mindingmybiz

This blog is my shared process in working towards integrating self-awareness with all other aspects of life, while on my way to becoming more authentic and whole.

24 Jun 2026

The Weight of What Adults Cannot Face

Before children ever blame a parent, they blame themselves. A child will twist themselves into knots to believe their parent is safe, because the truth is too terrifying to hold. And when adults can’t reflect or repair, children assume the fault must be theirs.

Children developmentally interpret conflict with their parents or other attachment figures as their own doing — and even more so, as evidence that something is wrong with them — especially when shame is induced, implicitly or explicitly. Because children depend on their parents for survival, the idea that a parent cannot provide emotional or intellectual safety is more frightening than believing, “This must be my fault.”

Decades of developmental and attachment research show that when children cannot rely on their parents for emotional, relational, and intellectual care — beyond basic physical needs — it can contribute to developmental trauma.

This isn’t about blaming parents. Most adults are doing the best they can with the capacities, histories, and models they were given. Parenting that extends beyond the physical and material into the emotional, relational, and spiritual realm nurtures children’s developing brains and nervous systems. And when those deeper forms of guidance, attunement, and protection aren’t predictably available or restored, the impact is significant — not because parents are “bad,” but because children are still forming their sense of safety, self, and reality.

If you’d like to explore the research behind this, look up authors such as Daniel Siegel, Tina Bryson, Allan Schore, Peter Fonagy, John Bowlby, and others who have spent decades studying how children develop in the context of relationships.

Spiritually speaking, the non-material aspects of human experience — intellect, emotion, and relationship — require dependable, humble parenting. Some parents struggle to provide this because of their own histories, stressors, or limited support. This is understandable. Parenting is profoundly difficult, and many adults were never shown the emotional skills they now need to give.

At the same time, there are parents who do have access to resources, stability, and support — and yet remain highly defended, emotionally unavailable, or unwilling to grow because it doesn’t initially or instantly feel good. This is a different category. These patterns are not about poverty, single parenting, or survival stress. They are about rigid defenses that block reflection, repair, and relational responsibility. And this is where my voice steps in as an advocate for children.

When parents repeatedly make relational missteps and do not recognize them, own them, or repair them, the child absorbs the cost. This is not a reflection of the child’s worth or behavior. It reflects a mismatch between what the child developmentally needs and what the parent is willing or able to offer.

When parents leave a void by refusing reflective repair because it’s too uncomfortable — and this persists for decades — something is out of order. To be that out of touch with your children for so long, and for that pattern to ripple into the next generation, is a sign of intergenerational trauma maintained by extremely rigid defenses.

When adults who have been grown for decades still avoid reflective work despite relational fallouts, estrangements, and fractured connections — and instead defend themselves by avoiding or blaming others, including their own children — we’re witnessing something that runs counter to our natural evolutionary instincts to protect and nurture our young beyond material needs.

This usually results in an interpersonal life that does not support close, secure relationships. And yet some continue as if this isn’t a significant enough problem to address.

In contrast:

People who feel discomfort — shame, fear, anxiety, guilt, grief, anger — and choose to self-reflect, change, heal, and grow are demonstrating a courageous and adaptive response that becomes more available in adulthood. This contrast matters, because many people have never encountered it. All they’ve known are individuals who live in defensive extremes.

To be clear: My purpose in writing this is to advocate for children — not to suggest that children should never be challenged, corrected, or held accountable for their missteps. Accountability is essential. But it must be offered in ways that preserve a child’s dignity, understands developmental capacities, and teaches them how to self-reflect, by modeling it yourself — a skill they will need throughout their lives.

As the saying goes: If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. If you teach a man how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime.

The same principle applies to children. If you give them rules, expectations, or checklists, you help them for a moment. But if you teach them to think critically and reflectively — rather than merely obediently — you give them a skillset they can use across many contexts throughout their life. You help them build resilience and adaptability for whatever life brings.

Parenting is a long game. It is profoundly difficult to do well — but possible, and deeply rewarding.

May we all learn to reflect more, rely less on defenses, and mind our emotional biz — for the sake of the children who depend on us.

Posted in emotional health, mental health, personal growth, personal healing, spirituality, Wisdom and tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment
14 Sep 2025

An Open Letter to Influencers of Public Discourse

In the Wake of Ideological Violence and the Assassination of Charlie Kirk

A Call To Those Who Shape Narrative

How you speak about “the other” matters – especially when you likely hold influence over those who are navigating a crisis of meaning-making, often while feeling isolated and disconnected.

