Readers Take Denver | Healing Through Connection

I have thought actively about this question for weeks now, if not many years.

It’s easy to see doctors, nurses, teachers, and childcare workers as Helpers–we do it for a living. Do you consider yourself a member of a Helping profession? Why and why not?
Here is my premise: We are all Helpers.

I just spent two days at Readers Take Denver, my first ever book event (it’s all about romance, surprise!). I skipped my annual national professional society meeting, in the city where Son goes to school, to attend this giant convention where I would meet some of my favorite voice actors and fellow Shane East fanatics. It. Was. Glorious.

I decided to get the whole experience, so I registered to volunteer for parts of the event. I was assigned to help Susie Tate for an afternoon, taking pictures with readers and moving books. I knew of her but have not read or listened to any of her work. Turns out she’s a doctor in the UK! We hung out between signings, and when anyone approached the table I got so excited to help a fellow woman physician writer connect with her readers! What a privilege. Looking back on our conversations, it stands out to me that Susie’s work as both physician and romance author helps people immensely. She may see 50 patients a day in her general practice clinic, and when someone is sick she knows how to navigate the system to get them admitted while also caring for everybody else on her schedule. It’s heroic. She draws on her medical knowledge and experience in writing novels with complex characters, living relationships of struggle and redemption. Readers and listeners relate to her stories and gush about how much her books mean to them. Susie Tate and all of her romance author peers are Helpers, no question.

Let’s also consider the amazing, talented, generous, and gifted romance narrators, shall we? I have now met Shane, as well as Jason Clarke, Sofia Lette, Kit Swann, Angelina Rocca, Gary Furlong, Henry Kramer, Sean Crisden, Lessa Lamb, Chris Brinkley, Aaron Shedlock, and Teri Schnaubelt. Not only do they bring these empathic stories to life in our ears, but they are, themselves, some of the most kind, compassionate, present, thoughtful, and attuned people I have met. It makes sense, right? They engage with stories every day, putting themselves in a diversity of characters’ shoes, minds, and hearts, all in service of helping us relate more deeply and meaningfully to our shared humanity. Wow. Helpers. God bless ’em all.

En route to Denver, I texted my Ethos friends (who are all basically 20 years my junior):

The Ethos Breakfast Club showed up! Encouragement, reflection, validation, humor, and love flowed forth more than I could have imagined, and I felt immediately buoyed. I was able to present at the convention not just to Shane, but to everybody I met, all me and all in, feeling humbly confident, grounded, and attuned. If you are a friend, you are a Helper! In times of struggle, pain, defeat, and fear, who but our friends lift us up? In times of joy, accomplishment, celebration, and connection, who but our friends ampify the light most brightly? I say often, “The only way out is through; the best way through is together.” It is a truth I hold sacred; none of us does anything without help from others.

And it was on me to ask for the help I needed, no? Helping oneself, in this case knowing when, where, and on whom to call, is a life skill, as important as any other. Individualistic Western culture promotes a delusion of self-made-ness that harms us. With help from one another, we can learn to balance independence with interdependence and live richer, more stable, and more fulfilling lives. We simply cannot overestimate how much human connection helps and heals.

Know it, like it, want it or not, we are all in relationship. All humans, everything in nature, the cosmos. Therefore, anytime you do something that makes anything better for anyone else, you Help us all. Stocking grocery store shelves. Driving a city bus. Growing food. Performing standup comedy. Listening. Parenting. Taking care of yourself.
Imagine if we defined any given job or activity as Helping? How would this change our perspective about its role in society? How would we show up differently to the work in this new context? ‘Helping,’ as a concept, feels very different from ‘providing a service.’ The former is personal; the latter is transactional.
Helping is connecting, person to person, recognizing and honoring shared humanity.

Identify as a Helper.

How could everything be better if we all practiced this, even a little bit?

*sigh* *smile* *silence*

How do you feel tonight, friends? What are your body sensations? How is your energy, your mood, your sense of well-being? What does turning a new Gregorian calendar year mean to you? Usually it’s meh for me. But this year feels very different. Looking back on this blog for the past two years, I read it, remember it, relive it: Transformation.

