Mindful Living

I am in New York City visiting my oldest son. Today is our last day here, and it has been a great trip/visit. I finally got to see his apartment (his 4th place!) and meet his friends. He has been in NYC for over 2 years now, and it has become his "home". And I can see why- the area fits him and he has done well here. He has grown up a lot over 2 years- he is more calm, less mood swings, lots of compassion, and wiser. One of the reasons for the trip was to get him re-enrolled in college, which we did accomplish. He is leaning toward becoming a therapist like his mother, which would be cool, but we never know where our paths will take us... He should be able to start at Hunter College in Fall as a transfer student. His apartment is huge, by NYC standards, all hardwood floors, nicely decorated, and he has the best "roomies", who tolerated his mother and sister invading for a few days. The thing that struck me the most about my visit is the great people Alex has sur...

We all want more intimacy in our lives, even if we don't recognize it. What is intimacy? To me it is a closeness, a sharing of our truest feelings, including the uglies; the shame, inadequacies and fears we have about ourselves and our place in the world. When we can share those things, wow! powerful intimacy and connections occur. But it's also the "good" stuff- our dreams, accomplishments, memories, funny stories, lessons, and hopes. Intimacy can be physical. Holding hands, spooning, kissing, hugging, and sexual touch. When we don't have intimacy in our lives, in it's many forms, we can feel alone and disconnected, like an island. Like one woman described it to me: "I am alone and can only rely on myself". She was in a good marriage and raising young children with lots of family and friend support, but she felt so alone , all because she wasn't intimate with others. She played many roles (mother, wife, daughter, friend) in her life and kept oth...

I am one of those people who need a lot of alone time, in order to clear my thoughts/emotions and get grounded. Part of this is because I am very in tune to how others feel (which I hope makes me a good therapist!), and I can unplug from that only when I am alone. Lately I have not had enough alone time, and I don’t feel as grounded or as peaceful inside. I have resolved to change that, and started so this past weekend. When I am alone, I journal, vegetate, sing, read, blog and exercise- activities that bring me much joy! I am not someone who is afraid of being alone, although sometimes I take my aloneness too far- where I don’t connect with the people in my life that I love and cherish, and then I start to feel alone , which is very different from being alone . If I retreat too much from loved ones, I don’t feel emotionally connected, and being an introvert, I do not have a lot of relationships, just a few close ones. When I feel alone it seems like I don’t have any anchors...