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 Friends,
It’s again our privilege to present another podcast with Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche. This finds him in a conversation with Polly Banerjee Gallagher and Jack Gipple, primarily focusing on how to work with our minds and relationships in this time of the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Rinpoche had been scheduled to record with us long before the various social restrictions came into play, and we found ourselves thinking how fortunate it was that he was doing these teachings at precisely this time—right when we need help with thinking about how to ride this avalanche of novel and threatening experiences. There’s so much potential for fear, confusion, and of closing one’s heart toward others—all of which is exactly what Rinpoche addresses. To say the least, these teachings are as timely as they are accurate. [Read more…]
Dear Friends,
We are pleased to continue to focus on our client Scott Klumb and his life with an autism diagnosis, which is documented in his autobiographical film. Our previous post featured a conversation between Scott and his psychotherapist, Jon Garson, prior to the March 10th release of that film. Scott spoke about how he came to be both filmmaker and subject, boosted by a serendipitous meeting with Temple Grandin, well-known for both her own autism and advocacy for others. Her advice about forging an identity beyond diagnostic labels is manifest in the film.
In this post, Scott’s current Windhorse Team Supervisor, Chuck Knapp, reflects on the growth he has observed in Scott—a result of personal determination and the willingness of a supportive team and family to ride out the bumps with him. [Read more…]
Dear Friends,
It’s a privilege to present this podcast, which displays a rare convergence of creativity with a remarkable recovery path. Scott Klumb, in dialogue with his psychotherapist Jon Garson, offers us a glimpse into his passion and creative process as a filmmaker. We also get to hear about his film, AUTISM: One Man’s Journey, which is his “coming out party” as a person with late-diagnosed autism. Now complete, this powerful film is about to premier in Denver on March 10th at the Sie Film Center, sponsored by the Autism Society of Colorado.
Adding further brilliance to this podcast is the presence of Temple Grandin, Scott’s newly found friend, whom he interviewed for the making of the film. [Read more…]
Dear Listeners,
It’s with great pleasure that we share these illuminating conversations with Joanne Greenberg. Though we’d felt a strong and warm connection with Joanne for many years, it wasn’t until the focus and depth of these recording sessions that we really started to experience her profundity. Interestingly, beyond the perspectives she shared, these far-ranging conversations appear to be taking us on an unexpected journey: one that’s inviting, positive, and affecting our creativity in an unmistakable way. Clearly, beyond what she knows, her life force is playful—and contagious.
Today’s podcast is the first of a three-part series, which we’ve titled, Swimming Lessons. Though our conversations were casual and often humorous in nature, they were set against Joanne’s personal experience of drowning in her mental illness. [Read more…]
Dear Friends,
Today’s Journal entry is the beginning of a series of texts and podcasts of the journey of relationship with Joanne Greenberg. Joanne is now an elder woman in her late 80’s “living on top of the mountain” as she puts it, in Golden, Colorado with her husband Albert, who is also a dear soul. Joanne is the well-known author of I Never Promised You A Rose Garden (1964), which is a semi-fictionalized account of her severe psychotic illness and complete recovery. Joanne has gone on to be a successful fiction author, teacher, and mental health advocate. Years ago, those of us working in the Boulder Windhorse community learned that Joanne was our neighbor, and so we reached out to her. She responded with an open hand and an open door to her home. [Read more…]
Dear Listeners,
In this second entry of the two-part podcast on trauma (first entry #27) we, Dave Dunlap and Polly Banerjee Gallagher, along with the moderator, Chuck Knapp, delve into personal examples and experiences of working with trauma. As Dave expressed in his introduction to our first podcast, “the discussion we engaged in captures only a small part of the story. We are not pointing to a single way to treat trauma, or even the idea that trauma is something that can be treated away.” With that understanding we continue our discussion recognizing that trauma is a vast and deep topic that is difficult to articulate cohesively without getting lost in a fog and missing the heart of what we mean. To our wonder, what came out of this discussion was our genuine connection to our shared experiences as human beings. [Read more…]
Dear Readers,
In this offering we return to consideration of trauma as a significant mental health issue. In a previous journal entry (#027, posted in March 2019), Windhorse clinicians Dave Dunlap and Polly Banerjee Gallagher engaged in a dialogue about trauma as an inevitable part of what it means to be human. And rather than speak from the safety of their professional roles in that podcast, they offered insights drawn largely from their own personal experiences.
Trauma, in general conversation, is often and rightly recognized for its power to destabilize and even destroy a life. But in this written piece, Dave presents a view of trauma that receives much less attention: its potential for growth. [Read more…]
Dear Listeners,
We’re delighted to be sharing the second part of a conversation we had about a year ago with Elizabeth Mattis Namgyal; a spiritual friend of Windhorse Community Services and gifted Buddhist teacher and author. Closely following the publication in 2018 of her second book, The Logic Of Faith, we had posted Part One of this conversation (entry #021), under the title “Taking Faith Apart.” For both podcasts she was joined by Gretchen Kahre, who is a close friend of hers and a senior Windhorse clinician. [Read more…]
Dear Reader,
Again, we are delighted to present a pairing of entries focusing on the work of Buddhist teacher, writer and student, Elizabeth Mattis Namgyel. In Journal Entries 020 & 021 Elizabeth shared from her book “The Logic of Faith: A Buddhist Approach to Finding Certainty Beyond Belief And Doubt”, which the editors at Windhorse Journal find extremely relevant to all aspects of the mutual recovery process.
Digging deeper into that same book, we’ve printed here an excerpt titled, “Emerging From Not Noticing”. Pratityasamutpada, the Buddhist study of the interdependent nature of all phenomena and experience, offers us a perspective of awakening to the more subtle and complex relationships that give rise to our world and our perceptions of it. Ms Namgyel writes:
Interdependence offers us a new way of looking at things by drawing us out of the narrow tunnel of self-absorption into a broader awareness. It shows us the way to live in sane relationship to our world, in grace. This understanding is not only inextricably linked with our survival but with basic sanity and insight as well. [Read more…]
Dear Listeners,
Today’s podcast, the last in an 8-part series on psychotropic medications, is an open-hearted conversation between Windhorse community members Emily Ashley, Joe Calcagno, Chris Emerson, and Eugenie Morton.
Looking back, we initially didn’t anticipate spending this much time on meds. But once entering the discussion—and knowing how critical it is to accurately understand the issues at hand—we decided to deepen our presentation with Windhorse staff and clients who actually use or have used them. Today you’ll hear a conversation with people who have extensive personal experience in this territory. [Read more…]