 Marilyn Erickson, MSN, APRN
“In the dance of life, a new phase begins, A journey of change, where the old world thins, Menopause arrives with quiet force, Bringing wisdom and grace on its sacred course.” —Dixie Lincoln Nichols So menopause presses forward whether or not women are ready for it. But knowing and understanding what is happening during this process of menopause can give women some sense of readiness and maybe even a little control. I will start you on this knowledge journey by describing some of the distinguishing features of the menopausal stages. Perimenopause: the beginning of the end of ovarian function. During this transitional stage, fluctuations in hormone levels are beginning. The hormones affected are progesterone and estrogen. Our periods become irregular and may be shorter or longer in duration. It may begin sometime in our 40s and more rarely, in the mid-30s. It may last anywhere between 2 and 10 years. Hormone levels fluctuate crazily during this stage and no one-time hormone test can diagnose it. But your provider can start menopausal hormone therapy (MRT) as symptoms emerge. The symptoms that are known to benefit from MRT are hot flashes, night sweats, menstrual irregularities, decrease in sexual feelings, fat gain in your abdominal wall and internal organs, hair loss, low muscle mass and bone loss. Once fertile grounds now lay sacred and bare, Yet within this stillness, a power to share, No longer defined by cycles of the moon, A deeper essence begins to bloom. —Dixie Lincoln Nichols Menopause: Occurs when you have not had a period for 12 months. It marks the end of a woman’s menstrual cycle and reproductive capabilities. It is really defined by a date on the calendar rather than by a list of symptoms. The average age of menopause is 51. Early menopause occurs before age 45 and premature menopause occurs before the age of 40. Postmenopause brings a woman to a new phase of her life. It lasts the rest of one’s life and is really a time to be kinder, more loving and giving to oneself. It may present with more hot flashes, heart palpitations, and sweating. The average duration of these symptoms is extremely variable. Because the changes in a woman’s life during this transition brings with it many changes of aging, it is important to pay attention to any symptoms that occur that could indicate that one is going through the perimenopausal stage. MRT started early on can be very beneficial and support a higher quality of life. A woman does not need to feel defeated or dismissed during this transition. As the poetry cited suggests, it is a time for growth, wisdom, and power.
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 By Daniel G. Weidner, LMHP
It is a beautiful day and you are going about your business in a cheerful and attentive mood. Then you hear that familiar notification sound from your phone. You open your phone to see a news flash that the federal government has defunded the production of essential vaccines. This information then gets added to the already significant list of very troubling information coming out of Washington DC. Instantly you experience a sense of disbelief, frustration and the kind of anger that makes your blood boil! Or you are having a likewise pleasant day and someone cuts you off in heavy traffic and you are forced to slam on your brakes to avoid a collision! Instantly you feel anger within you. Your hands clench, your pulse accelerates, and your respiration increases. Impulsively you give the other driver the one finger salute. Anger is a normal emotional reaction. Some anger is expected in life. The Buddhist’s refer to anger as Samskara, or a mental formation. Mental formations occur all of the time. Anger in itself is not inherently bad. However, it is both the accumulation of anger and our direct and/or indirect response to anger that can lead to suffering. Carrying anger within ourselves over time can have debilitating effects on our physical and mental health. Impulsively responding to anger can lead to negative consequences. What are we to do with anger? We understand that any change begins with recognition. When we feel anger arise we can begin by noting to ourselves “I am angry”. Some immediate relief can be found by merely recognizing and noting our anger. Victor Frankl said that between Stimulus (in this case the anger producing event) and Response (e.g., giving the one finger salute)– lies Choice. Recognizing and noting anger provides us with the opportunity to make a choice before we respond. Our first choice can be to pause and take 3 mindful breaths. This will help us to regain self-control and facilitate a mindful response to the anger producing event. It is the buildup and accumulation of anger over time that can be the most harmful to our wellbeing. This is where Meditation and Mindfulness practices can be helpful. Through Meditation practice we strengthen our ability to recognize when an angry thought and/or feeling arises. We make note of it (“anger”), let it go, and return to the breath. The effect here is to improve our ability to recognize anger as it arises – both on the cushion and in daily life. This practice also helps us to both reduce the level of our emotional reactivity and to more quickly recover from the emotional reactivity associated with anger. May you rest with a peaceful heart. May you find balance and peace. May you have compassion and equanimity with all the events of the world. By Jack Kornfield by Laura Crosby
