FACILITATING HEALING STORY SANCTUARIES IN AWFUL TIMES

One of the most effective things we can do as healers, activists, teachers, and individuals who want to make a positive difference is to create sanctuaries for others to gain a fresh perspective on their life, and to find and share their own experience in these times of wild change. We are not afraid to responsibly express our own truth.

Please join me on Tuesday, October 29, at 8-9:30 pm eastern for a brief and easy introduction to facilitating healing story sanctuaries. It's free and online. Write to me at julietbrucephd@gmail.com for the link and to inquire about my availability to help you or your organization become creative facilitators.

Please note: my approach is arts-based and experiential rather than clinical or academic It is based on my 27 years work within the oral and literary traditions and is guided by the approaches of artist/therapist Shaun McNiff, author of "Art as Medicine: Creating a Therapy of the Imagination," mythologist Joseph Campbell, and Jungian analyst/storyteller Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes.

Best wishes,

Juliet Bruce, PhD

Preferences

Hecate's Daughter: Listening for the Call of the World

Hecate, goddess of thresholds, mystery, magic, and the moon, via Jean Bakula, www.jeanbakula@exemplore.com

Silence. 

Beautiful, deep, alive silence.

Outside, rattle and roar of wind against windows. Inside, the quiet of a hundred people sitting in meditation, inhaling, exhaling the peace of this space. Dozens of small story fires radiate through candle flames; a carved wooden statue of Avalokitashvara, the Buddhist goddess of compassion, stands on the altar, as loose and graceful as an unfurling wave. 

It's New Year's Eve. Twenty blocks north is Times Square, with its screaming millions. Here, a different plane, one that I've been craving. I have chosen to welcome my new year at the annual New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care sit with other like-minded, softhearted New Yorkers trying to get through these noisy and scary times with equanimity. 

Why here? I have been following Zencare's Facebook posts (https://www.facebook.com/nyzencenter/)  and am attracted to its mission of offering solace and companionship to suffering people, including those at the end of their lives, as well as training those who want to do this kind of work.

During their dharma talks, the two guiding teachers, Robert Chodo Cambell and Koshin Paley Ellison, invite us to lay aside resolutions, which we'd be sure to fall away from by mid-January. Instead, they ask us to consider a quality we want to embody and nourish in our world in 2018. They suggest that embodying is an expression of giving birth, bringing a gift from within ourselves, is a Divine Feminine way of stepping into the new year rather than the conventional patriarchal notion of reaching out or making something happen in the material world.
 

Ahhh…. I exhale. This is an easy one for me. 

Listening. 

It is what I do, have always done, since I was a pesky little girl tugging on my father’s shirt: “Tell me a story, Daddy.” I have been saying virtually the same thing – tell me a story – ever since, as a comparative literature student, a reporter, and since 1994, a healing story counselor. “Tell me your story.”  

Given this luscious time to remember and visualize listening, I know with certainty that in 2018  I want to be able to listen more deeply to the stories life is telling through clients, places I walk through, environments in which I live, friends, family memories, new adventures, and through through my pen on the page. To listen more deeply to whatever is calling.

 

What quality are you embodying this year? Is there a visual metaphor you can use to hold the energy of your quality and to remind yourself to connect with it? 

 

Mine is Hecate, goddess of thresholds, magic, mystery, and the moon, the one who lives at a crossroads outside of town, listening for the cries of lost souls.

When I first started my Living Story practice in the world's most lost and forgotten places such as prisons and homeless shelters, I read a lot about myth and fairy tale, because ordinary language was inadequate to contain and express that experience. Two goddesses especially resonated with me, both of them transformational: Aphrodite and Hecate. Transformation through love, and transformation through deep listening and intuition. Lighthearted listening through delight, love, and playfulness, and deep listening to the call of the world's suffering.


Through the years, as I have listened to more stories, and especially in the last year, as I have faced personal challenges and my country has slid into a sorrowful place, Hecate is the spirit and the energy that most guides my practice. A mature female goddess whose wisdom comes from lived experience, Hecate is the goddess who hears the cries of lost souls and guides them home. 

I found the image at the top of this post on google and followed it to the website that houses writer-astrologer Jean Bakula’s blog, jeanbakula@exemplore.com. Briefly, Bakula notes that Hecate’s three-headed dog represents her ability to see past, present, and future. In my practice, Hecate’s way of knowing comes through story, which creates coherence between the present moment, the past that has led us to this place, and the future possibilities latent in any situation. From my own reading, I know that serpents represent higher consciousness and broomsticks represent the sweeping away of threshold hindrances. 

