change therapy

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for this mothers day, some poems i’ve written over the years:

mother of the centre

mother of the centre,
black madonna,
spirals around herself –
invisible and solid
iridescent and opaque
invincible and weak
irresistible and stark
irreverent and pious –
and dances: she is a dervish queen!
the dust that swirls around her feet
adores her.

mother haiku

waking up again
she cries; it’s a cold, cold night.
her mother holds her.

moon mama

. moon mama
……… in the sea
… show her teeth
………..… wide grin
stars mirrored in those
……………….. wide ivory mama tusks

.. and when she burps
the fish laugh

(image by parag sankhe)

one of the things that came up in our fireside chat yesterday was self deception. i just stumbled across one of my poems that is somewhat a propos:

the king and queen arriving
without clothes,
and we bow before them.
arrived, we also have arrived,
knowing the words that clothe them:
“how beautiful her skirt! and his lovely pantaloons!”

clothed, we’ve clothed them,
covered up their nakedness,
never to be seen again.
never to be seen again the truth of their skin,
the hollow of their knees,
the look in their eyes when they are not shaded,
not shaded by the hats with which
our dour imaginations have crowned them.

“if you love something, you set it free.”
clothed, we’ve clothed them.
covered, swaddled, iron-cast in clothes.

isabella mori
counselling in vancouver

the written word – of course, bloggers like me, we love it. and it certainly has healing powers, in many ways: it educates, it helps us think, it can soothe, it can make our hearts soar.

but there are so many other ways. here is a delightful little music video by m. ward that one of my good stumbleupon friends, mrcclass, a special ed teacher from halifax, sent me the other day. enjoy it!

for today’s “frozen pea friday” post on cancer, and because it’s national mental health week, i’ve interviewed someone on how she deals with the emotional effects of cancer. here’s what she says:

• i have 100% permission to have all the meltdowns i need to have (i.e. anger, crying spells)
• have a relationship with a psychotherapist whom i see regularly; that helps me remind me of self-care, putting my family in perspective and making sure i get my meltdowns
• i have buddies. we’re in a group and i strongly request my buddies corner me four times a week and get me to focus on what i want. they do it and also get me to look at the guilt monsters because guilt is huge for me
• maintain sleep, exercise and a regular eating schedule
• i get help with sleep with sleep medication
• i schedule regular meals and make sure i eat them
• i manage anxiety by being really practical and taking things that i want seriously and making steps towards them if i can’t actually do them right
• i very rarely tell myself “absolutely not!” usually it’s, “yes” or “yes, later” or “probably, later”
• i let myself care about other people, even though right now it’s “me first time”

other info on the connection between mental health and cancer:

sexuality and cancer

this study suggests that people with mental health issues have a larger chance of getting certain types of cancer, and getting it at an earlier age

this site has a large section on the emotional effects of cancer. what i find most helpful about that is that it shows the many effects – seeing this in print, knowing that these feelings are normal and experienced by many can in itself be helpful.

yoga may help with breast cancer

(refracted pea image by fellow canadian ecstaticist, whose blog is here)

yesterday i had a wonderful conversation with dr. matthew b. james about the hawaiian spiritual system of huna. since this is national mental health week and the focus of this year’s mental health week is workplace mental health, i asked him about huna in the workplace.

what is huna?
first of all, what is huna? it appears that huna derives from an ancient art and science of healing and spiritual development. dr. james believes this ancient system to be as old as 35,000 years. it is said to be a part of the original teachings of the peoples of a place which no longer exists. what remains physically of that land are the mountain peaks of the island chain called hawaii. huna is a modern label for certain spiritual and/or energy practices in the islands prior to western influences.

the term huna, i am learning, seems to be connected to something called ho’omana. ho’o means to make. mana means life force, equivalent, for example, to ki. “taken together,” says dr. james, “the word ho’omana means empowerment”.

pono - standing in the light
another important concept appears to be pono. literally, pono means “just beneath the surface”. it also means something like a wonderful form of righteousness: “standing in your own light, you are congruent with who you are”.

