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Friday, July 01 2011

 

Drama Remedy

 

       I love being an introvert.  While I'm friendly and sociable on the outside, the interior is my true home.  I'm regenerated by quiet times in the wilds of Mother Nature and by adventures in the wilderness within.  There's richness in that inner life, creativity in the quiet – ideas, speculations, stories, things to be written and shared.

 

       However, there is a downside: drama.  While imaginary conversations and creative inner realities can be entertaining – like going to the movies or reading a novel – more often than not, they create suffering.  I get caught up in stories of judgment and woe, painting dark and dangerous inner landscapes.  When I go unconscious with drama, what's true out there often gets distorted by "realities" in here.  I know extraverts also have challenges with inner drama, but, as an introvert, I feel particularly vulnerable in this area.  (That may be a story, as well, but for now I'm sticking to it.)

 

       The other day during a drama-laden meditation, a suggestion came my way:  Breathe light into the belly and exhale drama out through the third eye (at the center of the forehead).  I imagined butterflies flitting out my forehead into the universe.  (Bats might work as well.)  As the drama cleared, like water from rusty pipes, I experimented with inhaling light as before and exhaling love – first through the forehead and then through the heart.  At some point, I slipped into quiet spaciousness. 

 

       A couple days later, another suggestion arrived:  Observe the drama.  It points us toward our wounds and, if we're mindful, toward healing.

      

Posted by: AT 09:58 am   |  Permalink   |  Email
Wednesday, June 22 2011


A Healing Story

 

 

       A physician friend of mine, one of the most heroic people I've ever known, wrote in response to last week's wisdom.  I was touched and thought you might be too.  

 

 

     "Yes, isn't that it?! The Lakota traditional healer, Fools Crow, talked about being a 'hollow bone' for the spirits to work through - that healing comes from them, and we are just the conduit. 

     "Once, at a cancer retreat in a remote area, I developed one of the worst migraines of my life and laid there flattened in the lower level, when a lady kept sitting by me doing her knitting.  I remember being annoyed by her presence.  After a while, she quietly asked if I would like to be rid of my headache (!) and when I assented (another requirement), she touched my head and said, 'You think this is where your headache is coming from - your head - but it's really down here (base of my neck).'  She fluffed her hands around lightly in my hair and I thought 'no way is this going to do anything!'

     "Suddenly, boom, the headache was completely gone. She told me she had been in CD treatment and everybody had their meds taken away and they were all sick with headaches and one lady asked her to rub her neck and suddenly the lady's headache was gone and that's when she realized she had this gift. She said it is only for headaches and doesn't know why she has it, but attributes it to powers outside her. She went on to heal them all as they lined up in front of her... I walked upstairs and tried to tell everyone what just happened and they didn't 'get' it. I was just stunned. Ever since then I really believe in those things.  A few weeks after this, she died of metastatic breast cancer."

 

 

       Healing abounds.  Its miracle occurs daily in our lives – usually in small ways we hardly notice.  Sometimes, we heal dramatically – as in this story and many others.  Healing often includes a physical cure, but not always. 

 

       Notice its happening.  Notice, it's happening!

 

 

 

Posted by: AT 10:28 am   |  Permalink   |  Email
Sunday, June 12 2011

 

One Heart Healing

 

       Not long ago, Joanie awoke with a sore throat and asked for a healing.  My usual approach is to open to the loving energy of the universe, inviting it to gather in my heart and flow outward through my hands.

 

       This morning, however, I'd been fretting about work and was having some trouble focusing.  As I began the healing, a doubt arose.  "What if my heart isn't pure enough and I'm sending 'contaminated' energy?"

 

       Almost immediately, an answer arrived.  "Let your heart remember its union with the One Heart.  Let the One Heart be the healer."

 

       Once again, I get the message.  It's not about me, and it's not all up to me.  Relieved in spirit - and relieved of duty - I step aside and let the universe work its magic.

 

     

 

     

 

      

Posted by: AT 06:30 pm   |  Permalink   |  Email
Sunday, June 05 2011

 

Joy Job

 

       For many people I see – including, sometimes, the guy in the mirror – an inner judge, a kind of killjoy, drives our doing.  Do more.  Do better.  Do faster.

