Home-Based Recovery of Mental Health, Inc.
The Windhorse Journal’s mission is to inspire compassionate approaches to recovering sanity.
We do this by creating an evolving forum dedicated to exploring contemplative psychotherapy and the creation of therapeutic environments for the wellbeing of all persons involved. We envision this to be a rich dialogue among people with lived experience, family members, psychology professionals, and anyone interested in whole person-mental health and the diverse expressions of human sanity.
Dear Readers,
I appreciate the following paper by Carrie Doehring very much. Although academic, she speaks with much heart and vulnerability, sharing the loss of her son to suicide and how she uses the practice of listening to sacred choral music to experience the traumatic grief of her loss. She shares her personal story to make her argument that body-centered spiritual practices, such as listening to sacred choral music, are necessary for one to find the safety necessary to fully experience one’s grief and wholeness.
Traumatic grief experienced in the body can be quite overwhelming, and without the container of a body-centered practice, it can be hard to tolerate all of the difficult feelings that arise from the experience. From my own life, I know how hard it can be to step into the experience because it brings up a tremendous amount of fear, shame and self aggression… [Read more…]
Dear Friends,
We conclude a short series on the contemplative practice of Maitri Space Awareness with a podcast. This is the second half of a conversation among clinicians Kathy Emery, Anne Marie DiGiacomo, Daniel Green, and Jeremy Ellis.
In it, they discuss how maitri—as “unlimited friendliness”—has shown up in their personal contemplative practice and each one’s work. They also address its impact on the community at large, as acceptance of the variety of mind states within oneself allows space for others. Jeremy, Daniel, Anne Marie, and Kathy illustrate—through personal anecdotes and musings—how paying more attention leads to a bigger view of every situation, and a commitment to stay with it despite any discomfort… [Read more…]
Dear Friends,
As we continue a short series on the contemplative practice of Maitri Space Awareness, our entry this week is another written piece from Anne Marie DiGiacomo—Windhorse senior clinician, former Co-Director, and seasoned teacher of the practice.
In this offering, Anne Marie focuses on one of the five wisdom energies within maitri practice—Ratna—and reflects on its implications for inclusivity. Within the relational approach of Windhorse, the openness of Ratna welcomes all voices and all states of being as it encourages judgments about them to fall away… [Read more…]
Dear Friends,
Maitri Space Awareness practice, as described in this Podcast, has played a very significant role in my personal and professional life and development.
I was first introduced to this view and practice at the (then) Naropa Institute in the summer of 1977. The class was taught by Marvin Casper who—as indicated in the Podcast—was instrumental in the early therapeutic development and application of the work with these practices and in the subsequent development of such practices as a key element in the training of Contemplative psychotherapists. This was my introduction to meditation and Space Awareness practice… [Read more…]
Dear Friends,
This written offering is the first in a series of posts about Maitri Space Awareness—a type of contemplative practice from Tibetan Buddhism that is drawn upon in Windhorse work. Its author—Anne Marie DiGiacomo—is a Windhorse senior clinician, former Co-Director, and seasoned teacher of the practice. Maitri Space Awareness is intended to identify universal energies and illuminate patterns of thought and action—those of ourselves and others. The experience invites compassion—the kindness and friendliness that is maitri—for variable mind states. At Windhorse Community Services, Maitri Space Awareness is conducted in supervision groups of those in a shared role (e.g. Basic Attenders), or a particular clinical team may go through the practice together… [Read more…]
Welcome!
In this podcast, Jamie Emery and I explore our connection to Windhorse Community Services, a community we have been members of for over three decades. Windhorse is an intentional community and clinical service that works with people who experience the complexity of extreme states. It is a place that stretches, grows and cultivates health. It is a place to overcome loneliness and isolation—where people come to feel valued as they are.
The Windhorse community is a diverse array of families, clients and staff who have joined in partnership to explore the workings of community and how it can promote health. What draws us together and binds us is deeply personal and yet universal… [Read more…]
Dear Friends,
Our latest Journal offering is a written piece from Windhorse senior clinician and long-standing (now former) director, Jamie Emery. Reflecting on the origins of the Windhorse approach, Jamie takes us on a personal journey of the first attempts at building a therapeutic community in support of a client with multiple mental health and associated challenges. He emphasizes the necessary ingredients of such an endeavor: the structural needs of such a community, based in a client’s home, as well as the attitude of mutual learning and respect necessary for all members of the community. He also speaks to how important this community becomes to all involved—not just the client—and the difficulty when a team must change or dissolve, especially if dictated by outside forces… [Read more…]
Dear Listeners,
The following discussion on trauma captures only a small part of the story. It is the honest and heartfelt accounts of two individuals (and Windhorse clinicians)—Polly Banerjee Gallagher and myself. We were chosen to share our stories, not because we are special or that our stories are unique, nor that we have completed a process of working with our traumas. Rather, we speak because the experience of trauma is ubiquitous; it is known to all. And in sharing we desire for you who listen to find some peace in your own stories.
However ubiquitous trauma is, it does not manifest in a single form. Trauma is as unique in its expression in our lives as we are in our expression of ourselves in the world… [Read more…]
Dear Friends,
This paper is a heartfelt offering based on my own experience of trauma and my clinical relationship to others around their trauma. It is not intended to be instructional, scholarly, or comprehensive in regard to the vast topic of trauma. In writing, I used a storytelling—almost dreamlike—approach to the topic in order to highlight my curiosity about trauma as a story we tell ourselves. Just like a dream, memories of trauma and its ongoing effect on us is not solid and cannot be pinned down. In recounting a dream, we can notice subtle and not so subtle shifts in our interpretation. In the same way, we have an opportunity work with our trauma in such a way that we can discover options and opportunities to manifest our story in the direction of healing… [Read more…]
Dear Listeners,
Welcome to this second entry of a two-part series featuring our dear heart friend, the Venerable Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. We will be listening once again to his teachings on tsewa—a Tibetan term which most closely translates in English to “love.”…
If love is an aspect of life in which you find any value and in which you’d like to gain more clarity, you’ll want to hear Rinpoche’s gentle, open-hearted, and very practical guidance. And if you’re listening from the perspective of someone interested in mental health, this is all about the radical mind health that’s abundantly available to us as human beings. As I stated in the introduction to part one (Entry #010), these teachings are some of those rare gems that speak from the deepest roots of human sanity and intelligence, while being accessible and immediately applicable to our day-to-day lives… [Read more…]