Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: You are listening to exploring Satir's legacy, the Virginia Satir podcast.
[00:00:10] Speaker B: I'm your host, Michael Argumanis Harden, and together we will embark on the journey of self discovery, empowerment, and meaningful connection.
[00:00:20] Speaker A: Let's dive in.
[00:00:26] Speaker C: Welcome to a captivating episode featuring a remarkable guest whose contributions to the world of therapy and relationship dynamics have left an indelible mark. Today we have the privilege of sitting down with one of my mentors, Sharon Lotion, a renowned author, educator, and an instrumental figure in the legacy of Virginia Satir.
Sharon Lotion's impressive body of work includes multiple books delving into the profound insights of Virginia Satir, including the Satir process, systemic training in the skills of Virginia Satir, and enriching your relationship with yourself and others.
Her commitment to furthering Satir's teaching is nothing short of inspiring. Beyond her literary achievements, Sharon has played a pivotal role in shaping the Virginia Satir global network, serving as its past president. Throughout her career as a licensed clinical social worker and educator, Sharon has honed her expertise in training individuals to become skilled therapists, coaches, and mentors. In this episode, we have the privilege of delving into Sharon Lotion's journey. She will share her experiences working alongside Virginia Satir and how she pioneered the immensely successful Satir coaching and mentoring program. In collaboration with Jenny Wong, Miriam Freeman, and other esteemed colleagues, the coaching and mentoring program boasts trained coaches and mentors actively engaged in 21 countries across the globe. Join me as we explore the rich tapestry of Sharon's career, her enduring connection with Virginia Satir's wisdom, and the global impact of the Satir Coaching and mentoring program, which continues to foster healthy relationships worldwide.
Let's dive into this enlightening conversation with Sharon Lotion.
[00:02:09] Speaker B: Sharon, I am just so excited to have you on the podcast today and just really let the audience get to know you and the beautiful soul that you are.
[00:02:19] Speaker D: Thank you. It's my privilege.
[00:02:22] Speaker B: I would love it if we could just start off by you sharing your story of how you came to the satir world.
[00:02:29] Speaker D: Sure.
Well, first time I learned about Virginia Satir, I was in graduate school and I was assigned to work with the step family, and I started working with them and felt really at a loss and I wasn't getting any direction from the faculty. And so I went to the bookstore and turns out Virginia had just published conjoint family therapy. So that kind of became my guide.
And then fast forward ten years later, my husband got a sabbatical to Purdue University. So we were there for the year and I saw an ad that she was going to be doing a four day workshop. And I remembered the name, and I thought, I'd like to do that. And I went, and I felt like I'd learned more in four days than I had in two years in graduate school. I was just blown away. I took all the tapes and listened to them over and over and over. Still remember things from that very powerfully.
Fast forward ten more years. I'm living in California, and I see an ad that she's going to be working for two days at UCLA.
And I went, and she announced that she did month long trainings in the Rocky Mountains every summer. And I came home and I said, bob, she's 70 years old, and I really have to experience this.
Little did I have any clue what I was in for. It was the hardest 30 days of my life, because it's all about going inside and doing your own work. And when I left, I remember saying, I'll never, ever do that again. Thank God I survived. And four months later, I'd signed up for the next summer because I got so much feedback from particularly clients, saying that something was different about me, something in the energy. Dr. Dan Siegel has put together an acronym for mental health that I love, which is faces. Flexible, adaptive, coherent, energized, and stable. And I remember a student telling me before I had done that, that you seem very okay. Well, I think that's what shifted. When I did my own work then. I didn't have know rigidity.
[00:04:44] Speaker B: Sharon. Just knowing you the way I know you now, I can't even imagine you'd be rigid.
I introduce you as a beautiful soul, because that's how I experienced you for the very first day.
[00:04:54] Speaker D: Oh, thank you. Yeah, well, something shifted, and it wasn't any kind of conscious thing. It was just the two months of kind of experiential, impactful learning that's all done.
So many different aspects are being impacted that that's how, you know, turned onto it. And at the end of the second summer, I asked John Baman. I was standing in line for lunch with him, and I said, would it be possible for me to be considered for the teaching network, which was called avant at the time?
And he said, well, I don't know. Are you a mover and a shaker?
