Fighting Despair with Connection:
Without connection, it’s easy for our fear to grow as exponentially as the Covid-19 infection rates.
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Five Good Things
A Growth Fostering Relationship is marked by the Five Good Things. Coined by Jean Baker Miller in her transformational book, Toward a New Psychology of Women. These are the qualities of a relationship that creates fulfillment and counters inauthenticity and inequity. They include:
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Call for Posters (2019)
We are excited to announce a call for posters for our second annual Relational Summit: Learning Together.
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Fast, Shallow, Breaths
It’s a paradox. Our connection will help soothe our anxious brains, but it can’t work if it can’t first see what is there. The first work of that connection is seeing the anxiety/rage/discomfort/whatever and letting it be there. It can’t be trying to suppress, fix, or avoid it. But once we have that acceptance of what is, that authentic connection in the midst of struggle, there’s enough solid ground for calm to take root. We have to risk the fast shallow breaths to get to the good deep ones.
Read moreCourageous Connections Events (2018)
Bloomington Community Invited to Break Down Barriers with Dr. Maureen Walker and Daryl Davis Bloomington Center for Connection (BCC) is delighted to announce its first community events: Power Redefined: Disruptive Empathy as a Tool for Liberation Friday, August 10 7-9 p.m. and Conversations Reimagined: Relational Cultural Theory in Action Saturday, August 11, 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. Sponsored by Griffin Realty, both events are free and open to the public and take place the Monroe […]
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Bridging Difference: RCT and Intractable Arguments
Relational-Cultural Theory (RCT) has been presented as an antidote to the divisiveness we face on a daily basis. Whether the dissonance is of polar opposite political views, or a struggle over the best route to a common goal, RCT can help create and nurture the relationships necessary to move forward. This post is part one in a series. Because RCT pushes against a model of competition and independence, it can be misunderstood as “just being […]
Read moreSAVE THE DATE! August 10-12, 2018!
Bloomington Center for Connection is thrilled to announce our first annual Relational-Cultural Invitation: Bridging Differences. Friday, August 10th, we welcome our keynote speaker, Maureen Walker. Maureen joins us from the Center for Relational Growth. Maureen’s work includes helping people bridge cultural differences such as race, religion, gender and other social status markers. Maureen’s past talks have included Transforming Community through Disruptive Empathy, Getting to the Truth about Race, It’s Not About Checking a Box: Confronting […]
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Assuming Positive Intent
One of many things I love about my work is that I’m regularly challenged on ideas that I’ve held close for years. Sometimes this results in a recommitment to the foundational philosophy of Relational-Cultural Theory. Other times something we’ve used for years gets changed. A few months ago, we were consulting at a school and I mentioned Ross Greene‘s idea of assumption-free living, described in his new book, Raising Human Beings. “How does that work,” […]
Read moreConnecting This Week!
Hey friends, it’s cold out there, but we’ve got a warm building and fun activities to help connect caregivers and kids. On Tuesday, join us for Claytime with Connie, and on Wednesday we have our Music time! Both are open to caregivers and their children, with Claytime being more appropriate for older preschoolers who are less likely to eat the clay. Come on in and warm up.
Read moreEmotional Labor and #MeToo
Emotional labor was already on my mind when the tsunami of #MeToo happened. Emotional labor—keeping relationships mended, nurturing families and friendships, clearing the way for the daily demands of life to move easily—is socialized into women from an early age and devalued by a patriarchal society. Shining light on this invisible work is one of the essential lenses used in Relational-Cultural thinking. How do these two things intersect? One day into #MeToo, a friend of […]
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