Building and Maintaining Trust
I worked with a student recently who I will call Al. Al did not trust me and he had reason not to. He had been hurt by many people in his life and he was wary of putting his trust into another. In our first session together I noticed him watching me whenever I wrote a note. About half way into our session I asked him if he would like to read what I was writing. I was honest with him and shared what I had written and why. Al’s next statement of mistrust was to ask me, “What is your strategy here?”
We say it all the time at 
Much of what I have learned about the work I do everyday holding space for parents regarding their struggling kids came from my experience working at a residential treatment center (RTC) for adolescent girls. I, myself, am not a parent , but through this job I got the opportunity to experience what it’s like to be around, engage with, set boundaries with, and love teenage girls in a highly intense environment.
As a field staff, I am honored to witness powerful moments in the wilderness while students explore their therapeutic process. Many times, this exploration occurs through therapeutic assignments colloquially called “yellows.” After a year and a half working in the field, I’ve concluded my favorite yellows are assignments we call Empty Chairs. An Empty Chair is a chance for a student to address a concept or person that has had a significant influence in their life or “process.” I’ve seen Empty Chairs to students’ younger selves, family members, to anger, or school, for example. If this person, concept, or emotion was sitting in front of you in a chair, what would you say to them?
Recently, I was preparing for an Evoke Parent Support Group, stumbling through different topics looking for something that spoke to me (it may or may not have been at the last minute). I finally arrived at Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, something I have looked at dozens of times, and discussed with both parents and clients on numerous occasions. One of the things I appreciate about the world of mental health is that I can look at something many times and still have a new takeaway. I was struck in that moment of preparation by Maslow’s understanding of our need to belong. Maslow posits that our love and belonging needs come just after our need for things like food, water, and safety. Our need for belonging even comes before our need for things like self-esteem, recognition, and freedom. The gravity of the need was truly apparent to me in that moment.
When my daughter was eight years old she asked to be signed up for city league basketball. I signed her up, and bought her some sweet basketball shoes and a jersey. I was excited to watch her bouncy brown pony tail move up and down the court, and to see her try a new sport. After the first two games, it was clear that she hated it. Hated it. She begged to quit, and I responded with one of my favorite "Mom-isms" at the time. “We can do hard things!” I pushed her to each game, where she would sit on the bench in sadness, and what I know now as anxiety.
The night before I started 
I feel rejuvenated as I process my last shift in the field. This week I saw our kids share real truth about their character: steal each other’s food, squabble over the most banal topics imaginable, show up as leaders, class clowns, and saboteurs. I saw their old patterns of dealing with the world come into play again and again. I heard their laughter as they scrambled across red sandstone domes overlooking the borders of Utah and Nevada. I listened to them groan, complain, and sob as we hiked into the night to locate our next camp. Some well-worn paths of behavior were archaic and destructive, a few freshly cut footpaths emerged independent and empowering. I felt joy and exuberance as I heard a student check in as powerless, then correct himself: "Wait. I'm not powerless, I am empowered. There are so many things in my control. I am not powerless!" I found meaning and power for myself in that moment.
Anxiety is a feeling. A common emotion. It basically is the warning signal of a threat. That perceived threat can be physical or emotional or both. When excessive, anxiety can become problematic. Once anxiety reaches a high level and causes personal distress or interferes with an individual’s ability to function adequately, it is termed an anxiety “disorder.”
When I was 23, I attended a 50-day Outward Bound course in the mountains of western North Carolina. This experience propelled me into the career I have today and was the beginning of many years spent devoted to the wilderness. After I completed my course, I decided to make a blog out of the many journal entries I went home with. One of the blogs I wrote was called, Everything Is Better in the Wilderness. I remarked on several days that were incredibly challenging during that course, but how eating, sleeping, bathing, etc. feels better when earned. I had never tasted pizza that good even though it was made on pita bread on a small frying pan with a backpacking stove and contained no marinara sauce. When you’re living in the wilderness it feels like everything you do is earned. It’s just more satisfying and sensory to enjoy a meal at the end of a day when you have hiked 10 miles carrying everything you need to survive on your back.