As the pandemic continues and case numbers are on the rise, many people are facing another lockdown during the holiday season – and for a lot of them, feelings of isolation and sadness might be ramping back up.
That’s why today, we’d like to share something a little different with you.
During an interview a few months back, Peter Levine, PhD, paused to read the poem “Lockdown” by Brother Richard Hendrick, a Capuchin Franciscan living in Ireland.
It’s a reminder that even during times of fear, sickness, and even death, there are still reasons for hope and love. Have a listen.
Now we’d like to hear from you. How are you working with clients who have been struggling to find hope during the pandemic?
Please leave a comment below and let us know.
If you found this helpful, here are a few more resources you might be interested in:
When the COVID-19 Pandemic Leaves Us Feeling Helpless, with Bessel van der Kolk, MD
Feeling Stuck During the Pandemic: Specific Questions to Help Your Clients
Beautiful. Thank you for sharing this touching piece of love.
Very touching. Thank you for this. ❤
Thanks for the hope-filled words, Peter’s soothing reading and the softly inspiring images. It can help breathe in the midst of gut-wrenching circumstances… also in the aftermath…
I’m sharing with clients and friends.
That was very hopeful and moving!
This poem and video is very soothing and calm.
It deepens the breath.
Thank you
Sing. That is so moving. So we will sing. Like the birds, like the wind, like the angels on high. We will sing together, we are not alone.
Thanks for reminding us to sing.
Thank you, Ruth, Peter, & especially Brother Richard. I am moved. I felt the taste of Hope, & the ‘promise’ of a Fresh Start, new Beginnings. Love & Light to ALL. Happy, Holy Holidays of all types. Everyday can be a Holiday! Laura
We needed a reminder, one that wakes us and brings awareness to life that exists around us everyday that we take for granted and do not see. Thank you for this poem. Its heart filling.
The worst of times can bring out the best in people.
Thank you so much for this video. Certainly was uplifting and at same time expressing the reality of our world. It certainly resonated for me.
Here is hoping that out of the pandemic we will start to see a paradigm shift in how we in the Western world have become so consumer oriented with not enough respect for our planet and ALL beings.
Best wishes
Sue H
This was very good and insightful. When go through these troubling times, I talk to God and remember that he is in control. He wants the best for all of us! When I think about this, I’m reminded that all will be well, even during solitary days! This is good news!
A reminder that through the darkest days of this pandemic there is still hope!
thank you for hope!
Thank you. I remember reading this beautiful poem online at the beginning of Covid for us here in Tasmania, Australia in about February 2020. It is very beautiful to hear Peter Levine read this poem again for us all.
Thank you. I remembrr reading this beautiful poem online at the beginning of Covid for us here in Tasmania, Australia in about February 2020. It is very beautiful to hear Peter Levine read this poem again for us all.
I really enjoyed this. Who knows what lies ahead, but this was a moment of peace.
What a beautiful message; so profound, so healing, so transforming! Thank you so much, Dr. Peter Levine. I have admired your wisdom for many years.
I don’t work with any clients but I have family members who have benefitted from support during this time thanks to good caregivers.
Love this. Thank you for sharing!
Well I certainly haven’t been hitting them with this irrational stuff i.e. souls, spirits and birds singing, but I have been highlighting each clients positives whilst acknowledging their negatives, reality, resources and resourcefulness. I’ve also been doing a lot of reframing
Beautiful.
Well yes, it’s a nasty and even deadly flu and I agree with your anger. We should not need a random disease in order to hear birds sing again. And yes I don’t think that it’s useful to have someone reading this from the porch of his house in the forest. I will sing rain or shine, so I don’t see the point or profound wisdom in this either. It feels much better to vent a bit of my anger. Now I don’t think that, sorry I lost his name, did not mean well when this was recorded, but I do think it’s taken out of context and that after 10 months of mostly panic reactions of governments it is clear that the priorities of our species needs some shaking up. Oh I sing, I’ll sing in a storm or in a clear blue sea, but please don’t ask or tell me to, that I don’t need!
