About Me

CALL ME JILL

My online journal is much like me;  just as your journal will reveal both known and hidden aspects of yourself.  In fact,  Joan Didion  was very accurate when she said, “I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and want and what I fear.”  And once we know a bit more about ourselves, we find that our writing shows that enlightenment.   Writing helps us know ourselves. And it has a way of sharing ourselves with others in a way that can help them heal, just as our writing can heal us. So expect me to explore this aspect as well as techniques to grow our strengths and reduce our conflicts.

A lot of my writings share myself, as I’ve been writing for over seven decades—scribbles, published articles, books, journals,  numerous college research papers, pen pal letters, love letters, stories, and even collections of others’ thoughts that spoke to mine.  My desk usually has a problem of my finding clear space on its surface. 

I am a crone, who has been through the mill of life with a few more years to go. I was once told by a Lutheran minister I was on the road to hell because I had seen sad faces on a clump of trees whose companions had been cut down.  In the opposite direction, I’ve been told there is no one to pray to, but I have had my prayers answered. I believe that God is the energy exhibited by love, not a physical being that sits on a cloud in heaven and judges us when we die. I see nothing more healing than that creative energy within us and others. 

I have learned that things we do to deliberately hurt another must be paid for by us.  We are not punished by God, but by our own actions, and that includes those acts done in ignorance, through our fear of being separate and alone in the world, or because of our inability to forgive ourselves and others. This is known as karma, or in the common terminology “what goes out comes back around.” Karma is a way for us to learn which actions are beneficial and which are harmful and need to be changed. 

I continue to grow in understanding and recently a new understanding of fear came. I believe we need to look at what we do in fear. Fear is probably the main cause of the problems in our lives here on Earth. We seek to protect ourselves from loss and hurt and do harmful acts without considering the full consequences. In fact, in the new book I am writing, I ended up with four articles on fear addressing four different aspects of fear and solutions we can apply to live more fearlessly.

However, here, because I see everything as spiritual in its basic nature, you will find practical suggestions such as an article on straightening out your finances or ways to relieve stress. You may also discover me dipping into Shamanism or Buddhism or some practice like tapping. I may share an animal story or talk about rituals and ceremonies and other techniques I continue to use from to time.  Those items could be a gratitude journal, a fire ceremony, or techniques such as mandala making, creating an upside-down doll, sandpainting, or something else creative.

I will answer your questions and hopefully tickle your fancy with things like poetry, a short story, an exercise, or a chapter from one of my books. Life should be joyous. In the upheaval and change in our lives now, I hope to help you find some of that joyousness as well.

I am eclectic! To quote Walt Whitman in Leaves of Grass—

“Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I am large,

I contain multitudes.”

And so are you. My credentials follow.

Jill Hance Bakke, Ed.D.

• Formerly Licensed as a clinical counselor in Montana, New Jersey, and Colorado.

• Certified by Association for Financial Counseling & Planning Education, 

(AFCPE)— resigned in 2014 Emeritus standing.

• Formerly licensed as a clinical hypnotherapist.

• Shamanic Training with several professional teachers.

• Graduated Suma cum laude from Montana State University, Bozeman, MT.

• Writer and Teacher.