Joan Fenold, LMFT

03/18/2023

03/18/2023

Beautiful…

03/17/2023

02/25/2017

YOUR TRUE HOME

Each one of us is alone in the world. It takes great courage to meet the full force of your aloneness. Most of the activity in society is subconsciously designed to quell the voice crying in the wilderness within you. The mystic Thomas a Kempis said that when you go out into the world, you return having lost some of yourself. Until you learn to inhabit your aloneness, the lonely distraction and noise of society will seduce you into false belonging, with which you will only become empty and weary. When you face your aloneness, something begins to happen. Gradually, the sense of bleakness changes into a sense of true belonging. This is a slow and open-ended transition but it is utterly vital in order to come into rhythm with your own individuality. In a sense this is the endless task of finding your true home within your life. It is not narcissistic, for as soon as you rest in the house of your own heart, doors and windows begin to open outwards to the world. No longer on the run from your aloneness, your connections with others become real and creative. You no longer need to covertly scrape affirmation from others or from projects outside yourself. This is slow work; it takes years to bring your mind home.

John O'Donohue
Excerpt from ETERNAL ECHOES

Photo: © Ann Cahill

01/03/2016

The current focus in my attention to the people I work with is to help them learn how to love themselves and others, how to work with their own minds and hearts and support them in developing a deep sense of personal integrity.

11/12/2012

Joan Fenold, MFT, is in private practice in San Francisco, Berkeley and Marin County where she provides individual and couples therapy as well as consultation. She has over thirty years of experience as a licensed psychotherapist and Marriage & Family Therapist.