The old adage, “any port in a storm,” is an apt one these days, with more depth than its antiquated origin and casual use might suggest. Clearly, the 16th century sailor had better odds at any port, friend or foe, than at the hands of a merciless ocean squall. Today, according to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the any port idiom is “used to say that a person will use anyone or anything for comfort, help, etc., when in a bad situation.” So what does it mean to take any port in a storm? Really, any port? The “storms” of life are abundant and turbulent, swirling within and around us in ways that can leave us feeling adrift in a tempest of confusion and despair. What is a real refuge when the storms rage? We actually listen for the answer in every moment – always looking for the port of inner peace. Notice that any port in a storm assumes we are aware of and accept the storm. It assumes awareness. As a sailor on the waves of life, I know that storms are part of nature and while fully appreciating their danger and difficulty, I can see the futility of battling every rain drop and thunder clap. This frees me to focus attention on choosing a wise course through the storm and seeing the ports appearing on the horizon. I have agency. During storms, survival depends on opening to new ways of seeing safe harbors. There is an invitation to relax, or at least suspend, assumptions about friend or foe. Rather than holding more tightly to fear and fixed views, I can open to new insights and to help from new “places.” From a place of awareness, acceptance, and openness, I can reflect and study on what ports align with my intentions? What ports nurture and heal? What ports lead to stormier days? What ports no longer serve? And what of the ports within myself? Am I taking the refuge they offer? My deepest and wisest knowing. The courageous heart. Mindfulness. Compassion. Gratitude. The teacher Vinny Ferraro says, “When we meet our suffering with awareness, we go from victim to student.” May we be students of the storms. May we choose the ports that cultivate our compassion and equanimity with all the events of the world. May we trust in our own goodness, wisdom, and belonging.  By Laura Crosby
In the spirit of “everything and everyone is a teacher,” what you are about to read is a simple reflection on how mindfulness practice is present and relevant in unexpected ways. While drawn from recent events, politics are entirely beside the point (well, almost entirely). On November 3, 2024, the poet Alison Luterman shared, “Holding Vigil.” Within hours, it flew around the world in posts, texts, emails, phone calls, podcasts, and meditation rooms like ours at The Center. Read and re-read in conversation and community. You will find the poem in full below. Why? Why did this poem go “viral” with such a sense of urgency? It might be a few things: The way it met people precisely where they were aching in that moment. The way it offered “a moment of unity,” reminding us how many — “every single blessed being on the face of the earth” — were feeling the weight, if not worry, of the time. And it helped us understand that what we were doing was a kind of holding vigil. That the ache, unity, and magnitude of the moment was calling us to pause in observance of an uncertain end and beginning. When we hold vigil, we keep awake and pay quiet, watchful attention even during the time usually spent asleep. Some keep vigil in prayer or protest; hand-in-hand or bedside in honor of dying, death, and difficult change. We bring our vigilance to the import of each moment, tenderly holding the beings we share it with and the feelings that arise. This is quite unlike hypervigilance, in which there is exaggerated reactivity and confusion. From a mindfulness perspective, what makes this poem so significant is that it parallels how we practice: Meeting ourselves and others where we are in each moment. Not where we think we should be or would like to be. Starting right where we are, going to where it hurts or to what’s most true, and meeting the sufferings and joys with awareness. As the beloved teacher Vinny Ferraro says, “We show up, surrender, and care about what arises.” Through practice, coming to see that we are not separate or alone. That just like us others are experiencing fear, anger, and grief. Seeing our “interbeing” with all of life can unwind the binds of self-obsession. Staying awake to our life in a vigil-like willingness to be present with whatever arises. Bringing kind awareness and compassion to moments of intense difficulty — when we most want to escape into “sleep” — as well as to moments of profound ease, joy, and gratitude. The poem also contains discomfort, despair. A suffering that often brings people to mindfulness