Hello, everyone and welcome. You’re listening to SuperPower Mommas and I am your host Laura Greco. Today, our topic is the power of peace during uncertain times. And isn’t it true that no matter what’s happening in life, there seems to always be those uncertain times? Well, I met someone who is now my neighbor and I’m very excited to introduce you to her. Her name is Kimberly Ann Borin, and we got talking and discovered how much we have in common in certain realms of the world, especially around parenting and children. And then it turns out we knew each other from a time before, and so I’m very excited to introduce you to her. And in relation to the power of peace during uncertain times, I went to her website and I want to pull out something that she had put up there.
She says, “In today’s world, there are many things that contribute to or disturb our sense of peace. Research continually shows us when we practice relaxation skills we learn better ways to cope, thrive, and grow. What we need to know is that we can tap into the unending resource of inspiration and energy with simple strategies. These help us learn, heal, and breathe life into something new. When we learn to shift our energy we can also tap into more inspiration, more positive energy, motivation, and a renewed perspective. We are worthy of more peace and we can shift into this place easily with practice.”
She has designed and teaches relaxation skills to everyone including students, adults, teachers, and corporations. And so I’m very, very excited and feel very privileged to have Kimberly Ann Borin on the show. So welcome, Kimberly.
Thank you so much, and thank you so much for allowing me to speak with you today. I’m really looking forward to it.
Yeah. Yeah, I’m excited too. Our audience here, we also want to be sure to welcome you to the discussion. So be sure to let me know, go to the website artofsoulfulparenting.com and be sure to let us know what you think of what you hear today. But Kimberly, you really speak into peace, and so my curiosity is always the first question we ask on this show, what is your superpower?
Thank you. I just love that question. And I’ve been trying to think about that, and I think that one of my superpowers is that I’m willing to continually learn something new and I’m willing to continually learn how to be more present in the moment. It’s always surprising to me that even if you feel like you’ve sort of mastered it one day, maybe the next day, you have to learn it again. And so I’m always willing to just engage in that process of learning and to be kind to myself as I’m learning, and I feel like this is something that I am continually deepening in my work as a yoga teacher and my recent work as a chaplain. I’ve had to learn how to develop peace and a sense of presence in a lot of different situations and in situations that can be very stressful. So I feel like even though I’m learning on one day, I might be in a situation and another day that requires me to learn again. So I think that my superpower is being willing to continually learn.
I love that. I love that. And I’m sure you mamas out there and can really identify with that because just when you think you have something mastered, it changes. You think you get the child have, you’re communicating with your child and it’s all good, and then boom, it changes, right?
Right.
Yeah, Kimberly. Yes, you have an unbelievable amount of information about different walks that you’ve done and you’re continuing to learn. So would you like to share a little bit about that journey, what brought you from place to place in your willingness to learn?
Sure, sure. Thank you. I have been a school counselor for many years, and during my time as a school counselor, I was interested to learn about what children learn from their favorite moments in nature. And so the doctoral work I did was about that topic and I gathered stories from children about their favorite moments in nature and what they learned from the natural world. And this idea of stories is something that I’ve done throughout my life. It has been a theme in all of my work. So in my job as a school counselor, I was always listening to stories, in my doctoral work, I was gathering stories, and I had done stories work around the world. So one of the things that I did was it was a Fulbright Program in Swaziland and it was gathering the stories of high school students who were living amidst the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and at that time, Swaziland had the highest percentage of AIDS in the world.
And I was able to gather the stories of inspiration from the students and their journeys and their knowing that they have a gift to bring to the world. So I have been able to do that in Swaziland, South Africa, Morocco, and Egypt. And after my time as a school counselor, I’ve been a school counselor for over 25 years, I had always wanted to pursue something in the ministry and ended up pursuing a master’s in theology and working as a chaplain at Morristown Medical Center. So I pursued three clinical pastoral education units. So each one is 400 hours and I was able to learn how to continue my story’s work but at the bedside of families and patients. I have to say it is the most beautiful work. So I feel very fortunate that I’ve been able to be involved with students, families, patients, students of all ages, really, and to listen to stories, whether it’s in the yoga classroom, on the mat, or in my work at the hospital, or in my work as an adjunct professor at the college.
I just really love being able to hear people’s stories and to be a companion with people as they walk on the journey into something new.
It takes courage.
Yes, it does. Yes, it does. Oh my goodness, this is really beautiful. We have to take a short break, but I would love for you to share where people can find you and all your work. And when we come back, we’re going to go into that much further.
Sure. My website is theencouragingworks.com, and there you can find information about my books and yoga classes and some of the other things I’ve done.
Beautiful. Beautiful. So when we get back, we’re going to dive deeper into her experiences and really drive home this point of the power of peace during uncertain times. So hold on and we’ll be right back.
To listen to the entire show click on the player above or go to the SuperPower Up! podcast on iTunes.
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