Young people are longing for a worldview that offers identity, congruence, and meaning. They want something substantial – directional, reliable, coherent, and rooted in communal ethos or ideological kinship.

Please hold this responsibility with reverence and urgency.

We are witnessing an uptick in ideologically and politically motivated violence – what feels like tribal warfare, where disagreement is perceived as existential threat.

The Temperature of the Zeitgeist

Young people want something to devote themselves to. Do not offer them hatred as a form of purpose.

Model conviction without contempt. Hold strong opinions – but resist the seductive ease of dehumanizing rhetoric. Do not cloak disdain as intellectual or virtuous rigor. Do not make “the other” sound like a dangerous enemy that must be eradicated for society to flourish.

Pause Before You Denounce

Again – pause before making deeply polarizing denunciations that target entire groups of people that you do not belong to. The casual, prevalent dehumanizing rhetoric of “the other” is not good for your soul – or for the collective soul of our country or our world.

Be concerned with truth.

And just as much – be concerned with humanizing those you disagree with. Attack ideas, not people. Bring nuance back into style. Being pro something does not mean being anti-someone.

Do not promote rallying around shared hatred. Instead, promote rallying around shared values. Encourage allying according to virtues not vengeance.

For Listeners and Subscribers

Be mindfully responsive to what you listen to. Are your news or social media sources serving nuance-deficient stories? Are you getting a well-rounded take – or just one side that feels overly certain and incurious?

Just like we need a well-rounded and balanced diet, we need a balanced media intake.

And remember: Online discussions should not replace in-person conversations with a variety of people and perspectives.

Let This Be a Call For Reflective Action

To those who shape public discourse: Your words and ideas are not neutral, nor inconsequential.

In the wake of this tragic violence, make space for reflection and accountability – especially when you hold influence. Speak with conviction and passion, yes. But never at the cost of dehumanizing “the other”, or advancing a narrative that serves to deepen and intensify the “us vs. them” divide.

We need your high level of self and social awareness. We need influencers to lead with critical reflection and discourse that honors the complexity of our collective human family.

Let your influence be a bridge, in such a time as this – and not a weapon. The next generation is listening.

from

Posted in existentialism, morality, social awareness, Social Discourse, Uncategorized and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment
30 Apr 2025

Unrushed Presence

Let’s meet – soul to soul, heart to heart, mind to mind.

What activities take up your waking time? What does your sleeping mind show you at night?

Let’s be here, together.  What are your thoughts and hopes and fears for the future?  

What has remorse, regret, sorrow, grief, and anger taught you?

What has joy, accomplishment, excitement, and taking pride in yourself taught you?

Let’s go slow and deep.  Not hurried and rushed or boringly shallow.

So much of my communication these days seems so rushed and hallow. 

Let me show you my interest and curiosity about who you are, without freaking you out and scaring you away. And you can do the same without scaring me away either.

Take off the masks, the charade, the banter-chatter. Let’s just chill, pace ourselves with one another and choose to go slow to know each other better.

Even if we’ve known each other for years or decades.

This kind of interaction is so scarce in my life right now.  Perhaps it’s because I am overwhelmed with over-complicating my life by overbooking myself with demands that are so thoroughly unimportant.

Let me share my story and here-and-now with you. And unless I ask or you get my ok – please don’t inundate me with unsolicited advice and theoretical interpretations.

Just give and receive the purity, simplicity, and beauty of personal presence.  

That’s the best gift anyone can give and receive from me – pure, unhurried, undivided and untimed presence.

Posted in Friendships, intimate relationships, Uncategorized and tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment
03 Oct 2024

On Emotions

from

Emotions are part and parcel of being alive and human. They exist for the purpose of survival and flourishing.

Emotions are forces of energy which propel us to take particular actions that are supportive, protective, transformative, and creative.

Yet, just like other forces of nature or energy like heat – their power can range from being productive to destructive.

One of the first things to understand about emotions is that most of our understanding about emotions is flawed. More specifically – misguided, unhelpful, and even harmful.

Emotional literacy is not taught in our schools, nor is it valued. This leaves us far more ignorantly vulnerable and unprotected to the pathological, maladaptive, and misuse of emotions which are incredible sources of energy, power, healing, and innate wisdom.

