KATE INGRAM, M.A., is a counselor, soul coach and author. Her first book, Washing the Bones: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Transformation about her journey through grief and depression to spiritual awakening, was awarded a 2014 Nautilus Silver Medal and a 2014 Indie Book Award. To receive free monthly inspiration or to find out more about her work, please visit www.katherineingram.com. IT’S SPRING AGAIN … Mother’s Day, my birthday, baseball: the best time of year in my book. I will be celebrating all of those things with my son, who will be meeting me in San Francisco after completing his junior year in North Carolina. Mother’s Day at the ballpark with my […]
THE CLOCK said 3am, but I lay awake, my mind racing with unwanted thoughts: the murders in Minnesota, unlawful arrests, erosion of civil liberties, where it’s all headed, fearing for my children, for other people’s children, for the whole dang world. Not a good place to be at 3am. Or ever.
I […]
Put light against light — you have nothing.
Put dark against dark — you have nothing.
It’s the contrast of light and dark
that each give the other one meaning.
~Bob Ross
EVERY YEAR, as I feel the turn of the […]
“The things you think about determine the quality of your mind.
Your soul takes on the color of your thoughts.”
~ Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
WE ARE LIVING in troubled times. “Strange days indeed,” in the words of the late John Lennon. The planet, the world, our nation, our communities are all affected by […]
WHAT WANTS TO HAPPEN?
I frequently pose this question to clients who have come to the end of something but aren’t sure what’s next. “What wants to happen?” takes you out of your head and into your intuition, into an awareness of the subtle energies that are always flowing. When we align […]
A LOVELY, PHILOSOPHICAL CONVERSATION with a friend today got me thinking about the idea of receiving and being received. I never felt very received when I was growing up, not by my family and not by my peers. I was and am extremely sensitive, a deep thinker, and an even deeper […]
I RECENTLY HAD A BIRTHDAY. A big one. An “oof” one. Birthdays are a mini, private New Year’s event; you tend to review the past and think about your dreams for the future. In my contemplations leading up to the day, I discovered, to my chagrin and unhappiness, that my future […]
IF YOU’RE LOOKING to talk with someone about concerns in your life, it can be hard to know what to look for. The options are daunting. Should you find a counselor? Coach? Psychologist? All those letters after the names are like alphabet soup. What do they even mean?
Let’s break this down […]
FOR BEING SO COLD AND BLEAK, February is a pretty darned happy month. There’s the lunar new year with its celebration of new beginnings and opportunities for success, and Valentine’s Day, stirring thoughts of the heart (it also stirs groundhogs, but I’d like to focus on the heart; if you love […]
Winter is arrived, wrapping us in deepest darkness. The sun sits suspended on an invisible threshold, its solstice marking both an end and a beginning, a tipping point. The power, the crisis of this moment, was keenly felt by our ancestors. The myths and ritual celebrations surrounding the return of […]
Well my friends, here we are. As I write this in early September, the light has taken on that warm, melancholic hue that signals the end of summer. Every year at this time I find myself in a reflective reverie and this year has not a little bit to reflect upon: […]
Since I am in the midst of a significant major life transition—taking my son to college this month—I am sharing this piece originally published in 2017. Except for the zodiacal reference, I think it as timely as ever. Enjoy.
While this is the Year of the Rooster, I’m thinking about other birds […]
My son, Aidan, has been planning on attending the local university this fall. It’s been a long journey of many disappointments this past year, as my regular readers will recall. But just when we were settling into this next chapter, Aidan received an email. The arts conservatory on the East coast […]
“I would love to live like a river flows, carried by the surprise of its own unfolding.” ~John O’Donahue
The following is a bit personal: more personal, even, than I normally am, which is quite a bit. But, after 13 years writing this column, I’m taking some liberties and honestly, vulnerable is […]
Happy April y’all!