 

       As I sat with someone recently, this message arrived:

 

 

The joy is

just as

important as

the job.

 

 

Posted by: AT 04:20 pm   |  Permalink   |  Email
Wednesday, May 25 2011

Five Winners

 

       I love to think about relationship from a spiritual perspective.  I'm enchanted by the mystery of it all and intrigued by the notion that intimacy is a dance of uniqueness and oneness.  I'm inspired by the idea that every act of human love contributes to an expanding universe of Love, and I'm heartened to remember that, goofy as we are with each other at the level of personality, we're all madly in love with each other at the level of soul.

 

       In my work as a psychologist and relationship coach, I usually approach the subject more pragmatically.  I'm likely to focus on skillful communication and win-win problem solving strategies.  I invite clients, especially men, to consider the principle of "enlightened self-interest."  From this perspective, generosity is good business.  If we listen respectfully to our partners, honoring their needs as well as our own, we're much more likely to achieve our heart's desire.

 

       In The New Rules of Marriage, Terrence Real has written a powerfully practical book about intimate relationship.  In last week's posting, I reviewed five relational strategies that don't work.  Here are what Real calls: "The Five Winning Strategies."

 

·        Shifting from complaint to request – moving from a focus on what's negative in the past to positive possibilities for the future.  More specifically he advises:  "Don't criticize, ask! …  Criticizing what your partner has done wrong rarely engenders an attitude of increased generosity … Great relationships mean more assertion up front and less resentment on the back end."

·        Speaking out with love and savvy – remembering that you're talking to someone you love and being clear about what you want to accomplish.  He's speaking here about a deeply respectful style of assertion that empowers your partner and helps him/her give you what you want.  "A disempowered partner is seldom generous." 

·        Responding with generosity – listening to your partner with a generous heart, temporarily setting aside your own agenda, responding generously, being of service, giving what you can.  "When listening with generosity, points of contention become points of curiosity … When your partner confronts you about some behavior or character flaw, do a one-eighty on defensiveness.  Rather than deny whatever you can, admit whatever you can … Transform argument into acknowledgment."

·        Empowering each other – How can I give you what you want and help you give me what I want?  In relationship, we commit to teamwork, to helping each other succeed.  This, of course, requires overt conversation between partners about how to succeed with each other.  Terrence is not inviting a covert manipulation, as in:  How can I get you to do what I want?

·        Cherishing – cherishing what you have and keeping it strong, moving from appreciation deficiency to appreciation proficiency.  Focus on what you have rather than on what you have not.  Notice what you love about your partner.  Feed your connection.  According to John Gottman, healthy relationship requires that positive interactions outweigh the negative ones by a factor of at least five or six to one.  Sometimes it's a bit of a stretch for us to have it so good.  So, we need to ask ourselves:  How good can I stand it?

 

 

       Terrence Real summarizes this way:  "These winning strategies equip you to succeed in the critical tasks of getting, giving, and having.  The first two strategies, shifting from complaint to request and speaking out with love and savvy, help you get what you need.  The second two strategies, responding with generosity and empowering each other, help you give everything that you can to your partner and your relationship.  The last winning strategy, cherishing, helps you grow, sustain and honor all that you have."

 

       Works for me.

Posted by: AT 11:10 am   |  Permalink   |  Email
Wednesday, May 18 2011


Partnership

 

       Ordinarily, I'm not a big fan of self-help books.  Last week, I bumped into one, The New Rules of Marriage by Terrence Real, that really (pun discovered, not intended) speaks to me – and I've only read the first half.

 

       Terrence lists five relational strategies that don't work:

 

·        Needing to be right – trying to convince your partner that your point of view is the correct one.  Actually, who's right matters little in relationship.

·        Controlling your partner – almost always generates resistance, a great way to get stuck in power battles.

·        Un-bridled self-expression – often confused with honesty, letting it all hang out, without regard to the effect on your partner, usually does more harm than good.

·        Retaliation – when we get hurt in relationship, we often feel victimized and, perhaps, entitled to retaliate.  We tend to think that if we punish our offending partner, we're more likely to be safe from future "offenses".  Not true.  War begets war.