practice. To the healing and equanimity of moment-to-moment awareness. Grounded, relaxed, open, attentive, ready to see clearly and act wisely. It’s been just 200 days since Luterman released her poem. To say that much has happened understates the immense upheaval and toll of this time. Add to this the waves of gains and loss in our own lives, and … Yes, many of us are still holding vigil. May it be mindful. Dedicated to Dawn Dianne Wood, my mother and wise friend, for whom I am still holding vigil. Holding Vigil by Alison Luterman My cousin asks if I can describe this moment, the heaviness of it, like sitting outside the operating room while someone you love is in surgery and you’re on those awful plastic chairs eating flaming Doritos from the vending machine which is the only thing that seems appealing to you, dinner-wise, waiting for the moment when the doctor will come out in her scrubs and face-mask, which she’ll pull down to tell you whether your beloved will live or not. That’s how it feels as the hours tick by, and everyone I care about is texting me with the same cold lump of dread in their throat asking if I’m okay, telling me how scared they are. I suppose in that way this is a moment of unity, the fact that we are all waiting in the same hospital corridor, for the same patient, who is on life support, and we’re asking each other, Will he wake up? Will she be herself? And we’re taking turns holding vigil, as families do, and bringing each other coffee from the cafeteria, and some of us think she’s gonna make it while others are already planning what they’ll wear to the funeral, which is also what happens at times like these, and I tell my cousin I don’t think I can describe this moment, heavier than plutonium, but on the other hand, in the grand scheme of things, I mean the whole sweep of human history, a soap bubble, because empires are always rising and falling, and whole civilizations die, they do, they get wiped out, this happens all the time, it’s just a shock when it happens to your civilization, your country, when it’s someone from your family on the respirator, and I don’t ask her how she’s sleeping, or what she thinks about when she wakes at three in the morning, cause she’s got two daughters, and that’s the thing, it’s not just us older people, forget about us, we had our day and we burned right through it, gasoline, fast food, cheap clothing, but right now I’m talking about the babies, and not just the human ones, but also the turtles and owls and white tigers, the Redwoods, the ozone layer, the icebergs for the love of God—every single blessed being on the face of this earth is holding its breath in this moment, and if you’re asking, can I describe that, Cousin, then I’ve gotta say no, no one could describe it we all just have to live through it, holding each other’s hands.  Daniel G. Weidner, LMHP
Mindfulness is a practice. Meditation is a critically important aspect of the practice of Mindfulness. When looking at Meditation from a macro perspective there are two integral parts: (1) the actual practice of sitting in Meditation, and (2) the practice of using the calming (Shamatha) and insights (Vipassana) gained through the sitting practice to manage your mind in daily life. Concentration is one of the first things that we learn as we begin a Meditation practice. Concentration (Samadhi) is part of what the Buddhist’s refer to as “The Noble Eightfold Path”. Concentration is facilitated in Meditation through focus on a specific object – typically the breath. Concentration in Mediation differs from the form of concentration that we employ when we study or focus on completion of a complex task. Concentration is not a method for running away from yourself or suppressing. We concentrate to make ourselves deeply present. When you are deeply concentrated you are absorbed in the moment, fully present, you become the moment. Thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations arise and pass away like clouds in the sky. During Meditation we begin to observe our discursive thoughts - thoughts from the past, thoughts of the future. As we practice we become progressively familiar with our thinking mind. We begin to observe what Jack Kornfield refers to a “frequent visitors”, or thoughts that appear with some regularity. We learn to note and name these frequent visitors. Through this process we learn to recognize them and, importantly, we learn to let them go and return to our object of concentration and the present moment. One of the first things that we realize through this process is that we begin to relax. This is known as Shamatha. Shamatha simply means stopping-calming-resting-healing. Shamatha in Meditation then helps us open to insight (Vipassana). Vipassana, at a basic level, is seen as looking deeply. Through this process we begin to peel back the layers of our thinking and learn to directly face whatever is before us at the moment. As we work with Shamatha and Vipassana we become increasingly familiar with our thinking mind and the many emotions/feelings that may be swirling around with our thoughts. We also develop the skill of “letting go”. In Meditation letting go is the act of retuning to our focus of concentration and to the present moment. When we have a daily and consistent Meditation practice our insights lead to a deeper understanding of the thinking mind. Simply put, we get to know the person with whom we spend every day of our life. This leads us to the second integral part of the practice of Meditation: applying the insight (lessons learned) to our daily life. We learn to understand and manage our thinking mind as we move through our lives. This begins with recognition. We learn to recognize thoughts and commensurate emotions/feelings as they appear in our mind. Through recognition we learn to accept those thoughts as thoughts and see that they are impermanent and pass away like clouds in the sky. We learn to let go and to not get caught up in thoughts from the past or future and to return ourselves to the present moment – which is the only moment that we ever have. Recognition and acceptance also provide us with an opportunity to deal with thoughts and feelings that may require further attention. The ability to recognize and accept our thoughts and feelings leads to greater calmness and equanimity in our daily lives. This then leads to a greater understanding of our thinking mind and enables us to return to the present moment in our daily lives. Stability develops over time with our practice. The vicissitudes of our lives begin to level off and we find that we experience progressively smaller swings in our moods and feelings. This leads to greater happiness and contentment with our life as it is.  Hillary Rubesin, PhD, LIMHP, REAT
“The opposite of war isn’t peace. It’s creation.” This Jonathan Larson quote, from his hit Broadway musical, RENT, has been my email tagline since college. I honestly don’t think about it much... even though it has been at the bottom of every single message I’ve sent for the last twenty years. Around the time I added this tagline, I remember speaking with my then 5-year-old cousin, Lila, about her day at summer camp. She reported excitedly, “I made art!” I responded with a smile and a question, “What is art?” She looked at me like this was the silliest question in the world, and replied, “It’s whatever you make!” I’m going to be honest: In the current times, I’ve struggled, really struggled, to find my creativity. I have often felt pangs of guilt and hypocrisy as I’ve encouraged my clients to create as an active response to the horrors of the world. To combat this guilt and to help “get my groove back,” I recently signed up for songwriting lessons with a local musician. At our first meeting, we played around with various chord progressions on both guitar and piano, and he challenged me to write 16 different “parts” (think four or more bars of music) in the key of C as my weekly homework. I immediately responded, “Okay... but don’t expect too much!” I heard my cousin Lila’s voice come through him: “Whatever you come up with will be great!” Art is whatever you make. So I did it. I came up with random combinations of C’s, D minors, E minors, and so on... and, the best part was, I didn’t judge myself (even when I struggled to remember what the heck a diminished chord is!) And, as I could have predicted, the simple act of creation helped me feel better. So many psychological models and theories related to trauma and grief revolve around action: Posttraumatic Growth, Adversity-Activated Development; the Adaptation and Development After Persecution and Trauma model. The crux of these theories/models is that taking action directly pushes against the immobilization often triggered by trauma. One of the many incredible things about the arts is that they are inherently active. In order to create, to write, to dance, to drum, to strum, to paint, to act, to take a photograph, you must move. You must activate something inside yourself. The opposite of war isn’t peace. It’s creation. Art is whatever you make. I hope you make something today.  Marilyn Erickson, APRN
One of my daughter’s many jobs is to care for a 99-year-old woman. She desperately desires that this woman continue to live with as much strength and good mental health as possible. She also sees her own mother living a long life and wants her to be as physically fit as possible. She tells me how important it is to preserve muscle through exercise that focuses on strength and endurance-building and believes that exercise is the most important practice for longevity and quality of life. So, in this article, as much as to give myself a path forward to a regular exercise routine and one specific to building strength and endurance, I am offering you, the reader, encouragement to do the same. And while exercise is important in all stages of life, it is just as critical and, in fact, essential, for individuals in mid-life and later life. We are not too old to start or to continue to change our lifestyle practices! First, think about what kind of movement you enjoy doing. Something that measures up to cardio-type exercise. Examples include running, cycling, swimming, dancing, rowing, and boxing and many more