The Right Direction
.. just for this moment
“I slept and dreamt
that life was joy.
I awoke and saw
that life was duty.
I worked — and behold,
duty was joy.” ~ Rabindranath Tagore
Hello fiends and loving Substack community!
This week I am coming with another “different” post - a more interactive one - and I would appreciate your thoughts and feedback. Namely, I am on the cusp of jumping into something different in my work - in my professional life - taking a slightly different and not that (yet) apparent route. I still don’t know exactly what it looks like, but I know that I need a change, that the things I used to do don’t inspire me anymore, and I also know that it might take some time until this new thing gets a concrete shape and form. For now, it’s just an idea, a work in progress.
I believe I have arrived to a place which requires of me to think of life as a “moral obligation to the universe”. As Viktor Frankl, Austrian psychiatrist and psychotherapist, writes in his book Yes to Life: In Spite of Everything: “At this point it would be helpful [to perform] a conceptual turn through 180 degrees, after which the question can no longer be “What can I expect from life?” but can now only be “What does life expect of me?” What task in life is waiting for me?” We are the ones who need to answer this question for ourselves. The question feels different for all of us individually, but it also feels different throughout the various moments of our personal lives. It is a living, breathing question. Therefore, it cannot be answered in a simple, direct and concrete way - it is fluid and constantly changing.
I have always known that working with people is the right choice for me. Holding a safe space and offering my supportive and welcoming presence was always something I have done effortlessly, and seamlessly. Choosing psychology as my BA was a very natural choice, as well as teaching, coaching, counseling and mentoring, that all came later in life. Most of my professional path I did not really anticipate or plan - I mean how can one ever really plan the most incredible and unimaginable things in one’s life?! It mostly feels like my career path just happened to me, it was unveiled in front of me, as I was strolling through life facing my own challenges and obstacles, as well as triumphs and resolutions, while being open enough to recognize the opportunities. From one teacher to another, from one life experience to another, from one heartbreak to another, from one struggle to a new sense of freedom … I was growing, as my interests were changing and shifting. Each life experience opened up a whole new world for me, that I would, then, study more closely, analyze, reflect upon, and, eventually, use in my work with others. This “approach” to life and work created a lot of excitement for me, novelty and freshness, the expansion of knowledge and experience, as well as a continuing opportunity for learning.
I was always very good in using my own personal life experience - mostly my own struggles and victories - when working with others. Invariably, it was very important for me to be honest with myself, and not to guide and council others to do - to practice - what I am not doing and living myself, or what I haven’t at least tried once. Just like in the Gandhi’s sugar story, I have never “prescribed” a thing that I did not try myself first, simply because I have a certain type of a college degree and/or hold an authoritative position in the relationship with a client. Quite the opposite - I have embraced the therapeutic approaches and modalities which DO NOT create a distance between a therapist and a client, or consider a therapist an almighty god and an authority figure, and a client someone who is incapable to figure out their life on their own and without a capacity to live their own life. On the contrary, I have turned towards the modalities that look at the relationship between the therapist and a client as equals. If you are not familiar with the Gandhi’s sugar story, here’s a version of it …
A woman and her young son had come to the ashram to speak to Gandhi. She complained about her child’s addiction to sugar. “My son won’t stop eating sugar”, she told Gandhi. “Please tell him to stop.” Gandhi listened to her, and then asked her to come back in two weeks.
Two weeks later the woman and her child sat in front of Gandhi. He looked at the boy and said “stop eating sugar, it is very bad for you”. The mother was perplexed. “Why couldn’t you have told him this two weeks ago?” To which he replied, “Madam, two weeks ago I was still eating sugar”.
Most Eastern philosophies and health systems operate in this manner - a healer never advises a patient to do something that they themselves do not live and practice, or at least have not tried. Personally, whenever I forget about the profound ancient practices and wisdom, whenever I feel defeated and crushed by life or my own inner demons, and whenever I stray away from my path - cause this happens, as we are all humans - sooner or later, I remember that I can never ever NOT walk my talk, even if that means opening up myself and being vulnerable about the things that I am going through.
And so, I am embarking on yet another journey in my career. Recently I started writing and this became an essential part of my personal and professional life, an essential part of who I am really. Naturally, I wish to continue with writing and find different ways to incorporate it into my livelihood. Furthermore, I haven’t been teaching for a while. Covid (fortunately or unfortunately, I am not sure yet) opened up the virtual world and created more opportunities for online teaching (for me), and since it ended (without a further discussion if it really did end or did not) I have been moving around places and countries, and haven’t really taught anything for over a year now.