Most important to me about the energy of Hecate is that she brings the quality of listening to the world. It was Hecate who could not see but who heard Persephone’s cries from the underworld to which she had been abducted by Hades. It was Hecate who called upon an army of other gods to rescue the buried child, and it was Hecate who remained Persephone’s companion throughout her life, even when she returned every six months to take up her role as Queen of the Underworld, guiding those who had fallen there back to the light. 


I want to manifest Hecate's energy ever more fully this year. 

Back to the zen present: the evening concludes with the ringing of a huge bell 108 times for the 108 gates of liberation and the 108 hindrances, which in Buddhist thought are the same. Reverberating with the deep clear tones of the bell, I walk out into the night both grounded and lifted. Struggling against the frigid winds to the subway, past other stragglers going to their midnight destinations, filled with new energy, knowing that my path this year is about bringing forth more deeply the quality of listening – for the story beneath the story, the story that wants to emerge – in my life, yours, my world, yours, ours. 

Are you listening to the story your life is telling you?

In every moment we’re at a crossroads: past and future are right here with us in the present. We’re always being asked to let go of the past by telling its story, and to choose a direction forward. The fact is that we’re given difficult situations to help us grow — not to overcome its problems, but to ripen in it and blossom through it, to look and listen more deeply into ourselves and our experience to discover strengths, gifts, and a degree of commitment to life that demands more than we knew we possessed. 

Do you feel lost and stuck? Or do you simply want to listen more deeply, as I do?

Your personal world and its mood. The environments in which we find ourselves or choose to live often mirror our internal landscape. What does your world look and feel like? What features stand out for you? In my own recent life, I’ve lived in a series of rooms that aren’t my home. They reflect the major life transition I’ve been traveling through since my mother’s death four years ago. When I understand my experience this way, I feel not homeless and anxious, but calm and focused on listening for what is trying to come forth and what is being asked of me now.

 
Your supporting cast. Who's with you and who matters? I’m sure you’ve heard it said that everyone we meet is a teacher. This is true. The characters who populate our lives affirm and lift us, or denigrate and deplete us. Remembering that all the world’s a stage, and that the people whom we meet outside are often reflections of characters in ourselves, who uplifts and energizes you? Who sabotages you? Understand that we are all made up of light and shadow energy; your hero and your "villain" can be the same person. I have met both companions and adversaries during my life, and I am careful now, as I grow older and want my time to be spent more meaningfully, to identify and travel with the light-bearers who energize and inspire me.
 

What perplexing situations or yearnings are calling for your attention now? 
What are they asking of you?   
What are you not hearing?

Would you like to learn more about listening to the story that is unfolding right now in your life? I invite you to visit my website: julietbruce.com. If you would like to explore your experience as an unfolding story, please write me at julietbrucephd@gmail.com to set up a free story session. You can sign up for my periodic newsletter, which announces upcoming Story Sanctuaries on selected topics.

NEXT FREE ONLINE STORY SANCTUARY: THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 8-9 PM EASTERN. WRITE ME AT THE ABOVE ADDRESS TO REGISTER!

BREAKING THROUGH TO LIGHTEN UP IN DARK TIMES!

Photo by Larry Pence

Are you struggling with something that doesn't seem to give way despite your best efforts?

The dynamic metaphor we call a story galvanizes powerful internal energies needed to change our realities -- for ourselves and our world. That's why we tell stories; that's why we listen.

Here's some encouragement from the Story Zone for you.

Three-fourths of the way through a good story, the protagonist, who has long been oppressed by the forces of darkness, suddenly gains the upper hand through a transformational insight or surge of power. Call it the Grail moment—when the truth hidden deep within the crisis is revealed. In a revolutionary action, the protagonist seizes the sword and kills the enemy. With that, the world changes.

What has happened is that our protagonist's relationship to the problem changed.

The moment of highest tension and ultimate constriction becomes the one of complete unknotting. The most excruciating pain opens to joy, and joy expands to freedom.

It is here, in the most awful place, that the protagonist has claimed the inner quality needed for breakthrough. Now they can truly claim the identity of Hero -- the one who changed the story.

The plot changes from quest to return, as our hero slowly finds the way back to their waiting land or cuts a swath to a new home that is ready to receive the priceless gift they bring.


Imagine yourself into the above scenario.

What is your challenge?
What or who stands between you and the solution?
What qualities have helped you overcome challenges in the past?
How can you put them to use now?
What will you do when you've solved the problem?

For story-based help in dealing with your personal or group challenges, write me at julietbrucephd at gmail.com

How to Create a Thrilling Life with a Story Imagination

From Hubble space telescope

I'm my own best client.

Some time ago I brought about a miracle in my life -- I mean a real "pot of gold" type of miracle, something that never would I have thought could occur. I'm sure it wouldn't have happened if I had stuck with conventional notions of reality and failed to mobilize through creative metaphor the big, bold, life force energies that make lightning strike and magic happen.

