Guidance Through Life

About

Rev. Ed Cornell MDiv, MS, LPC

Pastoral counseling is a style of therapy that offers a safe and comfortable space to explore life’s questions and struggles in the light of God’s love. I have been drawn to counseling since the early days of my ministry and have gained extensive experience over the years. In addition to counseling my church members, I have provided grief counseling for individuals, helped families heal from the effects of domestic violence and assisted people to deal with life transitions.

Along with my Masters in Divinity, my education includes a Master’s degree in Clinical Counseling. I am licensed by the state of Connecticut as a professional counselor.

I was an active member of the American Association of Pastoral Counselors and served on the board of the Pastoral Counseling Center in New Milford, CT.

Margaret Cornell, MPH, MSN, APRN

Peg Cornell (she, her) is an experienced psychiatric/mental health nurse practitioner offering psychotherapy and support to help adults with life's challenges, difficulties and transitions.

She works with people to explore the connection between body, mind and spirit in a setting that is safe, caring and nonjudgmental. Working in partnership, she helps her patients find their way on a path of understanding and growth.

Peg will help to address concerns including:

Dealing with chronic illness
Challenges of care-giving
Loss and grief
Loss of a loved one to suicide or substance use
Gender identity and sexuality
Relationship issues
Parenting concerns
Life transitions
Aging and retirement

Specializing in Anxiety, Life Transitions, Grief and Family Conflict.

Treatment

Anxiety

Grief & Loss

Relationships

Are you anxious or just a worry -wort ? Do you lose sleep at night? Can you accept that all in the end will be all right? There are two types of anxiety. Anxiety in general. Is the response of the human Organism to anything that is perceived as a threat to what one regards as essential to one’s welfare or safety. Existential anxiety is normal anxiety. Everyone has it at some level. It arises from the very nature of human existence. You’re going on a first date and are choosing a tie to match your shirt. You fret a bit, but your self-confidence and logic rules and you decide if the tie is the deciding factor is this the kind of person you want to spend the evening with. In contrast Pathological anxiety rises when contradictory impulses, desires, or needs clamor for attention at the same time. It is the result of inner conflict. Existential anxiety while in its normal tone is manageable. We worry if our tie matches our short. But when we give in to our fear, its dark shadow touches all other anxieties and gives them power. We lose sleep, change shirts and ties, and find ourselves frozen in the mirror. If we manage to get to the date we apologize for the tie, and the shirt.

The omnipresence of loss and grief. Experiences that evoke grief are both more frequent and more varied that most of us imagine. The passing of a loved one, the termination of a relationship is such an obvious occasion of grief that many think it is the only occasion. In fact it is not, we all experience loss and these losses build or accumulate in our soul as we gather life experiences. We like to think that God will not send us more than we can bare but that is not fair to us or for that matter God. God does not send us burdens or losses. I dismiss that god in favor of a being that loves me and nourishes me. Life happens and sometimes it is painful and sometimes the pain will not let us go We turn to the well-worn cycle of grief and think it will pass in time. This misunderstanding of grief and its related cycle holds too many of us for too long with no way forward. We just recycle our grief into a dark place. There it lays waiting to be re-woke at a moments notice. These is help and a way out of this cycle. Sometimes we need a listening ear other times we need something more. In all cases we need to remember that we are loved.

The coming together of stories. All relationships have a unique story. Each relationship is a blending of stories. In a couple for all sorts of reasons, but ultimately, because each dream and hopes they bind themselves together. Each brings a unique patterns of personalities, and family history. This is what becomes the new story. In a healthy relationship there is relatively high degree of mutual respect, and satisfaction. It is when the stories are mutually heard, accepted and respected. Conversely, in an unhealthy relationship conflict occurs as the two stories collide rather than blend. This forms a high degree of frustration and distrust. If the relationship produces chronic unmet emotional hungers, it will diminish the self-esteem of those involved. Resulting rejection, anger and even sometimes aggression. In particular, the need pattern that one brings to a marriage depends on the personality molding experiences. No one enters into relationship alone. We bring with it all that we have learned, and witnessed from previous relationships, our parents, our grandparents. All this becomes part of the new chapter in our story. Each person has brought their own system to the equation. Combining these two systems a new system is born. Often the needs and patterns of one system collides with the needs and patterns of the other. Yet when these needs are shared, heard, recognized, and accepted all things are possible. A mutual joy and love and understanding becomes part of the everyday presence.

Life Transitions

Institutional Grief

Video - This Weeks Spiritual Reflection

Life is a series of stages we transition from one stage into the next. We journey - choose paths to take, stumble, get up and journey on. How we enter into the next stage is dependent on our spiritual wholeness. When we are comfortable with our present life stage, and we feel whole we can accept with excitement the next stage of our life. In many of these moments especially in are early days we transition into new and exciting moments of our life. Our world vision expands, and we grow both in spirit and wisdom. The soul rejoices at new adventures. Later in life as we continue along this road, we discover that the road once wide now narrows. We have fewer friends; our family and world feels smaller. Old age is the final great segregation of life. In all these stages at the center is ones need to be valued. Is your world expanding, do you still lean into the newness of the morn?

When a group or institution suffers a collected loss group or institutional grief may settle into the organization. Sometimes it is a traumatic event. The sudden loss of a colleague due to an unforeseen event. The loss may be prolonged as the long-term illness of a co-worker, or the departure of a beloved fellow employee. When the group suffers it often calls for a collect or group process that recognizes the institution as a living organism and calls for a family approach to the grieving institution. Every institution or organism is like a family a living organism. It has its ritual, customs and hidden and overt stories that will come forward or be buried deeper into the life story of the institution. When the group meets it finds comfort is the sharing of stories and the releasing of the burden of grief that ll experience but can now share. During the pandemic many institutions suffered trimitic loss. Many suffered unseen losses that are now becoming apparent. Is there a place a calling for the group to meet and begin the process of group grieving that can lead to a fuller and richer understanding of the purpose of your being?

Contact

Inspirational Message

" The most important kind of freedom is to be what you really are. You trade in your reality for a role. You trade in your sense for an act. You give up your ability to feel, and in exchange, put on a mask. There can’t be any large-scale revolution until there’s a personal revolution, on an individual level. It’s got to happen inside first.” ― Jim Morrison