Category: MA Psychology

One of my favorite parts of the Expressive Arts Opening of the Psychology and Counseling Program is the student artists’ presentation of their own work as “Performance Art”. At our opening during Fall 2013 Residency, Nicole Grubman read from her book, “I Left My Sole in Vermont: A Walker’s Journey and Guide through Central Vermont… Continue reading Performance Art at the Fall 2013 Expressive Arts Opening

I have returned to Goddard for fall residency and am immediately inspired. Students have shared their work at our Psychology and Counseling Expressive Arts Opening and the principles of Expressive Arts Therapy are embodied by the works created as well as by the creators. Students have engaged with varied mediums including clay, photography, written narrative,… Continue reading Fall 2013 Expressive Arts Opening

  “Mother Nature wants us to be afraid,” says Rick Hanson, the author of Buddha’s Brain.  Survival of the most cheerful is not, after all, what counts over the millennia.  Survival of the alertest does. The individual who is sensitive to fear will be the first to tell her hunting and gathering comrades that she… Continue reading Installing The Good

  I created fifteen “Soul Cards” [pictured at left] for the Expressive Arts exhibition at our MA in Psychology & Counseling Residency in April 2013. What started out as something like just a compliance to fulfilling coursework for a course on Addiction turned into an adventure in discovery, interaction and personal healing. My father died… Continue reading Soul Cards and Reflection by Student Nirodha Stearns (MA PSY '13)

And she answers: Probably not. Meditation is only one way to find stillness within. My husband sings in two choirs.  A good friend walks in the woods. Well, I walk in the woods. I even like walking in the woods.  But walking in the woods doesn’t make me quiet. I feel refreshed, usually, and ready… Continue reading The Mediocre Meditator Wonders Whether Meditation is for Everybody

In life sometimes I get so caught up in all the mundane and necessary things that I forget why I started to do something. Or why I am walking down a specific path. In learning to counsel with people and to listen to them I became so caught up in the information and the process… Continue reading Student Leslie Whitcomb Reflects on Expressive Arts Therapy

Meditation has something to offer I decided after a workshop on meditation surprised me with a gift of extra energy, the kind protein bars promise but don’t deliver. I talked about this in my second post for this series, you can go back and read it if you’d like. But one year passed, then another.… Continue reading The Mediocre Meditator: Her Second Lesson

For me, a magical aspect of residency is getting ready: making airline reservations, planning the seminar I will teach, hearing from students about the artwork they will exhibit and present, and looking forward to conversations with students and faculty colleagues on campus. Here is a “sneak preview” of the seminar I will lead this upcoming… Continue reading Looking Forward to Residency and Expressive Arts

by MA in Psychology student Cherie Crowningshield of Port Kent, N.Y.   When I was eleven I was intrigued by the thought of travel.  The idea that someone could get on a plane and before long be immersed in a new culture, and environment always fascinated me.  When I reached high school I met my… Continue reading Artwork and Reflection

Last week while in New Orleans for our monthly Jungian training seminar, I found myself with a free day, but in a torrential rain storm. No chance of wandering and making photographs in the French Quarter this visit. I remembered passing by what looked like an art supply store in the Fat City neighborhood near… Continue reading Better Than A Chocolate Store

As a lifelong knitter but only a recent (four years) but dedicated (every day if I can, several seven-day retreats) meditator, here is a short list of similarities between the two activities which I thought might apply to many other kinds of learning processes as well: 1. The beginner gets immediate rewards. Knitting: The magical… Continue reading The Mediocre Meditator Thinks About Knitting

Below are brief descriptions of my current three favorite books on meditation. Each one is written by psychologists who have been practicing psychotherapists and meditators for more than 25 years. I use them for reference, inspiration and companionship. I reread them and refer them to clients, friends, students and colleagues. Radical Acceptance (Bantam Books, 2003)… Continue reading The Mediocre Meditator #3: My Three Best Books on Meditation