philosophy, and share his message of compassion:

Knowledge (East Wing)

I honor life by not taking it anymore. Not a fish’s life.
Not a calf’s. No one’s brother or child. 

I did violence. I put it between my teeth
and it formed my blood, and I took blood.

Now I eat what they ate in Eden before violence.
Now I ask forgiveness for the life I’ve taken

that wasn’t mine to take—the man, and the calves
and fishes, the chicks and their mothers. 

The cops laugh. Their work is domination.
They lord over, and some men on the block 

call themselves kings. But I am done with that,
in every soul of me, every body.

As regimented and oppressive as prison is, people can find ways to own their own lives and grow into themselves. One way is through reading and writing literature. One of the many people who have found themselves through poetry while incarcerated is Etheridge Knight. His poems in turn have influenced and solaced many. “Knight (East Wing)” includes several phrases from brilliant poems that Etheridge Knight wrote in prison. I wanted to honor Etheridge Knight’s enormous influence:

Knight (East Wing)

Poisoned water, poisoned sleep
ground under the heel of my pillow.
If I didn’t know your cell song,
I would think I tread the red
circle alone. 

But Etheridge, I found you
here, and I have rolled 
myself up in your night speech,
so I know something good
come out of prison.

And I have pressed against 
the western wall, so I know
you saw through stone.

It’s not visions in my cell,
never those. Tony hung
from his sheet and I see him.
I see the bars cut the tensed cloth
into pieces across from me.
But not as visions.

And I’d like to report to you,
Sir Knight who gifted me
a name:

Sometimes the wind rings 
in this ear and then the other, 
but this poetman will die
as trumpets.

Something good come out
of prison. 

Have you ever wanted to be alone with someone you love? Imagine that being impossible. For most people in prison, it’s just that. Of course, that’s the reality for the people they love who aren’t incarcerated, too: they’re being punished as well. “Ingrid” imagines a woman coming to visit her beloved in prison. She, like all visitors, arrives first and waits for him in a room full of couples and families, bearing witness to the reduction of relationships to these public, regimented, curtailed sessions:

Ingrid (Visiting room)

The woman who won’t shut up, the kid whose eyes cross, 
the couple old as Moses with their slip-on shoes and clear bag 
of dollars. We all go straight for the vending machines, Swiss 
steaks enrobed in plastic for her, Swiss & turkey sub for him,
must be something about the Alps. 

What if the guard told a joke that was funny? There was a jumble 
of high chairs in that corner when I got here, now just one 
facing the wall, the wall an under-the-sea mural, all of us fish 
in air. The choking poster rolls its eyes above the Bible table. 

Now the men come through, one of them you, and check in 
at the guard’s double chin, like everyone, like always, 
and like always for a moment I can’t look up.

The question of who is and who is not allowed to participate in society, to engage in citizenship, is on my mind a lot because it’s so clear that many of my students would be strong community members if given the opportunity. Here is a tribute to them:

Hawk (North Hall)

“You cannot promote free will… by extinguishing it.”  — Bruce Western

A whistling hollow passes 
as you pass another citizen
in the street. The whistling
hollow a dead soul makes, or
a me-shaped hole not
on its way to create
in the world. Not allowed
to create in the world.
And what will rush 
into that vacuum?

What if I am 
worthy, not danger.
I am denied you. And
you don’t know \
who you are
without me.

What if my will 
would bend
toward citizen.
What if I would do 
out there like you do.
Better.

—

You may also enjoy reading Life After Death Row: How Magick Saved My Life, by Damien Echols

The post Writing From The Inside Out: Incarceration Through The Lens Of Humanity appeared first on BEST SELF.

Living with a genetic disability inspires a lifetime of service — and overcoming biases

—

On a flight to Los Angeles, I cannot concentrate on the important UNICEF speech on the global refugee crisis that I should be writing to be presented at the Annenberg Space for Photography. It’s a really big deal.

But my mind is racing and my heart hurts after being totally stunned by the actions of two airport TSA (Transportation Security Administration) agents who insisted on giving me a security screening known as a pat down in a private room. This is usually done in a wheelchair out in the open.

This time, however, as I struggled to stand, they posed a question that I wondered was even legal to ask: “Were you born like this?”

Obviously they were referring to my weakened body and the fact that I needed to lean on the wall, as well as my walker, in order to stand. While I invite inquiries about my condition to raise awareness about disabilities and break down stigma, their tone was not one that made me feel empowered in that moment.

I quietly explained that while I was born with a genetic defect, HIBM (Hereditary Inclusion Body Myopathies), a rare type of Muscular Dystrophy, the ‘impairment’ did not manifest itself until adulthood and that I was only diagnosed at age 30.

Their response, which probably came from their version of empathy, was instead just a worse kick in the gut: “Well that’s just awful. You sure are lucky your husband married you this way. What a blessing he is.” As they proceeded with the pat down, I was just dazed. My outspoken self had no idea how to respond, partly because I was confused about how I was feeling and shocked they could be so rude.

My husband John was waiting patiently, already annoyed with them for taking me in, so it did not help when they both praised him to high heaven for marrying me. “We heard your story,” they said to him. “You really are a blessing to her.” My husband could see the discomfort in my eyes, and my desire to simply get out of there, so he did not entertain their comments with a response about himself, rather with a sweet word about me, as he always does.

Later, sitting on the plane, the struggle inside me to make sense of what had just happened began to infuriate me. I lamented that I did not have my thoughts in place earlier to respond to the TSA agents with the following:

1. I am not any less of a woman, wife, companion or partner because I live with a disability.
2. I am not a victim because I live with a progressive muscle-wasting disease.
3. Yes, I am vulnerable and because of it, more courageous.
4. Yes, I have different abilities, which makes me absolutely unique.
5. Yes, I sometimes need help, but that means more moments to cuddle close together and reasons to say ‘thank you’.
6. My husband does not love me DESPITE my disability. On the contrary, he loves me because of how I face this daily struggle with dignity.
7. Yes, my husband is a blessing, but not because he ‘married me like this anyway’.

Are expectations of humanity so low that someone who marries a man or a woman with an impairment is automatically regarded as a saint? Are standards for being ‘marriage material’ that vapid and vain? Why does society still think so little of what people with disabilities have to offer to a marriage, a job or society?

If you, or anyone you know, has any of these small-minded, ignorant and archaic ideas, please do me a favor…

Wake Up!

Recognize all the valuable contributions that people of all abilities make every day to their relationships, families and communities.

Smarten Up!

Educate yourself on the issues facing people with disabilities to help shatter stigma and discrimination.

Rise Up!

Support people and causes advocating for inclusion and equality. Walk the talk, whether it be a sexy strut or wobble like mine.

If my unapologetic outspokenness has made you uncomfortable, be reminded that I take great pride and pleasure in being a part of human diversity, as a woman living with a disability. By no means does this bold stance come from natural born self-confidence, but rather an intuitive drive within me to serve others less fortunate than myself.

I have known from a young age that no matter what was going on with me, there was someone worse off than I was.

In helping them, I found a coping mechanism for all of my childhood traumas. This all sounds quite sophisticated for a child, but it truly is how I made it through some very difficult years.

My childhood was complicated and scary — not exactly one of the fairytales. I did not know many of the simple childhood joys of careless play, a safe haven home or childlike innocence. Our home life was one big secret that very few people ever knew about. Alcoholism and abuse, an evil that had followed my mother from her own broken past, possessed her from the time she divorced my loving father when I was just 4 years old.

The Chaos

Heartbreak was well known to me from a young age. I yearned to live with my father, holding my stuffed animals tightly during bedtime prayers, “If there is a God, please help us escape to daddy.” That wish would not come true for 11 years, until I was 15 years old.

I can count on one hand the happy memories with my mother. There must have been more — at least I hope there were — but they have been drowned out by the nightmare that was the day-to-day managing of her intoxication, violent moods and absence, sometimes days for on end.

Nevertheless I loved her, despite the neglect, the violence and the abuse. Sadly, her love for her children, my little brother and I, could not overpower the demons she fought. I understand now that her sadness and despair must have been as deep as mine, because soon after we moved away, after a decade of losing herself in a bottle every day — 40 ounces of Vodka to be exact — she took her own life. I was just a teenager and heartbroken again.

The Vision

When I was 6-years-old we were watching a telethon raising money for starving children somewhere in Africa. As much as a little one can be bewildered, I was… unable to accept the injustice of a child going hungry.

“But why not?” I boldly questioned when denied the option of sending some of our left over dinner to Africa. Sharing what we had made perfect sense to me. But instead of leftovers, I sent sponsorship money — coins I collected that very same night from my neighbors after I carried a shoebox around our apartment complex going door to door. My efforts resulted in something like $12.00, an absolute fortune in my mind, enough as the telethon promised, to save the life of a suffering child.

I figured out that night, determined with all my 6-year old might, what I had to do: help suffering children in need.

I proudly announced my plan to everyone. Mrs. Looman, my first grade teacher, called my mother to make sure I was ok after a passionate plea to my classmates to follow suit on this humanitarian quest (remember, we were only 6). Luckily, my schools eventually presented opportunities to dive into issues of social justice.

When I was 12 years old, my Social Studies class taught us about global affairs and the United Nations. Finally, it became crystal clear. I now had a concrete goal to channel my passion: When I grew up, I would work for the United Nations! You can check my school yearbook bios or ask my friends what I was going to do when I grew up and they will tell you the same. I knew it, I declared it, and I made it a reality. Who knew that early coin drive would lead to a professional career fundraising for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to support the world’s most vulnerable and marginalized children?

The Journey

So my journey began to prepare myself to be a competitive candidate to join the United Nations humanitarian agencies in order to save children’s lives. I reveled in my studies, especially world affairs, history and French class (because you need to be fluent in at least two UN languages).

Any social justice volunteer campaign that our school hosted, I joined: canvassing for the Canadian Cancer Society, climbing the stairs at Toronto’s CN Tower (twice) to raise money for the World Wildlife Fund or sleeping in the school library without food for a 24-Hour Famine to do my part for World Vision. I competed in every student UN speech and writing competition I could find.

Soon after my mother died, I represented Canada at the 1995 World Summit of Children. With 137 other youth delegates from around the world, I met the UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Gahli and shamelessly told the Canadian Ambassador to the UN that his mind was clouded with politics and economics. He was clearly unable to see what needed to be done to save the world’s children.

Oh yes, I said all that as I handed over our delegation’s suggested amendments to Agenda 21 on the Rights of the Child, a cheeky move that did get me scolded. But I did not care.

I was feisty, outspoken, determined, empowered and passionate, with a fire that has yet to die out.

In college I pursued a degree in International Development, studied a third language (Spanish) and spent a calendar year in a developing country, ensuring that I had the guts and stamina to live abroad.

