Strong Offers

My writerly colleague Patti Digh has a weekly tradition of making Strong Offers:

I have two strong offers today:

Strong Offer #1:

Dying School registration is open. This is the 6th year, 6th cohort. I’m doing a couple of things differently this year.

1. This initial course is now called D-School Foundations. This is an online learning experience, capped at 40 students. (D-School Intermediate and Advanced Trainings will be along next year.)

2. Participants since 2020 have been 25 - 80 years young and old. A handful with terminal illnesses. Many middle-agers caring for parents or who will be. Most feeling the pull to be in community where talking/learning about dying isn’t weird but life giving.

3. We’ll meet for four week sessions beginning March 11th, June 3, September 2, with integration time in between. Classes are Wednesdays for 90 minutes (9a Pacific | 10a Mountain | 11a Central | 12p Eastern). Skills Gym, an optional 50 minute class, will be offered Thursdays during each four week session. Start times are the same: 9a Pacific | 10a Mountain | 11a Central | 12p Eastern. All Classes and Skill Gyms are recorded.

4. If you are an LPC or LMSW in Texas, you can get CEs. <I’m working on CEs for those of you licensed elsewhere>.

5. If you feel the nudge, click on the link to have a look at the D-School webpage. Shoot me an email if you have any questions. www.marthajoatkins.com/dschool

6. Songs and movies are a part of our learning experience. Come See Me in the Good Light is a documentary on the watchlist for this season of D-School. The theme song by Sara Bareilles, Brandi Carlile, and Andrea Gibson is below. These three lines have me by the heart.

Keep the Novocain out of my wisdom teeth

Wanna feel it all

Salt then sour then sweet.

Here’s the song:

***D-School is an inclusive community built with love. We value personal sovereignty, kindness, curiosity, and community. The learning container is tightly held and as safe as we can make it. (Darn safe.) You’re invited.

Strong Offer #2

If you are considering hospice care, receiving it, or know of someone who is, who might be interested in having an in-person recorded conversation with me, please reach out (mj@marthajoatkins.com).

After a three-year hiatus, I’m recording and filming again, following a few people along in their experiences with chronic and terminal illness. With permission, these wee films (occasionally audio only) are used to teach/talk about dying.

I use them in D-School.

They’ll be added to my YouTube channel which is, how shall we say, full of promise! Not much there at the moment. I’ll let you know when that changes.

Wee films will be part of a seven-week series I’m teaching for the Shift Network (more on that mid-March) and at the Texas Mental Health Counselors Association meeting in Dallas, Friday afternoon, April 24th.

The one minute audio recording below is from an interview with Lydia where she talks about coming to the decision to start hospice care. Lydia’s been gone five years now. What a joy to hear her voice!

More from here later this week.

Martha Jo