When Son’s college search and launch voyage began in the summer of 2021, my own self-reflection journey intensified. Spontaneously asking his classmates’ parents and then myself, “What do we most want our kids to learn in college? What are the most important life skills?” instigated the yet ongoing exploration of what I now think of as the three reciprocal tenets of well-being: Self-awareness, self-regulation, and effective communication. NaBloPoMo 2021 saw me reviewing practices in those arenas that I strive to model for Son and Daughter. 2022 posts reflect further processing, culminating in a NaBloPoMo with the highest density of personally meaningful posts of any November yet. This year certain concepts saturated, condensed, and distilled in my psyche, and I shared those posts most frequently with patients and friends: Owning my sh*t, standing in my strengths, leading vs lagging indicators of health, and immersing in community.

Repeatedly here on the blog and every day in real life this year, I struggle to find good enough words to express my gratitude, amazement, and utter dumbstruck astonishment at my good fortune to have found Ethos and Shaneiaks, two tribes without whom I honestly think I would not have the audacity to undertake my Big Fat Hairy Goal of writing and publishing the book for which I started this blog in the first place, 8.6 years ago. It’s about time, don’t you think? And yet, it has taken this long. 2023 gave me the synergistic swell of connection, courage, and exposure to makers that has finally ignited my book writing booster engines!

I wrote last week about my back pain and how I attribute it to certain mental stressors. It all continues to evolve. My addendum tonight: It’s the tension between a relentless desire to write this book and share everything I have in my mind and heart, and the profound fear of doing so. That internal tug of war makes me positively squirrelly right now–I’m doing anything but sitting down to write book words and my back is still tight. HOW FASCINATING, where my body puts that ambivalence! Write (HA! unconscious word substitution! I think I will leave it. 😉 ) at my center of gravity, perhaps, where my body folds, hinges, carries. What’s the most useful story I can tell about this, I wonder?

Normally I prefer to sleep through and ignore New Years, but this year I think I may try to leverage it. The idea of resolutions grates me, and I can still meditate and act on meaning, purpose, journey, and goals for 2024. That means stop farting around and procrastinating. As my wise friend lovingly and gently nudged me recently, between thinking/knowing and waiting for that to translate to feeling/inspiration, there is doing. Butt in chair, 500 words at a time. Or 50. Whatever, anything counts. I cannot edit what I have not written. There is a balance between harsh, rigid, self-imposed pressure and lackadaisical excuse making. Perhaps I have leaned too much toward the latter until now? Or maybe it’s all just part of the process? Whatever! How fascinating!

Table of Contents by end of January. Two or three sample chapters by end of February. Proposal and pitch by end of March. Queries by end of April. Quiet, centered, grounded, loving, fun writing. The more I can feel deeply and effusively my own message as the words emerge, the more likely readers will feel it, too. And that is the goal–for readers to feel seen, understood, loved, inspired, and empowered. That I stand alongside them aspiring, practicing owning our sh*t, standing in our strengths, and thickening our ties to the tribes and causes that matter most to us, to be and make our best contributions. When I get quiet, calm, and loving, it all flows so easily. So this may be the year to adopt a formal sitting meditation practice, too–a sister discipline of calm and quiet, in service of the BFHG. Let’s see what happens, ya? :D

Thank you all for the time you take to read this blog. I appreciate the engagement, exchange, and encouragement. I found myself writing to so many people today, expressing gratitude more than anything else. May we harness all of our best learnings and wisdom to date and apply them with humility, generosity, and love in 2024 and beyond, all for connection and healing. Big love and light to all, and may this new year bring all good things!

___

Books and Media 2023

The romance immersion continues, full swing, with no signs of stopping. I am registered to attend and volunteer at Readers Take Denver this April, my first ever romance book convention. I will meet many of my new Shaneiak friends there (met two in person already, with another date scheduled in a couple weeks!), and I cannot wait. Shane will be there, too; Shaneiak Friend Heather has already agreed to stand next to me, stroking my arm, calming me down so I may resist the urge to tackle hug him to the point of cracked ribs. Good luck to her!

I began 193 titles this year, some in repeat. Bolded titles below are my favorites; bracketted are unfinished. Closed brackets indicate low likelihood of completion; open brackets are books currently in progress. I still like listening much more than reading, especially while making cards, cooking, cleaning, driving. In 2024 I can trade some social media for eyeball reading, perhaps. So many possibilities! Onward in verbal joy and learning!

Books