Upon graduating, the first internship I applied to (of more than 50, but really the only one I wanted) was with the United Nations Association of Canada, a steep competition of more than 7,000 candidates for 11 spots around the world. Somehow my plan worked. In 2001, I joined the World Food Programme, the food aid agency of the UN, in Ecuador and thus materialized my childhood calling. For the past 15 years, living in 10 different countries — mostly with UNICEF — I have indeed experienced a young person’s dream taking flight.

Interestingly, it is not my career that defines my essence. I also recognize how the globetrotting might be have been a crutch or escape from my past, a coping mechanism to deal with my own internal struggle of parental abandonment and suicide grief. In reality, it was the epic adventure of living with HIBM, a maze for which there is no handbook or Guide for Dummies, that has guided me to my best self.

Navigating this tumultuous new reality that has stripped away layers of defense mechanisms, pretenses, Band Aids and false certainties, has left me emerged in a naked vulnerability, blissfully immersed in courage, loving self-confidence, genuine self-identity, humility and a newfound and more profound purpose: as a global advocate for people with disabilities worldwide.

Being of service has been my saving grace.

This belief system is one that not only gifts a sense of purpose, but has healed the wounds of my past, while empowering me with super powers to face the obstacles of my precarious future.

Always maintaining a perspective of where I am in relation to others — better off or worse — has led me to go beyond what most people consider normal. I am so obstinate that I know my weakening body was given to me (rather than my brother who had a 50% chance of having the same genetic condition), because I sincerely believe HIBM is a blessing rather than a curse. Living with a disability and progressive disease, I can truly serve others in even more profound and meaningful ways than what my childhood heart dared to dream.

And marrying my gorgeous husband? That absolutely is another divine element on my path. Our marriage nourishes a part of my heart that was just waiting to flourish. Our love brings out an even more raw reflection of myself and helps me shine on a unique plateau of mutual respect and encouragement where there are no limitations, only exciting possibilities.

Ready For My Close Up

Today, I strive to break down the stigma and discrimination towards people with disabilities. Whether giving a speech to fundraise for UNICEF or taking on great physical and psychological feats like crossing the Grand Canyon in a one-of-a-kind expedition — and creating a correlating documentary, Her Inescapable Brave Mission — I work to redefine my own relationship to HIBM while shifting the perception for others.

Leg braces, walkers and all… I’m still that young girl who toted a shoebox around to collect funds… the one who believed in possibility — and overcoming adversity.

You may also enjoy Interview: Kris Carr | Crazy Sexy Awakening with Kristen Noel

The post Wake Up, Smarten Up, Rise Up | How a Genetic Disability Inspired a Life of Service appeared first on BEST SELF.

A Conversation with Nancy Pelosi about what it will really take to make a woman president

—

Four years ago, when I first began writing my book, What Will It Take to Make a Woman President? Conversations About Women, Leadership & Power, there were no female candidates running for president and that benchmark seemed distant and out of reach.  So it was incredibly exciting a few months ago to be able to witness Hillary Clinton mark the milestone of becoming the first female presidential nominee of a major political party.

No matter where you stand on the political spectrum, this is a symbolic breakthrough we can and should all celebrate together, just as we did with Barack Obama’s historic win, as a positive sign that we are moving towards greater diversity and a reflective democracy.

In the interviews I conducted for my book, many interviewees reflected on what having a woman president would mean for our country, culture, and collective women’s leadership.

The consensus was that having a woman break the presidential barrier would have an undeniable positive impact on women and girls in this country. The symbolism alone would be incredibly powerful, especially for young women and girls who would see first-hand that it is possible for women to be successful, respected leaders — especially the highest leadership position of them all.

That’s the reason I decided to write my book in the first place: my daughter.

The book was inspired by my eight-year-old’s seemingly innocent question after we were celebrating Barack Obama’s historic win: “Why haven’t we ever had a woman president?”

Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, the first female Speaker of the House, shared that sentiment in this interview, below, excerpted from the book.

I look forward to the day when our daughters don’t have to wonder why there have been no women presidents, but when there have been several for them to look up to and learn from — and when they too can easily imagine that they might very well be the next.

NANCY PELOSI

“It’s about equality, but it’s not just about equality. And the reason it’s necessary to have more voices is because that strengthens the debate and it strengthens the decisions. It isn’t that women coming in are better than men; they’re different from men. And I always say the beauty is in the mix. To have diversity of opinion in the debate strengthens the outcome and you   get a better result.”

 Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader of the U.S. House of Representatives for the 113th Congress, is focused on strengthening America’s middle class and creating jobs, reforming the political system to create clean campaigns and fair elections, enacting comprehensive immigration reform, and ensuring safety in America’s communities, neigh- borhoods, and schools. From 2007 to 2011, Pelosi served as Speaker of the House, the first woman to do so in American history.

For twenty-five years, Pelosi has represented San Francisco, California’s 12th District, in Congress. She first made history when House Democrats elected her the first woman to lead a major political party. She has led House Democrats for a decade and previously served as House Democratic Whip.

Under the leadership of Pelosi, the 111th Congress was heralded as “one of the most productive Congresses in history” by congressional scholar Norman Ornstein. President Barack Obama called Speaker   Pelosi “an extraordinary leader for the American people,” and the Christian Science Monitor wrote: “Make no mistake: Nancy Pelosi is the most powerful woman in American politics and the most powerful House Speaker since Sam Rayburn a half century ago.”

Pelosi brings to her leadership position a distinguished record of legislative accomplishment. She led Congress in passing historic health insurance reform, key investments in college aid, clean energy and innovation, and initiatives to help small businesses and veterans. She has been a powerful voice for civil rights and human rights around the world for decades. Pelosi comes from strong family tradition of public service in Baltimore. Married   to Paul Pelosi, she is a mother of five and grandmother of nine.

MARIANNE SCHNALL: Why do you think we’ve not yet had a woman president? What do you think it will take to make that happen?

NANCY PELOSI: Well, [there are] two reasons why we will, and one is there are plenty of talented women — one in particular, Hillary Clinton, who I think would go into the White House as one of the most well-prepared leaders in modern history. She has the full package of having served in the White House and as a senator and secretary of state. She knows the issues in depth and she has great values, a good political sense, and is highly respected by the American people. So… how long will it take? Just as soon as she makes her decision! [laughs] That would be the shortcut — it isn’t a shortcut, it’s over two hundred years due. Why I think it will also happen is the American people are very, very ready for a woman president. They’re far ahead of the politicians, and that may be why we haven’t had a woman president.

I always thought it would be much easier to elect a woman president of the United States than Speaker of the House, because the people are far ahead, as I say, of the electeds, on the subject of a woman being president.

And in Congress, you know, as I said on the day I was sworn in, you have to break the marble ceiling — forget glass, the marble ceiling that is there of just a very male-oriented society where they had a pecking order and they thought that would be the way it always was and they would always be in charge, and, “Let me know how I can help you, but don’t expect to take the reins of power.” So it was interesting to me that we were able to elect a woman Speaker, and it wasn’t because I was a woman. That’s the last thing I could ask my members: to vote for   me because I was a woman. But I just had to get there in the way that  a woman would get to be president; not because she’s a woman — says  she immodestly — but because she has the talent and the know-how and inspires confidence that she can do the job, whatever that job happens to be. In this case we’re talking about president of the United States.

MS: Looking at the bigger picture, because sometimes this gets framed as equality for equality’s sake, but why is this important to have more women represented and women’s voices — not just ultimately in the presidency, but in Congress and in Washington?

NP: Well, I think you’re right — it’s about equality, but it’s not just about equality. And the reason it’s necessary to have more voices is because that strengthens the debate and it strengthens the decisions. It isn’t that women coming in are better than men; they’re different from men. And I always say the beauty is in the mix. To have diversity of opinion in the debate strengthens the outcome and you get a better result. I do think that women bring a tendency, an inclination, toward consensus building that is stronger among women than men, as I have seen it so far.

MS: Women have made progress, and certainly it was history-making in terms of the number of women in Congress from this last election, but it’s still very far from parity. As women have seemed to make strides in so many other areas, why do you think progress for women in Washington has been so slow?

NP: Well, we’ve had a woman Speaker of the House. I don’t think enough appreciation was given to that, because I think a lot of people didn’t know what the Speaker of the House was. Now they do because they see an obstructionist one. Not to toot my own horn, but that’s a very big deal. President, vice president, Speaker of the House — you’re not there because the president chose you, you are there with your power derived from the membership of the Congress of the United States, so you go to the table as a full partner in the balance of power. And our checks and balances… the legislative branch is the first branch, the executive branch is second, and then the others. But more fundamental, what we have in our House — and it was a decision we made to make it so, and we want to do more — is our caucus is a majority of women, minorities, and LGBT. That is, 54 percent of the House Democratic caucus is not white male. In the history of civilization, you have never seen a representative body for a leading party that was so diverse. And the majority not being the so-called majority, as previously conceived.

Also, our committees will lead — should we win — but even in the minority, our top Democrats on these committees are a majority of women and minorities. Now, getting just to women and why aren’t there more… I’m drawing some conclusions the last few years when we’ve pushed and pushed and we’ve gained more, but in order for us to really kick open the door, we have to change the environment we’re in. The environment I would like to see is one where the role of money is reduced and the level of civility is heightened. If you have less money and more civility, you will have more women. And that’s one of the reasons — not the only reason, but to protect our democracy — that we are pushing for campaign finance reform to reduce the role of money in politics.

If you bring more women, more young people, more minorities, more diversity, more of a face of America to public office and to public service, just speaking in terms of women, I can guarantee you: if you lower money and increase civility, you will have many more women.

And that’s what we have to do: create our own environment. We’ve been operating in an environment that has not been friendly to the advancement of women, especially now that it’s become so harsh and so money-driven.

MS: Looking at the landscape right now, it does look very daunting to run, and even when you get to Washington, very challenging. What advice or encouragement would you want to offer to a woman who is considering pursuing elected office but feels discouraged?

NP: Well, one of the things that was very disappointing when they went after me in such a major way, is women would come say to me, “I’m not subjecting my family to that.” And I say, you have to know what you believe and how important it is to you, how urgent it is for the country, and then that doesn’t matter. You’ve stepped into the arena, you’re in the fight, you throw a punch, you’re going to get one thrown at you, and vice versa. They throw one at you, you’ve got to be ready to throw one at them [laughs], because it’s a rough terrain. It shouldn’t be that way, but that’s what it is now.

So what I tell women is, “This is not for the faint of heart, but you have to have a commitment as to why you want to engage in public service.” We want people who have plenty of options in life to engage in public service — not anybody where this is the only job they could get. So we’re competing for their time, and their time, their priority decision will be made as to how important it is for them to make their mark, whether it’s on issues that relate to the economy, national security, family issues, education, healthcare, and those kinds of things. But I consider every issue a women’s issue. So you have to believe in who you are and what difference you can make. You have to care about the urgency and the difference it will make to your community, and you have to, again, have confidence in the contribution that you can make. You believe, you care, you have confidence in the difference that you can make. And that’s not to be egotistical, it’s just to be confident.

