Where are you being radically honest with yourself and others? How are you caring for yourself by also caring for others? How are you inviting repair in conflict? What are you doing to gather more with others and build community around you?

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Someone asked me this past week, why I don’t work as a therapist and why I focused my work more on building peer mentorship programs, systems change, group work and family work. I have a lot of answers for this, so I am always curious what answer will show up in the moment. This time my answer landed here… the foundation of western therapy stems from a value in individualism and I want to build structures towards both individual and collective care.  While therapy is an essential part, we need more pathways towards one another - ways that focus on inviting repair not just boundaries, and more ways that care for self that also incorporate care for others. And…I wanted to spend my life focused on changing systems of oppression - learning and teaching how to better care for ourselves, each other and the world around us, over and over again.

Some thoughts on how to invite more care and repair - to move beyond only setting boundaries to avoid conflict… 

Consent is vital, and so is invitation. As a society, we often think of self-care as a way to take care of ourself - individualistic. But, how do we not abandon ourselves or others? This would mean we need to leave room for messiness while we simultaneously learn our needs, while also learning the needs of others, over and over again. And, it would mean inviting in conflict, in order to find more pathways to repair and resolution, when needs and ways of caring bump into each other.

 Radical honesty. I heard recently “secrets are held lies” and it stuck with me. If we share truths and feelings that we hold with one another, we invite deeper empathy as well as an opportunity to build trust instead of resentment. This requires us to separate the feelings from the meaning or story we have attached to them. These are often paranoias. False stories our mind has convinced us will be true, good or bad, to protect us. But…these stories are not reliable because they stem from wounds from the past. What would radical honesty look like for you?

Acknowledging power dynamics. We all know there are places we all have power and where we don’t, depending on who we are with and the context around us. We have to further shine a light on the places we have power to find our blindspots. They can be hidden in unexpected ways. For example, self-sacrifice or rescuing someone is a sneaky way of taking power because you can justify the taking of power with good intentions. Where can you shine more light on how you navigate the power you hold consciously and less consciously? 

Release resistance. Resistance is like being tied up in a rope that is impossible to get free from. We can toss around like a wild animal. Become more and more activated. More and more exhausted. More and more unable to escape. Or we can find the stillness to accept the circumstance. Which sometimes allows the creativity strategy to get free. Maybe this is why spies, always escape in movies.

Become more open to receiving. We as a culture always want more, but often deflect receiving - not acknowledging what we have or what is being given to us. It’s like walking around in the dark in life trying to shine a light on the things around us, just to get a glimpse and prepare. Sometimes we find people that can help us shine the light on things, and we shut their light off, every time they light up something. And other times, there are hands open to us, giving in big ways to us, and something in us causes us to turn away. How could you receive more and acknowledge your havingness even more?

I would love to know how these little seeds stirred your thoughts. Did I move you towards wanting to get more comfortable with the conflict and repair that true care requires for ourselves, others and the world around us? Or did I move you in another direction? I’d love to know.

Reach out and let me know if you want me to write about something specific in my next newsletter…I would love to hear from you. Connect 

Read more of my writing on my blog…

OFFERINGS

Connect with me for Coaching or Mediation: My intention is to help you build structures that support nervous system agility and exquisite (higher volume) care for yourself, your family, your business and your communities in challenging times of uncertainty, big divisions and fear through finding new options and pathways for outdated patterns and past traumas towards more resilience, joy and even playfulness. I offer Family System Coaching Packages for 7, 14 and 21 sessions. I offer individuals an introductory 5 session package as well as 4 sessions a month for a minimum of 6 months. My business and non-profit consulting is customized to the needs of the organization. For a 20 minute free consultation: Connect

Developing Peer Mentorship Training Programs in your Org or Business: if your interested in building a training program in your non-profit or business, reach out. I provide the infrastructure and training to efficiently build a program around the skill you want to teach participants or employees, while incorporating how we care for ourselves and care for one another, through conflict and repair, allowing for more sustainable systems and the outcome you want in your org or business.

ADDITIONAL GROUPS AND OFFERINGS:

Family Coaching Groups

Drop-in Group: Parenting with Support - Wednesdays at 12pm PST. Join any Wednesday, just reach out for zoom link!  

My dream is to disrupt the isolation in parenting and prioritize thriving family nervous systems, transforming generations through support and intentional community.  This group invites parents into a container of support to have the opportunity to parent together. All with the vision that more webs of communities and connections will grow from there.  Please reach out if you are interested in joining the parenting group and please share the opportunity with parent’s who you think might be interested!

Social Entrepreneur Networking Group - Mondays at 8am PT, join any Monday.

Join a growing community of entrepreneurs from underrepresented or underestimated communities who are dedicated to giving back to their communities. We meet monthly to network, collaborate and dream up the world we want to co-create. Connect

Finding Hope in Times of Despair Writing Group : Moving Beyond Survival towards …Together building a new world for ourselves and the next generations Fridays at 8am PT, Join any Friday, just reach out for zoom link!  

Join a writing group that focuses on curiosity with prompts, sharing and community support around how we can all better support our nervous systems through inevitable change to build the world we want for ourselves and the generations to come. The group’s intention is to find hope in despair as well as agency in knowing when to stretch to take risks, and when to slow down and nurture - better caring for ourselves, others and the world. Connect

Climbing Coaching and Boxing Coaching

Add indoor or outdoor climbing or boxing to your coaching package to embody your or your child’s shifts in a new way. Reach out if you are interested!

Check out climbing website: www.katwhippleclimbing.com

If you are CURIOUS about my offerings…connect with me for a 20 minute chat.