I went, I don't know. I think so. It was a strange conversation, and about a month later, I get an invitation for Virginia to be a part of the Avanta. So that's how it all started, and it has know the core of my life ever since.
[00:05:53] Speaker B: Amazing. Well, one of the things I love asking all those people who were friends and knew Virginia, is there a story that just was impactful to you or meaningful as far as engaging with her in some way that the audience would love to hear?
[00:06:07] Speaker D: Yes, I think so.
One day, she asked for volunteer. Okay.
And she said, okay. So I would like for the class, the class was 90 of us to think about and try to figure out. And she had a chart up there. How many holes do you think there are in Sharon's body?
They had a lot of fun with that, right?
[00:06:34] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:06:35] Speaker D: And she said, so when she was born, all of those holes were open, and she was whole. W-H-O-L-E.
But with life experiences and family systems, et cetera, holes begin to get plugged up.
Not okay to see what you're seeing, feel what you're feeling, say what you want to say, move, take risks. All those what came out to be known as the five freedoms, they get plugged up at different levels, depending on your experience, and then you're less than whole. But within that, there is a God given wholeness spirit that's never damaged.
And the more we can work to connect with that holiness by helping you unplug those holes, the better.
I will never forget that day, Michael.
[00:07:31] Speaker B: It's a great.
[00:07:32] Speaker D: Oh, yeah.
It was so powerful just to stand there and have Virginia was known, like, holding your hand. So she's holding my hand as all this inputs coming in and that connection with her and that anchoring was amazing.
[00:07:54] Speaker B: Well, I'm one of those people who just wish that I could have met her before she died. And I just love hearing the stories, and I tell people all the time, if they get to know people who walked with her and are in this satir world, they'll find that all of you kind of carry on her spirit.
She lives on the good work that continues to be done.
[00:08:16] Speaker D: Yes. And I think it's the proof of the universal understanding she had of what motivates us as human beings and how to help us grow is way beyond the person of Virginia, and that's why it's continued, because once that gets tapped into, that's been my experience.
There is an ongoing desire for creativity and productivity, and it just unfolds. It's just there. Nobody's cognitively thinking this out. It just happens.
[00:08:48] Speaker B: What I love, now that I've been around satir people long enough is the way that often people talk about Virginia. I've heard people from around the globe talk about Sharon that know, they talk about getting into the coaching and mentoring world and really what they were learning and how that changed their life. I think, oh, my goodness. I want our listeners to be able to hear about how you even started in coaching and mentoring, because you developed this program from the ground and it is blessing people around the globe. I would love for you to just teach us what's going on in that, in coaching and mentoring.
[00:09:26] Speaker D: Well, when I was talking about unfolding, it was never anything like, I have this goal, I'm going to do this. What happened was when Virginia died, I had learned a particular kind of roadmap for counseling. And I thought that was such a powerful thing for me. It was designed by Robert Karkoff. But now I've had this experience with Virginia, and most people say Virginia had her own magic and nobody can do it. And I thought, yeah, that's not true.
This is a map in my head. I had a map that I created. And so I wrote the book the Satir process, and that was for counselors. So one day, Marguerite Suarez, who was the director at that point in Ivanta, in Satir Global, called me and said, sharon, I've been teaching this to nurses, but you know what? I'm really using it in my own life. I think that we could do something with it. So then we modified it into a program called enriching your relationship with yourself and others. That was for the general public.
And then one day I'm reading the Los Angeles Times. It's a Sunday morning, and Bob and I are out having bagels. And I had had a client who told me, always read the left column because that's the premier investigative column. So I'm reading it, and it's about a priest in south central Los Angeles who's making remarkable impact.
And there's a sentence in there, and Porter says, well, what do you attribute your success to? And he said, well, I just asked these young people what they're feeling. And then I listened profoundly.
Okay. So I called LA Times. They connected me up with him. Fast forward.
He said he had me present to his staff, and they were very interested. So I taught them the enriching program.
And I started with one group of gang interventionists and then added another group of gang interventionists because they could hear the power of it.
And I'm still connected with many of those folks weekly. And that started in 2015. I think, as I say, we're doing this program. And then I realized these people are on the street every day.
They need more actual helping skills and mentoring skills than they're getting just in the personal growth.
