THE CENTER FOR CREATIVE HEALING
What We Believe
- We believe in the power of love to heal the human heart.
- We believe that family dysfunction, climate change, and world events are triggering a landslide of fear across the globe. More than one in four people in the U.S. in 2022 report the need for treatment for emotional and/or mental pain.
- We believe that teaching folks to allow nature to heal them, will also inspire support of climate change initiatives- we support what we deeply value.
- We believe that our forests hold a crucial key to balancing our bodies and minds.
- We believe that therapeutic interaction with animals, specifically horses, can bring to the surface the wounds we carry from being disconnected from the things that nourish us and from emotional trauma from important humans in our lives, allowing them to be processed and healed.
- We believe in the power of art, sound, and movement to express the pain of our injured parts so they can be unburdened and healed.
- We believe that every human being, regardless of race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, physical ability, or spiritual beliefs has a right to access to healing modalities and information about how to find and use them.
Who We Serve
At The Center for Creative Healing, we serve people who have experienced emotional trauma during their formative years through emotional, physical, sexual, financial, spiritual, and/or mental abuse.
Our clients are everyday folks who are ready and able to do the difficult and painful work of identifying wounds and bringing them out into the light of day so they can be healed.
According to Elaine Aron, author of The Highly Sensitive Person, roughly twenty percent of all higher mammals are born highly sensitive. This means that they sense danger and interpret its meaning before others even suspect something is wrong. Every horse herd has its highly sensitive members, which keep the entire herd safe from predators.
In humans, being a Highly Sensitive Person (HSP) has carried with it a high price tag in that HSPs experience emotional trauma at a much deeper level than other people.
Many of the clients who come for counseling and emotional healing are HSPs. The Center for Creative Healing specializes in meeting Highly Sensitive People where they are, structuring the program to meet their needs for decreased stimulation and overwhelm, so they can heal effectively.
What We Do
- Intensive Trauma Healing Retreats
- Long Weekend Focused Retreats
- On-Site Workshops
- Individual Personal Retreats
- Therapeutic Writing Conferences
- Film production
How We Do It
- Internal Family Systems
- Forest Therapy
- Equine Therapy
- Art Therapy
- Group Processing
- Healing Sound
- Labyrinth Walking
- Therapeutic Writing
What is Internal Family Systems?
- A proven system for healing wounds from childhood
- Identifies our internal “parts” that drive our responses and reactions to life’s curve balls
- Provides a way to communicate with our parts and unburden them so they can function the way they were meant to
- Offers a framework for understanding our behavior
- Teaches effective strategies for learning to love ourselves as we are
Forest Therapy
Healing the Senses…
Imagine with me that you are meandering through a pine scented forest, watching the sunlight filter through the tree branches, making dappled patterns on the forest floor. You see a squirrel race to the top of an oak tree, chittering as he goes. A doe and her spotted fawn step gingerly across your path, their eyes wide with wonder that you are visiting their woodland home. Listen to the lyrics of the bird song in the branches above you. Feel the cool breeze wafting up from a rushing stream, combing its gentle fingers through the static-filled tangle of your thoughts.
Spend an hour here, quiet, and uninterrupted by the tasks of the day. Breathing easily and deeply. In and out. Filling your lungs with life-giving oxygen and giving your fevered brain the clear message that everything is okay. Feeling it calm and settle. Feeling your heart rate slow, your limbs relax, and your mind clear.
Since the 1980s, when Japanese researchers discovered measurable health benefits in its subjects who spent several hours of quiet immersion in a forest area, countries all over the world are instituting forest therapy programs to improve the health of their people. It has been scientifically proven many times over that forest therapy lowers blood pressure, heart rate, and cortisol (the stress hormone.)
It has been shown over and over that forest therapy significantly decreases anxiety levels, increases clarity of thought, and has a measurable impact on stress-induced symptoms and diseases. And, in our program at The Center for Creative Healing, it sets the stage for deeper emotional work by relaxing the left, “monkey mind,” part of our brains to allow us to access the feelings in the right brain that will lead us to the wounded parts that need to be healed.
