July Eliot 2015 "Clearing the Clutter: Making Room for What Matters" with Carolyn Koehnline

     Clutter is the excess baggage that accumulates in your home, head, heart, and schedule.  It is the piles of paper, the clothes that don't fit, and the gifts you never wanted but feel too guilty to throw away.  It's also unhelpful beliefs, stuck emotions, and commitments that don't fit your priorities.  Clearing the clutter can provide a way to sort through what is serving you and what is getting in your way, to say needed goodbyes, and to open up space for what is emerging in the next chapter of your life.

     We'll spend our week together exploring how to distinguish the clutter from the treasures, what it means to open up space, and how clutter-clearing and the intentional creation of dedicated spaces can provide a way to navigate past and current life transitions.  Our sharing will be enhanced by songs, poems, and writing processes.  Carrie Koehnline, our featured presenter, will respectfully guide us into this rich and surprising territory with gentleness, compassion, humor and creativity.
     Carolyn "Carrie" Koehnline is a member of the Bellingham Unitarian Fellowship.  She is a licensed Mental Health Counselor and a Certified Journal Therapist and faculty member of the Therapeutic Writing Institute.  She's had a private psychotherapy practice in Bellingham, Washington for over twenty years.  During that time she has also been consulting, teaching classes, leading worship services, and presenting at national conferences, often on the subject of clutter.  She was the theme speaker for Winter Eliot 2009 and August Eliot 2012.  Personally and professionally she is drawn to combining practical methods with creativity and psychological insight, weaving music, poetry and storytelling into her presentations.  Carrie has written a collection of essays and exercises called Confronting Your Clutter and written and illustrated The Bear's Gift, a transformational tale for all ages.