543 Michelle's Earth Foundation: "Safe-ing the Environment"

Message no. 543[Branch from no. 497] Posted by Thomas Culhane (1311520071) on Sunday, March 4, 2007 10:11am Subject: Michelle's Earth Foundation: "Safe-ing" the Environment

Yes, Adrienne, that is my cousin, Michelle. From Arlington VA. (I say "is" because her passage to the other world does not negate her existence here; it is hard to say "was".)

And Patricia, reading your post and relational summary in which you described the trauma of sexual assault I was very moved. I wonder, if Michelle had survived her encounter with the demon who assaulted her, whether there would be institutions whose environment could help her back to the healing vortex and away from the trauma vortex. I am glad to hear you found a place whose environmental design could help, and I agree, from my work with abused teens in the inner city, that institutions that are badly designed can make people act out detrimental behaviors.

I did a workshop a few years ago after Shabbat in Jerusalem with Gina Ross on the idea of moving "beyond the trauma vortex". You guys may find Gina's work (and that of Peter Levine, author of "Sexual Healing: Transforming the Sacred Wound") very useful and informative:

Gina Ross is really great to know and to read, and you may find her theories about how to create environments that pull us out of the spiral into helplessness to be applicable to your own work.