the way i am starting to understand this is that ho’omana can be seen as the practice of empowerment – an action towards empowerment – whereas pono is the result of that action.

pono and negative emotions
“when a negative thing occurs, we put it put it in a black bag’”. this black bag absorbs energy – the light of pono – and then prevents a person’s energy from creating what they want.

i was happy to hear that dr. james was quick to point out that there is no need to vilify, deny or suppress so-called negative energies. negative emotions are sometimes really good barometers. the trick is to acknowledge them, do whatever is necessary, and then let them go. problems only arise when we hold on to these “negative” emotions.

when a person holds on to negative emotions, they are pushed out of balance. in ancient hawaiian terms, nothing can be done well unless all three parts of a person, the unihipili, uhane, and aumakua (roughly translated, the subconscious, the conscious, and the superconscious) are in alignment.

and if you hold on to anger for an extended period, it’s bad for your body.

someone who is pono (stands in the light, is empowered) does not hold on to anger. how does that play out in the workplace?

huna and pono in the workplace
first, if you truly dislike your job, quit it. you can’t survive on sitting around thinking happy thoughts all the time. being spiritual doesn’t throw out intelligent thinking. if something is harmful and you keep allowing it to happen, you don’t stand in the light.

and if the workplace is not horrible but has some problems?

here are some ideas.

forgiveness
we don’t make positive decisions when we stand in the negative. try to forgive the person and forgive yourself. this is part of the practice of ho’oponopono, which means literally (or as literally as any translation of hawaiian concepts can get) “to make things right”. it is also often translated as forgiveness.

change your language
in ancient hawaii there was no word for sorry. “’i’m sorry’ is blunt, and it ends the conversation. it encourages no interaction.” in hawaiian, one would say, “i humbly ask for your forgiveness. i forgive you, too.” this encourages interaction, and turns the exchange into a give and take: you receive, you give. energy or mana flows like an alternating current. we have to make a complete circuit. language follows energy; it acts like energy.

rethink how you communicate
once you change your language, your thinking changes. george naope, a hawaiian elder and master of chanting and hula, says, “think not that all wisdom is in your school”. often we think we know everything but all we know is how it works for us at this moment, not for someone else. george naope says, “i know you are masters, as well, and i respect that. this just happens to be the way i do it.” if you can’t recognize that, you set yourself up for confrontation. realize the other person may be there to teach you just as much as you want to teach them (or simply tell them what to do or think!).

management
dr. james has a masters in organizational management and does a lot of teaching in that area. the best way to manage is through team building. this closely mirrors ancient approaches to teaching. teachers/managers are not there to tell you what to do, they are there to increase the chance for success of the people they are managing through support, effective delegation and inspiration. most successful companies give their employees a lot of responsibilities.

good managers cultivate their employees’ pono – standing in their on light, accountable, empowered, productive. by empowering others they empower themselves and the organization. huna teaches that if you give someone responsibility, you have to give it to them 100%. you have to let them go through their learning curve.

expression
if something comes up, you just express it. and then together you come to a solution. however, first you must let the other person fully express what went wrong and not say anything until they have completely expressed themselves.

(go here for a glossary or some hawaiian terms and concepts)

(the interesting image of the lava tube is by timothy)

the image is by jackal, who says “i struggle with mental illness (borderline personality disorder) and i explore and express my world through photography and writing in which i believe there is no reality - only perception.”

today for my post on mental health, i’d like to share with you a letter i received a few days ago from a fellow canadian. while it is about the mental illness of addiction, i’d also like to think about it as a move towards mental wellness; wellness achieved by sharing our stories with others. here it is:

dear ms. mori

i am writing to you, as i have to many other ‘alcohol’ awareness/help organizations, regarding what i feel is a fairly unknown health problem. while everyone is painfully aware of society’s affair with drunk driving, i have only found one or two individuals, in the last few months, who have ever heard of this health problem and its cause. i’ll try to make it as brief as possible, however, please feel free to contact myself, should you require any further information what-so-ever.

