Eric Windhorst, Counsellor & Coach
139 Florence Street L8R1X1 Hamilton, ON, Canada

Willing to experience aloneness, I discover connection everywhere; Turning to face my fear, I meet the warrior who lives within; Opening to my loss,... I gain the embrace of the universe; Surrendering into emptiness, I find fullness without end. Each condition I flee from pursues me, Each condition I welcome transforms me And becomes itself transformed Into its radiant jewel-like essence. I bow to the one who has made it so, Who has crafted this Master Game; To play it is purest delight; To honor its form true devotion. -Jennifer Welwood #poetry #transformation #paradox #personalgrowth #psychotherapy #counselling #therapy

The greatest and most important problems of life are all fundamentally insoluble. They can never be solved but only outgrown. - C.G. Jung #personalgrowth #lifetransitions #therapy #psychotherapy #counselling #ecopsychology #cgjung #change #levelsofconsiousness Photo by qinghill on Unsplash

What is it that I need to let go of? "Autumn is the quintessential season to illustrate the key features of transitions. Where winter is the season of reflection, spring the season of rebirth, and summer the season of celebration, autumn is the time when we align with the action of #nature and ask ourselves the central question of any life transition 'What is it that I need to let go of?'... Perhaps it's your habitual thoughts of #worry or #anxiety; perhaps it's your tendency to nitpick or criticize your partner; perhaps it's getting angry at your kids; perhaps it's the inner critic, the voice that's constantly telling you that you're not good enough. Whatever it is can be blown down to the ground alongside autumn's leaves and decompose into the earth when we choose to focus consciously on what needs to be released." -Sheryl Paul #counselling #therapy #ecopsychology #ecotherapy #psychotherapy #lifetransitions #transitions

The #heart #heals itself when it's open to #pain. "There is no fighting #nature; the #seasons change, and time passes, and not matter what humans exert on this great, beautiful planet, we will never change the laws of nature. She is teaching us, always, the perfection of her #rhythms: that when we #surrender and #grieve - which means stopping long enough to allow the tears to rise up and release - we are offered an opportunity to tend to the sadness that lives in the heart. ... It's so easy to run from it during the warm, active seasons of long daylight. These shorter days signal the beginning of the time to turn inward, to snuggle into the #sacred and #vulnerable places, and allow for the emptiness, the dormant time from which new seeds for next spring's rebirth will gestate. When we breathe into the #darkness instead of running from it, we remember that there is nothing to fear. When we meet it, we transform emptiness into fullness and turn what could be a moment of anxiety into a moment of gold." -Sheryl Paul #counselling #psychotherapy #coaching #transformation #grief #ecotherapy #ecopsychology #alchemy

It's been nearly a year since I published fresh content on my blog! I hope you find this new entry, entitled, A More Beautiful World, meaningful and useful. "'Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.' -Arundhati Roy... We are living through tumultuous times. Of course, there is the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic with its yet unknown long-term global impacts. Readily apparent, too, is increasing social inequality and political polarization the world over. And then there are the even larger, looming, ecological threats: biodiversity loss, climate chaos, planetary collapse. It is very human to worry about the future, particularly when faced with so much uncertainty. I often catch myself asking: What will life look like in coming months and years and decades? What kind of Earth will (my) children inherit? Will Western civilization even make it through to the turn of the century? I don't have precise (or, ultimately, satisfying) answers to these types of questions. I do believe, however, that holding space for unknowing, honouring our pain for the world, and taking time to process ongoing personal and collective trauma(s) is vital to any livable future. I also intuit, along with Arundhati Roy, that another world a more beautiful world is on its way. Despite my regular worry, when I slow down and pay attention, I can hear her breathing......"

