LISA OLIVERA

PETALUMA --

Copperfield's Books welcomes author and licensed psychotherapist Lisa Olivera to Petaluma in celebration of her profound new book - When the Ache Remains: Lessons on Tending to the Unfixable and Finding Beauty Anyway.

Join us for a reading and warm discussion, followed by an audience Q&A and booksigning.

This is a free event, registration recommended.

"In When the Ache Remains, Olivera gently accompanies us into our hidden corners, encouraging us to discover our inherent goodness, awakening us to all that is possible when we open to the full range of our emotional experience." -- Sharon Salzberg, author of Lovingkindness and Real Life

Psychotherapist and author of Already Enough, Lisa Olivera blends her own personal experience of living with depression with therapeutic wisdom in a moving exploration of the emotional pain each of us lives with to offer readers guidance on holding the ache alongside the beauty.

Emotional pain, of all kinds and magnitudes, is part of life. We'll never be able to find ourselves free of it; no meditation or amount of therapy will cure us of the harder parts of being alive. The practice of turning toward the ache with care--reverence, even--might be one of the most meaningful gifts we can give ourselves. It might even save us.

Lisa Olivera has confronted this reality for years as a therapist, weaving her exploration of it throughout her popular newsletter, Human Stuff. She asks questions like, how do we confront and tend to the painful parts of being human without letting that pain entirely overtake us? How do we find joy even when depression visits, even when we lose someone we love, even when the hurt of the world is ever-present? How do we cultivate aliveness in the midst?

When the Ache Remains explores these questions for readers in a tender and wise exploration of how ache shapes life, how we can alchemize our pain into medicine, and how presence is accessible even in the midst of difficulty. Blending deeply personal narrative, humanistic psychology, lessons from nature, words of nourishment, and her naturally poetic undertone, Lisa invites readers on a journey alongside her as she explores the impact of depression and the process of learning to tend to it, and all of our aches, in more open, integrative, and loving ways.

Author: Lisa Olivera is a writer, author, licensed psychotherapist, mother, and creator of the Human Stuff newsletter. Over the last decade, she has supported thousands of people in remembering their true selves and embracing the multitudes of being human. She has worked in schools, community-based mental health, and private practice, all of which inform her lens of the world. Lisa’s work has been highlighted in publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Good Morning America, and The Guardian. She has appeared on many podcasts including Adoptees On, Hurry Slowly, and Off the Grid. Her debut book, Already Enough, was published in 2022. She lives in Northern California with her husband, daughter and two cats.

Praise:

"Lisa's writing feels like testimony and lament. There were moments while reading when a sentence would snatch my soul and wrap it up gently. Reading When the Ache Remains felt like someone was lovingly applying an ointment on a wound with relief and soothing felt immediately. A deep anchor and a flotation device in a raging sea. I was transported and changed when I finished reading. Lisa can write! This book is a gift and prayer." -- Tricia Hersey, founder of The Nap Ministry, performance artist, and author of New York Times bestselling Rest is Resistance and We Will Rest!

"Lisa Olivera's approach to the deep work of loss and suffering will be a blessing to anyone who encounters her work."-- Francis Weller, author of The Wild Edge of Sorrow and In the Absence of the Ordinary

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