to set the stage, the years preceding our health deterioration, we had both quit drinking for a year here and there, with no reactions at all, but went back to it, in order to keep some sanity in our previous/former bad marriages.

neither of us had ever heard of possible dreadful health effects, were warned only, of course, not to drink excessively for the obvious reasons, and then, not to drive! we both found it to be somewhat of a stress reliever though, as we were prone to worry.

both myself and my late husband were born to alcoholic mothers. they drank before, during and after pregnancy, but we were both born in good health. we picked up the nasty little drinking habit quite well, in our late teens. we were both well educated and held down good jobs with excellent income and work associates who, unfortunately, also loved to drink. never any illnesses or health problems, never a sick day off work, nor hospital visits. this all came to a devastating halt, for us both in our mid 40’s. it is called ‘grand-mal seizures’ (epilepsy).

there is no known cure!! prescription drugs are the only help. along with complete alcohol abstinence, permanently! the current drugs have pages and pages of horrific side effects and are costly. we both were forced to give up our occupations, which is unbelievably difficult to do when you have worked happily your entire life, not to mention being accustomed to a certain level of income.

seizures do not hit all drinkers, some not at all, some earlier, some later in life, with no rhyme or reason, similar to many health problems facing today’s society. i have a distant relative whose daughter was born with it, and, while her mom and dad have never consumed alcohol, suspicion is that her dad’s biological parents did. however, being adopted leaves the question unanswered.

your drivers license is suspended immediately when it hits, and not returned until you have made 6 full months, without an attack. however, it is like having a wretched poisonous snake, dwelling permanently inside of you, forever and ever, and ever! the medication professes to hold it down, so to speak, and yes, it does, however, it is always on your mind especially when your license to drive is returned and makes travelling costs to many doctor’s appointments slightly more affordable. there is a little journal book always here in our home, where it is noted, time and day the medication is taken, in dreaded fear of missing, then being served notice basically, by the python inside. he is very aware when he hasn’t received his breakfast or supper, call it his ‘tranquilizing medication’. consequently, you may or may not be served his wrath! i trust you get the picture.

i never ever leave the house without checking this precious little diary, always sitting in clear, plain view, as having a seizure while driving could cause horrendous dreadful consequences! this is not drunk driving, so to speak, but the aftermath of drinking for years and years, not to mention the worry of it causing a fall, splitting your skull open (again), or breaking bones.

a year before my spouse passed away, he had a seizure while in a large parking garage, negotiating two upward steps, and literally flew over 20 ft., landing and breaking his hip, resulting in surgery, then a year long recovery process. this is for someone who at 6 ft 4″ tall, in excellent physical condition. but he was lucky that time! not to mention a previously broken arm & ankle, from the same cause! never had he broken a single bone in his life!!

i am attempting to bring this to as many organizations attention, as possible, as well as our government leaders, hoping that it will eventually result in them ruling for all liquor containers to bear a large warning, and to raise the purchase prices as well! cigarette manufacturers have been forced to do both, while our government still makes plenty of money from them, so, they don’t lose out. but i can’t remember ever hearing of a terrible traffic accident or severe fall, caused by smoking !?!

this type of life with a minor affliction is difficult. again, it causes a great deal of stress. my beloved’s passing away a year ago this month was a direct result of bleeding internally from a perforated ulcer, and his reluctance to go into the hospital for treatment immediately, as he didn’t want me to be on my own, i suspect, in case of an attack. needless to say, i’m on my own now.

i trust you will pass this on to others. i have been replied to by some folks on the subject, they believing, seizures are only caused from alcohol withdrawal! well, not so, not so at all !! it’s like wondering if the tenant inside is dead, alive, pissed off with you, bored or maybe, just maybe, unusually content! (for now!)

sincerely yours, in the hopes of helping others,

sjg in canada

(image by melody)

this week is national mental health week in canada. like last year, i’ll dedicate all my posts this week to mental health. (in a way, all my posts are about mental health but this week we’ll just be a bit more explicit, ok?)

today a roundup of mental health events happening in and around vancouver this week.

movies and psychiatry - may 5th
the depiction of mental illness in film. a multi-media mental health awareness week event, presented by dr. harry karlinsky. a clinical professor at the university of british columbia, founding director of the award-winning frames of mind mental health film series and festival film critic for the canadian psychiatric association. dr. karlinsky will provide a historical overview of the depiction of mental health issues within the world of cinema. he will also explore how the practice of psychiatry can be influenced by concepts first introduced in popular movies. various film and video clips will be utilized throughout the forum to illustrate key points. date: may 5th, time: 7:00pm - 8:30pm, and location: douglas college, 700 royal avenue, new westminster room: 2201. enquiries: 604-523-1072.