Instead, we judge ourselves and others for having emotions even though they are a natural part of human evolution. We apply a lens that is restrictive and limiting to our emotions that is dualistic: “right or wrong”, “good or bad”. This makes it a lot harder to do what is evolutionarily intended: to feel them, and if they are intense – to feel and acknowledge them in the presence of supportive and understanding others.

So then – How do things go so awry when it comes to emotions?

Let’s start from the beginning, when humans start to develop. Infancy.

In order for infants to develop optimally – they naturally need and depend on an emotional bond with at least one caregiver that is characterized by a felt experience of: Belonging, reliability, comfort, being delightfully interested in, nurturing, and protection.

This kind of relationship in turn facilitates, understands, and values the preverbal communication of the infant – which is through expression of a range of different emotions.

The infant expresses feelings and needs: physical, social, and psychological. This forms the foundation for the child to develop their sense of who they are (self), in and through their relational experience of feeling enoughness: safe enough, good enough, on a consistently enough basis.

The necessary enoughness involves relational repairs when the inevitable human misattunements occur, which rupture the secure emotional bond from being experienced.

Relational repairs in childhood actually increases the tolerance level for inevitable misattunements and minor emotional injuries by loved ones. This is in a similar fashion to how the immune system develops – through micro exposures to a variety of foreign organisms it’s forced to adapt to, but I digress…

This kind of relational experience with at least one significant caregiver becomes internalized and cultivates how the child comes to see themself, even in a not yet consciously aware way.

This relationally developmental process profoundly influences the initial way the child sees themself and others in the years to come.

So, for better or worse: Young and vulnerable humans (infants) internalize how they are treated, responded to, and reflected back, by caregivers.

How are the inevitable mishaps, misattunements, and miscoordinated interactions by loving but imperfect caregivers handled?

It depends a lot on how the caregiver responds to feeling vulnerable and exposed as imperfect. This is where the difficult but important emotion of shame comes in. How do they respond to feedback that communicates: You’re missing me. You’re not getting it right with me – and it’s important to get it right – which activates some shame go alert for a course correct.

Will the caregiver rigidly defend against feeling shame and vulnerability to making mistakes? Or will they be open to owning that natural although uncomfortable part of being human and learn because shame is a marker that something important is occurring in this moment.

Can they respond to the invitation to reflectively course-correct with compassionate curiosity? This is the gift of within-tolerance-level shame. It alerts us to the inevitable need to course-correct when engaging in something that is important to us, like our relationships.

Course-corrections are a universal aspect of what it means to be human.

Humans are mistake-and-error-makers.

And –

Human are an incredibly teachable species, or we would not have been able to adapt and survive.

This learning or adaptiveness takes place when we are not so hardened to shame.

Self-compassion is an essential protector from intolerable shame which often in turn leads to being defended against or hardened to shame. That just robs us of the opportunity to make adaptive changes and course corrections on this journey called life.

That is my evolving introductory reflections from reading about attachment, affective neuroscience, developmental trauma, and on accelerated experiential dynamic psychotherapy (AEDP) which is a healing oriented approach to therapy.

In deep gratitude I continue to learn and have been profoundly influenced by studying the work of:

  • Diana Fosha
  • Hilary Jacobs Hendle
  • Peter Fonagy
  • Kristin Neff
  • Steven Hayes
  • Daniel Siegel
  • Ed Tronick
Posted in Emotional Empowerment Coaching, emotional health, mental health, Uncategorized and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment
23 Apr 2024
1 Comment

Adulthood Stranger Danger

There’s a label I keep hearing people throw on others, and that is simply this: “Weird”.

from

This “weird” is a pejorative, meaning: “not like me/us”. It could be anyone different, as if there is one set-standard of what’s considered “normal” and “acceptable”, which happens to confirm my biases!

In childhood, this may have helped keep kids safe from trusting all adults they didn’t know. In adulthood, the context for keeping ourselves safe is different because we are adults. We’ve got more capacity and maturity; emotionally, relationally, psychologically, financially, and physically.

What is “weird” or “strange” to us in adulthood could simply be what is unfamiliar or different. That’s it!

But how would we learn and grow if we approached everything that was unfamiliar or different as “dangerous”? Nobody would learn a new task or a new perspective or anything new at all! We would be pretty stunted people.

