In the sequel to Wisdom from the Streets, Dr. Kedric H. Cecil reflects on further examples from his life as a teenage runaway on the streets of Seattle, exploring his own experiences of trauma and abuse which often led to further problems and issues in adulthood. Following many years as a university professor and family therapist in clinical and residential treatment settings, the author describes his own life struggles and offers realistic and practical suggestions for personal transformation and empowerment.
Reviews
“The book depicts vulnerability as a strength…an asset to reach the unreachable. It pushes you to come up with your own truth, rather than fall into a pattern that was only developed in your mind because others told you it was so. The book allows you the permission to heal and reminds you boundaries are essential. I highly recommend this read to anyone who has a pulse. Growth happens, it’s not just a book.”
—Jen Tveraa, Adult Felony Probation & Parole Officer
Moonlight in Mud Puddles is a captivating and emotional read that celebrates the duality in the journey of life. Taking the reader along for the ride, I found myself both laughing and crying when reading this. Dr. Cecil shares intense past experiences, the science of trauma, clinical experience and humor while finding true self love. Anyone with a past who has ever struggled to understand themselves should read this book. In a beautiful dance between past and present, Dr. Cecil reminds us that we cannot run from ourselves and that we don’t need to.
—Chelsey Duenow, Licensed Addiction Counselor
Kedric H. Cecil weaves his personal story with psychological theories and affecting insights from tumultuous experiences of his own and others. Speaking both from personal depth and insights into the lives of others, the winding path of this book involves and inspires the reader. He includes conversations between himself as a young man and as a mature doctor of psychology. Hope is the glue which holds this book together, reflected like the image of its evocative title.
—Marcia Melton, Author
I recently had the pleasure of reading Ric Cecils book. I enjoyed the read very much and learned a lot more about my friend than I previously knew. It was an enjoyable ride through his life experiences that resulted in his realization of what his clarity of truth is, thus enabling him to reach out to help others heal from the same maladies that occupied much of his youth.
As an author myself, I found Ric’s use of his own life experiences to reference his problems and solutions, as an effective way to share with others how life “happens”!
There is no formula that works the same for everyone and it is the differences that offer up solutions we may not have access to within our own individual “self”. Ric does a great job of sharing with the reader that everyone has something to offer regardless of how we may feel about ourselves at any given time. That is perhaps the hardest thing to get across to any person who is “distracted” from seeing with clarity. Ric makes this quite clear in his quest.
—Jerry McGowan, Author
Sneak Peek
» The Conversation
Moonlight in Mud Puddles speaks to the amazing synchronicity that happens when the dark and the light impact each other to bring balance and harmony into all the world. Instead of running back and forth between the extremes, we need to embrace the function of both, and be inspired when the Moonlight is reflected in the places we feel stuck the most.
» 1. The Sadness Shield
As a runaway, I often thought about trying to go back to places we had lived before where I had friends and life made better sense, and somehow, all the broken pieces would magically come together again.
» 2. In a Trance
In my own healing process, I have become able to reframe my dissociative experience as the greatest training I could ever imagine to help others with similar problems. I am often astounded by the stories of other abuse victims with similar experiences, and how not only time seems to be suspended, but also the laws of physics as we know them.
Since it is my conscious mind by which I know myself, it’s amazing to think that I have a brain that is capable of protecting me when I’m not able to protect myself.
I don’t understand how that could be even close to reality, but my answer for such a possibility is a quote from Hamlet: There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
I stand in awe of the process.
» 3. A Fresh Start
I just couldn’t seem to break the pattern of starting well yet finishing disastrously. It was never my intention to fail so badly or so often, but I just couldn’t get a handle to put the brakes on my rapid descent into the abyss. My future looked bleak, yet somehow I still had a flicker of hope that something would happen to bring the change that was so badly needed.
I had no idea that in a few years, when it actually happened, it would be accompanied by so much more chaos!
» 4. The Misfit
My Intermittent Explosive Disorder as described in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders comes from the darkest and most distant places of my soul. Anger is easy to bury because it blocks out almost all other feelings until something triggers it. My sudden explosive anger often erupted when I least expected, giving the impression that it had a will of its own. The truth, however, is that my anger kept me safe on the streets. It became almost an autonomic response when the street kid within sensed danger or felt threatened in some way.
