Re: Re: The Compassionate Listening Project

[Guest guest]

Russ:

Your experience at the Night Counseling Center reminded me of my first day on

the job as a psychotherapist at a mental health center in Massachusetts. I

was right out of school with my M. Ed in counseling and trained in Client

Centered Counseling, ALA Carl , and Maslow's work and some of the

existentialists and a little bit of Jung. Along comes my first client who is

schizophrenic

and experiencing a full blown psychotic episode who proceeds to sit down, pee

in my chair and speak to me in what we lovingly called " word salad. " I think

they call that " trial by fire. " I spent the next six hours learning how to

get somebody admitted to the state hospital.

I met Gene at an Interhelp gathering in Massachusetts. I think she lived in

Manhattan at the time and those were the days (mid 1970s) when she, Joanna

Macy, J. Lifton, Deats, and others were focused on the

psychological damage we all experience because of the nuclear threat we lived

under during

the cold war. It's time to look anew at the threat of war we are all living

with now. I'm going to Sarajevo in a few weeks to do a peacebuilding seminar

for a certificate program I'm in at the School for International Training.

After the seminar I will spend a week visiting some of the orphanages and

creating " listening circles " at two mental health agencies for women who want to

share how they are coping with and making meaning of their lives in post war

Bosnia Herzegovina. We seem to be awfully busy creating new generations of

people

who will be traumatized by genocide and war all over our little planet. Seems

we never learn. There will be a compassionate listening workshop at SIT in

June....Their work is inspiring.

Suzanne

[Guest guest]

Suzanne,

Many thanks for posting this notice of Gene Hoffman's book. In the late

60's, while I was teaching at the University of California, Santa Barbara,

I had just started the analyst training program in Los Angeles and

quite by chance I met Gene at a faculty party. She was just starting the

Night Counseling Center and needed someone to supervise the volunteer

counselors. She urged me to take on take this on in spite of my

protestations that I could hardly be a supervisor if I'd never been a

counselor or therapist my self. She said my analysis would be enough! [My,

how times have changed!] So I ventured forth becoming supervisor for 5

volunteer counselors. I decided that if I was going to supervise those doing

the counseling and therapy, I ought to do some too. So I took on my first

" client " with Gene's hearty approval. This person was suicidal and was also

under the treatment of a local psychiatrist. I called the psychiatrist to

report that his patient was at the Night Counseling Center and in suicidal

crisis and I wanted his help in hospitalizing his patient. What I got was an

outrageous tirade against amateurs, the Night Counseling Center, Gene

Hoffman, me and just about everything else...but absolutely nothing about

any care or concern for his patient. That was my introduction to the

politics of the mental health scene in Santa Barbara in those days. I can

truly say that I developed enormous respect for Gene Hoffman and Ben

Weineger who dared something that was " impossible. " It was an enormous

training ground for me and I will be forever indebted to Gene for what she

did for me.

Thanks, Suzanne, for bringing back such fond memories.

Best wishes to all fireites...

Russ

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Re: The Compassionate Listening Project

Thought you would like to see this. I know Gene Hudson Hoffman from my

Interhelp Days. She's an amazing and beautiful woman. The Compassionate

Listening

Project is also doing wonderful work. Check out their website. Suzanne

We are pleased to announce the publication of:

" Compassionate Listening and Other Writings

by Gene Knudsen Hoffman "

edited and introduced by Manousos

" This 348 page book is a testament to the life of a remarkable woman.

Manousos, editor of the Friends Bulletin, spent a long summer interviewing

Gene and gathering family photographs for the beautiful and extensive

biography

section. Gene's essays, spanning fifty years, show the development of

Compassionate Listening in thought and action, including her candid approach

to

personal healing and spiritual peace-making. This book is a must for all who

seek to

be greater forces for peace and compassion in the world. "

- Leah Green, founder, The Compassionate Listening Project

[Guest guest]

God speed, Suzanne!

love

ao