When it comes to meeting new people and encountering different perspectives as adults, “stranger danger” is a major barrier. If you want to learn and grow beyond what you already think and know, or think you know, then start to embrace differences.

from

Different does not equal danger.

Disagreement does not equal danger.

Different does not equal deviant, aberrant, unsafe, or threatening…unless of course, you’re firmly stuck in being very fragile, rigid, inflexible, and have Difference Intolerance Disorder. Admittedly we can all slip into that state of being, and – we can all move beyond it, too.

Difference Intolerance Disorder is not an actual diagnosis. I just made that up. But I’ve experienced this in myself and with others, and it stunts adult growth and development.

When you encounter people who have a different take on something than you do, this does not mean they are dangerous. It simply means they have a different perspective.

When you encounter people who disagree with you, or whom you disagree with on certain issues it does not have to equal threat. It simply means there is a disagreement – a different perspective.

People are different than you. People see things differently. This is normal. Not weird.

What is weird is this generalization of Difference-Intolerance-Disorder, in that people expect others to be just like them, or they feel a sense of danger or threat which activates an intense response of fight, flight, freeze, or fawn – as if THAT is normal.

from

We have this ignorant-ignorance setting in where we are ignorant of our ignorance and are unwilling to learn. Instead, we quickly label anyone as different than us as “weird” in the pejorative.

May I suggest that we start seeing these differences and disagreements as opportunities to learn more about one another, ourselves, and grow out of ignorance?

Even if we didn’t change our conclusions, we could change how we understand others and how we relate to them. We won’t cling to needing others to be so like us, to feel OK.

Adulthood stranger danger is not cute, beneficial, psychologically or socially adaptive.

Difference Intolerance Disorder creates stunted adults and a not so good social ecology. Consider how biodiversity is embedded in nature.

There is an alternative way to be with those who are simply and normally, different. This involves humility, courage, and curiosity.

Imagine a world where people, just like the rest of nature, would expect (vs. suspect) and tolerate differences as if that was normal.

If you’re usually surrounded by or interacting with people who are pretty much just like you, consider all that you’re missing out on. And then get out there and grow.

from
Posted in personal growth, social awareness, spirituality, Uncategorized, Wisdom and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , ,
23 Apr 2024

Empirical Spirituality: Two Things

I ventured outside “the church” about 10 years ago. Prior to that, I spent almost 20 years of adulthood in the church.

from

Leaving the fold started with the ending of my marriage. In retrospect, it could have been said that through my divorce, my ex-husband got the church, and I got the world and the freedom to explore who I was, what I believed, and more importantly how I wanted to live my life and why (not just because the Bible or Jesus says so). This forced me to develop critical thinking and self-reflective skills which emphasized emotional intelligence from the inside-out. This was akin to an overdue internal reset, while raising young children.

Deconstructing my spiritual worldview, which was embedded in fear, gradually ensued.

A persistent fear of an omnipotent evil force ruling the world and my private thoughts was slowly investigated, along with a subtle but persistent fear of abandonment by a more loving but less powerful and erratically intervening God as punishment or mere consequence for not conforming my thinking, believing, and behaving to a set-standard.

Keep in mind – this has been about a 10-year journey, not a rapid and haphazard endeavor. As far as I can tell, this will be a lifelong journey, with different seasons and excursions throughout.

You see, the missing component in my spiritual worldview became apparent – a clear sense of what it meant to be me, according to me.

A slow and careful deconstruction involved my sense of self, which was also, guess what – feared as wholly untrustworthy. That belief had to be closely examined, with support of many trusted others.

The presumption that I was consensually conforming to this worldview from a place of being loved was something I could not grasp. It felt rigidly incoherent. I could not grasp this any longer, nor could I dismiss that I could not grasp it either. So, I tapped out.

Who was I? What did I believe in when it came to relating to the ineffable? How could I even embark on that when I couldn’t fully allow myself to express what was within, what I thought, felt, valued, and why? It all felt backwards. How could I relate to the transcendent when I didn’t know how to relate to the immanent? I often couldn’t clearly define what I felt, thought, and valued for myself. Why? Because I feared and/or disavowed all of that “fleshly” material for the transcendent. Again. Something felt amiss.

Looking back, the only thing I brought with me when I left the church was a curious, searching mindset out to answer something I couldn’t clearly articulate yet. What was I even searching for? I couldn’t have told you.

