Duality | Sheila Collins

How to Grieve War and its Atrocities

by Sheila Collins | Oct 19, 2023 | Community, Duality, Environment, Family, Gatherings, Good Will Come, Grieving, Meditations, Personal Stories, ReImagine, The Art of Grieving

Practicing the art of grieving throughout the years and using the arts to do that, has continually offered me lessons and learnings not available through any other method. A profound example are the lessons I learned in how to grieve when war was declared in Israel. ...

Estrangements in Work and Career

by Sheila Collins | Oct 4, 2023 | Community, Duality, Environment, Grieving, Institutional Loss, Our Children, Past Events, Personal Stories, Resilience, The Art of Grieving, the Big Body

Forty percent of people will lose a job at least once in their lifetime and 23% of people will lose a job three or more times, according to data from Intoo and the Harris Poll. In being fired, laid off, or furloughed, 73% of people will experience anxiety. This easily...

Between the Worlds

by Sheila Collins | Sep 27, 2023 | Duality, Environment, Family, Gatherings, Grieving, Health and Wellness, Our Children, Past Events, Personal Stories, Self-Care for Caregivers, Songs, Spirtuality, The Art of Grieving, Women, Girls & the Feminine

Not only do we not “practice dying,” as Socrates advised his students, but most people in western culture know very little about the process of dying, and how to be with someone when that is what is transpiring. Of course, not all deaths can be accompanied, many...

How the Arts Help Us Grieve

by Sheila Collins | Aug 24, 2023 | Art & Life, Celebrations, Community, Duality, Environment, Family, Gatherings, Grieving, Personal Stories, Rituals

I’m in that stage of life when family gatherings are more likely to occur around funerals and memorial services than weddings, holidays, or birth celebrations. We family members promised one another at the recent gathering for my sister’s funeral that we’ll plan and...

Remembering a Favorite Aunt as Part of the Art of Grieving Well

by Sheila Collins | Jul 6, 2023 | Celebrations, Community, Duality, Family, Grieving, History, Past Events, Personal Stories, The Art of Grieving, Uncategorized, Women, Girls & the Feminine

The Fourth of July fireworks always remind me that summer has arrived, no matter what a struggle the spring weather had getting us here. Their nosy beauty also reminds me that my favorite aunt’s birthday is coming right behind. Aunt Dote died in 2004, shortly after...

Are we willing to mourn?

by Sheila Collins | Apr 27, 2023 | Community, Dances, Duality, Family, Gatherings, Grieving, History, School Shootings, social justice, Songs, The Art of Grieving

Seven-year-old Daniel Barden’s father Mark came on ahead of the video I was trying to pull up this morning. I’ve seen him often though these past 11 years since his son was one of the 20 children killed when a 20-year-old with an assault-style weapon began shooting at...