I tell women… “If you have a vision about what you believe about America, about our country and our families, you have to have knowledge about the situation. You don’t want to be a notion monger, you want to be an idea creator. So you have a vision, you know your subject— you don’t have to know every subject — you can focus, whether it’s foreign policy or whatever. Vision, knowledge, judgment springing from that knowledge, confidence, a plan, thinking strategically about how you would get this accomplished. When you tell the story of your vision with your knowledge and how you plan to get it done, you will be so eloquent, you will attract support. You will be lifted up and you will lift others up.”

MS: You have written a whole book about knowing your power. Do you think part of the problem is that women and girls today don’t know their power? And what can we do to change that, for even women to know that they have a vision worth pursuing?

NP: Well, here’s the thing: I wrote that book — it’s like just a little puff — because people were saying I always wanted to be Speaker since I was five years old; I had no interest in running for office when I was five years old, nor when I was a teenager, nor when I was forty years old. I had an interest in politics, but not in running for office. So I thought I sort of had to keep the record straight. But for that reason, I was able to say to people, “Be ready. Just be ready. Take inventory of what your skills are. And if that means being a mom and all the diplomacy, interpersonal skills, management of time — all the rest that is involved in that — value that.” How many times do you ask somebody, “What do you do?” “I’m just a housewife.” Just a housewife? No, proudly a housewife, or a homemaker, or whatever the term is these days. But that’s what women used to say when I was young, and I’d say, “Don’t say that! I’m a stay-at-home mom, too, but I don’t think I’m just a housewife!” So in any event, take inventory of what your possibilities are and have confidence in that…. And what you have — as I say with the vision, knowledge, et cetera — you have your own authenticity that is very sincere and very convincing. So be proud of the unique contribution that only you can make. That really is what I want people to think — to enjoy why they’re attracted to a certain issue, to savor learning more about it, that they can have opinions that are respected, they have standing on the issue, a plan for how they can implement something to make progress for our country and our families… and that argument will always win the day.

MS: You were the first female Speaker of the House, which is a huge mile- stone. What advice or perspective can you offer on breaking through glass ceilings, or as you say, “marble ceilings” and being the first or one of very few women in the room and the pressure that comes with that?

NP: The only time I’m the only woman in the room is when I go to the lead- ership meeting. But by and large I have made sure that women were chair- ing our committees when I was Speaker, or the senior Democrat on each of the committees, where I had the jurisdiction, because I think it’s really important for people to know: it’s not just about one woman, it’s about women. And it’s about the issues that we care about and the reinforcement of a message, not just one person saying it. The Speaker has awesome power, there’s no question about it. That role, number three — president, vice president, Speaker of the House — they are the highest positions in the country.

But the fact is that, again, it’s not about one woman, it’s about what this means in the lives of women.

So the interaction of women on these issues was [more] important for the members than the reinforcement on how we see our role. We’re there for our country, we’re there for our districts, but women in America see us partially as their own, even if we don’t represent them officially.

MS: Did you feel the magnitude of being in that position? Because being the first is something that’s significant, even thinking about what the pressure’s going to be on the first woman president. Did you feel that you could be there and be your authentic self, or did you feel the weight of people’s expectations?

NP: Marianne, I want to tell you something, and as I think back on it, I was so busy. I was so busy. We had an agenda to get done for the American people. And while I never set out to be Speaker and I never even envisioned it, one thing led to another and there I was, but I just knew I had a responsibility. As I look back on it, maybe I should have taken time to just sit there and say, “Wow,” but I didn’t even have a second to do that. I’m looking at President Bush’s library, and he used to say, “You’re number three.” He’d point to himself, one, point to Cheney, two, [point to me], three. Yes, it would be driven home to me that I was in this very exalted position, but it was only important to the extent that I could involve other women at the proper level, so that it wasn’t just about one person. It’s pretty thrilling to be Speaker, no question about that. But, again, right away we had sent the president the Lilly Ledbetter [Fair Pay Act], and one week and one day after his inaugural address we sent him the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act. I mean, that’s when we had President Obama, but when we won, President Bush was president and we had a 100-hour agenda — the first 100 hours we raised the minimum wage; it hadn’t been raised in eleven years. We had our “Six for ’06” [agenda], most of which became the law of the land. So we were on a schedule. There wasn’t really too much time to think of how important I was. It was really more important for our members and our women to take ownership of the issues that build consensus around where we would go from here.

MS: Well, you did a wonderful job. And actually, I have heard your name come up many times, not only just being such an admired woman leader, but also as somebody who could potentially run for president or would make a great president. Is that something that you would ever consider?

NP: No. Here’s the thing: I didn’t even focus on becoming Speaker, but I knew — as whip, and as leader, and then as Speaker and then leader again — that the cooperation you get from members, which is everything — how you build consensus — has to have no doubt associated with it that it’s anything but for the good of the country. That there isn’t even a slight tinge that there might be some other political agenda at work. This is not for the faint of heart, any of it. You take a vote, you make friends and foes, and everybody has to know that this is a consensus that we build together. I think that’s really important. And nothing could be more of a thrill to me than to represent the people of San Francisco in Congress. To be speaker and have that recognition from my colleagues, and to be the first woman — I’m honored by that. I thought it would be not in furtherance of reaching all of our goals if there was any doubt that I wanted to run for any other office. And I didn’t, so that was easy [laughs]. There was no contrivance there; it was like, “Make no mistake: I’ve reached my height” [laughs].

MS: When you were talking about the importance of a consensus — and certainly in this current climate, that seems really important — what advice do you have on working with people across the aisle whose opinions you may disagree with but who you have to interact with?

NP: We come to Congress representing our own district. And so does everybody else, so even if you disagree with the manner in which some people present their views and how negative they may be, the fact is, you respect the people who sent them there. They are there, a House of Representatives, and so it’s unimportant what you think of somebody; what is important is that you respect their constituents and the right of that person to represent them. Now, having said that, you know you’re in the marketplace of ideas; that’s how our founders had intended. You depend on the strength of the power of your ideas, the strength of your argument, to compete in this marketplace of ideas to prevail. You know that if you’re going to do something that’s going to have sustainability that you’re going to have to try to build consensus across the aisle, if possible. Go to find common ground; where you can’t, you stand your ground, as I always say. But you always try.

MS: Looking at Washington right now, it can seem very daunting and it looks like a lot of work to people. What would you say are the positives? What drives you and fuels your work and motivates you every day? What are the joys of doing the work that you’re doing?

NP: Well, again, there are 435 members in the House, only one from my district, from each of our districts, so that’s a great honor — that is a tremendous honor to be able to speak for the people of your district. So that’s always a joy, and when it isn’t, it’s time to go home. To represent your district in the people’s House — how thrilling, how thrilling.

I think that people have some thought that this gridlock has been there for a long time. It really hasn’t. It’s largely something that has obstructed progress from when President Obama came in and the Republicans declared that they would stop his success, and they did that in a way that I think was harmful to the American people.

So it’s not about the niceties of debate; it’s about what are we here to do? If they’re standing in the way of jobs for the American people, then we have to make that fight. And we have differences of opinion on the role of government in whatever it is — the education of our children, the safety and good health of our neighborhoods and of our people, you know, all of that. We believe what we believe, and we respect that other people have different beliefs, but we don’t just roll over and say, “Okay, we all sign up for obstruction.” We just can’t. We can’t govern… we’re called the legislative branch; we came to legislate and that’s what we should do. So when people say this and that, I say, “You know what, understand this: the House has always been a competitive arena for the battle of ideas. Anybody who’s here to obstruct progress for our country really should be held accountable for that.” And that’s what we’re dealing with right now.

MS: Women and young girls can feel very hesitant to speak out or stand out too much. It seems like you’ve always had the courage to speak out for what you believe in. You don’t hold anything back. Where does that come from? How did you develop your inner leader?

NP: Well, I think a couple of things. I went to all-girls’ schools my whole life, so every model of leadership that I saw was a young girl or a woman, and so there was never any hesitation that women could lead. I know what I believe. And I really think — says she immodestly — one quality that I bring to my role is that I’ve been in Congress awhile, I know the issues, so I think I have good judgment as to what works or what doesn’t and an institutional memory of what has worked and what hasn’t. It’s also that I have a clear view of what I think our purpose is and that is to make the future better for all of our children, in every way, and that involves national security, our economy, every subject you can name, including those that are directly related, like health and education and environment.

MS: Are there concrete changes that you would like to see that you think would help foster more women leaders, not just in Washington, but in general? Are there things that you think we can do to increase the numbers?

NP: Well, I think that really lies inside of every woman. They have to really have confidence in themselves. If women have confidence in themselves, they will have confidence in other women. Sometimes we wonder, what is the support of women, for women? It’s by and large, very large, I think, but sometimes it’s not always there. And sometimes I think it’s because, “Well, I can do that. Why is she doing it?”

You know, it’s not a zero-sum game — there’s plenty of opportunity for everyone, so there’s no reason to worry about somebody else’s success, either saying you couldn’t do this so she’s better than you, or she’s doing it so you can’t. No, she’s doing it so you can.

Every piece of advice I give to people is, “Be yourself, know your power, have confidence in what you have to contribute.” If you have all of that, you will respect that in other women and we can just advance this. Now I’ve said to you before: reduce the role of money, increase the level of civility, and women will take these responsibilities. And many more women will say, “Okay, I’ll run. I’m not afraid of needing the money or being…” shall we say, “smeared.” A little girl interviewed me this morn- ing, she said, “How did your family deal with all the negative things that the Republicans said about you?” I said, “Well, they didn’t really care that much, because I didn’t really care that much.” What I do care about is that it’s an obstacle to other women entering politics, because they’ll say, “Why would I do that? I have plenty of options.” And women with plenty of options are just the women that we want to be in politics and government.

MS: It’s been brought up how remarkable it is that it was not that long ago that women didn’t even have the right to vote. It’s almost surreal to think about that. Where do you see the current status of women in the United States and around the world right now? What do you see is the current call to action for women today?

NP: I think that women have to know how important they are. Not that women are better than men, but the mix is a beautiful thing and you get a better result. I think that we will have a woman president soon. I hope that Hillary Clinton will decide to run, because I think that will bring that day closer to us… I do think that we will be required to be taken into a direc- tion where the American people are so far ahead of the Congress. And as I said to you before, I always thought we would have a woman president before we would have a woman speaker of the House, because of the way this system has been so male-dominated and the American people are far ahead on that score. So I see us on a path. I think it will be very important to our country, to women and little girls in our country, and to everyone in our country and the world, to see our country join the ranks of those who have women leaders.