What I was searching for was a clearer sense of a self – both as a unique individual and as a non-unique human being. How could I truly love or be loved without a clearly sensed self, first? Love involves freely sharing something of the self.

Codependent (vacillating between being overly independent or overly dependent vs. interdependent), fear and shame-based conformity was all I knew. I conflated that with love and faith.

As I moved beyond the confines of the church, I took this one premise for deductive reasoning: God is love.

That’s it.

But what in the actual eff, is love? An apropos question following a divorce, don’t you think?

How do you define, characterize, and identify something that has felt so forsaken, foreign yet natural, innate yet elusive, for much of your life? Another premise was running in the back of my mind and that was this: Whatever I thought I knew about God and love was wrong. I need to start over. Burn the dead trees and see what comes up.

Reflecting on lived experiences, lots of therapy, lots of studying about attachment theory, different spiritual worldviews, along with some inductive reasoning formed by a developing reflective self or put simply: a self, an autonomous self, has helped point to something a lot less foggy.

I decided I needed to explore the world and myself, outside of the codependent relationship I had with religion, within the Evangelical Christian worldview.

As much as possible, I wanted to explore my own spirituality; empirically, autonomously, honestly, and authentically. When I say “spirituality”, I’m referring to how I relate to that which is immaterial and ineffable.

For the first time, I felt a newfound and yet terrifying sense of freedom to explore who I was outside of a belief system that defined my identity and values, the nature of reality, and God, for me. I was now able to discover and develop a more empirical spirituality and identity vs. a theoretical one, for myself.

from

It was like I was an eager student/scientist when it came to existential angst and humanistic questions that I was now free to ask, test, and not have to immediately settle with answers I had already been given.

This felt both liberating and terrifying. What if I got it all wrong? What if I can’t figure this out on my own? What if, what if, what if?

My divorce provided a sense of “evidence” that what I had believed, how I had perceived myself, God, reality, and life…was missing that foundational piece: A clearer sense of a me. Again – as a unique individual and as a non-unique human being.

Along with my own observations without the fear of hell and the devil overshadowing everything. This was truly the biggest test of faith or of trust in God I had ever taken: leaving the church. It felt like I was leaving “home”. Leaving “Kansas”.

from

Prayer (or self-talk) with open, honest, and emotionally raw relating did not cease. If anything, it increased. It reminds me of the Psalms of David. He had no “book of Psalms”. He didn’t know he was writing what would someday be used as a hymnal or considered sacred Scripture call “the Psalms”. He was just pouring out his naked heart and soul to God (or himself), uncensored.

This is what I did not leave behind when I left the church. God (which I also define as “Reality” or simply “what is”) cannot be boxed into a church, an idea, a belief, or a label. This is what I refer to as empirical spirituality. I used my ability to observe honestly; internally and externally.

Leaving the church actually helped me become more of an honest observer of life, of myself, and of the hardest age-old questions that still are unanswered. Like why is there so much unjust suffering in this world? A devil, spiritual warfare, and a loving and powerful God who is at war in unseen dimensions does not sufficiently answer that, even if it may be so. Nobody can conclusively prove or verify this, nor can anybody conclusively disconfirm and disprove it either, just like the existence of a Creator God or the non-existence of a Creator God. It is an unanswered question I’ve learned to live with, honestly. It will probably remain as such.

This is how living in faith feels to me; learning to be at peace with uncertainty.

I have read, listened to, worshipped with, visited, conversed with, and digested enough of a diverse plethora of perspectives on religion, theology, epistemology, religious and secular historicity, and psychology to say this:

At the end of the day, I don’t know what the actual facts are about so many things, in the least – what I’ve not borne witness to (like the resurrection or a man named Jesus). Yet, I can say this: only two things really matter.

But first, I have to say this from being such a devout “believer” prior to venturing outside of the church:

What specifically doesn’t matter most is what you (or I) say you (or I) believe in or don’t believe in, when it comes to religious faith, or spirituality, or epistemology.

You can label yourself a Christian, Atheist, Agnostic, Ex-Evangelical, Born-Again, Progressive, Spiritual-but-not-religious, Jew, New Ager, Hippie, Rationalist, Non-Dualist, Buddhist, or Muslim for all I care.

These labels mean very little.

What matters most is how you show up in life, especially in relationships. And this includes the relationship with your very own self, for that replicates in your relationships with others. For example, if you’ve got low tolerance for your own emotions, you’ll probably have a low tolerance for other people’s emotions.

