“A community event, Growing beyond trauma,” at the Chestnut Hill Library Originally published in the Chestnut hill Local Thursday, September 1, 2022 by Stacia Friedman Lately, the news cycle can seem like a constant drum beat of physical and emotional trauma: COVID, Monkeypox, gun violence, sexual assault, war, racism, political…

Philadelphia Trauma Training Conference Inspires Again We know that gun violence, covd, and poverty put extreme stress on people. Working towards a better world, the 4th Annual Trauma Training Conference took place on July 16–17, 2021. With 530 global participants and 53 workshops, attendees joined remotely with the Whova app. …

What does it mean to celebrate the mundane? As my birthday approaches, I reflect on the years, the dreams, the losses. We often think of milestones as “big” things —graduations, weddings, large crowds, and lots of ‘Likes’ on social media. Hollywood. …

by Aviva Perlo On January 6, 2023, over 75 people gathered at the Parkway Free Library of Philadelphia to talk about hate crimes, combating hate, legal protections, and the importance of partnerships. The Symposium was organized by the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations. The commission was the first in the…

As a child on Thanksgiving, my parents, sister and I went to Texas’s George R. Brown Convention Center to serve turkey and stuffing to over 10,000 homeless people and then went home to eat our own meal. Last week I saw a perfectly good sleeping mat rolled up on the…

The beauty of Simone Biles’s Olympic performance 2021 is not only that she had the courage to speak up about mental health challenges, pause, and still earn a bronze, but also that: (a) she took initiative before a crisis; (b) she had support of coaches and loved ones; and ©…

“Touchdowns and Take Aways on Grief” I grew up with a Dad who played professional football. People used to ask- really? professional? “Yes,” I would say, sensing that my response somehow surprised them but I didn’t know why. …

What is Human Cheerleading and why cheer? Human Cheerleading is when you get out the ole pom poms and shake it to defy the odds and despair. No matter what, in spite of poverty, abuse, gun violence, broken families, government housing, you name it, there is still room to cheer…

Why write? Aviva speaks at Community College of Philadelphia to encourage students to become English majors and cherish the almighty word. Why? Because writing helps us clarify our thoughts. Because putting one’s thoughts on paper — or on the screen — breathes life and power into the words. …