Hear blessings dropping their blossoms around you. -Rumi As a new director of counseling at the community college level, I am greeted by a pressing need to think creatively and proactively to counterbalance the myriad students’ needs on the rise while the resources to address those needs decline. The severity of psychological and academic problems [...]

“We must all face the fact that we are very precariously suspended in life: we have a very slender foothold on the planet.” – Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan As I sit down and prepare to write this entry, a hawk circles outside against the blue sky. I marvel as it moves slowly, precisely, graciously cruising [...]

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. Don’t go back to sleep. You must ask for what you really want. Don’t go back to sleep. People are going back and forth across the doorsill Where the two worlds touch. The door is round and open. Don’t go back to sleep. -Rumi My approach [...]

People don’t get along because they fear each other. People fear each other because they don’t know each other. They don’t know each other because they have not properly communicated with each other.-Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. In my work with individuals from other cultures, I always start the conversation around our differences and how [...]

The virtues, then, come neither by nature nor against nature, but nature gives the capacity for acquiring them, and this is developed by training. Aristotle, in Nicomachean Ethics As our profession continues to solidify, California recently became the 50th state to grant licensure to professional counselors. I echo the claim of many, in that we [...]

Shifting from the laptop screen my eyes glance at the family of cardinals landing on the deck, one after the other, forming a red line, to then disperse in a disorderly manner. Their perky crests sticking up proudly, chests open, confidently pecking the seeds stuck between the boards, while a few finches dance their way [...]

As psychologist and author Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi puts it, creativity is a central source of meaning in our lives. It is “a process by which a symbolic domain in the culture is changed. New songs, new ideas, new machines are what creativity is about.” Everything in our surroundings is the result of inventiveness, of creativity. Csikszentmihalyi’s [...]

After morning yoga I walk to my car, conscious of every step. I look down at the muddy path, my clogs stepping firmly, yet gently, on the soft ground, knowing that the moment is precious and feeling the interconnection of breath and step. The rain falls discretely on my curls, and the scent of lavender [...]