Live Virtual Group Session: 12PM EDT March 28th 2025

22 Comments

Thank you to everyone who joined us for this session!

For this session we took a close look at the painting “Hospital” by Maria Lassnig, posted below.

Our prompt was: “Write about navigating an unfamiliar place.”

More details will be posted on this session, so check back again!

Participants are warmly encouraged to share what you wrote below (“Leave a Reply”), to keep the conversation going here, bearing in mind that the blog of course is a public space where confidentiality is not assured.

Also, we would love to learn more about your experience of these sessions, so if you’re able, please take the time to fill out a follow-up survey of one to two quick questions!

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Please join us for our next session Monday March 31st at 6pm EDT, with more times listed on our Live Virtual Group Sessions.

Credit: Maria Lassnig

22 thoughts on “Live Virtual Group Session: 12PM EDT March 28th 2025”

  1. michele348's avatar michele348

    About navigating an unfamiliar place~~~

    Where is the top?
    Where is the bottom?
    Do either truly exist?
    So many questions,
    but where can the answers be found?

    Whose reality am I observing?
    Is it mine alone
    or can you see it too?

    There are no true boundaries in this universe,
    for each of us has different expectations and
    different moral codes
    by which we navigate
    our life’s journey.

    The most we can ask of ourselves
    is to be understanding of others,
    for their reality may not align with ours,
    but does that alone make it wrong?
    Are we to discredit someone
    simply because they disagree?

    We all find ourselves
    navigating in a world with unfamiliar places,
    and we must make the best of it.

    Is there any alternative?

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    • Elizabeth's avatar Elizabeth

      Michele, I really like the idea of trying to understand others who might have a different reality. I also enjoyed that you asked a question at the end of your piece because it invites us to think and opens us up.

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      • michele348's avatar michele348

        Thank you, Elizabeth. So many times, we tend to have blinders fixed about our eyes and our hearts. What would it be to look from the eyes of the other?

        Like

    • antoinette56's avatar antoinette56

      I feel very attuned right now to the need to understand that we are not really separate from others, even though boundaries are also important. Your piece touched right on that point for me. Thank you, Michele.

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      • michele348's avatar michele348

        We are unique, but we are the same. Oftentimes, we fail to realize that… me included. Our most basic needs are the same… to be acknowledged, to be heard, to be loved. Unfortunately, there are those in the world who choose not to accept the existence of commonality and wander about imposing their will upon others, choosing only to see the differences. We all have much work to accomplish. Thank you, Antoinette56.

        Liked by 1 person

  2. Elizabeth's avatar Elizabeth

    We are navigating in uncharted waters now.

    Or are we?

    Is everything old new again?

    Is there anything new under the sun?

    I try to look back to connect the here and now to times gone by,

    Which causes me to question-

    Are we moving at warp speed to the great unknown?

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    • michele348's avatar michele348

      Elizabeth, I agree it’s difficult these days to find the familiar. But maybe we are not supposed to. Perhaps our objective is to forge new paths and find innovative solutions to what troubles our world. Not all of the past should be forgotten…commitment to helping those in need should never be covered over in dust. Sometimes, when we forget our origins, we become lost souls, trampling over others who deserve not these actions. This should be addressed if society has a sense of morality.

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    • antoinette56's avatar antoinette56

      Thank you, Elizabeth. I think we are always “moving at warp speed to the great unknown…” – what a wonderful way to put it. Can we find a way to accept the ride? I hope so!

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      Reply
      • Elizabeth's avatar Elizabeth

        Antoinette-Thanks for your response. I agree that we are always moving toward the unknown, but these days it seems that we are moving to the GREAT Unknown. I hope we are prepared. Sometimes I think we are always prepared from life experiences and sometimes I think we are never totally prepared, but learn on the job when whatever happens happens. To be continued…

        Liked by 1 person

  3. al3793's avatar al3793

    Write about navigating an unfamiliar place

    What would it be like to enter a space of Hope and Joy
    Removed from the whirlwind of a busy urban street
    With lights flashing from all directions and
    Noises of many different sounds or
    Arising at three AM to tend the field in time for
    The coming rain or length of day.
    Which direction would we step in this unknown place?
    Focused on the moments of Hope embedded in the journey of Truth
    rather that the mere journey of surviving one day
    undaunted by what worries us but basking in
    the confidence of the truth that we are loved

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    • antoinette56's avatar antoinette56

      Hi Andre – I feel like your piece captures just what I was saying in response to Elizabeth – there is a wonderful quote by Rabbi Nachman of Braslav (11th century? 14th? some long ago time) that goes something like, “The whole world is a very narrow bridge…the trick is to not be afraid.” I think of that often. Thank you!