So I began to design that and then realized this was something that other people were interested in because it turns out that it's more unique in the coaching process than many coaching programs.
First of all, because it's psychoeducational, there's a lot of. And that you can structure it and you can have classes and people really draw into the classes.
It's also unique, I think, in that it's very heart centered.
And those two things put together.
One of my friends calls it the law of attraction. They just keep coming and popping in. It just blows my mind. We're up to 21 countries now of people who have found out about it and just write in. We haven't done any marketing.
[00:12:50] Speaker B: Yeah, it is spreading. It is a very successful program, and I invite anybody who would really like to be a part of it and learn from you and other coaches to make contact. How could they get a hold of, if they're really interested in the coaching and mentoring program, where would they go?
[00:13:06] Speaker D: Website, just satirglobal.org.
And then on the menu, it'll say satir coaching program. And they can click on there and they can apply. And my vision, I've been a therapist for 40 years, but my vision was there is so much valuable teaching and learning and experience related to Satir. There's so many people who are never going to come to therapy who could use this. So that's how it began to evolve for me, is that we need to reach out to the world in a bigger way.
[00:13:41] Speaker B: This is also the beauty of Satir work, is the ability to go in and see people for their strengths, and not just look at any pathology, but to see the human being as a miracle. I'm impressed often that Satir people are able to do that.
How did that grow in you? Was that something that had to grow? Has that always been a part of who you are?
[00:14:05] Speaker D: I don't know if I have a cognitive answer for that, Michael. Immediately my father's spirit comes to my mind.
He was just a very caring human being when he was quite old, and some weird thing, he ended up inheriting $5,000 from somebody he didn't even know. And I said, hey, dad, what are you going to do with that $5,000?
And he got tears in his eyes. And he said, well, I read about this little girl in the paper, and she's got leukemia. So I sent it to.
Yeah, yeah. Just grew know with a lot of know. Virginia. I was always looking at context, and I realized in doing some of my own family history that I was the only grandchild born during World War II, which meant, number one, I had a lot of anxiety put in my body, absorbed. But it also meant that I was treasured by lots of people because I was the only child they could hold on to. And it's now that it came out okay. But then nobody knew I was going to come out okay.
[00:15:17] Speaker B: No. So you pour your energy, you started pouring your energy into coaching and mentoring in 2015, but you're still going strong in it. You're still actively engaging coaching and mentoring at this point?
[00:15:30] Speaker D: Yes, very. Yeah. Jenny Wong and I, who is from Vancouver originally Hong Kong, have been training around our third year of training a group of people in China from seven or eight different provinces. We started with twelve and we have nine who are going to be trainers and that will probably end about June. And they have bundled, they're getting translated, three of my works that are going to be bundled and sent throughout China. So that's been mind blowing to me. Just mind blowing. And then a group from Hong Kong invited us and we just started working with 14 people there. And there's four people going to become trainers and 14 you're going to be coaches. And then we just finished with a group in Singapore and we're going to start with a group. I'm going to start with Daria Heidegglo with a group in Europe at the end of February.
And we have two countries of somebody. I'm training in Kenya and somebody else in Zimbabwe and in Brazil. And now we have somebody just reached out to us from Mexico.
It's just mind blowing.
[00:16:40] Speaker B: It is mind.
And right now it's so important for people in the psychology world, in marriage and family therapy and social work to make sure that they are working multiculturally sensitive. And Virginia was already thinking about difference in people and sameness in people and honoring differences long before a lot of people were talking about this level of sensitivity. Why do you imagine, if I could ask you this, why do you imagine there is such an attraction in different cultures, not just in America, right. Not just in North America, but in cultures all over the world? Why do you think they are attracted to the satir model?
[00:17:19] Speaker D: I wish that we could have reported in a way for the public what it's been like to train a group in China because it is such an affirmation that we are all human beings on the same struggles. I'm struggling with my mother in law. My son's addicted to video games. I can't get going in my work. Everything that's human, Michael. That's what she was addressing at the family level, at the work system level. And I think that there is such a hunger for that, and there's a hunger for a deeper connection than most people have. We kind of live in a lack of community world, an urban world, a lot of isolation and loneliness, and people grab a hold of this. I was thinking about one person that I've trained who said she'd been in marriage counseling for years and they were doing okay. But she said after she took this training, their marriage is so much better.