·        Withdrawal – when we withdraw emotionally or physically from connection with our partner, relationship withers.  There are times when we need to pull back to re-group, but that's always with the intention to re-engage.  There are also times when we make a conscious decision to accept some aspect of a relationship, rather than fight a losing battle.  This mature letting go is not a withdrawal of connection or affection.

 

       So, what does work?  Terrence Real presents a model he calls "relationship empowerment."  Here, we move past the personal empowerment model, where I advocate for me, you advocate for you, and we both presume this path will lead to a good result (which it sometimes does).  In the relationship empowerment model, we are invited, not to settle for "good", but to go for "great."  We honor the individual, we listen deeply to ourselves and to each other, and we work together to give birth to something larger than me or you – a relational entity, an "us".  We advocate for us.

 

       This is not a co-dependent model, where we assume responsibility for each other.  It's a partnership were we are responsible, together, for what we create.

 

       This level of partnership:  As an approach to marriage (and other unions), it has a nice "ring" to it.

 

 

PS.  Stay tuned.  Next week, I'll share some thoughts from the second half of the book, including five strategies that do work.

 

Posted by: AT 08:24 pm   |  Permalink   |  Email
Tuesday, May 10 2011

 

Alone and All One

 

       As I approach the mystery, I see life – especially relational life – as a dance of uniqueness and oneness.  We are alone and all one.

 

       Here is a passage from the book, Who Dies, by Stephen Levine that speaks eloquently of life's invitation to embrace both aspects of being.  The Levine quote is followed by a poem I wrote years ago, Oddly One. 


       Enjoy.

 

       "As soon as the mind's conditioning to be someone arises, a kind of pain comes into our heart.  A feeling of being alone.  It is the loneliness of our separateness.  Our alienation from the universal.  But when we sit quietly with that loneliness and let it float in the mind, it dissolves into an 'aloneness' which is not lonely, but is rather a recognition that we are each alone in the One…. To change the intense loneliness of our personal isolation into an 'aloneness with God,' we must gently let go of control and stop re-creating the imagined self.  We must surrender our specialness, our competition, our comparing minds."  Stephen Levine.

 

 

Oddly One

 

If we follow

Our uniqueness,

We’re all

A bit weird.

 

Odd ducks

In God’s pond.

 

Oddly One.

 

 

 

Posted by: AT 10:33 am   |  Permalink   |  Email
Tuesday, May 03 2011

 

Weekend with Richard

 

       I just spent a delightful – literally full of light – weekend with master teacher and mentor, Richard Moss.  A private session on Sunday was sandwiched between workshops on Saturday and Monday.  Each experience was an inspiration, a healing, a heart-opening expansion of spirit.  Here's a small sample of the teaching, as I've incorporated it.

 

 

       Most of us have become masters in the art of poisoning ourselves over and over with a limited number of suffering stories that take us away from the center of being into judgments about ourselves, about others, about the past, or about the future.  To the extent we get caught up in these stories, our aliveness is diminished as we shrink into smaller versions of ourselves.

 

       The stories may feel true, but they're fictional in nature, an artifact of ego.  Don’t believe them.  Don't identify with them.  The only thing we know for sure that's real about these stories is the effect they have on us right now, the damage they do us. 

 

       With mindfulness and the techniques of "relaxed readiness" and "focused spaciousness," we can choose to let go of story and stay alive in the richness of sensation, feeling and creativity in the present moment.  "Spiritual muscle" is exercised by the discipline of gently and persistently bringing awareness back to our bodies and our immediate experience in the now.  As Richard says, "Who I am begins now."

 

       Presence in the now is a gateway to an inner spaciousness, the realization that we are much bigger than any story or problem we can have.  In compassionate spaciousness, we can create a "holding environment" for any human feeling or experience – observing it, making room for it, allowing it to move naturally within us and through us toward integration and transformation.  Thus, we become friends with ourselves, comfortable in our own skins, available for deeper connection with others and with all of life.