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      • al3793's avatar al3793

        Yes, Antoinette. I think John O’ Donohue captures this sentiment well in the closing stanza of Morning Offering”:

        May I have the courage today
        To live the life that I would love,
        To postpone my dream no longer
        But do at last what I came here for
        And waste my heart on fear no more.

        Like

    • michele348's avatar michele348

      We, as individuals, play unique roles in the “play of life”. We are all “supporting” actors to fellow actors. One’s role is enhanced by the level of quality given by our fellow actors. We are not competing, but working as one unit, together, to result in an excellent performance. Each role is equally important. Each rehearsal allows us to improve. And isn’t that what life’s about? It matters not the effort required, it matters what happens when the final curtain falls at the end of the play. Do we have an audience rising to their feet in applause, or does the audience file out quietly?

      Have we lived a life with no regrets, knowing that our existence has been guided by the limitless love of someone who has experienced all joys and sorrows, but is still ready to extend His hand to us when we stumble?

      **I hope this all makes sense…sometimes I get carried away when the topic motivates me to stretch my thoughts a bit farther. Plus, it’s way past my bedtime 🙂

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      Reply
  4. antoinette56's avatar antoinette56

    I think it is SO fascinating that you all wrote in questions!!Thank you for sharing!

    Mine:

    First day of internship.

    I had worked here before, but as a student. The same hospital suddenly felt so much louder, more full of echoes and light, like a prolonged externalized migraine. Nurses talked to me, constantly. I owed them something, where before I had been a burden, or invisible. I tried to calculate doses of potassium, with a nurse audibly fraying over the phone. My attention to detail was a liability, and meanwhile, another nurse pulled me aside and asked me to give her a prescription for urine incontinence. I somehow was both a sanctuary and a minefield, as if I – and not the place – were unfamiliar, suspicious and inviting, comic and tragic.

    I felt like a patient and when I was mistaken for a family member, sitting by a bedside with my head bowed and my name badge obscured, I felt I’d come full cycle and wasn’t sure how to inhabit my new body, my new name, my new powers.

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    • michele348's avatar michele348

      You were to be the source for all answers, whether answers existed or not. Caught between two worlds, all-knowing and questioning, which side to fall.

      When in doubt, bow your head and ask for guidance.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
    • al3793's avatar al3793

      Antoinette, I remember little of my first day on the wards as an intern and your speaker prompts my memory to ponder that day. I am sure I was very anxious. The day your speaker describes went full circle, from very concrete moments to depersonalization to and image of a patient and even a family member. This is a most amazing opening to a story that culminated in an advance sophisticated professional who listens to the stories. I suspect the intervening chapters are filled with stories. They are not always easy, but each contributes to who we have become.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
    • Elizabeth's avatar Elizabeth

      Antoinette, you’ve described a scene of disorientation beautifully-The unfamiliar in the familiar. I can picture the scene as if I was a fly on the wall. Usually, in these cases, things settle down, but it is challenging to wait for that-it’s good to remember that there ishope at the end of the tunnel.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
  5. antoinette56's avatar antoinette56

    I also promised to transcribe one sentence from Eileen Ain’s piece – she was the first to “read” but couldn’t read her own handwriting or quite get to saying it out loud, so wrote it in a private message to me, and then agreed to have me share it here. If you remember she talked out her piece, which was about going into an MRI machine, having made a deal with the nurses, that she could stay wrapped in warmth, but the noise was still overwhelming…

    “I wrote about creating a descant to obfuscate the clanking, clonking and horrid errant sounds.”

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    • michele348's avatar michele348

      Eileen, I so vividly remember the first experience I had with the MRI. I wish I had thought to bring a blanket for comfort; instead, the only quasi-remedy was the earphones with music, closing my eyes, and imagining I was elsewhere. Oh, and remembering the phrase..”this too will pass.”

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
    • al3793's avatar al3793

      Eileen, firstly your speaker strings a remarkable line of alliteration here. I wonder what that descant would sound like above or below the harsh cacophony of sounds from an MRI. The warm blanket “sounds” like an easier fix. The staff should have “listened” to you. I relate to the discomfort of being slid into the MRI tube. Andre

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

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