You may also enjoy Interview: Marianne Williamson | A Return To Love And Consciousness by Marianne Williamson

The post Nancy Pelosi: What Will It Take to Make a Woman President? appeared first on BEST SELF.

Nadia Lopez transforms her life — and that of a struggling neighborhood — through the school she founded

—

Mott Hall Bridges Academy in Brownsville, Brooklyn was born from the journey of my self-discovery and desire to create a learning institution that would honor children. Considered amongst the most disadvantaged and violent of communities in New York City, hopelessness resonated from those who live here. I saw beyond the despair and found that in fact there was a sense of unwavering resilience. Ultimately, despite the circumstances that these children and their families faced — they wanted to be acknowledged and respected — and I wanted to work towards giving them what they deserved.

My students face adversities that most adults would never want to endure.

Whether it is being raised by a crack addict, having no food in their home, being sexually abused, or dealing with a number of other post-traumatic stress related issues, my work has been to provide a safe, loving, and nurturing learning environment. My experiences of being raised in a single-family household to becoming a single mother, allowed me to empathize with my students on a level that many would not be able to relate to.

When I was in my early twenties, I firmly believed that the measure of success was based upon what society hailed as the ‘American Dream’. By the time I was twenty-four, I finished college, owned a home, had my first child, and worked for a company that offered lucrative pay and benefits. From the outside everything looked perfect, but in reality I was living an absolute nightmare.

I was subjected to mental and physical abuse in my marriage, along with numerous acts of adultery. For those who knew me well, it was hard to believe that I would allow myself to endure such a toxic relationship. And yet, I never wanted to have my daughter experience growing up in a single-parent household. I knew all too well the feeling of hurt and disappointment when my parents separated when I was only in seventh grade. I kept up a good face, but on the inside I was ashamed and slowly spiraling into depression, which led me to be hospitalized briefly.

I knew in that moment I was not living my best self and I needed to be in a space where I would just think, breathe and learn to love myself without the fear of judgment from others.

I found the solitude I needed visiting friends in Georgia. For nearly three months I stayed with them and their family, overcoming emotional pain and rebuilding my faith.

When I returned to New York, I returned to my corporate job, but I missed the time spent with my daughter. I wondered about her school-age years and whether she would experience a teacher whose classroom encouraged a love for learning and inspired greatness? The question came across my mind almost every day, until I finally made the decision to pursue a career in education through an alternative teaching program, which allowed me to teach while earning a degree in Special Education. Finally, I was pursuing my passion and my marriage seemed to be improving, until a year later when my then husband woke up one morning to tell me he was no longer in love and decided he needed to be happy. I felt betrayed and unable to face my students who I needed to teach that day. It took all of the energy and courage for me to drive to work, only to sit in my car for nearly an hour crying because I felt like a failure. It was in that moment I saw the school’s principal. She looked me in the eyes and asked, “What’s wrong?” With a heavy heart, I responded, “He says he doesn’t love me anymore and that he’s leaving to be happy.”

Without hesitation, she reminded me of all the children who showed up every day, seeking my love and guidance.

So, even if one person didn’t care to value who I am, the children in the school will remind me and never let me forget. That day, those words and the children in my classroom saved my life. I realized then and there that my happiness was not contingent upon one man, but actually living in my purpose.

Over time, my personal experience led me to design and implement programs that would focus on the social-emotional aspect of learning. I created a club for girls that would allow them the opportunity to receive mentorship, while giving them a safe space to share and work through their struggles. For the first time, I realized how much pain existed within our classrooms and that these children had no guidance or support to deal with it.

Three years later, I became the founding teacher at an all-girls school where my mission became to empower girls of color through education and mold them into leaders who would impact their communities. It was one of the most rewarding experiences and profound moments in my life. The girls, who ranged from eleven to thirteen years of age, were inquisitive, impressionable, and remarkable.

I saw myself in each of those beautiful girls and decided that they would learn the power of self-love, forgiveness, and not worrying about the judgment of others.

Twice a week I conducted a leadership workshop, then managed an after-school club that taught life skills. On any given day more than thirty girls would attend.

Being with my girls all day gave me great joy, but I longed for a co-ed setting because I knew that our young men needed just as much support as our young women — we needed to heal our communities as a whole. Reflecting on my relationship, I wondered how many missed opportunities there were for so many of our young men to receive mentorship and the guidance to manage their own personal issues. In many ways I knew that education would be the platform for me to offer hope and the love that so many children needed in their most formidable years.

It’s been six years since Mott Hall Bridges Academy opened its doors and has become a beacon of hope for the community of Brownsville. I have created She Is Me for our girls, and also I Matter, to provide our boys with positive models through mentoring and the opportunity to engage in dialogue about issues that impact their community.

My first graduation class is now headed to their senior year of high school, preparing for college, while I make room for our new incoming sixth graders.

Imagine, out of the pain of one man walking away — doors have opened for so many children to walk in — and fill my heart.

Isn’t life curiously divine that way? When we are willing to see things differently — we make room for endless opportunity. Every action matters. What thing could you do in your community? When we heal one person, we heal us all.

*Editor’s Note:

Little did I know, but Nadia Lopez was already in my house — here on my coffee table, featured in the iconic Humans of New York Stories. ~ Kristen Noel

You may also enjoy reading Youth Activism | Are You There? Messages From Our Future by Shea Ki

The post When One Door Closes | The Lopez Effect: Transforming Self & Community appeared first on BEST SELF.

Got hugs?

—

Could you imagine waiting 11 hours to receive one? Until you have experienced being in the presence of Amma’s energy, it is difficult to describe. Amma is not about religion. As she says, “my religion is love.” In whatever we practice, she simply asks that we go deeper within the values of faith and live by those principles. Sri Mata Amritanandamayi Devi, or more commonly referred to as Amma, the hugging saint, has dedicated her life to traveling the world to dole out hugs – literally hugging each and every person who has come to see her (and we are talking 1000s upon 1000s of people; she has been known to sit for 22 hours at a time). The most personally accessible spiritual leader alive today, she has given this motherly embrace, known as her darshan, to more than 34 million people worldwide in an effort to offer love and compassion, and inspire others to do the same and be of service to the world. It is her mission to eradicate suffering and poverty.

This isn’t all about kisses and hugs, however. Amma puts her money where her hugs are. Recognized as one of the leading world humanitarians, she has become one of the greatest patrons of the poor. Her charitable organization Embracing The World is now active in 40 countries and is dedicated to alleviating the burden of the world’s poor through helping to meet each of the five basic needs – food, shelter, education, healthcare, and education – wherever and whenever possible. the movie, is the story of about what happened when one person decided to offer her life wholeheartedly for the sake of others.

Service to those in need is the real worship of God. ~ Amma

The post Amma | The Hugging Saint appeared first on BEST SELF.

Have spray paint, will make the world a more magical place. In Pursuit of Magic: two female street artists on a crusade to elevate consciousness and amplify meaning in the world.

Have you ever randomly come across a message on a sidewalk or park bench spoke directly to you and made you smile – a message from the universe? When Betty Kay Kendrick and Chloe Crespi first met, they knew they were meant to do something together. In fact, they stayed together that afternoon until they figured it out. The words, “In Pursuit of Magic,” flashed before them and the rest is whimsical, creative, deeply meaningful, collaborative history.

A self-proclaimed global team of positivity vandals spreading magic, they created a stencil and started spray-painting messages in San Francisco and New York. Social media images began popping up everywhere. Check out their site (and while you are there, join the movement)!

Tumblr blog

pursuitofmagic.com

The post In Pursuit Of Magic appeared first on BEST SELF.

Steven Culbertson, president and CEO of Youth Service America, explains why youth leadership is essential social change and global transformation

—

The world has to offer today’s youth something better.
 –President Barack Obama

Whether you are considering the recent events in America’s cities, or those across the globe in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, young people’s voices are crying out to be heard.
A youth development “reformation” has been unfolding quietly under our noses for years, giving a proper burial to the Victorian concept that children are to be seen and not heard.

Today, more youth programs treat young people as assets and resources, as opposed to recipients, victims, or problems to be fixed. More youth are now at the leadership tables, just as we began to include women in previous generations, sharing their concerns and their suggestions for a better world. And they are volunteering at record rates, more than any generation in history.

But the world’s current events, especially poverty and terrorism, are shining a big spotlight on our slow pace of reform.

Every organization is taught to know its competition, and YSA (Youth Service America, of which the author is CEO) knows of several of ours: ISIS, al Qaeda, Boko Haram, Shining Path, Real Irish Republican Army, FARC, and more than 50 other terrorist organizations on the State Department list.

These groups recognize what kings and conquerors have known for millennia: young people make very effective warriors for achieving their ends.

YSA’s beliefs are the same worldwide: Children and youth, ages 5-25, are making their communities and the world healthier, smarter, safer, cleaner, greener, fairer, and kinder.

At YSA, we constantly say, “If you don’t have a youth strategy, you don’t have a strategy at all.” Fifteen years into the new century, many people still don’t understand why.

4 critical reasons why we must engage young people as soon as possible:

1. There are more young people on the planet than at any time in human history. Half the world’s population is under 25 years old; 40 percent is under 19. In a nutshell, we are outnumbered, but this gives me hope, since young people are always at the center of social progress. Yes, the youth bubble is on our side.
2. Young people are biologically wired for the three critical assets that lead to social improvement: novelty, risk, and peer authority. It’s no coincidence that UPS, Microsoft, Apple, HP, Bristol-Myers, and Dell were all started by teenagers on bicycles and in garages and dormitories. Brain science confirms the unique power of young people to see new things and then take the risks to bring them to the rest of us. Because young people listen to each other more than they listen to adults, they also bring their entire generation along with them. Yes, biology is on our side.
3. Every parent knows the intrinsic value of starting early, whether it’s reading, computation, music, sports, or the arts. What you learn and do in childhood will stay with you the rest of your life. In the same way, there is a deep connection between youth service and lifelong service and even philanthropy. Yes, childhood is on our side.
4. The world’s problems today are extremely complex and interrelated, driven by competing political, social, and economic forces. Climate change and humanity’s role are now backed by irrefutable science, and clean water, the essence of all life, is in scarce supply in many parts of the world. Simply put, we cannot afford for young people to grow up before they learn about and help solve our biggest challenges. No, time is not on our side.

At YSA, we believe in youth changing the world. Working with partners around the globe, we help young people find their voice, take action, and make an impact on vital community issues. Young people have always been at the center of social change, and we ignore their potential to reshape the world at our peril. If we in the civilized, law-abiding society do not engage them, someone else certainly will.

