About five years ago, my kids started telling their friends, I think you should talk to my mom.
We knew the world of however support and care gets doled out was wildly unfair and certainly none of their friends' fault and we were all on the same page that a therapist mom with a life-long open door policy to the kids was definitely a community resource.
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What happened next was way beyond any of our imaginations, my own most of all. Over time in that organic, natural way things happen sometimes, more and more kids said yes to talking to the therapist mom, in 2's and 3's and then sometimes in 10's and 20's and sometimes one-on-one in parks and (so many) coffee shops I'd never visited.
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It was startling to me, stunning. Something was happening between me and the kids, and while for me it was all held inside a community frame of adult elders being of service to the kids, other adults around me started murmuring about non-profits and wanting to support my work in financial ways. And so here I am naming this thing Resilient, and writing a website to tell you the story.
It's not hard to see WHY the kids would want to talk to someone who seemed to have real, true interest in what they were dealing with personally and who also had an eye on what they were obviously up against in their adult years to come. I certainly don't presume to have all the answers about anything about the future, but I do know quite a bit about processes of growth and development and what we need both inside and outside of ourselves in order to face what comes our way with strength, sturdiness and resilience. We can be strong. And the more we let go of the Western world's fantasies of being able to be strong all on our own, the more resourced we become.
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I'm Jen Payne. I was trained twenty years ago in psychotherapy and have picked up all manner of things to add to that work along the way. I've got the one-on-one model of practitioner work down, naturally, and, whenever possible, I lean (way) into the group and what happens for us there. The group is certainly no utopia - humans are a real pain in the ass - but it is absolutely, truly, essential.
I so appreciate everyone who's joining in to support this work. (donation button)