 

       Along with insight, compassion and a personal embodiment of these teachings, Richard offers practical methodology and tools for healing and expansion.  His teaching is uniquely accessible and powerfully relevant.  I encourage you to check out his website:  www.richardmoss.com   

 

       Maybe with a book, retreat or free e-course, you too can have a weekend with Richard.

 

        

Posted by: AT 10:41 pm   |  Permalink   |  Email
Wednesday, April 20 2011

 

Whyte on Heartbreak

 

 

       Poet and philosopher, David Whyte has written, among many beautiful works, a book entitled The Three Marriages, in which he delves deeply into the intimate relationships we have with a partner in life, with our vocation and with our deepest self.

 

       Recently, he delivered a keynote address at the Psychotherapy Networker convention in Washington, D.C.  My good friend Kirk was there, bought a recording of the talk and lent it to me.

 

       Here's an excerpt from David's keynote:

 

 

       "When you think about it, there is no journey of sincerity that a human being can take in life without having their heart broken.  And there's no love affair you can follow, without that imaginary organ being rent asunder at one time or another.  And there's no marriage, no matter how happy it is, that won't leave you helpless and wanting at times, leaving you literally with a broken heart.

 

       "Not only that, there is no work you can follow without having your heart broken.  If you are sincere about your vocation, you will get to thresholds where you will not know how to proceed, and where you will forget yourself, and where you will start to imprison yourself with the very endeavor that was first a doorway to freedom.

 

       "And then, in that third marriage with the self, a really sincere examination of the old interior substrate should, if you are sincere, lead to existential disappointment.  And, if you don't become disappointed in yourself, you're not trying.

 

       "So, it's interesting to think that there is no path a human being can take with real courage that doesn't lead to real heartbreak.  It's astonishing to see how human beings actually spend an enormous amount of their time and energy turning away from that possibility and trying to arrange for a life where you won't be touched and you'll be left immune by the great forces and elements of life.

 

       "And, of course, when you leave those forces and elements behind, you leave the very genius at the heart of what you're attempting to bring into the world, to incarnate into the world, including the incarnation of your own presence."

 

 

       By the way, I don't think David is trying to romanticize heartbreak.  As I listen, I hear an invitation to soften to heartbreak, to make room for it rather than run from it, to appreciate its teaching, to keep a sense of humor about it, and to cultivate what he calls "robust vulnerability" – a necessary courage for those who aspire to live in integrity.

Posted by: AT 10:35 am   |  Permalink   |  Email
Sunday, April 10 2011

 

 

Inside-Out Healing

 

       A wonderful teacher is coming to Minnesota at the end of April.  I have experienced a ten-day retreat and a number of workshops with Richard Moss and have come away each time deeply moved and more deeply connected.  His work, his wisdom and his presence bring together the spiritual and psychological, inviting a deep integrity with self, with others and with life.

 

       Inside-Out Healing, his most recent book (on which the Minnesota workshop is based), offers gem after gem of uncommon wisdom, along with a practical methodology to access the power of presence in the now as a gateway to spaciousness, transformation and healing.  If you're interested in the book, the work or the workshop, please check out the website:  www.healing.richardmoss.com

 

       While there's no way to capture the depth of Richard's wisdom with a quote or two, I'd like to share a couple passages from the end of the book – passages among many that touched and inspired me.

 

 

       "When you are no longer the doer, that is when something deeper within you begins to live through you.  This is a state of remarkable aliveness.  This is what every athlete, artist, and writer has discovered at some time in his or her career…

 

       "When you become a vehicle for your inner wisdom, you are witness to an inner creator, and that experience gives you faith in yourself and a sense of marvel about what is hidden within you that, given a chance, can live through you.  It also offers you profound appreciation for all those who have let their deeper

aliveness and inner genius be born through them…

 

       "This is really what it comes down to: risking to let yourself become radically alive.  It will help you heal.  At the very least it may soothe your body and take away pain.  Being that alive, even if only for a matter of moments, may actually cure you of illness.  But even if that doesn't happen, your heart will be overflowing with gratitude.  And there is no medicine more powerful than the energy of your own grateful heart."

 

      

 

Posted by: AT 12:16 pm   |  Permalink   |  Email


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