You may also enjoy this article on Youth Activism | Are You There? Messages From Our Future by Shea Ki

The post Youth Leadership | 4 Reasons We Need Youth as the Leaders of Today appeared first on BEST SELF.

Surviving the Hillsborough tragedy at the FA Cup in England as a boy of 16, Chris Arnold founded World Merit to develop and empower young global leaders

—

April 15^th 1989 ended the lives of 96 people at a stadium in the UK; it also irreversibly influenced the lives of thousands, including me. I was at the semifinal of the FA Cup, a huge football (soccer) match in England. A series of errors by officials led to a tragedy inside the stadium, leaving so many people dead in the enclosure I was in. We were crushed because fans had been let into the stadium through the ”exit” gates and subsequently allowed into a tunnel leading to the already full terrace where I stood. It was a day that simply became known as ”Hillsborough.“ Ninety-six people between the ages of 10 and 67 died; brothers and sisters, friends and fathers. This is the day I first understood that life is short.

Like all those involved, my flashbacks and memories are many. For me the hardest memory, the one that often comes back to shake me, is that of a man who pleaded with me to give him space before he fell unconscious, pressed into my side, sliding slowly down beneath the mass of merging bodies.

We were trapped in a cage built to keep people from gaining access to a soccer pitch. As the crushing crowd moved me to just three or four bodies back from the fence at the front, a place where I thought everyone would be dead, I am still struck with shock and anger at what I saw.

Looking past the heads, past the pain, and past the vomit in the hair of people pressed against that front fence, I could see photographers snapping us, clicking away as we fought for breath and survival. Whatever they might say about their professional need to do their job, there was an essential need and room for them to help; rather, they took photos of us dying. There is no doubt that those people on the other side of a fence could have tried to save us, could have tried to get the emergency gates open, tried to pull on the fence to tear it down, but providing content for the following days newspapers was their focus. They simply had to choose — drop the camera and save a life or turn their backs on those in need for a “shot.” This is the day I understood that priorities aren’t as obvious as they should be — people and the planet, and then profit, should be the order.

The stewards did not immediately respond by opening the inadequate gates in the front fence. Instead they meekly waited for an order and followed bureaucracy while people’s breathing had stopped. There was a loss of basic common sense. Police were reluctant to help any of those who, with sheer survival instinct, had scrambled to the top of the molten crowd; when the first wave of people crawled on their knees across shoulders and heads to escape over the spiked fence, they were pushed back in.

I learnt about survival instinct and self-preservation that day.

A father, who had lost his son comforted me, a 16-year-old stranger, and I learnt about true kindness. My dad thought he had lost me in that crush — his face and shock showed me what losing a child might mean to someone, something I only fully appreciate years later now that I have my own sons.

Hillsborough also taught me that people, even senior officials, will lie to deflect blame and responsibility.

I learned that when trapped in a lie, these same people will allow it to escalate and perpetuate to such an extent that thousands of lives are destroyed, a city’s good name is smeared, and that justice is something that bereaved families are forced to fight for over a quarter of a century. The lie was told by Chief Superintendent David Duckenfield, the senior police officer in charge at the stadium: he said that fans had forced the exit gates open when it had actually been a police directive. That lie snowballed and suddenly, three days later, on the front page of Britain’s biggest tabloid newspaper, the fans were suddenly being deemed a drunken mob. Under the headline, “THE TRUTH,” we were accused of pickpocketing the dead (our brothers and sisters), of urinating on the police, of beating up the police while they tried to resuscitate people (our brothers and sisters). I was there and this was a terrible lie that upset me even more than the events of the day itself. This was an attack.

It took over 20 years for the British government to order the release of the documents from the disaster. Although I knew the truth, it was still a devastating shock to find that hundreds of police and witness statements had been materially altered to remove any criticisms of officials. The coverup has led to the longest public inquiry in British legal history, something that is still ongoing and difficult to bear.

So is this day my inspiration? In many ways yes — with the accelerated learning I accrued on that day, I was left with an insight that would stay with me as I work to make a positive impact.

The vigour, resolve and dignity that the families of the deceased have shown while fighting for the truth, makes me feel incredibly proud and determined to more consistently be the best version of myself.

The ‘Justice For The 96’ campaign is a source of great inspiration to me, and I feel a real gratitude to those who devoted decades to it. However, the energy from Hillsborough was entirely destructive for me until another truly pivotal day of my life happened six months after the disaster.

I was late for school, again — showing up on time just didn’t seem important. I was attended a poorly performing school and my city was filled with unemployment and suffering, as it was in the harsh recession of the late ‘80s. My cynicism and mistrust of authority was high, my confidence for a good future low. I walked up the stairs into the student room of the college, with no real thought or care. Mary Wilson, my English teacher, was waiting for me. After pushing me into an office she proceeded to redirect me and as far as I’m concerned, save my life.

In this most pivotal day she made sure I understood my responsibility to reach my full potential. She sharply pointed out that I knew many others who did not have that opportunity.

She forced me to think how to make the most of a life I was lucky to have.

She wrote a life plan alongside me that I actually did stick to for 25 years. A plan that led to my building a global perspective through travel and through finding incredible role models; a plan that led me to the founding of a group of youth-centric businesses, and ultimately, to the building of the most fulfilling and beautiful undertaking I’ve ever known and been part of — World Merit.

World Merit is an organization which connects young citizens around the world, each of whom is looking to fight collaboratively for positive change. We are addressing low social mobility, low confidence, and low aspirations in youth. Behind the scenes, I would tell you that my personal aim is for World Merit to be a ”Mary Wilson” on a vast scale — to make sure that as many people as possible reach their potential and that they connect to use their talents for the betterment of the world. We are a growing movement of 100,000 and have a target of one million members by the end of 2016. Malala Yousafzai, Sir Ken Robinson, and other astonishingly brilliant people are supporting World Merit and our mission to empower, uplift, and revitalize global youth, the inheritors of our world.

I would never have had the chance to become my ”best self” without Hillsborough and the insights drawn from terrible days. I would never have had the chance to become my ”best self” without an attentive and strong teacher and the plan we crafted all those years ago. Life is short, life can be unfair, so start fighting for it to be better, fight for justice and equity, and continue that fight every day. Take your inspiration from every single moment. You are lucky to breathe, so go on, take a deep breath, and start moving purposefully toward reaching your potential. Start fighting with every breath for people and the planet. Oh, and if you can, be a “Mary Wilson” for somebody.

World Merit Manifesto

It is not for us to relax or slow, nor stop nor drop to weakened knee, when faced by odious inequality. Not for us the mourning of dated dreams that mock and rebuke the last nights of life. Nor for us a cowering retreat from menacing medieval traditions or simplistic mistaken doctrines that render many unable. No, no, my friends, for us it is the opportunity to strive for goals, to meet aspiration with full and unhindered determination. It is for us to see all potential unshackled, to ensure those with ambition are released from inequity or insecurity. It is for us to lead those of merit to others and see that together they reach their fullest height. We will fight those who dare challenge our right to endeavor. We will rise as a community of citizens to meet global issues, including those that grow to daunt others. We will work for a world of merit, and we will achieve.

~Chris Arnold, founder of World Merit

Learn more at worldmerit.org

You may also enjoy At War…With Myself: A Soldier’s Story of Spiritual Survival by Stacy Bare

The post Breathing Room | The Hillsborough Tragedy appeared first on BEST SELF.

Reflecting on the joys of inspiring youth, schoolteacher Rebekah Stoll realizes that her students have equally inspired her

—

Twenty students gathered around five working kitchens, aprons in place, recipes set before them with excitement in the air and the warmth from the ovens heating the chilly classroom. Enthusiastic chatter from students can be heard as they are preparing their feast. Later in the day, there are 24 young men and women eager to begin their first sewing project, each needing my immediate assistance. The sounds of scissors cutting fabric and sewing machines humming is in the background. These are the sounds of students learning through creativity.

Inspiring youth is an important and challenging job. There are many pressures on high school students that stem from social expectations, familial obligations, and academic overload. Creating a safe, creative outlet for students helps them master the necessary skills to cope with their daily struggles. One field of study that can help students with these challenges is Family and Consumer Science (FACS), the modern-day version of home economics. While these courses are required at the middle school level in New York State, most people do not realize that this field still exists. Districts are quick to eliminate these programs even though there is an initiative in education for College- & Career-Ready skills and Career & Technology education — right where FACS teachers fit in. Yes, we still enjoy baking cookies, but more important, we offer courses on parenting, child development, nutrition, fashion, life skills, culinary skills, career success, and money management.

In an environment where students can be themselves, where they can be creative, comfortable, successful, and safe, they are likely to transfer those assets to other areas of their lives.

After an unexpected layoff, I was lucky enough to obtain a new position quickly. Shortly thereafter, I realized that starting my new job was the best thing that ever happened to me. I had become stagnant in my former one. I had not been taking risks, I had been too quick to fall in line with the status quo, and I had not pushing myself hard enough. I had to reinvent myself, as I was teaching different courses at new grade levels. It was overwhelming but eye-opening, and I was reminded of how amazing students could really be.

A wonderful sophomore student named Stephanie* enrolled in my Basic Foods class. Stephanie is a very quiet, shy student who is also very intelligent. In class she was engaged, asked great questions, would do additional work at home, and shared some of her successes with me. Her mother communicated how much Stephanie loved my class and was so grateful to have the opportunity to learn from me. Stephanie and I are both vegetarians and I was granted permission to expose my students to alternative nutritional venues. Because of this, my students were able to explore different cooking techniques, consume a variety of vegetables, explore food ethics, and learn about nutrition in ways they had not been previously exposed to. This shared experience allowed Stephanie to feel more comfortable in my classroom and so she was able to be herself and open up a little bit.

Partway through the year I asked students to write a few words on their own time about the class so we could add it to the course catalogue the next year. Stephanie said:

“My experience so far in cooking class is amazing. When I get older I plan on going into the Family and Consumer Science field. I want to be able to continue classes like this throughout my high school years so I can get as much knowledge on cooking as I can. My favorite topic so far in this class is the baking unit because I love to bake cupcakes.”

Recently I discovered that Stephanie is an entrepreneur, running a successful cupcake business as a high school junior. Her customers rave about her culinary skills and her attention to detail.

As an educator, seeing a student use the skills learned in class in the real world is both inspiring and amazing.

Other students may not enter with Stephanie’s sense of purpose and direction. Maria’s* direction is less certain; she is less sure of what she wants to do with her life. Under tremendous stress in terms of her academic work, she fears the possibility of falling behind, but all of that disappears when she hears the hum of the sewing machine in her Advanced Fashion class. She is able to be creative, express herself, and get lost in the moment when she is sewing. Some days she comes to class upset over her difficult trigonometry class, feeling like she is going to fail at life because she is struggling academically. Once she gets to work in the fashion class, however, she finds her groove and creates beautiful pieces of art. She may not always like or appreciate the work she does, but she pushes herself to try new things and improve her skills.

