It’s Time to Check Back in

I’ve been realizing it’s time to put up another blog post. I knew it had been some time. But when I checked to see the dates, it’s been a year since I wrote for my blog. And what a year it has been!

Some things I learned this year:

• My clients and I adjusted very well to doing telehealth sessions via zoom or on the telephone. Really, none of us had thought this would work. We have all been pleasantly surprised! We actually prefer the ease of just logging in and not having to drive anywhere. Or get dressed up from the waist down. 🙂
• I like telehealth so much that I will be letting go of my office where I have paid for my space with barely using it for the past year.
• I like doing all morning or all-day workshops or retreats or intensive one-on-one sessions for individuals and have a lovely space in which I can continue to offer those going forward.
• My clients appreciate reminders that as surreal and lonely and bizarre this year of quarantine has been, they are not alone in feeling this way. Each of us has our particular challenges and at the same time, as a society, we share the commonality of going through uncharted terrain of the pandemic with its associated fears and angst.
• I knew that the transition out of the quarantine would be chopping and tension-filled as well as exciting and a relief. I did not realize the extent, though, of this adjustment. My clients report a sense of almost vertigo as they grapple with where to go without masks, whether to go without masks, how to resume their lives and whether they want things to go back to the way things were “in the before times”. 
• There is a kindness I see demonstrated in the public at large as I go about my business and life. We, as a people, have been through something unprecedented in our lifetimes. I see compassion and relief in people’s faces.

We still have a ways to go in integrating this HUGE experience of the last year with all its pros and cons. Some people are grieving mightily the loss of loved ones, the loss of an entire school year, the loss of their businesses and income. There is, yes, PTSD in the population. 

So, please look out for support for yourself and for your loved ones – through therapy, yoga, breathing exercises, gardening, being in nature, eating well, spending time with vaccinated loved ones, petting your animals, meditating, doing art, playing music, hiking in nature, going to the beach – whatever nourishes you. We need to take time to heal and not rush into some imagined lifestyle we are not sure we want to return to. Things have changed. We have changed. Give yourself the gift of time to ease into this new phase of your life.