It’s actually March and snowing as I write this, but I’m not buying into the deception. I can see the maple outside my office window covered in snug little buds. Spring is right around the 34º corner and I am in spring cleaning hyperdrive: scouring […]
“Catch the vigorous horse of your mind.” ~Zen saying
I used to ride a wonderful horse named Sampari, or Sam for short. Sammy was an Arabian, which means that Sammy liked to bolt. If a bird startled him, or the wind blew, or a fly went by, he would react. He could […]
“Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder. Help someone’s soul heal. Walk out of your house like a shepherd.” ~ Rumi
I have a shelf on my bookcase fairly devoted to the subject of finding one’s purpose. I sought this elusive, holy grail for longer than I care to admit. […]
The other morning, I sat in the pre-dawn darkness on my porch, wrapped up against the cold, staring at the stars. I listened to invisible raccoons running through the trees, saw the inky outline of the branches bending under their weight. I heard the soft clopping of deer hooves, and […]
It is early October as I write, and the weather is sublime. The light is low and the leaves just beginning to change. I love autumn, yet this beautiful season always elicits a soft sort of sadness in me, a feeling I can only call melancholy.
I am, by nature, a melancholy […]
I’ve been sharing a lot recently about some personal transitions I’m experiencing, but I’m keenly aware that we are all going through major cultural, political, economic and social transitions, writ large. There’s a whole lot of shakin’ going on these days.
Given this, it’s amazing to me how the impact of these […]
This summer has been a particularly fecund one for birds in my world. We’ve been surrounded by nests of blue jays, robins, and spotted towhees (which I call grackles—I can’t tell you why, but I like the name quite a lot). The bird babies are fledging now, which is a perfect, […]
As I write this, Mother’s Day is here, and as you are reading this, my son, Aidan, will be a newly-minted, high school graduate, tentatively stepping into the beginning practicum of becoming an adult. It’s a passage I’ve anticipated and wished to forestall since his arrival on a meltingly hot summer […]
As a young girl I loved the Little House book series by Laura Ingalls Wilder, which chronicled her life growing up in the 1860s. I read the books innumerable times and when the television series came out, I was glued to it.
I had the pleasure of revisiting those books with my […]
Just as spring arrives, just as the pandemic recedes and life begins to look a bit brighter, Vladimir Putin.
Seriously? Two insane years of Covid, massive political and social upheaval, The Great Resignation, spiraling inflation, and now a globally destabilizing war in Europe. Toss in personal life struggles and […]
AN OBJECTIFIED ME.
I need that myself
to help the other separate the viewer
and the viewed
which subjectivity’s mirror
fuses;
someone
for a short time
to wear my problem so that unburdened
I
may
save
my soul.*
I love stories. I love listening to them, reading them, telling them. I am privileged, in my work, to listen to the life stories of […]
Well, congratulations. We made it into another new year. And regardless of how you may be feeling about this fact, I think we should all be feeling darned good about ourselves for having slogged through what can only be described as the weirdest—if not the worst—two years in recent history. We’re […]
The holidays often evoke more stress than gratitude, and this year promises to be a bit “extra” with Covid fears and vaccine wars added to the usual familial fracas. I hope this classic—read with cocktail in hand—will help you brave the onslaught.
It’s November, time for Thanksgiving gatherings and the annual viewing […]
Eighteen months ago, I began this column by saying, “Are you as tired of hearing and reading about this horrid virus as I am?”
Little did I imagine.
Here it is, another fall in masks; another season of uncertainty on multiple levels. I am beyond sick and tired of this horrid virus. But […]
This is a story about surrender.
In the spring of 2002, I was a newly re-married, very happy doctoral student halfway through the Depth Psychology program at Pacifica Graduate Institute. Once a month I would travel from San Francisco for a long weekend of in-person classes. A Ph.D. was a long-time dream […]
Pop Quiz: Do you have a tendency to any of the following?
If you answered none of the above, you are either A) not being very honest with yourself, or B) you are a highly evolved being who has come to this planet […]
There is a mantra I saw written on a whiteboard in a yoga class one day which changed my life. It really did. It’s so simple and so important that I adopted it as one of my Core Principles for Living; it’s that big. Are you ready?
AWARENESS + NON-JUDGMENT = TRANSFORMATION
I […]
Authenticity is one of my deepest values. I strive to live authentically and I encourage and support my clients to do the same. For me, living authentically means being your true self: not some idea of who you are, or who other people think you are or “should” be. It means […]
This past, week, I received two newsletters. The first, from writer Maria Popova, shared an excerpt from author Katherine May’s book Wintering, about the quiet, difficult seasons of life and how to allow them. The second, from Eileen at Rebel Heart Books, described the loss of her husband’s parents to COVID-19 […]
The following is from the ‘Soul Matters’ archives, back when we went places and saw people.