Maria’s class was assigned a project where they had to choose a famous artist’s work and recreate it in fabric. Some of the students complained at first because they were not making clothes. Maria dove into the project immediately, diligently working during class and spending countless hours of her free time perfecting her work. Her finished product is absolutely beautiful! The students all remark when they come into my classroom how much it looks like the original piece. It would have been easy to dismiss the project when the students began complaining, but Maria’s excitement encouraged me and the other students to continue. Eventually, the assignment was a success with the class. It is often difficult for teachers to break out of their comfort zone and try a lesson that is somewhat unorthodox, but students like Maria help revitalize our enthusiasm for thinking outside of the box.

Although I was devastated at being laid off when it first happened, it really was the best thing that happened to me professionally.

I met many amazing students, faculty, and staff that will stay with me forever. New opportunities arose which made me a better, stronger, more flexible teacher, while exposing me to new challenges. Students like Stephanie and Maria are what make teaching so rewarding. They are what make all the difficulties and moments of self-doubt worth it. I may not be the reason that Stephanie has a baking business, and Maria may have found a love for sewing without me, but I am proud to have assisted in their journey. They motivate me to strive for connection with all of my students; you can never predict your effect on them. Although my goal as a teacher is to give students a safe, comfortable environment in which to learn and be influenced, I often find that I am the one being inspired by their creativity, lust for life, excitement, and sense of possibility.

*Names have been changed to protect the students’ identities.

You may also enjoy reading Youth Activism | Are You There? Messages From Our Future by Shea Ki

The post Inspiring Youth | Who’s Teaching Whom? appeared first on BEST SELF.

The WWII ambulance drivers who went on to found the AFS, paving the way for foreign exchange programs everywhere

—

It all begins somewhere. Some spark of divinity arrives even if you didn’t realize you were searching for it. I have always been a seeker — always a storyteller. I’m fascinated by other cultures and the universal passions that connect us as human beings.

For most of my early life my storytelling was conveyed through acting. After graduation from New York University (NYU), I spent nearly a decade trying to get work, but jobs were few and far between. My acting career was going nowhere and I was miserable. It was the year 2000 and my husband and I were planning a vacation to Kenya. Unbeknownst to me, everything was about to change.

Shortly before we left I had breakfast with my friend Kathryn, who told me about a fascinating panel she had seen at The New York Theater Workshop. The panel was comprised of a group of performance artists from all over the world who were making a difference through the expression of their art. She was particularly struck by a woman from Kenya named Anne Wanjugu. Anne had started a performing arts orphanage in Nairobi as a means to rehabilitate street children. On learning of my trip, Kathryn asked me to visit the orphanage and to make a donation on her behalf. She pressed into my hands a pamphlet Anne had given her with an address on it.

Months later I stood before the threshold of the orphanage. When the doors creaked open it was completely silent. How can this be, I thought. One hundred and fifty children live here!

I could feel the sun envelope me like a warm embrace. In an instant Anne Wanjugu appeared and it was as if I was standing in the presence of an angel. Our meeting and her work with the children profoundly moved me. I was so inspired by what I had witnessed. I wanted to help raise funds to support Anne’s efforts so I created a short video.

Back home, I shared this video with as many people as I could think of. Equally touched and impacted by what they saw, they all donated money and encouraged the making of a documentary. The message was clear — this was a story that needed to be told.

I had done some directing while I was an acting student at NYU, but not much. YIKES!! I needed advice and fast! My husband suggested I contact Ward Chamberlin, a television pioneer he knew through business connections.

Ward Chamberlin is also a lawyer. During World War II he was a volunteer ambulance driver for American Field Service (AFS), which he later helped transform into the first high school foreign exchange program. In addition, he helped draft The Marshall Plan, and is credited with being a cofounder of both PBS and NPR. While at PBS, he discovered Ken Burns, the renowned American director and producer of documentary films.

My husband and I headed to a meeting at Ward’s PBS office. With trembling hands, I pushed in my VHS tape of the children in Kenya performing and pressed play. You could hear a pin drop. But the uncomfortable silence was interrupted upon recognizing a tear falling from his eyes. Ward stood up with authority, and this highly accomplished man of big ideas put his arm around me and said, “Go get this story!”

He advised me that gone were the days when an unknown director could walk into PBS and get funding.

However, he suggested I take my passion and surround myself with the best film team I could find. Encouraged and undeterred by the realities of the new landscape, I set out to get my story. A beautiful serendipity larger than I could possibly have known in that moment was at play.

Passion drove me. Purpose drove me. I was on a mission. I had found my calling. The film I made about the beautiful work of Anne Wanjugu is called Street Journeys.

ITUNES: http://bit.ly/1auTXVW

This was where it started — this is where I activated what I was meant to be doing with my life. Not only had Ward generously mentored me, our paths would continue to cross — and I would go on to tell his story.

Today I am working on a new film (my current labor of love) called The Drivers about a group of unlikely peacemakers who emerged out of World War II. This film is inspired by Ward Chamberlin’s work as an ambulance driver with the AFS.

The Drivers reveals the little-known history of a corps of World War II ambulance drivers who came back from the war to create the world’s first high school student foreign exchange program (also called AFS).

In 1947 the first group of AFS students arrived from Germany, Japan, and Italy, our former enemies in the war. The Drivers tells the extraordinary story of three early participants who paved the way for the hundreds of thousands of high school foreign exchange students that followed. Inspired by this courageous adventure of their youth, these unlikely peacemakers went on to live incredible lives of service.

Combining a rich collection of archival footage, the personal stories of these early participants, and interviews with the AFS ambulance drivers themselves, The Drivers chronicles this extraordinary effort to create a lasting peace between former enemies.

This effort… has not been made merely to give you an interesting year. It has been made because a judgment has been reached that you will be among the future leaders of your country. That you will carry with you a sense of responsibility and commitment…that you will stand in your community, in your state, and in your country for those principles which motivate us all: A chance for everyone, a fair chance, and also for a world in which we have some hope for peace.

President JFK addresses AFS students, The White House, 1963

I am indebted to Ward for sparking something within me, for believing in me, and ultimately for entrusting me with his story. I never would have had the courage to make my first film without his support, encouragement, and unwavering belief in a bigger message. There is no greater gift than igniting purpose and passion within another person.

I am always grateful for the incredible talents of my collaborators and for the people who entrust me with their stories — they are precious gifts.

The Drivers, while on one hand progressively groundbreaking in its time, is timeless on the other. The film stands as a testament to what is possible when we see humanity in one another, not divisiveness fueled by borders, race, creed, and political agendas. This amazing group of young men identified the need to transcend the barriers of war — by building bridges of peace. It’s a legacy that continues to grow, as the AFS now operates in more than 60 countries worldwide, with approximately 500,000 alumni.

Rising from the embers of wartime atrocity and tragedy, a story emerges about love, humanity, and peace.

Will you join me in preserving history?

To learn more about the film or to donate to the completion of the film, please visit sandgrainproductions.com

You may also enjoy When One Door Closes | The Lopez Effect: Transforming Self & Community by Nadia Lopez

The post The Drivers appeared first on BEST SELF.

Actress Maggie Wheeler finds a deeper calling in leading communal singing

—

“I used to say, ‘I act for my supper and I sing for my soul.'”

Maggie Wheeler is describing her bifurcated career as a successful actor (most notably in long-running roles in the sitcoms Friends and Everybody Loves Raymond), and as co-leader of The Golden Bridge Community Choir-an inclusive singing group open to all comers. “For many years I was vigilant about not turning my singing work into work. That changed nine years ago.”

Wheeler hasn’t quit her day job exactly, it’s just that running the choir and giving workshops in community singing have taken up an increasing amount of her time over those nine years. Both passions had grown side by side from childhood. At the same time Wheeler’s aspirations to act were first percolating around the age of seven or eight; she spent summers at a camp in Vermont run by Pete Seeger’s brother John and his wife Eleanor, that was a kind of haven for the folk musicians who worked there as counselors. Guitars, banjos, and dulcimers hung from hooks in the hallways.

“So there I was,” Wheeler says by phone from her home in Los Angeles, “a New York City kid, surrounded by music-and the campfire, and people getting up and leading the community in song. It became a touchstone for me. And as I moved out into the world beyond Camp Killooleet” (she spells it for me by lilting the song they were all taught: “K-I-double-L…”), “I found that I was always searching for that campfire wherever I went. And if I couldn’t find it, I would find a way to create it.”

In the meantime, Wheeler pursued her desire to entertain and to make people laugh through acting. “I’ve always loved the sound of the human voice,” she says, “and stretching it to imitate the sounds of different people from different places. As an actress I often make the journey to the character through the music of speech, and the song that exists within every character’s cadence.”

In pursuing this thread of her life’s desires, Wheeler had the good fortune to study and work with the actress and playwright Anna Deavere Smith (perhaps most widely known for her role as hospital administrator Gloria Akalitus in the Showtime series Nurse Jackie). The training served Wheeler well as she not only acted in Smith’s first play but also landed a slew of television roles. Yet her childhood passion for communal singing was not to be submerged.

“There’s a mysterious component of what music moves a person. I can’t explain — I think it’s mystical — that I am so deeply moved by African music and gospel music.”

Her fascination led her to visit Africa at age 16, and later to study with Ysaye Maria Barnwell, who sang bass and wrote many of the songs for Sweet Honey in the Rock, the renowned a cappella choral group. Working with Barnwell, among other teachers, Wheeler says she had the extraordinary experience of learning “how you can take a roomful of people who don’t know what’s possible, and you can set the bar way up in the air and you can get everyone to rise to it before they’ve had the chance to think, ‘I can’t do that.’ In our culture, if you don’t belong to a church, or you’re not a sanctioned ‘singer,’ or you don’t read music and you’re not in a band, there are only so many opportunities to sing-and for the rest of the population it’s off the table. I am passionately committed and motivated to putting it back on the table for the rest of humanity.”

Her passion for communal singing is grounded in what she has learned about the role that sharing vocal music has traditionally played around the world. “In so many cultures, singing is something that runs through the course of every day,” she says. “There’s music for celebration, music for sorrow, music for work, music for rest. Nothing is done without song. No meeting takes place before singing has taken place and no meeting is closed without singing. The work I’ve been doing for the past 20 years —and for the past nine years under the umbrella of conducting a choir-is to reintroduce music into everyday life.”