Everything terrible is something that needs our love. -Rilke I've seen again and again that the essence of #healing emotional pain lies in listening to what hurts--in both knowing how to listen to oneself and being listened to by another. This is one of life's little ironies: Though all emotional #healing requires it, listening to pain is difficult--the greater the #pain, the more difficult it is to listen to. ... To be a professional listener is to enter a terrain without a destination. Listening is more than hearing words or deciphering #meaning...one listens with the limbic system, the third ear of intuition, as much as with the cerebral cortex--emptying oneself to allow another's #story to enter, opening to the energetic movement of emotion, empathically joining with someone else's experience. This is the secret of all successful #therapy, regardless of the training or theoretical orientation of the therapist: by a kind of grace, good listening #transforms #suffering.

You're really not going to want to miss this. SENG Online: 2020 Annual Conference (August 7 - 9). 60+ insightful speakers sharing their expertise in understanding and promoting the social and emotional needs of the gifted. The best part? You will have access to recordings of every session for 3 months after they happen live! My offering is this Friday @ 1:15 EDT. Here is a short description of what I'll be sharing:... Drawing from relevant literature (e.g., #giftedness, Dabrowskian, psychotherapeutic, etc.) and my clinical experience (as a Registered #Psychotherapist specializing in serving gifted adults), in this #presentation I will provide attendees with a variety of insights, tools, and resources useful for nurturing mental well-being in #gifted adults. Topics I will cover include: healing developmental + giftedness-specific #trauma; nourishing the whole self (intellectual, emotional, physical, social, + spiritual domains); managing #intensity, #sensitivity, and #empathy; identifying #imposter syndrome; harnessing #perfectionism; and, finding #meaning in a suffering world. See you there! https://www.sengifted.org//seng-online-2020-annual-confere #giftedadults #mentalhealth #mentalwellbeing #impostersyndrome #ecopsychology #ecotherapy

Please join me (and several of my insightful colleagues - sorry if I missed tagging anyone!) at SENG - Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted 2020 ONLINE conference, running from August 7th - August 9th. Diverse speakers will be presenting on a variety of topics related to helping gifted individuals thrive across the lifespan. I will be presenting @ 1:15 (EDT) on Friday, August 7th. Below is an abstract of my presentation:... Drawing from relevant literature (e.g., #giftedness, Dabrowskian, psychotherapeutic, etc.) and my clinical experience (as a Registered #Psychotherapist specializing in serving gifted adults), in this #presentation I will provide attendees with a variety of insights, tools, and resources useful for nurturing mental well-being in #gifted adults. Topics I will cover include: healing developmental + giftedness-specific #trauma; nourishing the whole self (intellectual, emotional, physical, social, + spiritual domains); managing #intensity, #sensitivity, and #empathy; identifying #imposter syndrome; harnessing #perfectionism; and, finding #meaning in a suffering world. See you there! #giftedadults #mentalhealth #mentalwellbeing #impostersyndrome #ecopsychology #ecotherapy

#Change can be hard. While we may feel driven to grow, we so often get stuck -- often in familiar swamplands that, ironically, we ourselves have created. #Jungian analyst James Hollis offers two exploratory questions that help unearth what often lies beneath these apparent impasses: ... "What anxiety is my stuckness protecting me from?" And, further, "What specific fears lie hidden within that paralyzing anxiety?" Hollis goes on eloquently: "When we examine those fears, we find they usually are very primitive in their message: If I do this, express this, you will punish me, or I will lose your approval and affection, and I will perish. Yet, seldom, if ever, are those fears going to materialize. They are the simulacra of archaic anxieties of childhood, the ghostly hauntings of our defenseless past. If they were to materialize, would we not find our adulthood sufficient purchase on a ground firm enough to weather even that? Most of all, what is the cost of continuing stasis and stuckness when our being wishes to grow and develop? What betrayal of soul transpires when we collude with our debilitating fears? And who, besides us, will pay those debts of unlived life -- our children, our partners, our colleagues, our society? Do we not see that the best thing we can do for others is really to bring our best, most nearly #authentic selves to engage them?" #anxiety #fear #personalgrowth #psychotherapy #counselling #lifecoaching #jungian #depthpsychotherapy

