“This book is like a portable therapist for everyone.”
Shelagh Rogers, CBC Radio
“Patricia Morgan and her daughter have written a book that is searingly honest. It doesn’t just bleat and wail, but talks about the pain with genuine insight. Most important of all, there are solutions in this book—tools and techniques to move us all forward. This mother and daughter have been through hell. What they have to say can put out some of those hell-fires for you.”
Dr. Sidney B. Simon, Professor Emeritus, University of Massachusetts. Author of Values Clarification and other books
“There are books that tell you about addictions and recovery – Patricia and Kelly’s book makes you feel it.”
Jeff Wilbee, CAE, Executive Director, Alcohol & Drug Recovery Association of Ontario, Toronto, ON
A True Story with 14 Ways To Demonstrate Unconditional Love
Love Her As She Is was featured in a CBC television documentary and is recommended as a valuable resource for all parents and mental health professionals.
You will gain insight into the effects of a disturbing childhood, ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder), adoption, the world of drugs and life on the street. Through the story of a mother struggling to connect with a distant and dual alcohol and cocaine-addicted daughter, you will discover 14 ways to love unconditionally while maintaining clear boundaries, develop healthy solutions for connecting in challenging relationships and turn hope into loving action.
Love Her As She Is: Lessons from a Daughter Stolen by Addictions has supported and given direction to many people concerned with loved ones susceptible or challenged by addictions or other troubling circumstances. Purchase it to help the person who is hurting and seeking a way to love while maintaining clear limits.
These clients looked for an Albertan or Canadian speaker. But even more importantly, they sought a speaker who could help their people relieve their stress, lighten their load, brighten their outlook, and strengthen their everyday resilience.
Testimonial Letters
Click on the logos below to see just how impressed some of Patricia’s clients were!
“We laughed. We learned. We walked away with useful tools to better take care of ourselves. Patricia pressure proofed the women of Ipswich.” Joni Birch, Relationships Australia
“The group, found it rejuvenating, thought provoking, and fun! She truly shares herself in her sessions.” Doreen Hogarth, Alberta Council of Disability Services
“We appreciated the light-heartedness yet deep message Patricia presents. . . Our participants left with a smile, feeling positive and revitalized.” Dr. Anita Mitzner, Education Consultant, Alberta Health Services
“We recommend Patricia to anyone who is looking for a fun and authentic speaker who can provide practical tips for building their own and others’ resilience.” Jacqueline Peters, President, Calgary Association of Professional Coaches
“She was absolutely fantastic! Some of the feedback from her keynote and sessions were: ‘Listen to your body and learn that it is OK to say no’; ‘Inspiring, helped me realize that I am normal’; ‘A real spirit lifter!’” Judy Carney, Grasslands Paraprofessional Support Staff Committee “The results and feedback from participants indicate their desire for more of Patricia! . . . to take better care of themselves, using positive self-talk and listening to their body . . . We have already booked Patricia for another presentation!” Doreen Nasr, Executive Director, Primary Care Network, Calgary West Central
“Patricia Morgan’s humor and genuine compassion for others enables her to connect with her audience. An excellent speaker and motivator she provides a very practical approach to appreciating the value of self and celebration of differences.” Karen R. Plamondon, Manager, Human Resources, Newalta Corporation
“Patricia was a spring tonic for the women of Edson.” Vera Calvert, Executive Director, Edson and Area Community Learning Society
“Your energy and enthusiasm were outstanding. You have touched each of us in a very special way—sharing yourself and your struggles. I have seen positive changes in many of the individuals who were in attendance.” Doris Gudz, Gerontology Conference Organizer
“We recommend Patricia Morgan to anyone who is looking for a dynamic, humorous and heartfelt presenter that can speak effectively and passionately to a diverse group of people and help them realize what’s important in their day to day lives.” Marita Delobelle, National Sales Manager, Silver Group Purchasing
“She is an awesome speaker who interacts with the audience and provides excellent tips to improve our work and home life.” Rose Fusaro, International Association of Administrative Professionals
“You have a fun and informative way of sharing and encouraging the value of appreciation in our lives as you’ll see from the following excerpts: I’ve never had so much fun learning at our ADVR meetings! I will listen more and smile more. I will find more ways to show random appreciation for volunteers and other staff.” Cherie Tetz, Association of Directors of Volunteer Resources
“She brought tears to the eyes of some participants through her honest approach, and she made us all laugh. She has a very comfortable presence that we all enjoyed.” Heath Miller, Bethany Care Society
“Many (participants) commented on her humorous and friendly style, but more importantly noted that they received valuable advice and affirmations from Patricia.” Tricia Lirette, Grant MacEwan College