***

improving your life-work balance - wednesday may 7, 7-9:30 pm.

organized by the canadian mental health association, vancouver/burnaby branch.

in this interactive workshop, we’ll discuss what life-work imbalance is, how it impacts your life, the different ways that you can improve your own life-work balance and spend more time doing what you love. you’ll leave the workshop with an action plan for improving your life-work balance.

admission is $10.00 at the door, cash only please.
location:
alan emmott building
6650 southoaks crescent
burnaby, bc

***

turning grief into action - dealing with teen suicide

when jude platzer’s 15-year-old son josh committed suicide in 1999, her future became clear.

the vancouver resident, overwhelmed with emotion, jumped into action and adopted an advocacy role to help raise awareness about teen suicide and prevent other families from going through what hers had.

this week, as part of national mental health week (may 5-11), platzer will speak at the canadian mental health association north and west vancouver branch’s health lecture series on wednesday, may 7 at john braithwaite community centre at 7 p.m. for more information, go here.

***

face value by the youth theatre action group
a play about teenagers dealing with mental health issues, addiction and prostitution. may 6th-8th at the roundhouse community centre. there are two matinee shows on may 7th and 8th at 1:15 p.m. evening shows are may 6th, 7th, 8th at 7:30 p.m. all shows will take place at the roundhouse community centre in vancouver. more info here.

***

public education series on addiction
at the pacific spirit community health centre on west 43rd. all are welcome to come to this free drop-in group. every friday from 9:30 to 11:30. this friday, may 9: chemicals and the body. more info here.

for a full list of events put on by the canadian mental health association in british columbia, go here.

yesterday was beltane, one of the two most important holidays in pagan traditions.just as hallowe’en marks the time when we slip into the darkness of winter, on beltane we celebrate opening the door to the joys and exuberance of summer.

i’d like to dedicate this beltane to all women with breast cancer.

i imagine an end to the wintery weariness that comes with chemotherapy, radiation and all the other medical procedures – and the blossoming of fresh energy, ebullient laughter, and renewed pleasures in your bodies.

let’s have a handfasting between your bodies and the flaming red, bursting energy of tulips, the sparkling green of the new grass, the elegant white of plum blossoms!

come, let’s hold hands and jump over the beltane fire together, leaving behind pain and the cold grip of fear!

beltane is about fertility. the fertility of sisterhood, holding each other, holding on to each other, holding each other up, growing in our circle much more than what we can create each one by ourselves.

(this is another frozen pea friday post, in support of the breast cancer recovery and work of susan reynolds and those she inspires to help end breast cancer. ***** image by stephie)

(image by luke carter)

hello people! this is the new edition of the carnival of eating disorders. unfortunately, i’ve been having problems with the blog carnival site (the site that administers all the carnivals) so i have had only a few submissions this month, two of which i’ll be including.

to substitute for the slim pickins, i’ll feature this time a poem – last day of poetry month! – and two topics that twitter friends of mine have suggested.

a bulimia poem

imagine yourself in a room of people eating.
jaws break down and digest tiny nutrients
absorbed by miniscule pores, countless internal mouths
in the stomach lining, fissures in nerve tissue.
by the window, there is a girl frozen with fork raised,
distanced from the herd—a cautious lone zebra
crouching in the reeds, spying lions at the waterhole
and hiding her stripes.

go here for the rest.