options. There are studies that show that cardio or aerobic training can help reduce the fat that accumulates as our hormones change with transitions to different stages of our development. Additionally, there is a greater benefit when you do both cardio and resistance training. Resistance training includes lifting weights and completing simple functional movements using your own body weight, like push-ups. Resistance training is one of the most impactful things you can do for yourself because the focus is on your muscle power. Muscle power is the ability to generate force quickly. It is critical for helping us perform better when playing sports or exercising in any setting. However, it also determines how well we do activities of daily living like climbing stairs, getting out of a chair, and protecting ourselves against falls. Around age 50, muscle strength (the ability to exert force or lift heavy objects) declines by about 3% per year. Muscle mass decreases by about 1% per year. But it is not inevitable that we lose muscle as we get older. It does take effort and commitment to ourselves, however. As you can see by the percentages above, muscle power declines more rapidly than muscle strength as we get older. So what can we do? Examples of power training exercises can include:
Physical activity affects mental health positively. Consistent, regular physical activity has the potential to help with sleep difficulties, depression and anxiety. I am a believer in having a body that is as healthy and as strong as possible will also give us a boost toward better mental health. So there is no time like the present to start some kind of program that works for you to start building endurance and muscle power. It is never too late to start! And you can start slow and small; change one thing at a time. Resources: Haver, Mary Claire. The New Menopause. 2024. Mahindru, et al. “Role of Physical Health and Well-being: A Review”, Cureus, 2023. Patrick, Rhonda. Found My Fitness website, 2025 document By Pamela Mueggenberg LIMHP
“Absorb what is useful, discard what is useless and add what is specifically your own.” ― Bruce Lee As I write this, I am peering across a chasm of government transition. For me, right now, it is January 5th. I am writing this to you with bread baking in the oven, the weather is bitingly cold, and Biden is still president. For you, right now, things are different. Regardless of your political affiliation, for you these few weeks have been (if reality remains consistent) a lot. When forces outside of our control whirl around us, kicking up pain and fear and anger, it can serve us well to think about safety. What can we do to facilitate our own safety, the safety of those we care about, the safety of our community? First things first. How do we experience safety? Is it keeping things the same? Despite our super-powered monkey brains hating change, we can admit that maintaining the status quo is not safety. Is it keeping threats away? Counter-intuitively, not really. Once we begin identifying what could hurt us, we realize everything could hurt us eventually, and that doesn’t end well. I believe that safety is not the absence of threat, but rather the presence of connection. We cannot through force of will pause the rhythm of the universe, but we can dance with it. But what does that look like? I have a list.
Gather your loved ones close, your own heart closer, and know: we are all connected. We can take care of each other. Love is always here.  Hillary Rubesin, PhD, LIMHP, REAT
Over Thanksgiving, I was lucky enough to fly to New York City to see Hadestown, a modern-day musical retelling of the tragedy of Orpheus and Euridice. Admittedly, I had never heard the music before the curtains opened. To say I was blown away would be an understatement. To say I cried for the majority of the second half would be the truth. To say that watching this show three weeks after the presidential election was both gut wrenching and inspiring... well, that’s the point of this article! The final lines of the show hit me hard: “It's a sad song... We keep singing even so.” As an expressive arts therapist, I use the arts to help my clients express all emotions, many of them painful. There is something deeply grounding knowing that sad songs have most likely been sung since the dawn of humanity. Artistic expression is not only an act of healing. Artistic expression is an act of resistance. One of my teenage clients (and his mother) gave me consent to share a poem and drawing he created a few days after the election. I’d invite you to take some time to reflect on his words and imagery. As he writes so eloquently below, “...the world is not ending / It has simply begun to begin / To sprout, to grow, to flower again.” Untitled I am skin over fat Over muscle over bone Over atoms over molecules And much more, I suppose So, tell me, which part do you hate? Which part do you loathe? Which part of me deserves all the pain you impose? Is it my heart which longs to be free? My spirit, my lungs, my mind, all of me? Which part makes me not human to you? Which part makes you do all that you do? Or