“We recommend Patricia to anyone who is looking to have a team building session that is looking for practicality, humor and to have fun.” George Sidor, Manager, Electronic Gaming, Alberta Gaming and Liquor Commission
“We can count on Patricia to tailor every presentation to the unique needs of her audience. Her passionate, humorous, and humble approach resonates with everyone. Our Impact speakers are expected to inform, inspire and entertain. Patricia does all three exceptionally well with a positive and professional attitude.” Sheryl Hayes, Manager of Learning and Development, United Way of Calgary and Area
“Comments from participants included ‘You’ve changed the way I look at life,’ and ‘I will try to focus more on the positives from now on.’ The audience really loved your use of humor together with your down to earth way of presenting.” Kim Bridgland, West Moreton Women’s Health, Ipswitch, Australia
“Patricia Morgan is an exciting, warm and energizing speaker who showed us all how to inject humor into the day to day work of caring for marginalized children and young people. Day later, participants are still remarking on her excellent presentation and the new skills they have learnt.” Peter Melrose, PeakCare Qld Australia
“We were looking for a dynamic presenter who could engage our staff in learning about themselves to strengthen their workplace resilience and build team amongst our support staff. . . We recommend Patricia to anyone who is looking for a facilitator who brings a wealth of knowledge and experience coupled with energy and humour into her presentations.” Jan Pistawka, Human Resource Manager, Foothills School Division
“Learnings I will put into action: say no, focus on my strengths and know that I can’t control others. Patricia is an excellent speaker and kept the session fun and light.” Diane Cadarette, RBC Royal Bank
“Patricia is simply fabulous. My chakras are now in balance and my funny bone is enriched with laughter.” Kat Brandon, Artist
“I will say to myself, ‘Do your best, release the rest!’ This is a life long intention to make each day. Thank you.” Nicole Ainscough, Registered Respiratory Therapist
“I learned to have fun and be a conscious thinker. Patricia has a common sense approach to life. She made me smile and increase my face value.” Maria Orydzuk, Producer, CTV
“I will now reframe from labeling. I have always been careful about labels but the light went on for me.” Mary-Lynn Wardle, Teacher
“Motivated me to look at and change myself.” Fay Woodward, Dreambuilder Conference
“This presentation is life and career changing. I learned many strategies that will benefit my personal life and job.” Arlene Baskin, Team Leader, BLAST Program, Lethbridge
“While her focus is on strengthening personal resilience, Patricia’s sense of humour adds a special facet to her life lessons and suggestions. “(Patricia is) humorous about serious … situations, which makes you feel at ease,” said one participant. Inspiring and motivational, yet also down-to-earth, Patricia is a great choice for keynote speeches and presentations, and I would highly recommend her.” Anne Beaty, Amazing Airdrie Women Conference
“I am always inspired when I hear Patricia speak. Best of all her humour makes her presentations energizing, fun and thought provoking. You can’t ask for a better combination.” Linda Edgecombe, CSP, Professional Speaker
“You are a fun, entertaining, thought provoking and conference enhancing speaker.” Patricia Fripp, Past President, National Speakers Association
“Patricia’s engaging presentation was new and enlightening information for many of the women participants, and long-held wisdoms packaged in a dynamic and different way for many others. Whatever the case for the women involved, Patricia certainly captivated her audience with her sincerity and enthusiasm.” Renee Andreas, Social Worker, Australia
“Patricia is absolutely out-standing with the energy and motivation she brings. this was an absolute once in a life-time learning opportunity.” Emily Pfannschmidt, Queen Silver Star 53rd, Vernon
“Patricia’s presentation was inspiring and empowering. I was very empowered and thankful for the knowledge. ” Courtney Hayes, Medicine Hat College
Kristin Neff’s book Self-Compassion: Stop Beating Yourself Up and Leave Insecurity Behind was published in 2011. Neff provides research and stories illustrating the importance of compassion toward ourselves. She also offers easy exercises that invite self-awareness, as well as self-compassion.
Overview:
Neff argues that being kind to yourself strengthens your emotional resilience. Some of her conclusions include:
Both self-compassion (accepting our weaknesses) and self-appreciation (celebrating our strengths) are important.
By developing mindfulness, awareness and new thought patterns, we can stop evaluating, comparing, resisting, obsessing, distorting, and judging our experience.
Basic Concepts:
Many of us live with self-distortions of who we truly are.
It is important to stop beating ourselves up with self-critical thoughts.
Self-compassion requires: 1) self-kindness, 2) recognition of our common humanity with a sense of connection to others, and 3) mindfulness so that we acknowledge our painful and pleasurable feelings without either minimizing or exaggerating them.
Suffering = Pain x Resistance.
Neff borrows four questions for self-soothing from Marshall Rosenberg’s book called Nonviolent Communication:
What am I observing?
