Courageous Well-being: Strategies for Personal and Professional Renewal

Coping and self-confidence in your work require taking the time to understand the evidence-based literature and use effective strategies to enhance your well-being, find meaning in your work and discover joy and support in relationships. This session will explore the essence of courageous well-being. Based on evidence-based strategies, attendees will explore nontraditional approaches to minimize the consequences of stress and trauma—through nature, the arts, and creativity as indispensable wellsprings of respite and joy. The profound healing effects of advocacy for health and well-being are also introduced. Attendees will receive several handouts with practices and guides for use in their work and home lives.

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Continuing Education (CE) credits are not available for webinar playbacks.
Target Audience: Counselors, Social workers, Bereavement support professionals
Instructional Level: Basic – This best describes a topic or issue that the prospective audience is encountering for the first time in a meaningful way.

Objectives:

After attending this webinar, participants will be able to:

• Discuss how working with bereaved children and their families can put professionals and volunteers at risk for empathic distress fatigue, vicarious grief, ongoing stress, or burnout.
• Describe the six elements of psychological well-being.
• Explore how trauma and vicarious grief are carried in our bodies, hearts, and minds and the strategies used to manage the consequences of their work.

Speaker Bio:

Donna Gaffney, DNSc, PMHCNS-BC, FAAN, an advanced practice nurse-psychotherapist, author and educator, works with individuals, communities, and professional nurses in the aftermath of personal and national crises — 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, and the Coronavirus pandemic. Donna provides pro-bono psychotherapy through the Emotional PPE Project and facilitates Virtual Schwartz Rounds for the New Jersey Nursing Emotional Well-Being Institute. With extensive experience in classroom, experiential and online education, she offers workshops, presentations and webinars nationally and internationally. Donna has taught and directed graduate programs at the International Trauma Studies Program, Columbia and Seton Hall Universities. Her webinar series at the beginning of the pandemic, Healing Ourselves, While Healing Others, was offered through Rutgers University School of Nursing and the Northeastern University School Health Academy. In addition to academic papers, book chapters, and articles for the lay press, Donna is the author of The Seasons of Grief, Helping Children Grow Through Loss. Donna holds graduate degrees from Columbia and Rutgers Universities, and the University of Pennsylvania. She received the 2021 APNA Award for Excellence in Practice – APRN. In 2023 her book Courageous Well-Being for Nurses will be published by Johns Hopkins University Press.

Nicole C. Foster, MA, NBC-HWC is a national board-certified health and wellness coach, consultant, and writer. She is Head of Coaching at Lief Therapeutics, a start-up that offers the only mental health wearable device using HRV-Biofeedback. At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, she self-published an eBook, Well-Being in the Waiting: Finding Presence During Unprecedented Times, and provided complimentary copies to healthcare workers. Nicole collaborates with the With Grace Initiative, a non-profit organization supporting children with cancer, providing pro-bono workshops that promote connection, support, and psychosocial education in their Warriors of Wellness series.

She is a graduate of Columbia University’s Spirituality, Mind-Body Institute and holds a Master of Arts in Psychology. Her personal essays surrounding the loss of her father in the terrorist attacks of 9/11 have been published in New York Magazine and Maria Shriver’s Sunday Paper. She is the co-author of Courageous Well-Being for Nurses, to be published by Johns Hopkins University Press in September 2023. Learn more about her work at www.NicoleCFoster.com and @NicoleCFoster on Instagram.

Supported by the philanthropic investment
of the New York Life Foundation.