Thank you
That was awesome! Thank you for sharing!!!!!!!!
thank u- from wounding to wonder, wonder2wounding~ again & again…. jl, amherst, mass
Beautifully read.
Lovely sentiments.
May whatever you have be enough …..?
Thank you, thank for this message of hope. I am grateful, Dr. Levine.
I am a nurse psychotherapist working during this entire pandemic. Public mental health. We are open every day. I am either home on telepsych or in the office. Patients fall into my arms. I am here. I am available. I am love.
Teresa
Beautiful, brought tears from my heart as it revealed such truth.
Thank you, and may you too be touched by the Light of this season and be filled with comfort, warmth and joy.
?? Jules
I’m very grateful and reminded me just to be in the connection and let the system do what he have to do for the best…
Thank you for sharing.
Yes, this was the sentiment months ago, I remember it, I was writing and speaking those very words.
But, With so little cooperation between countries and fear mongering and divisiveness, especially in our government, I for one am very discouraged and exhausted from looking and straining toward the future, away from the present. most of the population doesn’t have the luxury of looking at these conditions from this perspective-job loss, home loss, food loss. Very different from last spring when we had hope.
How to stay in the present? Breathe, breathe, breathe……
I have loved this poem and other guides, near and far,
and that anchor, hold, tend and abide living rhythms beyond pandemic time and who hold indwelling well being for all life.
‘Liminal space’, that phrase, woke me in deep night several months in to the pandemic. Having no clue what the phrase might be, and literally given a wake up call, I explored…Liminal space continues to anchor and guide, and open portals…I believe, beckoning and re~minding, all ☆
That was beautiful. And so true. We’re learning to slow down and enjoy for the first time. Thank you.
That was beautiful. I have one client in particular who is, more isolated than ever since COVID…this person is a healthcare worker, her husband is a front line healthworker, who has to work many 24 shifts . Our telehealth sessions must include some form of farm story. She has not made that request, but it helps to have her hear of funny mishaps on my “farm”. She likes animals, so to help her with her depression, I always use one of my many experiences to end our session. It is usually light hearted and has her laughing before we close the session.
Laughter is always the best medicine.
Candis Firchau, LPC-S, NCC, EMDR
God bless all people. Put down all your electronics and actually call someone and really listen.
Its amazing what a caring person on the other line really means! I know, there are days I long for a phone call. I do call others too and just listen!
A very heartwarming poem. Thanks for sharing this.
Orly
Heartwarming and wise words! Thank you for sharing.
Lovely, beautiful, inspiring, thank you for sharing.
Beautiful
Beautiful . Thanks for sharing ??
A beautiful poem, beautifully narrated!
A very heartwarming poem. Thanks for sharing this.
Beautiful beautiful poem. Thank you.
My personal experience of lockdown has been about time for me, time for noticing and time to think about change.
For some time I had been putting off starting private practice so now I had time, no more excuses and I worked on my profile. I started my private practice in August, it’s the best thing I could have done for my personal and professional growth.
I also began to experiment with different recipes for dinner and started to bring my elderly uncle dinner every Friday.
I couldn’t babysit for the young couple next door so I took their 3 year old out for walks.
I don’t have any pets but I began feeding the neighbourhood cats and they kept coming back even when they weren’t hungry.
I made the most of online training and took down the books from my bookshelf to improve my practice.
I learned to navigate my computer better than I have ever been able to in the past.
As for my clients; I have never been busier!
I am open to all platforms: I use telephone, zoom and some face to face work with caution.
I have found that while it is the COVID related anxiety that brings them to therapy, it is the quiet of lockdown, the inertia that has given clients an opportunity to reflect and to take time to address long standing issues and wounds.
The courage and strength of the human spirit in the face of adversity never ceases to amaze me.
I am truly grateful to my clients for all that I witnessed and learned from them in what had been a difficult and challenging year for all.
Now that I’m retired from years of counseling practice, parenting, and volunteer work, I’m enjoying taking extra good care of myself and Bilbo, my little companion dog.