What am I feeling?
What am I needing right now?
Do I have a request of myself or someone else?
Kristin Neff Quotes:
1. “You don’t want to beat yourself up for beating yourself up in the vain hope that it will somehow make you stop beating yourself up.”
2. “Whenever you notice you are in pain, you have three potential courses of action:
You can give yourself kindness and care.
You can remind yourself that encountering pain is part of the shared human experience.
You can hold your thoughts and emotions in mindful awareness.”
3. “So why is self-compassion a more effective motivator than self-criticism? Because its driving force is love, not fear. Love allows us to feel confident and secure (in part by pumping up our oxytocin), while fear makes us feel insecure and jittery (sending your amygdala into overdrive and flooding our systems with cortisol).”
4. “Be kind to myself. Appreciate myself. Take care of myself.”
5. “You can use the following phrases when you are stuck in negativity. They are designed to validate your feelings while also focusing on your desire to be happy:
It’s hard to feel (fill in the blank) right now.
Feeling (blank) is part of the human experience.
What can I do to make myself happier in this moment? “
Conclusion:
Neff includes a chapter on self-compassionate parenting emphasizing the importance of embracing the fact that we will all make mistakes raising our children.
Self-compassion includes not only research-based concepts; but also Neff’s personal experiences. It will assist those readers who are willing to embrace themselves as human paradoxes of strength and vulnerability. Isn’t it time that we all gave ourselves the self-care and self-kindness we deserve?
In some ways, all of us are resilient people. Yet, there are some people who prove obvious and high resiliency. You know! Those people who when you hear their story you ask, “How did they do it?” Examples of famous and highly resilient people include Nelson Mandela, The 14th Dala Lama, and Malala Yousafzai.Of course, there are thousands upon thousands of everyday heroes who model vibrant living regardless their obstacles.
Researchers such as Dr. Al Siebert, Positive Psychology founder, Martin Seligman and others have developed descriptors of how people with high resilience think and behave. We all can learn from them.
10 Signs of Highly Resilient People
#1: They attend to their bodies. Your body is stronger when you eat wholesome food, get adequate rest, drink moderation, and do not smoke. Your body can then better manage the stress placed upon it.
#2: They identify and deal with their stress. Denying stress can increase it. When you name what is distressful and deal with it or accept it, it is minimized or collapsed.
#3: They take responsibility for their thoughts and feelings. Self-critical talk can ruin your day and perhaps your life. By changing your thoughts you can you can change your feelings, perspective, and attitude. . . your life!
#4: They know and use their strengths. Once you have identified your gifts or personal strengths, you can better make contributions at work, home and community. Many people find that knowing their strengths and using them gives them a sense of life purpose.
#5: They accept life’s contradictions and ambiguities. When you are adaptive to life’s incongruities you do not waste time nor energy feeling frustrated. Here is a contradiction from the German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, “That which does not kill me, makes me stronger.”
#6: They develop effective communication skills. When you can better communicate with others, you have the ability to make yourself better understood. You can also better establish clear boundaries and have mutually supportive relationships.
#7: They surround themselves with support. You are not alone on this planet. When you practice acts of kindness, let go of resentment, and forgive relationships improve. The same is true when you listen with empathy, lend a helping hand, ask for help, and give and receive acknowledgment. We flourish in communities that provide emotional and protective cocoons.
#8: They create meaning from the hard times. Meaning comes when we accept what we cannot change and change what disturbs us and we can change. Doing so also helps heal past hurts, setbacks, and disappointments. In essence, you become a resilient role model who walks with experience, wisdom, and gratitude.
#9: They accept responsibility for the events in their life When we turn 18 years of age, we are considered adults with full responsibilities and freedoms. We can decide for ourselves to drink or not, swear or not, blame ourselves or not, and blame others or not. When you decide that your life is primarily your creating, flourishing becomes a distinct possibility.
#10: They take themselves lightly. When you develop an optimistic perspective, you will feel lighter, be healthier, take more risks, and better enjoy yourself. Add some gratitude, smiles, and laughter to instill a sense of joy.
You may consider yourself a resilient person or not. Either way we can build on our resiliency capacities to consider ourselves among those we name resilient people.
Consider discovering how you rank as a resilient person by taking the quick Score Your Resilience quiz.
Patricia Morgan MA CCC helps her readers, clients, and audiences lighten their load, brighten their outlook, and strengthen their resilience. To go from woe to WOW call 403.242.7796 or email a request.
If you enjoyed or benefited from this blog, please leave a COMMENT below and subscribe to my eNewsletter, Your Uplift.
