MANI FENIGER
“A bird doesn’t sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.”
–Maya Angelou
COUNSELING
“Each time I go to Mani with an obstacle that seems immeasurably bigger than me, she shifts my experience, and I walk away with the tables turned; I have grown and the obstacle has shrunk. I find new room in the house of me.
I am beyond grateful.” –J.C.
“Please know what an absolutely crucial role you have played in my life. You were there with me during the hardest time. I use the tools that you taught me, and those we created together,
on a daily basis.” —K.V.
My original training in 1987 as a Clinical Hypnotherapist forms the foundation of my counseling work. Over the last thirty years, I have incorporated many other programs that have built on this essential framework for understanding how memory, trauma, brain style, personality structure and even our spiritual outlook may affect how we how the mind processes information and experience.
Our responses are often charged by negative memories that get fixed in our nervous system. We may not trust life enough to give up the familiarity of a bad situation for the unknown possibility of a better one. We may not have been taught the skills we need for manifesting our full potential. By recognizing these difficulties, we can focus on realistic steps for change.
This process is collaborative. I have experience, tools and practices to offer. You are the authority on what you want, what works best for you and how you want to pace yourself. If you are looking for support to handle issues that are calling for your attention, please contact me.
Individual counseling in the SF Bay Area and by Skype or phone by arrangement. Please fill out my contact form and let me know if you would like to be reached by phone or email.
I offer a twenty-minute free phone consultation to find out if this work is right for you.
ENNEAGRAM
I originally learned about the Enneagram in 1979 when I met Michael Gardner. He had participated in the Seekers After Truth groups in Berkeley, where his teacher Claudio Naranjo first introduced the system of the nine personality structures combined with modern psychological theory.
My own introduction was a little more personal. I was doing my best to bounce back after a divorce and had not done very well in my brave but well-defended forays into dating. When I met Michael, I knew I really liked him, but I pretty much did the same things I had done to push away all the other men I met. He wasn’t fooled by my cover. “You’re a Type Six in the Enneagram,” he said to me after a few evenings together. “I know you’re doing that because you’re afraid. I’m not giving up.” He was right about that but even more important, he saw beyond the automatic defense mechanism of my personality and knew there was so much more to me.
Since that time, we have taught together in many different venues and deepened our understanding of the Enneagram. My background as a therapist complemented his understanding of the scientific roots of this profound system (and we have been happily married for many decades). We teach with panels of exemplars and are excited to offer some new workshops in Berkeley this Fall. We look forward to exploring how you can use the wisdom of the Enneagram to deepen your own relationships, communicate with difficult people in your life, and most of all, be more aware of your own motivations and the breadth of possibilities open to you.
Click here to find out more.
The ENNEAGRAM
MEMOIR WRITING
During the decade I spent writing “The Woman in the Photograph,” I discovered some things about memoir writing that I hadn’t known before. First I realized that, like a muscle that you exercise, the more I wrote, the more details I remembered. I say “remembered” though we know that every time you tell a story, it is changed by your perspective at that moment. Memory is a living testimony, not a fixed reality.
Even more important, as I sat at my computer literally day after day, I often wept for my mother’s pain, or for things I had missed in my childhood. Some days I felt angry, other days sad. Over time I became increasingly grateful and forgiving to myself and to her. I discovered that through memoir writing, I was transformed. Old wounds were healing and new experiences of gratitude and appreciation were emerging.
This is what compelled me to offer writing classes to others. Each group starts with a poem or a quote to awaken creativity. We use simple phrases to warm up our written voice and get our pens or our fingers moving over the keyboard. Then we write for twenty minutes. When each person reads out loud, we give feedback only on what we loved, what moved us, what we would like to hear more about. We don’t criticize. We listen with an open heart.
Over the years I have laughed and cried at the wonderful stories read in these classes. In the coming year, it is my intention to create an anthology of our stories and personal essays. New classes are forming. If you are in SF Bay Area and want to find your own creative voice in a supportive environment, please contact me.
If you are in SF Bay Area and want to find your own creative voice
in a supportive environment, please contact me.
Date time and Events
New Memoir Writing Workshops