I share humor, dog stories and good food with my husband and friends. 77 is a wonderful age for a woman. Live well and don’t worry, be happy!
It is a wonder-filled age for men too 🙂
Yes well that song by Bobby McFerrin was written wit a wry sense of humor. Not something you say to someone has has lost his job, can not pay the rent and is now living in a homeless camp.
How beautiful. Trishxx
Tapping in to people’s experience of connection to cultural foundations, spiritual essence and finding what “keeps their home fires burning” their “ahi-ka” – is about the only way I can find to roll out calm possibilities as job loss and family distances take a toll (albeit it mild here due to excellent epidemiology, No. 8 wire attitudes and solid leadership.)
Many folk with traumatic backgrounds, Rambo’d up to meet the challenge and protect their families – reminded of how they’d been strong in their past, to protect self from annihilation. Some others from trauma histories were overwhelmed by fear and became susceptible to conspiracy theorists and a mix of freeze, collapse or dissociated responses. Our government and we counsellors found that honesty about the pandemic risks, medical and scientific information sharing, encouraging clear hygiene and quarantine practices, virus contraction testing, mask wearing encouragement and one-day-at-a-time self-regulation, worked very well. Applauding people’s individual ways of preparing and standing against the virus, helps to encourage resilience.
Of course – our freedom is still fragile and we have to employ a certain level of vigilance to avoid a “bruising wounder” infection on our shores. Soo many people coming “home” from other countries are infected and our 14 days mandatory quarantine shows that containment efforts are fragile.
For me, a little epidemiological knowledge from studies years ago, together with emergency/pandemic planning policy development work, has strengthened my inner core of being – curiosity and knowledge strengthens personal power and calm. Ruth and the therapy contributers have shared so willingly and this is what also has held me steadfast and sure. I have felt equipped by all the wonderful learning made available, topped-up enough to be a living and breathing mammal that stands beside and witnesses the pain of others in this era. What a privilege it is!
We are sorry for your hardship and the beautiful moments within parts of it. Here in Aotearoa/NZ, we are going out to sports fixtures and summer partying festivals, as if all in the World is hunky dory; hoping no community super-spreader gets loose on us this holiday season. Here is a series of Haiku-styled poems I fashioned in Aotearoa/NZ’s initial Lockdown of several weeks. [“Rahui” is an indigenous term denoting a ban or sanction against food gathering or visiting practices in physical locations, out of the need for regeneration of the natural environment or crop/food resources there – like when shellfish populations are dwindling, or blooming algae is at dangerous levels. Rahui carries a death-related warning].
Rahui Haiku
Rahui Haiku
preserving self, other, we
one wave, rolls to shore
We heard it coming
invisible destroyer
troubling our world views’
Rahui response
pause, breathe, think, do, things anew
minds connect, re-ground
Whip-lash skipping now
harsh critiques for swift action
taken-time, re-Zoom
Licking wounds of loss
feeling Earth under-our-feet
OUR wave lands, retreats
Exposing fresh ways
autumnal at-one-ment buds
regeneration
Rahui pauses
observe, respect, thankfulness
contain loss, re-set.
Jenny Arnold 21 May 2020
This is wonderful Jenny.
Thank you for sharing these.
Thank you Jenny. I am a ‘world cousin’ from across the Tasman Sea in small Tasmania and have met many New Zealanders in mwditation retreats here in Australua and in Vanuatu and NZ.
What I want to say is thank you for your beautiful haiku. I read your notes and will memorise the name you have given your form.
Even during a time of disaster there are possibilities of loving….Yes, let’s SING!!!
Oooh job watene,….goosebumping me. Yes, let’s all sing – raise our voices with a croon to the universe and a collective desire for peace on Earth.
Thank you Ruth. I love your mission in the world and have a lot of respect for all that you and NICABM contribute to the healing of humanity. I have learned SO much from your seminars this past year. I appreciate this little gift to all of us; and how you bring all the magnificent folks like Peter Levine and his peers together for us to learn from. Much love and many blessings to you and your team! <3
Beautiful ❤️