So, what are the characteristics you embody while relating to others?

Simply put: How do you behave towards others?

from

How do you treat your family, partner, friends, exes, co-parents, ex-friends, co-workers, subordinates, bosses, neighbors, enemies, other people’s kids, people you’ve heard gossiped about, the have’s, the have-nots, acquaintances, people who are not like you, people you disagree with, or people you interact with online?

Of course, the way you relate to others varies immensely depending on context and many variables. There isn’t just one description, there’s complexity.

But in general, consider the people you interact with most – what characterizes how you show up? Or, do you avoid getting close to people?

How do you try to repair the inevitable mishaps in ongoing relationships?

How do you treat people who don’t interact with you regularly? Do you treat them better than those you interact with regularly? Or do you treat them a lot worse? WHY?

That is what matters most to me. It’s what I ask myself constantly.

How much do you care about how you treat people? Your label and beliefs mean very little compared to this.

Secondly: Are you growing?

How are you changing? One thing is constant and unchangeable in life: change itself. While change is inevitable, personal growth is not.

So, are you growing? And, how would you know? What is used to measure this change, merely your own opinion of yourself while you live a relatively isolated life? Ha! That’s a funny one! Especially if you have no record or documentation to track your inner life, your internal dialogue: your thought and emotional life. If you’ve not shared or expressed your inner life over a period of time to anyone, even yourself, i.e. a journal – how can you know any of this with confidence? Don’t fool yourself! Are you relying solely on memory? That is another thing that constantly changes. The story you tell yourself about the past. Your memory might be misleading you without you knowing it. Memory is very limited and bias, depending on mood and cognitive capacity, especially as you age in adulthood.

from

Don’t get me wrong, you’re definitely a major source of information, but you cannot be the only source with zero accountability or reference checks, so to speak. Who else would be able to answer this, in addition to yourself?

Consider thinking in terms of blocks of several months or years. How have your relationships changed? How has using your time and money changed? How has your perspectives changed?

Are you growing? And how do you know?

Is the only thing that is changing in life, the calendar and the ticking clock?

For me, to answer these questions with more clarity, I had to step outside of the church or a systematic worldview that I conformed to without a clear sense of self. I felt the pull to develop a spirituality that was more empirical. More authentic. More real and meaningful to me. This involved taking detailed notes, journaling in-depth, recording vulnerable discussions within myself/to God, and at times this involved sharing these with another trusted person.

I’ve found that for me, God represents a focus on reality and relationships, including the relationship with oneself, and fosters growth in how I connect with myself and others. In essence, God is reality: that which is or simply exists, empirically rather than theoretically.

The labels, beliefs, canonized books, and whatever interpretations come from ancient, canonized literature all matter little in comparison to those two things. At least, for me.

from

And one thing is perhaps the icing on the cake: Spiritual community. Authentic spiritual community. Where can I turn to for this? I think I can now turn back to the church. Perhaps, I am more ready to integrate community because I can find enough solidarity within any community as long as those two things have plenty of sunlight, soil, and water for there to be deep growth with others despite differences in mere labels.

Relationships and growth. They go hand in hand, together.

Let’s see what this will bring forth. I am looking forward to this next chapter and in contributing in a meaningful and authentic way. And community that can help foster those two things (which go hand in hand) is good enough for me!

At the end of the day, I will grow…come what may.

from
Posted in Christianity, deconstruction, existentialism, personal growth, personal healing, Progressive Christianity, spirituality, Uncategorized, Wisdom and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment
29 May 2023

Attractive Joy

The most attractive energy in others to me these days is simply pure, authentic, unefforted joy.

This is a beautiful, innate, and natural quality we all have. Joy.

When we can recognize our Essence clearly, we will remember our natural state of Being, which is characterized by pure and honest joy.

Posted in mental health, spirituality, Uncategorized and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment
29 May 2023

Enneagram and Non Duality (Advaita) Musings

from

The Enneagram is a useful tool which can assist in doing the “highest activity the separate-self can engage in”.

The Enneagram assists by organizing complex and seemingly random human experiences and behaviors into basic patterns or basic flow.  The Enneagram does this by reducing human experiences i.e. behaviors, thoughts, feelings, sensations, and perceptions down to their most basic common denominators:  Basic desires and fears, and key motivations.  A solid Enneagram study can reveal what consistently drives thoughts and feelings which lead to behaviors and choices, in a coherent manner.  

