Anxiety and Connection: Help that Helps
A somatic therapist and spiritual care provider, Elle Miller, takes time out to bring Books in the Burgs back to address the need for community, connection and conversation around meaningful topics.
Hi…. Years ago, I started a book club called Books in the Burgs. I had just moved to Blacksburg, Virginia. I wanted to meet people and the me of who I am wanted it to be meaningful. I have a busy life as we all do and forming meaningful connections can be hard. I love language and growing the capacity to share space with other human beings. The first book I picked was Brene Brown’s Gifts of Imperfection. In one moment, strangers came together. As the meeting ended the comment that was heard throughout was how did we create the space to be that vulnerable with basically strangers. It is my belief that cultivating that type of space is more important than ever before.
As a spiritual care provider and somatic therapist, two comments I hear often circle around the reality of anxiety and the need for connection. I, honestly, can’t remember when Sarah Wilson’s books, “First, We make the beast beautiful” and “This one wild and precious life,” crossed my path. As I read them, my whole being thought that it was time to bring back Books in the Burgs.
““I yearn for a complete sense of self; I’m not sure it’s something I can find or something I just have to wait for. I want to be authentic. I yearn to find the real me. I feel I am missing a connection with myself. But the thing is I want to find it while “life-ing.” I want to have yearning and be in this life. Everything seems to be fractured, rather than unified as my gut tells me ought to be the case. This stems from a yearning for the world to make sense, to fit together. I yearn for life direction and purpose. My dad’s illness made me question what I REALLY want to be doing with my life as I could inherit the illness and I don’t want to waste time. I want to wake up. I feel like a zombie going through the motions of work and married life and the real me is dormant. I want to know the real me, even if I have no idea what the real me is. To know the connection to a bigger force. To know that the universe has got this one. It burns at me every day to know that everything I’m doing makes sense.””
“We create our better world. The time has come to boldly, wildly, imagine better. We are being called upon, individually and as a society, to forge a new path and to find a new way of living.”
I feel it in my being, the need and desire to gather and to share common space as human beings, to practice the art of presence and listening. It is my utmost hope that you will join into the gathering. There are dates and times for in person and online.
SAVE THE DATE: FEBRUARY and MARCH 19TH
February: Sarah Wilson’s first, we make the beast beautiful: A Journey through anxiety
March: Sarah Wilson’s this one wild and precious life: the path to connection in a fractured world
12:00PM In person @ 708 S Main st Blacksburg, Virginia (location open to change)
2:00PM Online @.
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88663341826
