Friends! Skool has started offering a "hobby plan" which makes hosting the group waaaay more affordable, so I'm going for it! I have noticed myself thinking, I wish I could just pop this or that into the community so the timing was perfect! And fall is my favorite and it always gives me a bunch of energy, so yay! I'll send this out in a newsletter as well so folks get the heads up. Here's the two videos I had wanted to share today, I'm doing SO much art right now so it was fun to come across another therapist recognizing the nervous system benefits of creativity, thanks @Miren Lopez xoxo

in my DBT class tonight they shared this gorgeous Rumi poem: This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still, treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

End of February, under inches of ice, fell while shoveling and then came down with covid, it has not been my favorite week, but there is something beautiful about seeing myself willing to rest and relax and let down expectations and disappoint others with more ease than ever before in my life! I credit the RRP and the fact that I get to think and talk about the value of taking care of ourselves all day! So any people worry that if they take the time to actually respond to their needs, they'll never "get anything done" again. I think this one fear has kept more people in the system than any other. What/who would we be without the "getting things done" aspect of self? The winter always makes me fall in love with trees because they just stop doing everything for months on end and then spring comes and they churn out leaves in such a frenzy that they go from barren to lush in just a few weeks time. Why can they trust themselves to be dormant and then to respond to the call of spring, and how do they trust themselves to let go of all that hard work every fall? It's extraordinary to me! Anyhow, whether you're snowed in like me or experiencing some other kind of winter, sending you some deep tree love, some faith filled warmth and gentleness and the promise that spring always does come, with all it's bustling energy! xo, z

Hey dear friends, as you have seen, I have not been able to figure out how to make the hangouts work for the past several times and am still stumped looking ahead, I'm not sure what it's about, but my focus right now internally is to really accept when things are not falling into place and let them go even when it may disappoint others, this is really what the RRP is giving me so clearly, this internal stability around disappointing others in a way I've not felt before, the part that is worried about everyone else is still worried, but less so and that feels like a win....so all of that to say, I am going to put the hangouts on pause and see if a time opens up that makes sense or if it just is no longer needed or whatever else arises from the void, so powerful to begin seeing that letting go of things or letting things crumble/end/die is the natural way to open the void that then is where a new creation can spring from or that provides the space and quiet stillness where peace or chaos or anything in between can take up residence, really cool how the less material production and doing the more space can be welcomed and echo the growing understanding of how everything in physical reality is like 99.9% space! Bring on that dark femme chaos! And speaking of, at our last hangout came forward a really beautiful conversation around the dark feminine and @Noah Souder-Russo and @Rachel Williams and I had a continuation of that conversation and it was just delicious! What is your experience of the darkness?

I didn't expect to love this as much as I did, I've previously experienced Mel Robbins as so hustle culture, but this was a wild experience to watch a mom own and apologize for how she showed up and for a daughter to be able to be blunt and open about the pain and disappointment of being her child and for them both to confront together the punishment that it is to all parties to try and make anyone have any sort of experience in relation to us and the sanity and liberation that comes with giving others back their autonomy, very much in the vein with Courage to be Disliked, really excited to hear this coming from the "mainstream"...and really looking forward to reading the book! A big thanks to @Laurie Glazener for sharing this with me! xo, z