Doing the Work | Watering + Waiting

What your clients need most, especially now.


Several weeks ago, I planned to write a blog post this week for helping professionals about this very topic:  watering and waiting.  As helping professionals, we may often experience the anxiety or agony or uncertainty that comes with investing all that we can into a person or a situation or a group, and then waiting to see what grows.

 

How timely and fitting for the situation in which we find ourselves today.

In the ever-unfolding crisis of COVID-19, I’ve heard and seen and felt a growing sense of concern and panic:  about income, about personal well-being, about clients’ health and safety, about loved ones’ security.  As humans, I think we all have the propensity toward a “fend for yourself” type of living, especially when life feels limited and restricted and scarce.

 

But as helping professionals, I think we all have the invitation to something else:  to continue watering and waiting for growth.

 

The more consistent and steadier we can be for our clients and those we serve, the more we give them one more predictable thing in a world that doesn’t feel normal.

 

The more generous and thoughtful we can be for our colleagues and clients, the more we debunk the trend of taking and hoarding and keeping.

 

The more committed and hopeful we are about the work we do, the more we remind ourselves and our clients to choose something different than fear and panic.

 

So let’s keep watering and waiting, for growth is coming.

 

With you and for you,

Alair

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

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Some different options about where we can start

Couple's Therapy

 

Learning why we feel disconnected, and creating new ways of being with each other

Individual Therapy

 

Discovering and developing what it's like to have a relationship with yourself

Family Therapy

 

Finding out why we don't get along, and figuring out how we can be a family 

Play Therapy

 

Helping kids use play to feel safe and strong, especially when bad things happen



sit and stay a while

Some thoughts I share on "Rooted + Grounded"

 

 

The New Normal | Do I Want to Go Back?

 

 "Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself." - Rumi


in the neighborhood

Some helpful resources in the nearby and virtual community

  National Child Traumatic

Stress Network

Talking with Kids + Teens When Scary

Things Happen

 

These resources offer guidance on talking with children and youth when scary things happen. This fact sheet includes information on checking in with yourself, clarifying your goal, providing information, reflecting, asking helpful questions, going slow, labeling emotions, validating, and reducing media exposure. 


 

Alair Olson, M.A.

 Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist (LMFT#86504)

858.634.0302 | therapy@alairolson.com