After taking that workshop with Ysaye Barnwell, Wheeler came away with “a vocabulary of song running through” her, and she has continued expanding her vocabulary to include traditional songs from Asia, Africa, Australia, and Russia, along with spirituals and gospel music. “I found that I was able to give myself permission to create song in a different way,” she says. “That set me on a path. I realized that was my work.” The catalyst for her decision to give communal singing equal weight with her acting work was a Community Choir Leadership Training in Victoria, British Columbia, in 2006, where she learned how to work with a non-auditioned choir-meaning that anyone who wants to sing in the choir can join, regardless of training or skill level. In her years of running singing workshops she had been approached by the more experienced singers asking her to start an exclusive group, but her heart was pushing her to open the door for people who might have no other opportunity to follow their own passion. While attending a workshop with Barnwell at Hollyhock, she was urged to take the choir training in Victoria by Gloria Hanson, a long-time member of the Getting Higher Choir in Victoria, who cited a quote from Balzac for inspiration:

“Vocations which we wanted to pursue, but didn’t, bleed, like colors, on the whole of our existence.”

“Those words tapped on my head like a woodpecker until I decided I had to go to Canada,” Maggie says. “I’d been teaching vocal workshops for 15 years, but it was always the ‘excellent’ people who were asking me to start some form of choral group.” She wanted to do something that was “inclusive instead of exclusive” and, because she had a young family, to make it family-centered, and in Victoria the pieces fell into place.

“Then, just before I left for Canada, Gloria called me again and said I should meet a man named Emile Hassan Dyer, a vocal improviser who had taken the same training a couple of years earlier.” Also a percussionist, dancer, and storyteller raised in France and Senegal, Dyer draws on his multiethnic background to add a rich array of rhythms to the mix, including various forms of vocal percussion. Joining forces after she returned from Canada, they were able to create a shared vision of a family-centered community choir based in the Los Angeles area that meets for a series of 14 Sundays at a time. Wheeler had recreated the campfire she’d been looking for since Camp Killooleet.

Much of Wheeler’s motivation to create her inclusive choir derives from her awareness that many people have had experiences that she calls “musical wounding,” like being singled out when your elementary school class is rehearsing a song and the teacher tells you to just “move your lips” without actually singing (I speak from experience). I ask Maggie if she has encountered people in her workshops who absolutely cannot carry a tune.

“One gentleman came to choir who was having trouble finding the pitch,” she says in response. “When I was in Canada during the training, they told us that they firmly don’t believe in people being tone-deaf. A very small percentage of people suffer from something clinical that stops them from being able to reproduce a note-for the rest it is usually something emotional, or traumatic that gets in the way of hearing the note. I’d had tentative singers and scared singers, but there’s safety in numbers and we never point to anybody or ask them to sing alone…

“It’s a loving and patient and safe environment in which everybody gets a chance to get where they need to go.”

When she noticed that this man was having trouble finding the pitch, though, she asked if he would be willing to work with her privately, and he agreed. “So I took a deep breath and said to myself, ‘Okay, now I have to walk this talk.’ He came to my house and we sat down at the piano. I used humor to lighten the moment so he could be a little bit less uptight about the whole idea, because he was scared. I could see that his thought process was telling him that he needed to reproduce the note immediately. So first we slowed everything down and I gave him permission to take his time, until he could find the note. Sometimes he would start below the note or above the note and I would motion for him to come down or come up. And when he found it he could feel that we were vibrating together and he knew something was happening. We did this for quite a while and when he hit the note I would say, ‘That’s it! You’ve got it!’

“And he cried and said, ‘Don’t lie to me.’ I said, ‘This is not my opinion. This is the note and you’re singing the note.’ And in fact he had a beautiful voice-such a beautiful tenor voice and such a range that he was confused about which register to sing in, and finally he confessed that he had been in an a cappella group when he was very young. He was such a perfect example of what is possible and the pain around not trusting himself because someone had told him to stop.”

The Golden Bridge Community Choir is part of the Ubuntu Choir movement, a national network of local non-auditioned choirs that accept people who initially sing timidly or off-key.

Wheeler eschews even the use of sheet music. “The first thing is to remove the idea that help is needed,” she says. “We’re all so profoundly attached to the idea of perfection and I have no interest in perfection. I have an interest in harmony and in giving people the best experience possible. But I don’t have an interest in arriving at that perfect destination. That is one of the things that stops people from being able to freely vocalize. Everybody has a song. We may not have the song that’s winning American Idol this week, but everybody has a voice. I don’t mean that there isn’t room to get better at what we do. But that comes with doing it. I do think that many people are paralyzed around the idea of singing because they think that if they are not excellent they are not allowed. My goal is to get people to stop thinking. The gift of doing the work the way we do it is that there’s no time to think. Before you can let your story or your fear get in the way, suddenly there’s music. The music supplants everything else, and then you’re just filled with joy.

“The list of positive results of this kind of music is endless. It heals loneliness; it heals isolation. It lifts you when you’re sad; it lifts you higher when you’re happy. I’m fortunate in that I’ve doggedly followed my passions in this life and they’ve led me to some incredible places. This passion for connecting through music I’ve been able to take up and embrace because it lives through me. It doesn’t require permission from another. My acting work requires permission. That’s the nature of the business. But this music work I can carry on my back.” (Translation: She and Dyer will travel anywhere to work with groups who want the experience of making music together in this way.)

A big part of the healing she describes comes from the mere fact that when we sing we’re breathing deeply out of necessity. “You’ve expelled all the air you have in the service of the song, and your body needs to fill up again,” she says. “All that oxygen is invigorating. That automatic, unconscious intake of air transports you. That’s the yoga of song.

“People of the World” audiocast: Words and music by Maggie Wheeler; vocals by Maggie Wheeler and Emile Hassan Dyer

Another aspect of the restorative power of song comes from the fact that when people sing together, their heartbeats are in sync. “There’s something that’s healing in the vibration of the song as it’s running through us and the person next to us. I say that it causes a kind of cellular rearrangement. I have gone out to teach when I’m sick and by the time I’m done with choir, I’m healed. And the same can be said for bringing emotional pain into that setting-it transmutes.”

Maggie Wheeler pauses and extracts one final, perhaps unanticipated byproduct of communal singing: forgiveness. “I wouldn’t say I’m setting out to [teach forgiveness], but it’s embedded in the process of creating song. You have to love that song, you have to forgive its failings, and you have to keep lifting it up until it takes flight. And that reflects back to the individuals in the room. We begin to understand that we all long for that same forgiveness of self. The creation of song becomes a metaphor for the forgiveness of fallibility and imperfection. We all walk away with a little more forgiveness of the people around us and of ourselves, and that ripples out into people’s lives, which is a sort of unexpected, quiet gift.

“Until you’ve forgiven yourself for those things that you think are shameful or unforgivable, or that separate you from others, it’s difficult to do the work we have to do in the world. It’s part of the human experience and you have to do it over and over again. One of the things I say about this weekly singing experience is that we sing together on a Sunday, and it keeps you high until about Wednesday. On Thursday it starts to wane, by Friday you know you need more, and then you come back again.”

Learn more about Maggie’s work at maggiewheeler.net, goldenbridgechoir.com

You may also enjoy reading Jazz & Spirituality | The Mindful Music of Jack DeJohnette by Peter Occhiogrosso

The post Maggie Wheeler | The Yoga of Song appeared first on BEST SELF.

School nutrition is an increasingly important issue facing our children — here’s the reality and a vision for change

—

School nutrition has taken a turn, albeit a slow turn, for the better over the course of the last four years. With the signing of the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 (HHFKA), students have seen an increase in the amount of real food being served in schools and a decrease in junk food. While on the surface this change seems great, it is also very challenging for school nutrition programs with tight budgets to serve students increased servings of fresh fruits and vegetables and whole-grain foods. REAL food costs more money and with only a $.06 increase in funding signed into law with the HHFKA, this has become troublesome for many schools districts.

As a former Chef and Executive Director of School Nutrition Programs in Connecticut, I would like to see less red tape and bureaucracy in school nutrition programs and an increase in funding toward recruiting experienced culinary professionals and registered dietitians to lead these programs to a healthy future. No two school nutrition programs are alike.

There are school districts with a population of students from households who can afford to shop at health food stores and buy organic, but I would say the majority of the school nutrition programs throughout the country feed children from households that are food-insecure.

School nutrition programs, for some, provide the only nutrition of the day for these children. By employing a team of chefs and RDs, along with a School Nutrition Director to feed these kids REAL food, we can overcome some big hunger barriers and see meaningful results in the classrooms and overall long-term health costs.

The overarching goal of the HHFKA is to provide students with healthier foods in schools, incorporate nutrition education into curriculums, and increase access to food for all students through the Community Eligibility Program. This program is designed to reduce paperwork and provide free meals to all children in school districts with a large population of students in high-poverty areas. While this is a step in the right direction, there is always room for increased improvement: elevate food quality, reduce paperwork, and provide more nutrition education.

In many ways the system is antiquated, with roots that stem back to the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) that was signed into law by President Harry S. Truman in 1945, and that is overseen by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Originally designed to bulk up boys to serve in the military, the program hasn’t kept up with our current food reality.

Today, feeding kids in schools involves as much and perhaps even more paperwork than is required to educate them.

The problem is that while the paperwork is mounting, the funding is not. It’s time for a shake-up, some fresh thinking, innovative ideas, and new ways of approaching our overall food system.

While not dismissing the realities of budgets and other practical considerations when it comes to providing a higher quality of fresh fruits and vegetables, there are many great ways to increase flavor and nutrition in the foods that schools (and parents) serve to kids. In 2012, while a chef and School Nutrition Director, I attended a School Nutrition Association Conference and came face to face with one of those great ideas — vegetable purees. In fact, I was so excited by the prospects of this product that in 2014 I decided to leave my job and accept a position as the VP of Brand Development for Hooray Puree, an innovative company dedicated to a plant-pick-puree-package philosophy. Non-GMO vegetables are picked at peak freshness, cooked for less then three minutes, pureed, and packaged in BPA-free pouches. From the moment I first came in contact with this company, my head was spinning with recipe ideas and the bigger picture — making nutrition available to the masses.

There’s only one issue: The USDA does not currently recognize a vegetable unless it is visible. Hmmm. I’m not quite sure how those highly processed and breaded “chicken nuggets” that do not resemble a piece of chicken are making the cut. Clearly, nothing trumps the value of a fresh vegetable or salad; however, incorporating healthy purees into recipes to enhance nutritional content is a no-brainer. What do we risk — developing palates for nutritious consumption? What’s additionally exciting is that the Hooray Puree products are shelf-stable for two years, making them economically viable and available to organizations and institutions. We handle the entire process from farm to fork. We not only encourage healthy food choices, we inspire healthy change – for young adults to enter the arena of agriculture research and innovative thinking.

With enhanced nutrition education, we can show this generation of kids how to shop for healthy foods at the grocery store, how to cook and prepare healthy meals and snacks, and how to reap the benefits of overall healthy living. By empowering our kids to make the changes themselves, we are teaching them where their food comes from and what to do with it when they have it in their hands. We inspire them to think outside of the box.