"The most poignant truth...is that all our #neurotic #self-destructive patterns are twisted forms of basic #goodness, which lies hidden in them" - John Welwood A #holistic, #integral approach to #therapy recognizes and values both the need to actively engage with our personal issues AND the transformative power of letting-be -- the unconditional #acceptance of what is. It is not either-or, it is both-and. As John Welwood notes, "If we are unable or unwilling to actively engag...e with our personal life issues, then letting-be could become a stance of avoidance, and a dead end. Yet if we are unable to let our experience be, or to open to it just as it is, then our psychological work may reinforce the habitual tendency of the conditioned personality to turn away from nowness." The most important quality of a #therapist is their capacity for unconditional presence. When a therapist is unconditionally present with a client's experience, something inside the client begins to relax and open up more fully. #Authentic healing and growth is a natural outcome of being planted in such nourishing soil. #psychotherapy #coaching #counselling #transformation #personalgrowth #integration

Mark your calendars! Clear your schedules! Next Wednesday @ 12:30 (EDT) I have the privilege of interviewing Mary-Jayne Rust about her new book, "Towards and Ecopsychotherapy." It's a FREE online event, but registration is required. ... Please join me! Thank you to the Canadian Ecopsychology Network and Carol Koziol for hosting. #ecotherapy #ecopsychology #psychotherapy #counselling

There are at least two kinds of #therapists. One kind develops a great deal of expertise in understanding and has explanations for everything. Another kind of therapist seems more shamanistic, follows the mysterious, and relies more upon #imagination. - Amy & Arny Mindell I provide both: #integration, #wholeness #psychotherapy #counselling #personalgrowth

"Even if all these [basic] needs are satisfied, we may still often (if not always) expect that a new discontent and restlessness will soon develop, unless the individual is doing what he, individually, is fitted for. A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to ultimately be at peace with himself. What a man can be, he must be. ... He must be true to his own nature. This need we may call self-actualization... It refers to a man's desire for self-fulfillment, namely to the tendency for him to become actualized in what he is potentially. This tendency might be phrased as the desire to become more and more what one idiosyncratically is, to become everything that one is capable of becoming." -Abraham Maslow #personalgrowth #selfexpansion #humanisticpsychology #selfactualization #nature #master #individuation

Inspired in part by @scottbarrykaufman new book #transcend and the #anxiety/uncertainty precipitated by #covid_19, I've been delving more deeply into the #existenial and #humanistic psychologies; the work of thinkers like Victor #Frankl, Abraham #Maslow, Karen Horney, R. D. Laing and others. I am reminded of the transformative power of human choice and #freedom. We can (nearly) always choose our attitude in response to outward circumstance(s). No matter how difficult and dir...e a situation may seem, there is always a freedom...the inner freedom to choose how we will respond. Will I focus on what has been lost, or savour the opportunity for creating something new (and, perhaps, healthier)? Will I respond from #fear, hoarding resources at others' expense, or choose to respond with care and #compassion, fostering communal well-being? There is always a choice. P. S. A #trauma informed perspective reminds me that accessing this "space" for choice can be incredibly difficult when our nervous systems are in a fight, flight, and/or freeze response. Finding ways to self soothe (and/or receive care from others) can be potent remedies. #covid_19

Self Portrait It doesn’t interest me if there is one God Or many gods. I want to know if you belong or feel abandoned;... If you know despair Or can see it in others. I want to know If you are prepared to live in the world With its harsh need to change you; If you can look back with firm eyes Saying this is where I stand. I want to know if you know how to melt Into that fierce heat of living Falling toward the center of your longing. I want to know if you are willing To live day by day With the consequence of love And the bitter unwanted passion Of your sure defeat. I have been told In that fierce embrace Even the gods Speak of God. #davidwhyte

You do what you have to do. You put one stone on top of another and another on top of that. If the stones are knocked down, you begin again, because if you don’t, nothing will be built. You persist. In the long run, it is #persistence that shapes the future. #activehope #inspirationalquotes #purpose #meaning #covid_19 #values

There are only two mistakes that one can make along the road to truth: not going all the way, and not starting. #buddha #wisdom #personalgrowth #truth