Once you understand that your life is an unfolding story and that you are the storyteller who can shape and play with it on the page, then use that page as you would a roadmap, you gain tremendous power in your life.

In this month's blog, I'm going to share a story process with you to spark your imagination around an issue or situation.

The Alchemical Process for Bringing About Amazing Change

First, embrace your life as it is, right now, right here, knowing that you are exactly where you're supposed to be in your own development.

1. Describe in "real" world terms the situation, crisis, misfortune, wound, or lack. What’s the real world reality facing you? This is a narrative report generated by your rational mind. This step alone will make you more present and attentive to what’s going on around you.

Now, look at your situation from the perspective of story. By that I mean, break it down into the elements of story. These include:

Time, both in terms of when it happens and in terms of beginning, middle, and end. Time gives story its basic structure and makes it a safe container for difficult feelings.

Setting and Mood. Where is this situation taking place? What’s the mood? External environments usually mirror something about the people who live or work there. The overall atmosphere reflects the deeper emotional context.

Characters.
-- Protagonists in stories are the main characters. They're seeking good things for themselves and their loved ones. You're the protagonist in your story. What do you want?
--Antagonists created the lack or want to keep the status quo and create obstacles. Bad bosses, mean spouses, people who instill doubt, weakness, lie and betray your trust, and create obstacles to your success. Who's or what's standing in your way, and why? Could they be reflecting an inner demon?
--Allies, friends, sponsors, coaches, wise counselors, caring doctors expand you and give you energy. Who are they in your situation?

Plot. Whenever you try to change a situation, you set up a conflict, even if the new one will make you much happier. The forces of the old ways rise up to hold you fast. In story, this struggle creates the dynamic of plot. Describe the conflict, the choices you want to make, the actions and outcome that you desire. These and your adversary’s response create the unfolding plot.

Storyteller. This is the Voice in you that reframes, changes, shapes, and tells the story. Your voice is where your power lies. It externalizes internal conflicts and feelings, makes you and others more aware of what's really going on, and helps you know you're not alone.

2. Next, rewrite your story as a fairy tale. Writing in the third person as omniscient narrator, turn each story element into a metaphor -- a fantastical object, place, or character. Metaphorizing experience translates it into a language of the senses, which captures its essence. It awakens the non-rational, intuitive right brain and guides you to a deeper knowing where you can discover the unconscious dynamics and hidden treasures in a situation.

Metaphors for Time. “Once upon a time,” is an archetypal wake-up call to the right brain, where new connections will be made. What’s your metaphorical time frame and mythic period?

Metaphors for Setting and Mood. Archetypal landscapes and structures capture the meaning of experience to the interior world. These include deserts, oceans, islands, prisons, parlors, stairs, bridges, tunnels, towers, crossroads.

Metaphors for Characters.
-- Hero: The one who steps up to change the story. Often someone who is vulnerable or marginalized in some way. (Change happens first at the edges, where the status quo is most vulnerable, not at the center or in the mainstream, where it’s strong.)
-- Villain: an illness, misfortune, status quo, forces that represent resistance to change; orthodox priests and reactionary and/or violent political forces. His agents can be armies or trolls, demons, and snarling dogs.
-- Mentors, allies, helpers – wise and old men and women, talking birds, omens, gods and goddesses.They represent your intuition, the heralds of your highest and best self.
-- Demons, monsters, trolls, and natural events such as storms set the hero back, but can become important teachers.

Metaphors for Plot. After an arduous journey, struggle to the death, or terrible drought, water flows again. A sleeping princess awakens. An ugly duckling is recognized for the swan she is. Transformational story always has some kind of positive outcome, redemption, or shift of consciousness that gives meaning and hope to the struggle. This doesn’t mean a cure or a perfect solution. It means that the life force has begun to flow in a sterile situation.

3. Improvise. This is the step of serious play. What stands out for you in what you've just written? Pick an image, character, or moment in your story that stands out and make that the title or beginning of a 5-or-10-minute freewriting session. Allow whatever wants to emerge through writing, other artistic media, or brainstorming.

4. Translate this fairy tale version of your life back into ordinary reality. Very important! Come back across the metaphorical bridge: What does this look like in the material world for you? With this new and deeper intuitive understanding, what wants to emerge here? What are these circumstances asking of you?

~~~

Story is a spiritual practice. You tell your story not to hang onto it or identify with it, but to release it by embracing it, and to release yourself from a pattern that no longer serves you or others.

Tell the story of a painful life experience and it loses its emotional charge.

Tell the story of a block and it dissolves.

Tell a new story and you begin to change your life from the inside out.


(c) 2010 Juliet Bruce. All rights reserved.