Stepping Stones

By Ellen Brown
They say that grieving is a lonely process, and if you’re grieving the death of a loved one, you may feel all alone with your feelings. But it doesn’t have to be that way. There are support groups in your community and online that you can join, and people there who will understand [...]

By Ellen Brown
In our culture, we’re taught – subtly or not so subtly – that certain emotions are better than others. Joy is “good.” Anger and sadness are “bad.” Guilt is pointless. And shame is, well, shameful, and best swept under the bed.
Often, these emotional dos and don’ts are reinforced by our families, when we’re [...]

By Ellen Brown
Lately, I’ve been hankering to try something new. To experiment. To explore. To get out more. This all makes perfect sense since I haven’t had much time or energy to play in the past year, a year that began with the slow decline and death of my father-in-law last August and ended with [...]

By Ellen Brown
When you’re dealing with a difficult life transition, such as divorce or job loss, do you sometimes beat yourself up because you can’t seem to  “get over it and move on?” Many of my clients fall into that familiar pattern, and I’ve certainly done the same from time to time. The problem is [...]

By Ellen Brown
When we’re dealing with difficult life transitions like job loss or the death of a loved one, it’s not uncommon for us to focus a little too much on the past and the future. We may ruminate about the day our supervisor delivered the bad news. Or we may obsess about how we’re [...]

By Ellen Brown
As I often tell clients and friends (and anyone else who will listen), meditation can help us weather some of life’s toughest storms. While it’s hardly a magic bullet, meditation can help us feel more relaxed and peaceful, and medical studies have suggested that such practices may lessen anxiety, depression, and insomnia, which [...]

By Ellen Brown
Years, ago, when I was healing from child sexual abuse, I found it SO important to be around people (and books and movies) who could inspire me, as I traveled the journey from victim to survivor (ultimately becoming a thriver). Because navigating that transition could be grueling, and sometimes, I’d wonder whether I’d [...]

Note: This Thanksgiving Day post is dedicated to the memory of my dear father-in-law, John Stephen Erdie, who passed away peacefully on November 8, three days before his 86th birthday.
By Ellen H. Brown
If you’re dealing with the recent death of a loved one, I don’t need to tell you that the holidays can be a [...]

By Ellen H. Brown
In our culture, death is personified as a stealthy stalker, to be avoided at all costs. So it’s no wonder that many of us hate thinking about death, let alone making friends with this dark and devious character. But what if we COULD make friends with death, or at least make peace [...]