Working in today’s healthcare environment, with its increasing emphasis on profits, can result in our forgetting why we are here. This reductionistic climate is the antithesis of mental health and caring. To resurrect the culture of caring and help us reconnect with ourselves as nurses, the Center for Caring (CFC) at University Health System, based on the principles of Dr. Jean Watson’s Transpersonal Nursing, was established in 2003. During the first annual CFC retreat, the nurses created group Mandalas. This paper explores how the process of creating Mandalas gave participants the freedom to connect with themselves and each other, by living, imagining, and sharing Transpersonal Nursing in their lives.

The purpose of the article is to provide a deeper understanding of the guidance of nursing students from a caring science perspective. The methodological approach is Gadamerian (2004) hermeneutics. Interviews are used in sampling and analyzing data (Kvale, 1996). The main findings were confirmation, reflection, and authority. This article focuses on the phenomenon of confirmation only. The main aspects of confirmation are that it includes genuine interest and care, makes nursing students feel secure and is a key to development, strengthens the relationship in a group and between individuals, and is a good base for reflection.

This essay, based on my personal reflections as a cancer patient, examines the impact that knowledge and power associated with professional position has on the care given to healthcare providers when they become patients. Lessons learned through this experience, which can enhance future professional practice, include never underestimating a patient’s personal knowing, taking notice when a patient says that enough is enough, and never using coercion and allowing caring to become oppressive and disempowering.