I was out with a friend the other evening enjoying a real Manhattan in a real bar. In the course of conversation my friend said, in a rather Eeyorish way (i.e. witty, humorous and severely cynical), […]
When I was giving birth to my daughter, there came a point—about twelve hours into my unmedicated odyssey—where I was done. I looked at my midwife, bleary and exhausted, and said, “I don’t want to do this anymore.”
I think a whole lot of us are feeling something akin to that level […]
Well, we’re almost there my friends. We’re at the finish line of 2020: the craziest, weirdest, most tumultuous, contentious, painful, scary, exhausting years most of us have ever seen. The year that we stopped asking, “Anything else?” because the answer was always, “Why, yes, as a matter of fact: Here!” […]
This month, in light of the current state of this crazy country and world we find ourselves in, I thought I’d share a little excerpt from my new book, “Grief Girl’s Guide.” I have abbreviated and altered it ever-so-slightly from it’s focus on grief to speak to the turmoil many of […]
As my faithful readers undoubtedly know, I am a porch-sitter. It’s where I sit and watch the sunrise, express my gratitudes, speak my prayers, and think my thoughts. And the thought that came to me this particular morning, watching the backlit beauty of sprinkler droplets and marveling at the tiny, perfect […]
You cannot ask the darkness to leave; you must turn on the light.” ~Sogyal-Rinpoche
I’ve been thinking a lot about what to say this month. My mind and heart are troubled by what I see and hear: Division, anger, violence, finger-pointing, hypocrisy, grandstanding, virtue-signaling, and a whole lot of agitated herd behavior. […]
One of the more obvious and trying aspects of this pandemic we’re floundering in are all the things we can’t do. This horrid little virus has spurred limitations the likes of which most of us have never seen. Constrained on multiple levels— movement, activities, work, income, socializing— we are experiencing a […]
I know you are probably sick of hearing and reading about this horrid virus; I know I am. It’s like hearing about the hurricane that’s brewing off-shore: we hear report after report, we prepare, we hoard, we hunker down … and we wait … and […]
It’s Spring, so let’s talk about viruses and anxiety, shall we?
I’m not a fan of viruses. I’ve had one plaguing my body for over six years now. Mine is called Epstein-Barr. So, I know about the anxiety related to illness. I know what it’s like to lie in bed at night, […]
“It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.” ~Marcus Aurelius
For most of my life, I have been a seeker: a seeker of truth, understanding, and also happiness. Seeking understanding and wisdom is honorable enough, but the happiness bit has been somewhat challenging.
It’s […]
I am writing this column on January 1, 2020. It’s the first day of a new year, a new decade, and for me, a new adventure.
Well, not exactly new.
A long time ago, just out of graduate school and some 2,500 hours into a five-year process of becoming a counselor, I sat […]
It’s two weeks before Thanksgiving as I write this. Walking in town yesterday, I was met by store windows chock full of Christmas. Displays of faux snow and baubles, decorations and gifts sat in strange juxtaposition with the unusual, t-shirt-warm weather. It was unsettling.
I’m not in sync with this Christmas […]
Ten days ago, I was planning on writing the expected piece on “gratitude” for this November edition. And then, the unexpected randomness of Life happened and my companion, Baci (whom you may recall from his recent celebrity appearance in this column) had a disc rupture, leaving his back legs paralyzed.
I spent […]
“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” ~ Ian MacLaren
It is truly remarkable to me the number of people I know who are in pain. I’m not just talking about my counseling practice, where I expect to hear about difficulties and struggles; I’m talking about friends and […]
I am an incredible parent. I know this because there are moments in my parenting life where I stop and think, “Man, these kids are darned lucky.”
One of these moments happened this week. During a meeting at my children’s school my son was reminded […]
One of the (few) perks of getting older is having a longer view of life. Being a newly-minted mother of two teens, I’m remembering just how inwardly awkward and stressful adolescence is. Figuring out who you are and how to navigate life is rough on rats. And parents.
“It is what it is.”
My husband introduced me to this phrase. He uses it all the time and to be honest, it used to annoy the bejesus out of me. I’d get all snarky and retort, “What does that mean? It means […]