Wow.
I love.
[00:18:24] Speaker B: Too.
Is there an idea within Virginia Satir's model that you are just naturally drawn to? It's a big focus of what you do, because the concept that she explained is so meaningful to you.
[00:18:38] Speaker D: Yes.
I don't know if you've read this new book out by David Brooks called how to know a person. The art of.
[00:18:44] Speaker B: You told me about that book, and I bought it and read it. It was wonderful.
[00:18:48] Speaker D: Wonderful book. Yes. The art of seeing deeply and being seen deeply. Right.
And I thought about how much I was drawn to Virginia's original poem. The greatest gift that I can conceive of having is to be seen, heard, understood, and touched. And after I read David's book, I thought I would change that a little bit to. I think the greatest gift that I can give and to receive is to be seen, heard, and valued.
Because I think that the essence of Virginia's miracleness, if you will, or magic, was that she truly, truly saw in front of her someone that she felt was a miracle, and she was in awe of that spirit. Like she said, there may be a lot of dark stuff in between us, but there is a pure spirit in there, and I'm going to work from my pure spirit to connect with yours. And I think that's powerful and unique.
[00:19:47] Speaker B: It is. And then to be in the presence of somebody who's able to see you that way, it's so different than somebody looking at you and seeing brokenness or seeing pathology. But to see the true human miracle that a person is, it really is a gift.
[00:20:05] Speaker D: And I hear a lot about strength based therapy now, which is fine, and it falls in that category, but somehow it doesn't grasp to me the power of truly believing in somebody's potential for growth and helping them to access their own wisdom.
I do so much modeling, of coaching now as part of the training, and I am in awe every time. If I can just discipline myself to stay with that or believe that, if I can help validate them, they are going to come up with their own ideas and their own wisdom and own energy to change. I had no idea where we were going to go.
[00:20:47] Speaker B: Yeah, I have a question. Because a lot of people kind of stumbled and didn't know what to do during the years that we were locked down in Covid. But it seems like coaching and mentoring flourished during that time. Tell me a little bit about, you.
[00:21:03] Speaker D: Know, Virginia talks about checking in to try to help people understand what their yearnings are. And I think, as Brene Brown said, we're all wired for connection, and we got cut off. And thank God, I think the person who invented Zoom should get a Nobel Peace prize because that was one way we could connect. And again, because of that, the work that I did with Virginia, there's a lot of creativity in me, and I was the head of president of Satir Global, and it just popped into me one day because for years, I had been trying to get some kind of Zoom gatherings going.
Nothing was working. But when Covid hit and we put out the word, all of a sudden people were home.
No matter what hour of the day, they were longing for connection, especially the kind of connection you get through satir meetings.
And that was what, 2019?
[00:22:02] Speaker B: Well, it really hit in 2020, and really everything shut down at that point.
[00:22:07] Speaker D: So now we've recorded, I think, over 130 presentations from that, and now it's set up. So there's one presentation every first Wednesday of the month, but then there's three coffee hours for anybody who wants to stay connected throughout the month. So I do believe it's the longing for connection that made the difference.
[00:22:31] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:22:32] Speaker B: And you just mentioned the coffee group that meets on Wednesday. People can connect with Satir Global and find that group, and it is a free group. People can not only be educated, but be connected with other people in this important way.
[00:22:45] Speaker D: Right. I'm just blown away by the library. We now have a video library with beautiful presentations like yours that any student, anybody can just go in and watch for free.
[00:22:55] Speaker B: Yeah, it's amazing. I guess what I'd like to do now is think about if there's a message that you would like to send, that is something that Virginia would want them to have. What message would you want to send the listeners off with Tina Turner?
[00:23:12] Speaker D: I think it was. Sang the song what's love got to do with it? Do you remember that?
[00:23:17] Speaker B: I do.
[00:23:19] Speaker D: Which was related to all of her pain in an abusive relationship that she walked out of with nothing on her but clothes on her body and ran across the freeway and escaped so all that pain and bitterness was there.
And all of a sudden, the answer came to me. It's got everything to do with.
Because if her partner had loved himself and he'd been able to love, that would never have happened.
And it's not anything that I don't want to say, you must love yourself, because then it's like, no, it's a process.