In some moments, on some days, someone feels hurt, sad, angry, frustrated, discouraged, worried or anxious. It might be you, your children, your spouse, your friend, your neighbor or a coworker. That’s a probability. Also, true is that caring and kind words can help calm troubled emotional states.
When and if you notice someone out of sorts, gently smile and ask, “How are you feeling?” and listen.
When appropriate deliver the best-fit comforting and kinds words. Here is a list for those tender moments.
Love and care:
No matter what, I care.
You matter to me.
I see the pain in your eyes and I hear the distress in your voice.
I love you.
I miss you.
I have been thinking about you. How are you really?
Patricia Morgan MA CCC helps her readers, clients, and audiences lighten their load, brighten their outlook, and strengthen their resilience. To go from woe to WOW call 403.830.6919 or email a request.
If you enjoyed or benefited from this blog, please leave a Comment below and subscribe to my eNewsletter, Your Uplift.
T-shirt slogan: I LOVE Slave Lake, One Year Stronger
May 14 2012 was the anniversary of the Slave Lake, Alberta fire which destroyed approximately one-third of the buildings and left 732 people homeless.
On May 11, I was honoured to participate in a community resiliency project with other presenters such as Dr. Wayne Hammond of Resiliency Initiatives and Spencer Beach, author of In Case of Fire. I learned much and was affirmed in my message of “You’re stronger than you think.”
Slave Lake’s Building a Resilient Community committee bought 1010 copies of my micro-book, Frantic Free: 167 Ways to Calm Down and Lighten Up. In the customized printing we included the following message from the committee:
Following life-changing events, it is important to take care of yourself. This mini-book is designed to provide you with useful tools for managing distress. We hope that you enjoy this resource and are able to share it with your family and friends.
Wishing you and your family resiliency, friendship and joy!”
At the event I led participants to explore who were their resilient role models throughout the year and how they were personally strengthened by their experience. There were moments I felt touched by these citizens who had survived and appeared to be thriving.
Much ado has been made by the media about the anniversary, while residents themselves reflect on the situation with mixed reactions and perspectives. Some were still grieving their losses, some were feeling more connected and vibrant. Many were ready to scream at the invasive media, “Enough already! We’re weary of being peered at.” Actually, while I was presenting, a camera crew came into the room and was quickly asked to leave.
That year Slave Lake was a relatively prosperous community with teen-agers making up to $15 an hour. Those with good house insurance were building lovely new homes. Some people even enjoyed the purchase of new clothes and home furnishings. Some Slave Lake residents were dismayed that, following the fire, truck loads of unneeded goods were sent to them. I was reminded that it is a very good idea to first ask those who face adversity, “What would be helpful to you?” Of course those who lost their homes needed temporary housing and empathic support to heal the trauma of such a loss.
But despite, the varied opinions and perspectives on how the fire had changed Slave Lake and its residents, I left agreeing that Slave Lake is a resilient community. At that time they were already back on track with a popular mayor, Karina Pillay-Kinnee. It was her third term. The community had engaged in extensive home building and bustling stores. On May 13, 2012, the Calgary Herald featured an article about “the aftermath of last year’s massive Slave Lake fire.” Many of the quotations from residents supported my experience:
“I think it (the fire) has made me and my family stronger, just trying to keep united and positive with what went on.” Gail Hughes, teacher assistant who lives in a temporary, mobile home
“You think about all the things you had, and you think, ‘Is that all necessary?’ We had so much stuff, how much of it did we actually need, and how much of it was just there for no reason? I don’t want too much anymore. Just a roof over my head, food in the fridge and the TV.” Neil Dickson, oilfield worker
“I think we make the most out of every day. We enjoy every sunny day, we enjoy even the rain.” Susan Al-Mais, business owner
“I’ve probably gained a far better appreciation of the people who work in emergency services, town employees and our elected officials. . . This community is so much closer together now. The thing that really strikes me in an event like this is that it makes acquaintances become friends, and friends become family.” Doug Babiy, Owner of Slave Lake Ford Sales Ltd.
“It’s made me stronger as a person to get up and experience new things and not to rely on the past, but to rely on the future ahead of me.” Ivy Gaskell, Slave Lake Regional Library employee
Let these Slave Lake Lessons Inspire:
Appreciate what you have.
Avoid getting hung up on what you don’t have and want to have.
Love and appreciate those around you who help keep your family and community strong.
Live in the moment, the hour, and the day.
Be open to letting go the past and embrace your future.
Consider the gifts that have come your way through challenge and adversity.
Patricia Morgan MA CCC helps her readers, clients, and audiences lighten their load, brighten their outlook, and strengthen their resilience. To go from woe to WOW call 403.242.7796 or email a request.
If you enjoyed or benefited from this blog, please leave a Comment below and subscribe to my eNewsletter, Your Uplift.