Hello R&A Community,
In thinking about what to write in this newsletter, I became keenly aware that I am and our group is undergoing a profound growth spurt. The kind of change that feels so re-orienting that it is difficult to speak about because the words are new and the process of metamorphosis is live. The momentum of this evolution feels like it is leading us to greater grounding within ourselves and with each other.
For me, this journey began by seeking a more regular return to feelings of open and expansive engagement in order to have the kind of candid and meaningful conversations with all of you that fuel my why and our group’s collective reason for doing this work: to connect and to undo aloneness. I am grateful for finding this vagal state of flow often and with a lovely intensity during my travels this summer. I guess the best way I can describe it as seeking and savoring moments of flow.
The author Teju Cole more elegantly described these experiences of flow, in reference to a particular moment of eating really good, fresh black pepper on properly spiced goat biryani by saying:
“You have this moment. These moments of pleasure, of epiphany, of focus, of being there, in their instantaneous way can actually feel like a little nudge. They are telling you by the way this is why you are alive. And it won’t last. But never mind that for now. And it happens in art, and it happens in friendship and it happens in food, and in sex and a long walk, and being immersed in a body of water, baptism once again, and it happens in running, and endorphins, and all those moments that psychologists describe as flow. What is interesting is that they happen in real time. As Seamus Heaney says useless to think you’ll park and capture it more thoroughly – you are a hurry through which known and strange things pass. You are just a conduit for that. But if you are paying attention, it’s almost enough, I’m not sure if it enough, but it is almost enough I am certainly glad for it. I’d rather have it, than not have it.”
Part of our changes at Rennicke & Associates this fall have been the addition of three phenomenal postdoctoral fellows: Anisha Patel, Psy.D., Bradford Stevens, Ph.D. and Carolyn Sorkin, Ph.D. Please read more about each of their unique histories below. If you are interested in joining the Rennicke & Associates team, please check out our new Career website page and clinical, training and administrative opportunities, by clicking HERE.
To steady us this fall, Dan Wolfson, Psy.D. will continue his group for adults processing major losses in their life in his Shared Grief Group. Adult adoptees will find common ground and fellowship together Monday evenings within Elizabeth Studwell, Psy.D.’s Adoptees Joining Together Group. Bob Bamman, LCSW will be highlighting how using playfulness, acceptance, curiosity, and empathy (P.A.C.E.) can transform adoptive parents relationships with their child in his Parenting with P.A.C.E. Group that is reforming in October.
For professionals, I will be leading a 4-day training at NewBridge Services in Parsippy, NJ in Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy Level 1 Training this December and January.
So here’s to being the hurry, to the known and strange things, and to the moments where it is enough…
With gratitude,