This is IFS Informed Forest Therapy.
Equine Therapy
Letting Go of Fear…
Horses are beautiful, majestic creatures that have fascinated humans for millennia. They have been the stuff of legends in almost every culture on earth.
In recent years, studies are revealing what every young girl whose daddy buys her a horse for her birthday could have told you: being with a horse can heal a human heart. Horses are being used to teach at-risk youth to trust enough to be able to work with their counselor on deep traumas that they haven’t been able to talk about previously. Prison programs that team wild horses with inmates for “gentling” are finding that profound, life-altering changes are happening in the inmates because of their experience with the horses.
Why do they have such an impact on human emotions? Tim Hayes, author of Riding Home: The Power of Horses to Heal, tells us that horses are prey animals and have the deep, primal fears that all prey animals share. According to Tim, this fear response is why they have survived, and it is also why they are so healing to a traumatized person. When they trust you, they shift from fear to curiosity, safety, and comfort. This shift speaks to the deepest part of a wounded human heart, inviting trust in return.
At The Center for Creative Healing, our team members lead clients through specific exercises with our gentle horses, designed to help build trust and, because horses are such effective mirrors of human emotion, hear the coded cries of hidden wounded parts.
This huge, muscular beast, who doesn’t judge, criticize or blame, becomes a friend who responds with acceptance, tolerance, kindness, and respect. These are all characteristics of love, and love received is what heals wounded parts.
This is IFS Informed Equine Therapy.
Art Therapy
Healing the Heart…
“I am no artist,” she says nervously, holding a paintbrush in her hand and looking at me like I am about to torture her.
“This isn’t about being an artist,” I tell her gently. “It’s about letting the part of you that needs to talk to us about unseen wounds speak its truth. It can do it better with colors and images than with words.”
She sighs and begins to put paint to paper. The colors she chooses speak volumes about the pain that has been trapped inside for decades. Black clouds and red flames coming from a window, deep purple clouds blocking the sun, a tiny girl in the very corner of the paper with no mouth: the feelings of abandonment and grief flow out through the brush and bring the pain onto the canvas and into the daylight where the trauma can be “heard” and healed.
Counselors the world over are finding that art therapy helps people discover things about themselves as they process feelings and emotions that are otherwise very hard to express. People with PTSD that have frightening flashbacks and nightmares are, through expressive art, finding the strength to begin the healing process without having to relive the traumatic experiences.
Here at The Center for Creative Healing, our art therapy involves painting, sculpture, writing, and expressive movement to help our folks listen to the parts inside that need to express their frozen grief and pain. This begins to let the trauma heal and set the person free to create a life that isn’t revolving around unhealed wounds.
This is IFS Informed Art Therapy.
Group Processing
Healing Family Wounds…
Wounds that were created in a family system must be healed in a family system.
So, what do we do if our family of origin has no interest in or intention of healing? There is a way around those roadblocks!
Group work, when done in a safe space with a skilled facilitator, can replicate the family system and bring deep healing to participants.
At The Center for Creative Healing, our skilled facilitators help group members share their feelings and find resolution for painful family of origin issues.
Sound Healing
Releasing Trauma…
According to healing sound experts, Isaac and Thorald Koren, humans are one in only eight species on the planet that are vocal learners. We create memories and attach them to sounds.
Many of our memories are made before we have language to express them. Through sound and the power of our voice, we can express the emotions that are stuck inside when the traumas happen.
In our group sessions at The Center for Creative Healing, we learn the twenty-four tones of our sonic anatomy and use them to release stored trauma and heal our nervous systems.
Labyrinth
Calming the Spirit…
The labyrinth is an ancient symbol of wholeness. It evokes the feeling of a journey, meandering but purposeful, back to the center of ourselves, then out to the world again.
A meditation and prayer tool, the labyrinth helps our clients “unwind their minds” so they can release stress and relax.
It is the perfect place to connect, unhindered by outside stimulation, with the inner parts that are waiting to speak about their needs and feelings.