is it simply the fact that it’s there? The fact that it is enough to scare? Enough for your logic to be far enough impaired? And I have done nothing Nothing I have done Should put me on the end of the firing gun With my hands high in the sky Please, before you end it, at least let me try To have a future before you stamp it out To develop a life that I might defend I stand by my body until the very end And that I might Put up enough of a fight To outlive you and make it alright So, with my body, or all that is left I listen to the drum banging in my chest And I push, harder than you ever could Cause evil pales to the power of good So one day I’ll dance on your grave I’ll uproot all the poisoned plants that you made So for now we go on to simply just go We keep going and going and the next thing you know We’ll be there, there where we’re free Where you no longer have power over me So the world is not ending It has simply begun to begin To sprout, to grow, to flower again There’s no telling what we might make So please, for tomorrow, live through today  By CML Practitioners
Each year, as the wheel turns, the practitioners at CML take a moment to reflect on the coming year and a choose a word that might be a source of intention or focus for the months ahead. Here are our choices for 2025. “Please” – Hillary Admittedly, I struggled to come up with a “Guiding Word” for the year ahead. I have been feeling a bit untethered since the election, without a guidepost to direct me towards my future dreams/intentions. I decided to turn to the primary being connecting me to the present moment—my two year old. “Max,” I asked, as he dove into a bowl of macaroni and cheese, “What is your favorite word?” “PLEASE!” he shouted, a mouth full of yellow. Sure, he was most likely confusing his “favorite word” with “the magic word,” but I decided to go with it. Thanks for acting as a guide, Max. Please take care of your body so that you can be as strong as possible this year, and in the four years ahead; Please take care of your mind—keep reading for growth and for pleasure; Please take care of your soul—sing from your gut, play your grandfather’s piano, pick up your paintbrush again, dust off your guitar, write a poem for a friend that you haven’t spoken to in a while; Please connect with your community—remind yourself of all the good people in your orbit, help advocate for human rights. Do not disengage. Do not lose hope or heart. PLEASE. “Immensity” – Laura Inspired by the poem “Big” by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, which found me on my birthday. This is, perhaps, the year to learn to be big. Spruce tree big. Cliffside big. Big as mesa, as mountain lake. Big as in cosmos, as in love. Being small has never served me—constricting, contorting, trying to fit into a room, into shoes, into a name. Let this be the year to escape all those little rules with those little shoulds, all those little cages with their little locks. Time to make of myself a key, time to lean into immensity. Time to supersize communion, time to grow beyond self. Time to open, to unwall, to do as the universe does, accelerating as it expands, not rushing toward something else, but changing the scale of space itself. This is the year to be big “Nimble” – Louisa Nothing has become clearer to me recently than how much the rules of the world seem to be in flux as we navigate yet another transitional stage in the human story. In this liminal time, as the old ways die but before new ones are born, it feels important to me to stay flexible and question any attachment, especially to expectation or outcome. I am using the coming year to “lighten the load” by releasing old beliefs that no longer serve, discarding projects that no longer feel vibrant, and ridding my home of unnecessary clutter. I want to feel as limber and pliable as possible so I can be responsive at a time when it feels that disruption, chaos, and the unexpected reign. “Community” – Marilyn Listen, learn, and implement trusted lived experiences. Be resourceful in finding trusted sources of information in this age of misinformation. It may take some digging, experimenting, and courage in connecting with new pathways. Recognizing community knowledge through intentional, authentic partnership and meaningful shifting of power to community can be a form of healing, including personal healing as well as healing of our families, institutions, and the greater national and global societies we are a part of. Never forget that we are stronger together than we are when we are divided. “Connection” – Pamela Connection is one of my most primary organizing principles. I live a life designed to facilitate and celebrate connection - and when faced with bad news or stressful times, my first instinct is to gather all my loved ones close to me to weather out the storm, hunkered down together against whatever comes. This year, I am going to challenge myself. I would like to experience connection expansively - meet more people, find more alliances, learn more systems. Stretch my arms to hold more than just my own and become a part of something larger. |
