Helene Gratitudes
UPDATE: I WROTE THIS PIECE ON NOVEMBER 8 FOR MY EMAIL COMMUNITY AND ALSO WANTED TO SHARE HERE. WE ARE NOW IN MONTH 4 AFTER THE HURRICAINE AND OUR HOME IS STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION, BUT WE ARE MAKING PROGRESS WITH THE REBUILD. READ ON FOR WAYS TO HELP.
One word doesn’t seem to be big enough to capture the experience of navigating a 1,000 year flood but if I had to choose I would say “initiation.”
We are a little over a month out from Hurricane Helene, my kids are finally back in school and I feel like I have some mental space to share our story and to chronicle and express my gratitude.
I wrote this reflection last week but didn't have the bandwidth to send it out until now and I know many of us are metabolizing U.S. election results.
I decided to go ahead and send it today in case you could use a bright spot and hopeful that there is never a bad moment to express gratitude.
I also want to make my resiliency coaching program, Sunshine in a Bottle, available as a gift to Helene survivors now and for the long road ahead. Every tool I teach in this self-paced program has been deeply supportive to me during this experience and I want more people to have access to these resources.
I share details about this gift/award below as well as options for supporting the recovery process.
Warmly, Courtney
PS The photo is of a community altar/place of remembrance at a mutual aid hub nearby. I found it really comforting to honor all that was lost and to celebrate all that was saved.
Helene Gratitudes
A friend recently asked me how it was going and I texted back…. Hmmm OK. Exhausting. Progress. Tedious. Tired. Grateful.
If you have ever navigated a natural disaster or a big personal challenge that thrusts you into daily survival mode at least for a while, then you get it. We are each a kaleidoscope of emotions on a good day and that human experience has only been heightened during the storm and the aftermath.
I’m sure I will have more to share as the days and weeks unfold, but for now I really want to say thank you to those of you who reached out with concern and expressions of care.
Like most of us I suspect, I’m more comfortable being a doer and a giver. This experience has given me an unyielding opportunity to receive:
starting with the neighbor who drove his generator down the mountain in a truck and the other neighbor who managed to turn our shop vac into a pump to get 55,000 gallons of water out of our home.
Thank you for the free emergency acupuncture in the fire station turned mutual aid hub.
Thank you to the stream of volunteers who have helped us including the robust crew from a Baptist church in Tennessee who showed up with the tenacity of a football team and ripped our flooded flooring out.
Thank you to the neighbors who brought us water from their spring when our power was out and our well was inaccessible and who secretly deposit bouquets and leaf crowns on my mailbox to keep up my spirits.
Thank you to the colleagues who gave us donations and gifts
Thank you to my family for almost daily text check-ins and encouragement and the offers of plane tickets and homes to stay in
And thank you to friends, coaching clients current and past, and others from our community who texted, called, emailed, sent messages via social media and otherwise showered me with wisdom, perspective, and prayers.
I have never been at the center of a natural disaster before and the scope of the response was tremendous.
The sheer volume of donations and the speed of its arrival gives me so much hope for all of us and the generosity and capacity of the human spirit.
We have received warm meals and water as well as donated tools and supplies, sometimes with little hand-written notes tucked inside saying things like “your neighbors in Maryland stand with you.”
These notes usually made me stop and cry. Because it feels good to be seen and to know you aren't alone.
I want to lead with gratitudes but I don’t want to minimize or bypass what has been hard.
Most of our Christmas decorations got wet and moldy, some of the kids special art projects we had professionally framed got ruined along with an album of our daughter Perl's baby pictures.
Honestly the most challenging thing for me has been the close living quarters. All three of our children had their bedrooms on the bottom floor that flooded, as well as their desks, a lounge space and a kitchenette mostly used for raman, tea, and heating up left-over burritos. They lived down there. Now our daughters have taken over my office/studio, I work in our bedroom, Rich heads out most days in search of wifi, and poor Coleman is stuck with a bed in the living room. This is a lot of upheaval for anyone and like many other empaths and introverts out there I am sensitive about my space.
With so disruption in my home-nest, I have been doing a lot of yoga on the porch and channelling of the wisdom of the Desert Mothers, who remind us that we each have a nest within.
And I have had to feel those feelings of loss and exhaustion, not to mention bouts of survivor guilt and connecting to the collective grief about lives and homes lost and the erosion of creek beds and toppling of many beautiful large trees.
But honestly the overwhelming sensation for me in the wake of the storm has been one of being carried.
There is so much more I could say and so many more gratitudes than I can even share.
It has been challenging for me, a people person, to not be able to say thank you to each person who reached out. So if you reached out to me personally and I haven't yet responded, please know I read and was heartened by every message.
I hope to be able to respond and to write more as my capacity grows.
The entire experience makes me more devoted to the themes of personal and planetary flourishing I’ve been exploring the last several years.
For now I’ll say I have been pressing every inner life resource in my personal ‘formula’ into service this last month (Enneagram awareness, somatic and stress-reduction tools like tapping and yoga nidra, nature-practices and coaching frameworks like The Change Cycle). They have all been holding containers and this experience makes me want everyone to have easy access to these powerful resources and support in applying them effectively.
If you have read this far, thank you. I hope you are well and enjoying a beautiful autumn day. Read on for ways to support.
Courtney
Support Options
There was so much generosity on display in the wake of the storm, like this pop-up farm stand from nearby Ivy Creek Family Farm who provided 'pay if you can/when you can' produce to the community (while navigating extensive damages themselves.)
Here are three local groups who inspire me if you have been wanting to make a donation. These organizations were all here before the storm and will be here long after as recent experiences only deepened their commitment to resilient food systems and waterways.
Mountain True Hurricane Recovery Fund
Cooperate WNC: Regional Mutual Aid for a Regenerative Future
Bountiful Cities: Growing Food, Building Community
And if you know someone who was affected by Hurricane Helene I would love to offer them free access to Sunshine in a Bottle ($399 value.) You can share this blog with them or nominate them directly here. (Choose either award listed on this short scholarship form and put 'Helene Recovery' in the answer box along with any other info you would like to share.)
Lastly, if you have been considering investing in coaching this year, now would be a wonderful time! (Rich and I were both out of work for several weeks with no wifi so it feels good to be getting back into the income-earning flow.) I would LOVE to welcome new people into Sunshine in a Bottle. This material is hurricane-tested!
If you have any questions or want to see if Sunshine in a Bottle or private coaching would be a good fit for you, just send me an email to cp@courtneypinkerton.com and we can talk more.