Therapeutic Writing
Finding a Voice…
Writing engages a deeper part of the brain than conversation does, helping the writer delve much deeper into his or her thoughts and feelings.
In IFS Informed Therapeutic Writing, we give our clients exercises that help them to get in touch with inner parts that have important things to say about their pain and trauma. We identify the old inner story that has been creating their painful outer reality.
Then, we help them write a new story of healing that incorporates the roles of their parts now that they are unburdened and released to be who they were always meant to be before the trauma happened.
Clients have the opportunity to tell their personal stories so that they can be shared and understood by others. It is a way to have a voice and say, “I am here; this is who I am” and for others to acknowledge this and say, “I see and hear you. You are an important part of this family of choice.”
Who We Are
JoAnne Chitwood RN, Border Mountain CEO and Director, is a hospice nurse, grief and trauma counselor, film-maker, author, and artist. She has written more than a dozen books and created educational films for hospice that have been used all over the world since 1997.
Her most recent books are Living in Color, Please Help Me Die Well, and Journey of the Heart. Over the past three decades she has facilitated many healing groups using therapeutic writing, art, and storytelling. Learn more about JoAnne’s books.
JoAnne is also a public speaker for women’s retreats, seminars, workshops, YouTube videos, corporate relationship building, professional conferences and master classes.
The Center for Creative Healing is the fulfillment of a life-long dream of hers: to employ a stunning natural environment to create the safest, most soul-nourishing program for people to process and heal emotional trauma using proven techniques in art therapy, equine therapy, and forest therapy.
Duane Lamar is a television and film producer, director, and script writer with a vast amount of experience in all facets of documentary film making. As COO of Border Mountain, Duane plays an integral role in all aspects of the company’s managerial decisions and creative strategies.
And, as executive producer of the video and film department, Duane will produce and direct the company’s documentary and film projects, and its YouTube and social media video content. In addition, he will also collaborate on the creation of brochures and promotional materials, its online content, and its business plan.
Randal Nowack has played an integral role in the formation of Border Mountain’s Center for Creative Healing.. He brings financial expertise and a passionate belief in the company’s mission of emotional healing and personal wellbeing.
As CFO of Border Mountain, Randal has organized and managed fundraising opportunities and has overseen budget projections. In addition, he has conducted extensive market research to create both advertising campaigns and social media strategies to ensure that Border Mountain achieves its goals of informing, educating, and providing counseling options to the public on issues dealing with emotional health.
Donors and Investors
JoAnne has developed a wide network of supporters (potential donors) over the years through her counseling, group leadership, public speaking and writing.
She and her team have compiled a list of donors and investors to approach with a presentation detailing the various programs.
The team is actively connecting with potential donors to create partnerships for the documentary and retreat center’s programs.
Promise Productions, Inc.
JoAnne has been creating books and training materials for hospice and grief classes through her publishing company, Promise Productions, Inc. , her book and educational materials production company since 2013 and, before that, through Promise Publications from 1997 to 2013. Her non-profit company, Border Mountain, Inc. produces the documentaries and provides for the actual healing retreats taking place at The Center for Creative Healing and JoAnne’s speaking engagements in churches and other organizations.
Sponsorship funds for The Center for Creative Healing will be received through Promise Productions, Inc. and will be used to create the grounds for The Center for Creative Healing. Building projects will include the log lodge, cabins for clients, the garden pool/greenhouse, the art studio, a covered riding arena with stalls, the labyrinth, groomed trails for forest therapy, and a sound garden with chimes.
Donations
Border Mountain is a 501c3 Non-profit Organization.
All donations to the film, In The Shelter of Trees or to The Center for Creative Healing retreats, are fully tax-deductible.
Mountain of Grace
One Woman's Journey from Heartache to Healing
Many of you have asked for the backstory on Border Mountain, so here it is! Mountain of Grace is the dramatic story of JoAnne's journey from heartache and tragedy to deep healing and purpose in the formation of Border Mountain.