The Restory Retreat Centre

Internet image O, to write like this! Every now and again I read this piece of exquisite writing by Clarissa Pinkola Estes which I found as part of an advertisement for her storytelling training courses on her facebook page  with a link to the website mavenproductions.com I read it for the pure joy it brings me. But also to keep a dream alive. "Dear Brave Souls:  ORIGINAL VOICE™ STORYTELLING TRAINING: Rowing Songs for the NightSea Journey Do you want to tell the stories that flower from your lives, and from the lives of your blood and bones? Do you hope to move people for good reasons? Do you hope to learn about yourself and what I coined a term for "your farback people"? Do you have a calling to tell stories or even just one story? Do you want to speak to the souls of others? Do you hope to delve and know and speak and create story in your own one of a kind voice so that you sound only as yourself and no other? Do you have nonotmei'mnotgettingupinfrontofother-...

We have a beautiful phrase in Afrikaans: om tot verhaal te kom. If you had a very difficult time, or had a crisis or an illness that caught you off guard and disrupted your life and now, gradually, things are returning to normal, that phrase is often used. Someone will ask: “How are you doing?” And you’ll say: “I am not over it yet but at least I’m busy om tot verhaal te kom .(I am busy regaining my strength, I’m busy regaining my balance).” I think that in order to become whole and integrated again, to regain our overall balance in life ( om tot verhaal te kom ) it is important to move in this case from the figure of speech to the literal sense. It is important for us om tot verhaal te kom. It is important to return to stories, to create a space for them and invite them into our lives. Constantly. Stories heal. If there is a people who understand and apply this, it is the Jews. Some of the deepest, most beautiful stories are found in the Jewish tradition. Maybe because they ...