Dear friends –

As we prepare for 2023, we reflect and see that we have all survived over 900 days of hard. I am proposing that each of you get RADICAL in at least these 4 areas in 2023.

RADICAL GENEROSITY- Let’s be gracious, gentle and generous with ourselves and others. We will have hard days. It’s okay! We don’t have to have all the answers. We don’t have to be perfect. Go generous. Go gentle. Give yourself credit for doing the best you can. And offer that generosity to those around you too.

RADICAL BOUNDARIES- Our ability to sustain care long term, genuinely empathetic care is directly tied to our ability to set firm boundaries around our own needs. The most compassionate people are the ones who have the strongest boundaries. Don’t hesitate to say “no” to others in this season in order to preserve your own well-being.

RADICAL ADVENTURE- We must discharge the energy we hold in cathartic ways. And we need to go to places that make us feel small again- where we can see/feel/hear God’s great glory and majesty and remember his power! Get out and hike in the woods, go sit by the ocean, ride your bike under the stars, challenge yourself physically, walk every day.

RADICAL REST- When you take a nap, sleep in, daydream, you are engaging in vital, restorative processes. We are valued and cherished and “enough” even when we are not “earning” it through productivity. Rest gives us a chance to breathe, receive and heal.

My challenge to us is to get truly radical in our generosity, boundaries, adventure and rest this year as this has a huge IMPACT. Not just for you, but it impacts everyone around you. Practice these things and see the transformation happen. And then let us know how it’s going!

THANK YOU for partnering with The Refuge Center to continue to provide “a refuge and a hiding place” for all those who come through the doors. It is YOU, our partners, who allow The Refuge Center to provide, as Isaiah 4:6 reads, “A shelter and shade from the heat of the day and a hiding place from the storm and the rain.” You make this life-changing work possible!

With gratitude,

Amy Alexander, LMFT, AAMFT Approved Supervisor

The Refuge Center for Counseling, Executive Director and Co-Founder