But coming back to that place where you truly feel your worth and value, then you're not going to hurt other people.
[00:24:13] Speaker B: I like the idea of being congruent in that we honor ourself, but we always honor the other. So love that wouldn't honor the other person is not very.
[00:24:22] Speaker D: No, no. One of our beloved colleagues who passed away this year, Dr. Janet Christie Seeley, the way she described congruence was emotional, musty, with consideration and respect for the other person. I love.
[00:24:41] Speaker B: World. The world lost somebody special when she died.
[00:24:45] Speaker D: They really did.
[00:24:47] Speaker B: Sharon, there's one other thing I wanted to ask you. I know that I said that we're going to leave the listeners with something that Satir had to say, but one of the things that some of the listeners might not know is you're a past president of Satir Global, and being a leader in the.
I just. I would love for you to ask you, what are you most excited about the future of Satir and the Satir model?
[00:25:16] Speaker D: I'm excited about the fact that we are coming back to the original wish in Virginia's will that we become a learning center.
When she died, it just was not possible.
She had a charisma, and people would come to trainings and so forth, and it just wasn't happening.
And then when we switched our name to Satir, originally, Avanta was a teaching network that she chose the people going to be teachers. And then when she died, and it transformed into Satir global, and eventually I became the president.
Unconsciously, I think what I started doing is what I would call lift. And truly, I was so excited to interact individually with all these people around the world and lift them up in whatever they were doing and encouraging it and then linking people together. Did you know, so Michael's doing this. Did you know? Gene's doing that over there, and you might get together or something?
[00:26:27] Speaker B: You do that very well, by the way.
[00:26:29] Speaker D: Thank you.
[00:26:30] Speaker B: I have a lot of friends because we all knew.
[00:26:35] Speaker D: Well, you know, I was thinking about that know. That's why Virginia created. I learned was she wanted people to know each other and learn from each. Yeah. And again, that was not conscious until I was thinking about it today.
Now, what did you ask me? I forgot.
[00:26:53] Speaker B: Well, just as a president, you're a leader in this field.
What are you most excited about in the future for the future of this tier model?
[00:27:01] Speaker D: First of all, I want to say something about leadership, because the person who has added the most to my understanding at a theoretical level after Virginia was Richard Schwartz, who developed the internal family systems model.
And one day he ratled off something, and I took notes, went, he talked about self leadership. Virginia would know, be in charge of yourself. He called it self leadership. And somebody said, what does that entail?
And he said, well, it entails being inspirational to your members. This would be inside but inspirational, nurturing, protective, facilitating communication between the members and mediating conflicts. And I went, whop. So that kind of became my framework for the presidency.
And so now going back to the future, so we went away from the training model. That was what I think Virginia wanted in the original will, because we couldn't make that happen into the lift and link up. And now we're coming full circle. What my hope is, so excited to have you leading the troops on this, is that we can become a learning center in so many ways. There's so many different aspects of ways that Virginia's teachings can be used.
And to offer those to people of different interests is really important.
[00:28:43] Speaker B: Different interests, different cultures, different places in life, different ages. It has been a beautiful thing to see how this has been helpful to others.
[00:28:54] Speaker D: Absolutely.
[00:28:56] Speaker B: Well, Sharon, I just want to thank you so very much for joining me here. And I know that the listeners are going to be so blessed by just getting to know you just a little bit more.
[00:29:07] Speaker D: Thank you. It's great to be with you.
[00:29:14] Speaker C: As we conclude this episode of the.
[00:29:15] Speaker A: Virginia Satir podcast, I want to leave you with a reminder that the journey of self discovery and transformation is ongoing.
Virginia Satir's wisdom continues to inspire us to nurture healthier relationships, foster open communication, and embrace personal growth. Remember, you hold the power to create positive change in your life and the lives of those around you. Well, that's it for today's episode.
[00:29:40] Speaker C: See you next week.
[00:29:41] Speaker A: Thanks for listening to the Virginia Satir podcast. Be sure to, like, subscribe and give us a review wherever you listen to the podcast and share this with a friend. Also, for more information on Virginia Satir, you can go to satirglobal.com or liveconnectedtherapy.com. Until next time, be kind unto yourself and to others.
[00:30:02] Speaker C: And remember, you are a miracle.