The last course I taught was a year-long experiential course called A Year to Live, inspired by the book of Stephen Levine. Besides this, I have taught several 8-week mindfulness courses over the past few years; more precisely, the course is called Mindfulness Based Addiction Recovery (MBAR). During the whole covid time I facilitated a weekly recovery meeting online, and since I don’t have a continuous place of residence, and I change time zones frequently, I had to take a break from it. I wish to go back to teaching different programs, workshops and retreats, and also offering a recovery meeting online again. And, finally, I have enrolled into a Jungian coaching program (I had my first class yesterday!!), and I am excited to see where that will take me professionally, and what I might gain from it on a personal level too.
I feel that my place is overall in the recovery world - but I am widening the scope of understanding and defining addiction and recovery, how we work with and through recovery, as well as how we use different methods and principles in addiction recovery. Furthermore, I am taking into consideration how being a highly sensitive person affects addiction and recovery, the meaning and importance of spirituality in one’ recovery, as well as the benefits that we can gain from yoga and Ayurveda (as well as any other ancient practice, really) in recovery - especially early recovery.
It sounds like I am mentioning the word “recovery” quite often, doesn’t it? It’s true - recovery became the center of my life and my main focus for the past nine years. And at the same time I don’t wish to limit myself to only working in the recovery space; or rather, I should say, recovery from addiction. I see the term recovery as something that describes a process of recovering, retrieving, getting back a long-lost connection with our higher self - our truest deepest self - and this is something well known to all of us humans. You don’t need to be in a recovery from addiction in order to know what I am talking about.
I wish to continue working with people in the form of “mentoring”, rather than counseling, therapy, teaching, coaching, or healing - as I used to call it in the past. Mentorship seems to involve a relationship in which a mentor would act as a partner, a confidant, space-holder and teacher to those who are either less experienced in a certain area, or in a need of a mirror to share their observations, and the relationship can help them maximize their potential and arrive where they need to arrive. This work would include providing clients with knowledge, curiosity, counsel, support, safe space, full presence, and an opportunity to investigate their own pursuit of life goals, and their own search for their true self.
I wish to keep on writing about things that I am exciting about.
I would also like to know what other people (YOU) are interested in and maybe also write about those things.
I would like to keep offering classes and workshops in the areas that I am excited about - recovery and sobriety, yoga and Ayurveda, meditation and mindfulness, individuation, etc.
I would like to build a community and see it grow slowly and steadily.
I am considering starting a podcast. I have heard it in the past from friends and clients that they enjoy my voice and they are interested in what I have to say. I could also record an answer to some of your questions and post it on podcast. Furthermore, I could have guests covering different topics and expertise, offer meditations etc.
I wonder if I should consider writing both in English and Serbian … I have been working with people from Serbia for the past several years, and some of them might appreciate to read in their own language. Additionally, in this way I could respond to many more interests and inquires from variety of people.
I am interested in adding a section “Ask Marina” to my Substack profile. I would collect your questions and post them weekly, separately from the Sunday weekly essay.
These are just some of the ideas that I have been thinking about these days. I am sure there are many more out there that I am not aware of at the moment. As I am preparing for another migration (I won’t tell you where, just yet), I am considering what my work might look like. It would be helpful to hear from all of you. From you who know me as well as you who don’t, you who have worked with me in the past or you might be my client at the moment, you who have never worked with me in any capacity, you who are only here reading my posts from time to time … all of you probably have something you are interested in. If that is the case, please comment, send me your thoughts and suggestions. I might come up with a poll soon, but for now - this is it; an open invitation for interaction and discussion.
Is there anything in particular you would like to read about? What topics (within the scope of my work and background, if possible) interest you? What format of a podcast, if any, you would be interested in? Would you be interested in posts that offer more of my personal experience or something more along the lines of psycho-ed and/or healthier habits and lifestyle in recovery? Anything else that I am not mentioning? …
Thank you in advance. I can’t wait to hear from you! May you stay well, open and curious.
May we take our practice into our hearts and out into the world.
“The fact, and only the fact, that we are mortal, that our lives are finite, that our time is restricted and our possibilities are limited, this fact is what makes it meaningful to do something, to exploit a possibility and make it become a reality, to fulfill it, to use our time and occupy it. Death gives us a compulsion to do so. Therefore, death forms the background against which our act of being becomes a responsibility.” ~ Viktor Frankl