anorexia promotion to be outlawed in france
the first topic suggested is by jan, who thought it would be useful to talk about a bill adopted by france’s lower house of parliament this month which could be the catalyst for the worldwide fight against eating disorders. the bill still needs to be approved by the senate but if that occurs, it would make it illegal for anyone — including magazines, web sites and advertisers — to publicly promote extreme thinness or unhealthy methods of dropping a few dress sizes.

here are three views on that.

girl – woman – beauty – brains says

with the jury still out on the cause of eating disorders, i can’t condone france’s hard line approach to dealing with the media. you know what happens when the government gets involved in free capital issues. not only does corruption loopholes or other means to circumvent the system arise, but usually the legislation and ensuing laws are ineffective.

looking at how this might play out in the courts, particularly in the US, carrie from ed bites takes a more favourable view, citing the ideas of a father of a person with anorexia who also happens to be a lawyer:

while the first amendment probably protects pro-dieting and pro-ed speech from government censorship, it does not protect that kind of speech from civil liability. the tobacco industry, for example, was nailed for huge money damages for failing to disclose the dangers of smoking and for evil practices like marketing cigarettes to children. those practices violated general tort law and consumer protection statutes and were found by the courts not to be protected by the constitutional right to free speech. it would be interesting to look at the marketing practices of the diet industry for examples of where it crosses the line. like failing to warn of the dangers of dieting.

finally, the people at 5 resolutions are pretty clear on their positive take on this and urge others to go along:

if you think the u.s. government should play an active role in eating disorders research, treatment, and prevention, go to the eating disorder coalition’s website and sign up for their newsletter. we just did.

what do you think? should any form of favourable communication about anorexia and bulimia be banned? or is that a form of censorship? what kind of effect would such a law have on people with anorexia or bulimia, and on the population as a whole?

anorexia and exercise
the second alert i got from my twitter friend rob cottingham, who pointed out that the april/may edition of the running room’s magazine has an article about eating disorders. i tried my best to find anything on the internet about that but wasn’t able to. going onto the running room’s forum, there is a small section on anorexia. interestingly, it has a poll asking whether anyone on the forum knows a runner with an eating disorder. 25% said they did. i think the idea of a sporting goods company talking about eating disorders is fascinating, and if any of you know anything more about this, please let me know!

and here are the two submissions that made the cut.

obesity and overeating
the weight loss continues to report on his particular way of losing weight – trying a new diet every week or so. here he talks about eating raw.

at small steps to health, people who are struggling with their weight are encouraged to

take a few days (at least one weekday and one weekend) to write down any emotion related eating. on a sheet of paper, put in four columns: triggers, behaviors, consequences, and action plan.

she then goes into a bit of detail for each one of these. this is a method that works well for people who are really ready to beat their demons. it works for any habit, and i highly recommend it.

so, people, that’s it for this month. if you have written an article on any of these topics or have seen one you like, please, submit it to the next edition of carnival of eating disorders, to come out on may 31. please use the carnival submission form.

(image by jo salmon) 

still in the spirit of poetry month, an excerpt from ernesto cardenal’s versos del pluriverso (verses from the pluriverse):

if there is an endless number of worlds, they say,
there is also a world where napoleon won the battle of waterloo.
and a world where she requited my love, in granada.
but these worlds and ours will never find each other.

quantum waves are vibrations of the possible.
“quantum waves” they called empty waves.
but in quantum theory there exists no “nothing”.
and an electron “literally has no dimension”.
or:
“to our understanding it is no object.”
(an electron)
the particles are no firmer and no more durable,
they say, than a stream of water from a fountain.
for heisenberg, less substantial than a promise.
if space-time was visible, they believe,
it would have the shape of foam.
bertrand russell still owes an answer to the cab driver.
very old, he hailed a cab and the cab driver recognized him and asked:
“so, what is it all about?”
for the first time in his life he could not respond.

when the universe expands:
then from which centre does it expand?
or is each point the centre?
then the centre of the universe
is also our solar system,
also our planet
(and she, who once was it for me).

one of the things that fascinates me about this work of poetry is that throughout, cardenal expands his views to the unimaginable and then always comes back to the minute particular – the centre of his universe, once, a woman in granada.

