Finding courage
When I listen to my heart tell me what is more important to me than avoiding an immediate threat, the courage to act can suddenly appear.
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September 4, 2019
What matters to me
Asking “What matters to you?” as well as “What is the matter?” It doesn't sound like a big change, but it is.
June 3, 2019
If the lights go out, just move
This past winter I spent a long weekend on retreat in stillness and good company. The theme of the retreat was hidden seeds, the way nature can look as if it's sleeping or even dead, when it is in fact gathering strength and getting ready to burst forth when the conditions are favorable.
May 9, 2019
Co-production and advocacy / Disability / Improving healthcare / Leadership and growth / My toolkit / Special Needs Parenting
To start a movement, tell a story
Increasingly, activists and change agents are using their own personal stories as a way to awaken leadership in others. Stories speak the language of emotion, the language of the heart. They not only teach us how to act, but also inspire us with the courage to act. Our stories help us translate our values into action by accessing our emotions.
May 2, 2019
Co-production and advocacy / Disability / Improving healthcare / Leadership and growth / Special Needs Parenting
The tyranny of Norman doors
Through their design, objects subtly communicate instructions on how they should be used. Certain handles just feel like they should be pushed, and others pulled. Bad design sends us signals that are confusing.
April 16, 2019
Beginnings
After four years of wonderful work within a large healthcare agency, I feel called to take a smaller, quieter path. I'm not exactly clear where this new path is going and I'm giving it time to unfold. It's a bit awkward when someone asks what I'll be doing next and I have to struggle to find an answer; I'm ok with that.
April 9, 2019
Photo by Pixabay
Turn your face to the sun
The snowdrops came up this weekend. Their reappearance every year brings a shock of hope so unexpected and intense it’s almost violent. It only took a few hours of sunlight on a warm brick wall and there they were.
February 18, 2019
The tired tropes of special needs parenting
If you listen to or read pop culture reviews, you’ve probably stumbled upon a conversation about tropes, which are basically plot devices, themes or recurring character types. When disability gets represented in life and culture, plenty of tired tropes surface.
December 11, 2018
Passages
I opened a book last week and a bookmark slipped out onto the floor. It was a freebie from a favorite bookstore from my old life, back when I lived on the other side of the ocean. I loved that bookstore, with its coffee counter and author events and the way it always had exactly the book I needed even when it didn't have the book I wanted.
November 29, 2018
The new year as a threshold
Every moment offers a new beginning, but there is something special about the collective transition from one calendar year to the next. It is and always has been a struggle for me not to get too caught up in new beginnings like this, to not be spellbound in the illusion that simply resolving to change will bring change, or that most of the mundane changes I desire, will bring lasting happiness.
January 1, 2018