Navigating Values Conflicts
Blog by Valerie At times I know that if I don’t speak my truth in a certain situation, I’ll walk away feeling ashamed. And yet I suspect that when I do speak, I’ll walk away feeling unsafe and social anxiety.…
Category Culture
On Money in Two Worlds
Blog by Valerie Many of us see money as a reflection of our individual worth. I think it’s more a reflection of how we are able to navigate our collective capitalist context, along with a dose of individual fortune and…
Accepting ancestral pain
Blog by Valerie I recently received German denazification records for my great grandfathers and grandfather. I paid the state archives to scan them for me after finding out how that process works in an article in der Spiegel, a German…
Mothering our Spirits
Blog by Valerie Some days I feel like I am running a race from the moment I wake up to ensure I use my time carefully to fulfil my responsibilities with my family, around the house and garden, with the…
Graceful Leadership
Blog by Lukas There are many different ways to reflect upon the tumult of world right now. Indeed, the very sense that things are particularly tumultuous is in some ways a mirage, and like all mirages, is born of perspective.…
Parenting with Indigenous Science
Blog by Valerie There’s so much parenting advice, and so little I resonate with, so I thought I’d share my perspective. Parenting is about building relationships through developmentally appropriate leadership (which is related to a previous post on…
Trickery of heartfelt words
Blog by Valerie Many of us are familiar with the four (or five) agreements concept of spiritual teachings Miguel Ruiz wrote about based on ancient Toltec wisdom. The first is: Be impeccable with your word. It is much easier to…
Clean & Dirty Pain
Blog by Valerie I recently came across the concepts of clean and dirty pain. This is a well written deep dive if you want to read it before I share my perspective. I’ll describe it as follows: Clean pain is…
Transitions
Blog by Valerie Years ago when I was practicing restorative justice/discipline in schools, what consistently came up as the toughest aspect of change were periods of transition. Teachers said, when the kids are in class we can get into a…
Material Wealth
Blog by Valerie When I was growing up, I watched my father hoard food, books, even household cleaning items. I remember the pain I felt when he told me the story of realising as a young teenager that he’d read…