One of my first self-discoveries was recognizing my lost capacities for engaging with people without being paid. As I interviewed the women I realized how much fun I was having, how I felt on equal footing and yet privileged to be hearing their stories, how “female” I felt and how connected. I loved this wonderful opportunity to have time with women that was not social time and yet not work time, either. I began to realize how hungry I had been for this kind of “at ease time” with women. My childhood had pushed me away from such time with women. After all, I had to get out, to get going, to be competent and, often, competitive, not connected.

The second layer was feeling profoundly more connected to women, all women, than I had ever felt before. I found myself suddenly able to ally myself with and have compassion for many women, an ability which had eluded me prior to these interviews. Family members, friends, my mother, all took a softer hue.

As therapists, we can certainly wonder why this hadn’t happened as a result of my training and my time in therapy. After all, I had been exposed to hundreds and hundreds of intimate stories over 15 years. My hunch is that while in the treatment room, I, like any paid healing professional, saw myself, to some extent, as being in the authority position. This may have reinforced some natural biases that I carried with me from my childhood. I think I continue to withhold some deep level of empathy, still seem myself as being apart. When interviewing the women, however, I was automatically their equal, and that placed me differently. Having the privilege of listening to the 18 women, began to listen to other women’s voices with less bias and value judgments. For example, I had always valued certain capacities, such as pragmatic decision-making and the capacity to carry through once a decision had been made. This is a capacity which can be restricted for women. After this glimpse into the girlhood dreams and shattered hopes of many of the women interviewed – the compromises made with life and the painful, yet successful ways of salvaging one’s soul after many lost opportunities – I was able to cross a barrier and join them at some level of womenhood – removing my old iron bars, my negativity and judgments. Buy the Enchanted Self from Amazon.

This is an amazing trip back in time for me. I was about 18 years younger! A lifetime. Since that time the issues I actually dealt with seem remote. I would no longer call them my issues.

Yet, the struggle of staying connected to one’s Enchanted Self rather than selling out to other people’s roadmap’s for your life, your decisions, even your feelings, remains constant. That issue of a successful merger of your own mind, body and soul, rather than a compromise merger, always remains.

Now my dance is a different dance. We all have different dances at each stage of life. The music shifts and the background stage changes but the beat does go on. The ‘beat’ is the reclaiming process of our ENCHANTED SELVES. Listen for that beat, which will show up as feelings in your gut or elsewhere in your body or spirit. Listen for these signals. Hopefully they will tell you are on target for yourself and your needs. But sometimes they will signal you that you are not. Take note and if necessary, sit down, process, get to know yourself again. You may be able to do this by yourself or you may need a buddy, a best friend, or a therapist. Do what you need. Realize you are saving yourself for your life and your future journeys. What could be more precious?

Technorati Tags: Childhood Memories, experiences, female response, finding joy, Positive Psychology for Women, The Enchanted Self

The person will greatly appreciate being treated with care and affection! Happy Valentine’s Day! Dr. Barbara

Dear Diary,

Last year I wrote my secret entry about Paul on Valentine’s Day. Do you remember? I sent him a Valentine and I was so desperate to see if he sent me one. I had to open Valentines from everyone in the class until I found his. Do you remember what it said? It said, “Be my Valentine.” I was so happy. I could hardly sleep that night.

This year I will of course be sending Paul a Valentine. Even though I don’t feel quite the same about him. I’m not sure why, but I know one reason is that he looks away a lot when I look at him. I think he might think I’m staring at him.

Anyway, I decided to do something else this year. I read about the idea in one of my mother’s magazines. It was in an article called BE YOUR OWN BEST FRIEND. There was a long list of things you could do to be nice to yourself.

Some were stuff like skip the laundry this week , buy yourself a new nightgown and get a new hairstyle. Some of the list sounded stupid. Anyway it was for women, not girls. But the one thing I liked was Send a Valentine to Yourself. So I’m doing that this year. I have almost finished it. I made it out of construction paper and lace and it is very beautiful. And you know what I’m saying?

“I love you very much and I’ll never forget you!” I am very excited. I’m even going to glue little candy hearts on it.

Don’t tell anyone. They would think I was silly. Remember, it’s a secret.

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“When a sudden memory from you past comes into your head unexpectedly, may it only fill you with delight and the pleasure of remembering what has been good and fruitful in your own life!”

“May you always be true to yourself and at the same time put mind and body to good use to be kind and generous to the rest of the world.”

— © Dr. Barbara Becker Holstein

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Technorati Tags: experiences, Life History, maybe I'll tell you mine), Narrative of our lives, Purposeful Life, Recipes for Enchantment, Secrets, Secrets (You tell me yours, Self Fullfillment, The Enchanted Self, The Enchanted Self a positive therapy, The Secret Ingredient is YOU!

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Advice for young women in this category, how they might be able to sort of go around difficult circumstances and manage:

Get mentors outside of the household. A neighbor who will — who’s really a good person, who maybe you can go over and the two of you can cook together in her kitchen now and then. It can be a teacher that takes an interest in you. Perhaps she introduces you to fine literature or she finds a young piano teacher so you can take lessons at a price your parents can afford. I don’t mean a formal mentor like we think of in coaching, where you pay someone by the hour. I simply mean someone who sees you in a positive light and enriches your life in positive ways.

I’m talking about people who can take you beyond your family circumstances.

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Click link below to listen to show!

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/chaklet-cof…

http://bit.ly/8S3PAK

Technorati Tags: Childhood Memories, growing up, parenting, Tweens and Teens

A great quote! Sarah Berhard gave of herself in her acting. I believe that we can all give of ourselves and become emotionally ‘richer’ through telling the stories of our lives and even more. Perhaps writing them, or perhaps writing that book inside of us. That’s what I talked about at the Powerful YOU! meeting. After sharing the latest that is happening in the publishing world and how much easier it is to get into print, I asked the women to brainstorm on index cards stories and or a book just waiting to get outside of themselves. The results were astounding. Everyone had at least one story and/or book to share and many of the women had two, three, even more. Some even had their titles picked out and believe me, these were national best-seller titles. We couldn’t stop the conversation. Finally, I ended the talk by asking each woman to carry a tiny notebook for ideas with her, and to tell at least one story a week to someone. One women came up to me at the end and said, “You are really on to something. You just unlocked a very important key.” I’m glad I could help ignite the resources and energy that is inside of these women and actually is inside of all of us.

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In response to a family who puts together a holiday jigsaw puzzle and brings the old puzzles out of storage yearly, Dr. Barbara Becker Holstein says, “Participating in something supportive rather than competitive helps family members cement bonds. And looking at old pictures conjures positive memories.”

In response to a family that does a yearly holiday scavenger hunt for items that are usually related to long-standing family jokes, Dr. Barbara says, “The value of being together in a connective way like this is priceless”. This year the family is donating everything on the hunt to a local food pantry. To this, Dr. Barbara says, “It’s been documented that we get more of a feel-good high from doing for others than if something is done for us.”

Technorati Tags: Childhood Memories, finding joy, positive memory retrieval, Women's Happiness

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