About In This World

Hi, and thanks for visiting In This World!  I'm Erin Moline, a psychotherapist and person living and working in Portland, Oregon with my husband, Kjell, and our beautiful dog, Zoe.  Kjell and I own Confluence Clinic, where he practices Chinese medicine, herbs and acupuncture and I practice as a therapist.

My path to this particular moment in life now seems obvious. I spent my college years convinced that I was going to be an academic, a medieval historian to be exact. Yet, shortly after graduation, I decided instead to bring on my very own quarter-century crisis by throwing that all out the window.  It was 1997 and I spent the next several years moving through the stages of the quarter-century crisis: Job I dislike, Burnout, Severe Self-Questioning, Giving Up, Finding Myself, Falling in Love, Getting Married, Finally Finding a Job That Makes Sense.  At least that was my version.

That time of pain and anguish was so important in my life.  It  frames what I do and who I am now; it is why I am a therapist and why I write this blog.  I learned during that time that what was on the outside had no meaning if I was not okay with myself on the inside, and if I didn't have my own true relationship with the world around me.  It sounds so simple, but if you've been there, you know that it's not.

I've learned that nature is my greatest teacher, and that my relationship with the world around me is an essential part of the journey of self-discovery.  I love to observe and reflect on the lessons that nature has to offer, whether through tall trees, tiny tomatoes, or a powerful encounter between two people.

Because of all of this, I spend a lot of time when working with clients in my office talking about meaning, about finding peace with oneself, about finding empowerment, about love.  In This World is an extension of that.

The name In This World comes from a movie of the same name about a journey of Pakistani refugees to freedom in England.  When a character in the movie had passed away, rather than stating that he had died, they would say that he is no longer "In This World."  This resonated with me as I want my blog to be about life and being alive and living in the world.

Thank you for stopping by, every visit truly means a lot to me.  It is my hope that you enjoy and benefit from what you read here, and soon find yourself discovering new ways to encounter the everyday mysteries that are always present in your own world.

Best to you,
Erin

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