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The addiction to my approval fix became almost as strong as my need to run away. I lived in a self-defeating cycle of seeking approval, even by helping others, yet ready to run away at a moment’s notice if someone’s response hurt my feelings or threatened my existence in some unimaginable way.
» 5. Transfiguration
As I had so often in my troubled existence, I just wanted to give up because I had nothing left to live for. It seemed that nothing I had ever done had any meaning or purpose other than to send me into a dark abyss with the only light illuminating every failure in exquisite detail.
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Many people have asked what turned me around in the first place from a pathway of self-destruction, toward being able to offer help to others with similar issues. The answer is: In addition to a whole lot of life experiences that brought me to the brink of a disaster, I experienced a touch of the miraculous from heaven and an anxiety disorder from hell!
» 6. Even in This Darkness
As a Family Therapist and University Professor, I have had many opportunities to relate to patients, and students in the throes of anxiety disorders and panic attacks. Often, like the first patient I told, they said, “Wow, it’s so comforting to know that someone understands being trapped in the feelings of this nightmare.”
“But what did it take to get better?”
Of course, the answer is, that because the anxiety disorders are always present in the memories and mindset of the subconscious, the healing process must be constant and can include many components. It may be facilitated by medication or mindfulness. We can participate in a variety of therapies and ideas which help us learn to relax, reframe our experiences, and relive our distress no matter what the reality that confronts us.
But ultimately it is essential that we confront our greatest apprehensions and anxieties and change the way we think about everything!
» 7. Almost Broken
I have often found that the best way to really help troubled kids is to show a vulnerability, which slips in underneath their defenses. At those times a therapeutic window opens briefly, and if recognized in time by a caring helper, an opportunity for trust and healing emerges.
» 8. Grandma’s Recipe
Beyond the scope of the genetic predetermination, the family system instills in its members patterns of behavior and attitudes, which impact every emotional and social involvement in an individual’s life.
» 9. Into the Unknown
I was a former “Street Kid,” still rebelling against the establishment, who was better at helping others with issues similar to mine, and needed to emphasize what I was good at rather than trying to live up to the expectations of others who saw my potential, but became furious with my performance. I also had a lot of lessons yet to learn, as I continued matriculation in the Graduate School of Good Intentions, marked with self-destruction and chaos just around every corner.
» 10. Soul Train
Staying close to my children became my primary objective, and they stayed with me on weekends, and whenever else possible. Eric, at seven years old, summed up his feelings about the marital breakup and its impact one weekend when he declared, I like this divorce thing, Dad. I get to spend a lot of time with you, you and mom aren’t fighting and yelling all the time, and I get two birthdays and two Christmas’s with more presents than I ever got when you and mom were together!
It seemed that everything would work out just fine… at least in the mind of a child.
» 11. Mad Indulgence
In my wildest dreams, or more aptly, nightmares, I could never imagine becoming a meth addict. No premonition or intuition even hinted at the upcoming disaster.
There was no awareness that I was about to climb to the highest tower on the bridge, and willingly jump off into the deepest part of the abyss. I could not blame any precipitating event or any other person in my life. I alone was responsible for doing the “first line,” and of course, I was responsible, many years ago, for doing the last!
» 12. A Time to Heal
Breaking the cycle of addiction requires a major change in the way we think about everything. Addictions manifest in different forms, but have one overriding trait in common. They are dominated by a misguided attempt at self-soothing to the exclusion of everything and everyone else in the addict’s world.
Sometimes, no matter what becomes our motivation or how badly we truly want to quit, change is only possible because of a significant wake-up-call.
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As I forged ahead in new ways to actualize self-empowerment, I developed Seven Principles of Personal Transformation:
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The Seven Principles of Personal Transformation are not an attempt to suggest deceptively simple solutions to complicated problems. However, simplicity often provides insight which is most profound, if for no other reason than it is easier to remember and actually works.
The wake-up-calls, and the lessons, both tragic and triumphant, propel me toward an awareness of what’s really important, as I choose to embrace life in all its glory!
» 13. Connected
Life is such an incredible journey. When we learn from yesterday, and live in the present, we are liberated in the future.
Those who have been traumatized as children are often stuck in a past that is too painful to remember, yet too poignant to forget. The past often feels too fearful to face, the present ready to erupt into chaos, with a future that promises only more of the same.
But, when we celebrate the experiences that have taught us so much, a transformation process begins that will revolutionize our entire lives.