Cambodia, Day One.

The Year of the Dragon, the Chinese year 4710, kicked off on January 23, 2012. Coincidentally my birthday is the same day and I arrived in Asia that day, with seconds to spare. Legend has it that long ago Buddha asked all the animals to meet him on Chinese New Year. Twelve of them came and Buddha named a year after each. Dragons are innovative and passionate. Oxen, like me, are stable and persevering (I was clearly not acting very oxen like in the 80s, just sayin.')

I am traveling with the lovely Lisa Stegman (photo above) who introduced me to James and Athena Pond and Transitions several years ago, with the idea that we should work together. A few months after that, two beautiful young Cambodian survivors accompanied James and Athena to the U.S. to tell their stories. I met them then and did a mini-workshop to see if they liked the True Body Project work. They did. (Bonus info! The two beauties on the motorbike above are these girls! We ran into them in the street yesterday. Kismet. Karma. Joy!)

A year ago, I came to Cambodia to do a series of workshops with the girls and now I have returned with a workbook/journal, written with them in mind and in partnership with Transitions, to further our mutual goals of providing integrative and somatic therapies to at-risk girls here and around the globe.

Lisa is getting her Ph.D in Transpersonal Psychology at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology and has created a practicum to study the effectiveness of the workbook. We have been friends since the passionate and unsteady 80s. It is mind-blowing to think we are now here working together, trying to make a difference.

So this morning I put together the curriculum for tonight. We will do some work to find the resources our bodies hold for wellness and to expand our definitions of how we conceive ourselves.

We will ask the girls this question: how would you fill in the blank?

My name is _____. I am _____ and I feel _____.

How would you answer the question? Does your first answer REALLY define you? Can you broaden the list?

I will report tomorrow on how it goes tonight.

Thanks for reading, friends. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your support of this work. It helps me to be passionate and innovative and stable and persevering.