We  just returned from the moving play, The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion, reliving the year in which both her only daughter and only husband died.  I cried most of the way home.  Fontaine Syed brought Joan to life and let her anguish visibly hang out.  When I read Joan’s book during my [...]

The most unexpected thing occurred during the last years of my parents’ lives.  Our roles shifted enormously.  My parents, as they cruised closer and closer to the ends of their lives, dropped their filters and their persona.  I had the, perhaps rare, and delightful opportunity to be with their true selves, perhaps even more so with Daddy, [...]

That fine line between compassion and selfishness is a big blur these days.  Decisions about euthanasia or terminal illness graphically illustrate the lack of clarity between wanting contentment and quality of life for the ill and not being able to watch them suffer without suffering myself.  Fortunately, this is true of my family situations, not my client experiences.  [...]

Staying sane. It’s the only good revenge on life’s trials. True sanity…how elusive in this society. Sanity bespeaks of grace, allows grace, snubs its nose at empowering heavy and cumbersome, incorporates restorative quiet and lots of laughter. Another word I like comes from the French. Sang-froid (san-frwa) is a state [...]

Eldon Ray Berridge – Feb 9, 1914 to June15, 2009
My father passed away just before 7 pm on Monday, June 15 at the age of 95.  We were a team.  This is my version of our story.  We think of life as a living and dying cycle.  Yet, to me, it is now birthing and birthing.  [...]

Grace is omnipresent, as is all wisdom through the grace of vision.  Seeing the truth in that statement changes my life.  Wherever I am and regardless of what is happening around me, remembering Grace and knowing Wisdom keeps me, or takes me back, into loving compassion.  The Inka experience, in the East segment of their [...]

The Point: 
Being a child is rough.  We need to depend on others to keep us safe and love us since we don’t know how to do those things for ourselves.  Sometimes those around us don’t know how either and are so struggling to keep themselves safe and feeling loved that they fail to be there [...]

Loving kindness shines most brilliantly when offered from heart to heart.
When we love, greater love is kindled and our glowing fire exponentially expands to others as well.

I am fascinated by this human experience in which we co-partner, like it or not. Witnessing rather than ‘taking enemies’ intrigues me. We typically react, at least on the emotional level, to unwanted stimuli. That seems the one thing that keeps us from experiencing the joy we find in grace. Actually they are co-creators, aren’t [...]

Bob and I life coach together.  Bob is an MBA-financial analyst type who works as CFO of an organization which manages care for emotionally-disturbed children and their families.  I am a healer, feng shui consultant and aspiring author of ‘If You Want Something, Make Room for It’.  Our book delineates how to go from where you are [...]