a liberation theologian, he always brings philosophy and theology down to earth. we see the brilliance of bertrand russell bursting into foam at a simple question from a cab driver. theory needs to inform us but if we have to be able to touch it, at least here and there, at least for a moment. yes, we really do not have good words and concepts (yet) for the form of water in a stream – but it’s there, very real, very important.

ernesto cardenal studied in mexico and at columbia university in the US, and with thomas merton at a trappist monastery in kentucky in 1957. nicaraguan dictactor anastasio somoza declared cardenal an outlaw in 1957 for his support of the sandinista movement. in 1965, he was ordained a priest and founded a christian commune, solentiname. during the revolution, cardenal served as a field chaplain for the FSLN. after the triumph, he served as minister of culture from 1979 to 1988 and promoted literary workshops throughout nicaragua. at present he is the vice president of casa de las tres mundos, a literary and cultural organization based in managua.

i translated this from the german translation by willi zurbrueggen – i couldn’t find either an english translation or the spanish original on the web. the english translation in book form is about to come out, with some amazing translators, including thomas merton and kenneth rexroth.

go here for more information about ernesto cardenal.

today friday, as usual, a post having to do with cancer. to finish off april, the poetry month, i’ll serve up three poems.

the first one is one i wrote shortly before my friend nikaiah jaguar left us.

nikaiah
butterfly woman
your bones are so thin the moon shines through

some say
the moths are eating you
but we know
you are becoming one with the light.

here one by denise larrabee, from the cancer poetry project:

you are in my thoughts
are with you are part of
the ?prayer chain? at our
church will say a mass
for you accept all
prayers on your behalf we
will say a rosary for you
tonight lots of people
are calmly, psychically
cheering you on sunday
will light a candle for
you are in our thoughts
and prayers are being
said for you need all the
health karma there is a
candle lit for you in
front of my madonna has a
special place for young
women in trouble require
positive and healthy
energy to kiss someone
you love when you get
this letter and make
magic.

and lastly, one that has been floating around the web for a while, by an author whose name we don’t know. i found it at ma walking wolf:

what cancer cannot do

cancer is so limited…
it cannot cripple love
it cannot shatter hope
it cannot corrode faith
it cannot destroy peace
it cannot kill friendship
it cannot suppress memories
it cannot silence courage
it cannot invade the soul
it cannot steal eternal life
it cannot conquer the spirit

(image by nancy waldman, a fellow canadian)

i was going to send this as an email to someone but why not post it here?

the question is – how do you turn something dreadful into something you like? actually, the words used were “purgatory” and “heaven”

i have a few exercises for this, and one of them has something to do with how we feel when we’re not 100% good at something. so here we go.

somewhere i read this: “the fact that we do not know how to be or do everything perfectly is not a good reason to lose confidence in ourselves.”

this can be turned into a little exercise:

list a few things that you don’t do perfectly, e.g.

• paperwork
• play with kids
• exercise regularly
• look after bad back
• perform well at presentations

then ask yourself – what’s fun about these things?

what’s fun about doing paperwork?
e.g. i like paper! like, the actual paper. makes me think of books and writing and drawing.

what’s fun about playing with the kids?
e.g. i like finger puppets.

what’s fun about exercising regularly?
e.g. the cute guys at the gym

what’s fun about looking after my bad back?
e.g. lying on the floor with the TV on.

what’s fun about presentations?
e.g. i like powerpoint.

it’s a good idea to come up with at least 5 fun points for each activity you feel you’re not perfect at.

(p.s. it was much more fun to write this than to finish round 1 of my taxes. i soo dislike doing that this time around. so i’m going to take my own medicine. what’s fun about doing the taxes? 1 - i get to go on the web site of one of my favourite financial institutions; 2 - when i’m done, i can phone my husband and GLOAT; 3 - i get to walk my talk - one of my biggest motivators; 4 - i get to have a better overview over my finances - something i always enjoy; 5 - i enjoy looking at the neatness of spreadsheets. ok, i’m off now!)

(image by my lovely friend mj ankenman)