Conversation with Barbara (B) Herring

Maybe the influences of my history and coming into narrative practices. I always wanted to be a therapist. And I never knew how I was going to be here. I’ve had a very big life, growing up in the inner city. I had a son very young at 22.  I think what saved me during many years of my life was my spirituality and my changing.

When becoming a therapist, going back to school,  the first narrative class that I had was with Charley (Lang). He was talking about how the narrative lens sat in the position of curiosity.  It’s the way that I move in the world. I just want to know.  Why” was a bad word growing up in my home. You just took what was offered, for many, many different reasons. People didn’t have time to answer that question of why.

I always was curious why people did what they did, why they thought what they thought.  I always was in question of “how can that be true?” I grew up Baptist church, and there, you couldn’t really question why either. You just took. But I always had questions because it didn’t make sense to me. So I think the not being able to ask that question and really get answers made me rebellious in that I wanted to figure out everything.  I can’t be the only one who thinks the way that I think.

I think that the whys, the hows, the whos, the nuances and the small details all create the picture. I really do believe that the magic is in the details , and in those small details, it’s like you’re getting to the heart, the mind, and the spirit of the human that’s sitting in front of you.   We have all these influences by the outside world from the micro to the macro, but what is true for you?

If I worship anything, it would probably be the moon. I love nature. I love the moon. I love the stars. I call myself a witch. I used to be a Christian. I believe in the love of Christ.  But it’s open ended, it’s not attached to anything. And  it’s between me and whatever my higher power is. And it’s just everywhere and everything. I think my spirituality is what keeps me going. It was a difficult growing up.. I think what saved me was my grounding in my own power of now. Because the more I’m in the future, I can run very, very, very, very anxious, and I can run depressed for all the things of the history. I just think of my spirit, it’s just in the now, and it’s really evolved as the years.  I just have my practices. I do tarot. I do moon baths. I have a hot tub, and I like to take moon baths.

Hmm. What phase are we in? A lot of it, for me, is about release and invite. ..A new moon, I’m inviting in. And at the end of the lunar cycle, I’m releasing. Actually, at the full moon, I’ll let go of things that no longer serve me. Thoughts, ways of being, people… It’s interesting living now where I live and really having access to the stars, it reminds me also, really how small I am. I’m just part of the universe.  You’re just a spot dot, just a little bit. And it grounds me in. Everything’s going to be okay. .. With my clients,  how mindful can we be, particularly now with the state of the world? … I had a spirituality before, but having access to this nature and this way of being has elevated my sense of spirit. It’s even made me more curious, but grounded.

If I’m not grounded, it’s difficult for me to be curious because I’m usually worried. And in worry, the type of curiosity I have is not beneficial to me. If I’m grounded, I feel like my mind is more open.
When I’m not grounded, my monkey mind goes in all different kinds of places. It makes up all kinds of stories.

I believe in magic because I see it come to fruition. So I’m really particular about what I say, what I ask for, what I do. And I always do everything out of love and what is in the best interest of most

I think when I was little, but I used to gaslight myself. I used to go, did I really think that? Did I really say that? And so I used to talk myself out of it.

Becoming a therapist is something I put into the universe a long, long, long time ago. It’s what I wanted to do. It’s how I wanted to create. I wanted to figure out why people thought and did the things that they did. And I wanted to know what people’s secrets were because I’m nosy. I was like, I get to be a professional secret keeper. I’ve always been curious about the unspoken. I did a very hard thing in changing from one career to the other. I went to school to become a teacher. Didn’t like the bureaucracy of becoming a teacher. So I became a nanny, and I trained how to cook when I was in college and became a chef. But this was not all of my purpose or how I wanted to be in the world. And I finally did the hard thing, I’m going to go back to school. And I had support to be able to do it.

Sometimes our secrets are where our heart desires are, but we’re afraid. There’s fear. That’s why we keep it in the dark. So I think being able to ask in the nuance of the things that people don’t tell others, you can really find what is most meaningful in people’s lives.

Absolutely, because I can really sit in the position that they are the directors. This is their story. They know their story better than me. I can sit in that place and be in wonder with them.

Whether it’s what we secretly want, whether it’s in certain aspects of shame… I just think people keep secrets for a reason because they think that they’re going to be judged based on them. So if I can sit in a place of non-judgment and they can just share whatever it is that they want to share wholeheartedly, openly, honestly, we can discuss it. It’s a place where they can find freedom, and it frees them.

Heavy shame can really hold people hostage, or they can remain stuck. I have to remind people that’s not their shame to have. Some people don’t even realize it’s not their shame to have  Because it’s from the outside narrative, or it’s from the family narrative. It’s from the, I’m not supposed to be. So I tell people…  don’t should on yourself. Who are you in all of this? Is this yours or is this somebody else’s? Is this your voice or is this somebody else’s voice? So oftentimes, shame will be what I shouldn’t be, what I shouldn’t be doing, what I shouldn’t want, what I should…

There can be repair, and there can be repair and magic.I do a lot of ritual work. And I think that’s all magical. And it’s the same thing, inviting and releasing.  I have  people who want that type of work done. And that’s where they sit. So that is what is real for them.

What do you feel right now? Where do you feel it in your body? What’s going on? How does it feel to say that? Just really keeping people in the mind, body connection. It is beyond words because it’s sometimes hard to describe. And language can be so limiting.