Kids who get their hands dirty in the garden will eat what they sow and harvest, simply out of curiosity.

If this curiosity leads to kids sampling foods they may have never eaten before, then we are all in for a very cool future.

Bottom line — we need leaders. We need office staff and man/womanpower to staff our school nutrition programs. We need policy modifications at the federal level to recognize these developments and we need funding allocated to incorporate healthy food and education into programming. As parents (I am a dad to four amazing children), we can work with our school districts to make a difference: join the wellness committee, talk to the principal about reading food-related books to the students, and ask teachers for time to do a healthy cooking demo. Let’s put to use the strengths we all possess and share with others to make a difference in the life of a child. Together we can end childhood hunger, decrease childhood obesity and disease, increase awareness, and most importantly, live as a society knowing that we are a TEAM: Together Everyone Achieves More.

You may also enjoy Interview: Congressman Tim Ryan | A Mindful Revolution with Kristen Noel

The post The School Nutrition Dilemma: An Insider Speaks Out appeared first on BEST SELF.

The fight for equality in our immigrant nation requires a new, mindful paradigm regarding the rights, values and citizenship of  immigrants — and ourselves

—

Every evening, I resolve to wake up early and have 20 minutes to myself before my daughter and husband awake and the daily rush begins. Most mornings since December, I have instead stayed in bed, sometimes in deep sleep, and at other times, in a half-awake state, guiltily enjoying the warmth of the covers and, if my daughter has snuck in at night, her peaceful breathing. In this way, I’m not much different than most other Americans, well intentioned about our health and well-being yet thwarted by the mundane but real stresses of our daily lives. Overcome with exhaustion, or a hangover from too much wine or too much television the night before, we relish that extra 20 minutes in bed — a blissful treat in advance of what will likely be a hectic day of appointments, errands, and deadlines. The challenge inherent in those days is juggling the must-dos and the should-dos, with little time for the precious want-to-dos.

Like others, I could benefit from 20 minutes a day of me-time — quiet, unencumbered by responsibility, and free from demands. But year after year, I find those 20 minutes to be elusive. This year, I am trying to make peace with that, mostly because I’m accepting that my mindful practice is engaging in meaningful and transformative work. Without my work, I could have all the minutes in the world and be restless.

What is this work that brings me the same peace and satisfaction of 20 minutes of quiet time? It’s ensuring that the playing field of American democracy is more level and equitable.

At the New American Leaders Project, we’re mindful of the glaring gap between the American public and its leaders. The 114^th Congress is 80 percent white and 80 percent male; the country is only 72 percent white, and is more than 50 percent female. There are further divisions – in income and religion, for example. We are working to close the gap by training people to run for office at the local and state levels, and eventually move to Congress. Why does this matter? Well, for one, leaders who come from diverse backgrounds are more likely to be mindful of engaging their community members in the political process. They understand the challenges facing a first-time voter in this country, or someone for whom English is not a first language. Leaders who really reflect the diversity of the American experience can do something else — they can create policies that respond to that diversity. Assuring that immigrants can drive to work, benefit from in-state tuition, or have translated materials about government programs are some examples of what immigrant legislators do.

As an immigrant, I value American individualism. It’s one of the reasons I came to this country, and stayed.

Often, we think of mindfulness as a practice that’s individualistic. But it doesn’t have to be. We are mindful of the earth, for example, and we should be mindful of the people around us. Not just in ways that serve our interests and make us feel that we are caring and committed human beings, but in ways that explicitly honor the connections between us. We can teach immigrants how to exercise their right to vote, or we can see immigrants as the leaders of our country, for whom we can vote. We can see immigrants as people willing to come to America for a better life, or we can see America as a better place because immigrants continue to come here. This is the mindfulness I practice — of human interconnectedness, of improving others’ human conditions while also working on my own. If 20 minutes a day of meditation and yoga could get me closer to a more inclusive America, I’d be getting out of bed much faster on these winter mornings. For now, I’m taking those 20 minutes of sleep instead, mindfully and purposefully, to refuel for the workday ahead.

You may also enjoy reading Life as a Refugee: The Struggle to Create a Better Life by Noor Ghazi

The post Crossroads of the Immigrant Nation appeared first on BEST SELF.

On women, equality, and a process for finding your passion

—

I grew up in North Little Rock, Arkansas in a working class, African-American neighborhood, literally on the wrong side of the tracks.

I was raised to say “yes ma’am” and “yes sir,” respect my elders, and speak only when spoken to. I knew at an early age that I didn’t want to stay in Arkansas and that I would have to work hard to “get out” and experience all the world had to offer. So, when many of my friends and neighbors hung out, I studied.

When my father died just before my 17th birthday, I focused even more on striving for academic excellence. I hustled to support myself through college and managed to graduate with a degree in finance and a ticket to New York City.

Today I am a Harvard MBA, run my own consulting firm and sit on the board of the Lean In Foundation.

Throughout my journey, I found my voice and learned how to advocate for myself. Many of my lessons came the hard way and what I have learned is that everyone has a story. Whether you grew up in an affluent neighborhood or just in the hood. Whether you had a “normal” childhood, or you had to negotiate an environment that included drugs, crime, and violence, you can live an authentic and empowered life. It starts with knowing your worth and the value you bring to the world.

My story is unique but the challenges of living an empowered life are universal.

Make no mistake. Living an authentic and empowered life is hard.

We are trained early to stand down, and as we get older, “stand by our man.” I was told that my feelings, desires, and thoughts were not as important as those of my father/brother/husband.

I know now that many women experience similar double standards. I was led to believe that men make the decisions and essentially rule the world. Well — if you look at the state of things — Ferguson, our economy, world politics, and horrific violence — it’s not working so well. We have been taking a back seat for far too long. The statistics are staggering:

• Women in the first year out of college are paid 82% of what their male colleagues earn
• Women do the majority of the world’s work, but earn a small percentage of the world’s income, and own even less of the world’s property
• For every dollar white men are paid, white women earn 77 cents. African-American women earn 64 cents and Hispanic women 54 cents
• Women would have $11,600 more a year if we were paid equally
• Women comprise only 19% of U.S. congressional seats
• There are less than 30 female Fortune 500 CEOs. Women hold about 15% of the executive officer positions and 17% of the board seats
• Women have less than 6% of top CEO jobs in almost every country in the world
• According to the Shriver Report, if women working fulltime, year round, were paid the same for their work as comparable men, we would cut the poverty rate for working women and their families in half.

There are many reasons that women’s wages lag behind those of men. Societal issues such as gender stereotyping, gender segregation in occupations, discrimination, and inadequate family-leave policies are contributing factors.

The problem is systemic, interrelated, and complex.

But there is hope. Knowing your worth is about understanding exactly what you deserve out of life and what has already been promised to you. I grew up as a “nice” little Southern girl and leveraged my desire for “a different life” to bust out of my comfort zone. I found my voice amid the wolves of Wall Street and then eventually used that voice to step out on my own.

Knowing your worth starts with finding your passion.

If you want to transform your life, I highly recommend figuring out what you are passionate about, then choose to do it for a living.

Now, this isn’t as easy as it sounds, but it’s well worth the effort. If you dread going to your job, or find yourself constantly lacking motivation, you are never going to get what you want out of life.

I learned this firsthand coming out of college. I graduated with a degree in finance and set my sights on Wall Street. I arrived at a top investment bank with a number of other college graduates, and we joined an analyst “class.” Almost immediately, I stood out like a sore thumb. Most of the people in my analyst class were Ivy League graduates who were savvy to the ways of Wall Street.

I was a fish out of water — a girl from Arkansas with a southern accent and flowered dresses. And if the culture wasn’t bad enough, I found the job to be unfulfilling and the hours exhausting. I was miserable. I had worked for years to get this job, yet I decided to quit, and began working for a start-up nonprofit for half my salary.

Even though I am a compensation consultant, I know that money isn’t the most important thing for lasting happiness and career satisfaction. Too often, I see people get caught up in the “salary-race,” and personal contentment goes by the wayside.

If you want true professional fulfillment, choose a field or a job because it is your passion. And then, work to be paid equitably. Unless you are born into a wealthy family or marry rich, you will spend the majority of your life working. The average fulltime employee spends 65-75% of each year working, and that is far too much time to be doing something you don’t love. I am a firm believer that if you follow your passion, the money will come. The ideal balance, of course, is a job that is fulfilling AND pays a competitive wage.

How can you find what you’re passionate about? Here are some suggestions:

• Is there something you already love doing? Do you have a hobby, or something you loved doing as a child, but never considered it as a career possibility? If there’s already something you love doing, you’re ahead of the game. Now you just need to research the possibilities of making money from it.
• What do you spend hours reading about? For myself, when I get passionate about something, I’ll read about it for hours on end. I’ll buy books and magazines. I’ll spend days on the Internet finding out more. There may be a few possibilities here for you… and all of them are plausible career paths. Don’t close your mind to these topics. Investigate them.
• Take a self-assessment. The Strong Interest Inventory® assessment is one of the world’s most widely respected and frequently used career planning tools. It has helped both academic and business organizations develop the brightest talent and has guided thousands of individuals – from high school and college students to midcareer workers – seeking a change in their search for a rich and fulfilling career.
• Never quit trying. Can’t find your passion at first? Give up after a few days and you’re sure to come up empty. Keep trying, for months on end if necessary, and you’ll find it eventually. Thought you found your passion but then you got tired of it? No problem! Start over again and find a new one. There may be more than one passion in your lifetime, so explore all the possibilities. Found your passion but haven’t been successful making a living at it? Don’t give up. Keep trying, and try again, until you succeed. Success doesn’t come easy, so giving up early is a sure way to fail. Keep trying, and you’ll get there.

When you are pursuing your passion, it makes it so much easier to ask for what you want.

Whether you are just out of college or in the middle of your career, you probably have a vision about what your ideal career looks like. I know that for myself, I had it all planned out when I graduated. But, as we all learn, even the best-laid plans can’t prevent life’s unexpected twists and turns.

You may covet a prime position, only to realize you are miserable in it. Or, you may settle down where you’re happy, yet not make enough to pay the rent. Career ups and downs, such as these, are inevitable, but as long as you stay focused, you will keep moving in the right direction. Set professional immediate and long-term goals so that when life throws you the inevitable curve ball, you can refocus on them and get right back on track.

My hope is that Best Self will give you a few more tools for your personal toolkit to help you ask for, and receive, what you seek and deserve in life. The rewards of knowing your worth will help you have healthy relationships, pursue your dreams, and reach new heights in all areas of your life.

You may also enjoy Podcast: Brendon Burchard Interview | Live, Love, Matter with Kristen Noel

The post Women, Equality, and the Pursuit of Passion appeared first on BEST SELF.