Infinite Consciousness (aka. God) becomes or incarnates as a finite human body-mind to experience the marriage of divinity and matter.  Aka a human being.  What humans often do irrespective of race, class, gender or any other demographic distinction however, is forget who they truly are and misidentify as only the finite body-mind.  The experience of waking up to what’s beyond the finite mind-body within, and integrating this essential truth into all of life is what maturity is about, to me.  The process of growing into or integrating the infinite with the finite and recognizing they are not two separate entities, but One – is a journey I believe is unique to humans. 

Think of two people running in a 3-legged-race. They need to learn how to harmonize their steps and coordinate as one, or they will not get far, fast. Their journey will be frustrated with incoordination and an inefficient use of energy and rhythm. This is where the Enneagram becomes exceedingly useful, when you understand its potential along with accurately typing yourself, it accelerates unf**king yourself. It helps coordinate the infinite and finite movements in feeling more graceful and efficient versus effortful and strident in your energy flow or movements. This manifestation is experienced first inwardly, then will inevitably manifest outwardly. This is a lifelong unfoldment of integration – to experience more alignment and ease in being while experiencing the full spectrum of human-ing.

We are all God or Infinite Consciousness, incarnate. The vehicle or conduit of infinite consciousness is the finite mind-body. The ego state is when the finite mind-body mistakes its very own activity or role as a separate identity or self or entity. It wrongly believes it is separate from Infinite Consciousness or God and must therefore gain or avoid something, in order to be whole.

How does a separate-self go about doing this? The Enneagram distills this down to 9 basic patterns or constructs, each with 9 levels of development.

The finite mind-body has its place and role. As it grows in recognition and remembrance of its inherent and essential incarnate nature aka Essence, and integrates or is overarched by this recognition, wholeness will increasingly manifest and unveil itself.

Suffering occurs when the inverse order takes places. In other words, when the separate-self superimposes itself above all else, and conflates role and activity (thoughts, feelings, sensations) with its essential nature or identity. Another way I’ve said this is making the footnotes, the Title or Header.

Accept the invitation by the Enneagram to “know thyself”, well, including but beyond the ego. It is indeed as Rupert Spira says, “the highest activity the separate self can engage in”.

Posted in existentialism, mental health, Non Duality, personal growth, personal healing, spirituality, Uncategorized, Wisdom and tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment
13 Nov 2022

You, Me, and We

It is right and not wrong for me to have, to possess; an autonomous, differentiated, individual sense of self.

It is in fact, essential.

I need an “I” to relate to a “thou” (whether this is a Higher Power and/or another human being) to become a part of a securely and healthy functioning “we”.

It is also true, that I need a “we” that is supportive, “I”- affirming, flexible, and stable or secure, to develop an integrated and whole sense of an “I” in all its richness and complexity. In other words, I need the “we” to be a safe enough place where I won’t worry about losing or jeopardizing our “us” when the formation of my “I” overtly or covertly differentiates from the “you”, in our “we”. And if I (or you) do worry, it can be openly talked about and worked through in the “I” space and the “we” space. It doesn’t become the proverbial elephant in the room that eventually eats the rug it’s being impossibly swept under due to deprivation.

When I experience being me, and you experience being you, and we can honor and affirm one another without denial or diminishment of one another’s differences, this is beautiful intimacy that generously supports You, Me, and We.

This “we” can include a couple, a friendship, a workplace relationship, a family, a neighborhood, a community, and a world of all these worlds of we’s.

When there is a breakdown in the You, the Me, and therefore our We; instead of interdependency, codependency is found in all its cunning and baffling forms.

To mind our “You, and Me, and We” business is essential, courageous, breathtaking, and rewarding work. I believe we are inherently wired to flourish and thrive in this work, together. After all, it is a lot of work.

But let’s also leave room for humor and work, along the path of humanlightenment.

Posted in codependency, intimate relationships, personal growth, personal healing, recovery, Recovery, Uncategorized, Wisdom and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment
26 Sep 2022

On Addiction

from

There are many ideas and images we hold in our minds when it comes to addiction.  Some of them are more Hollywood, simple, and basic and some are more comprehensive and complex.  There are a lot of caricatures of “addicts” that portray a very negative and misleading idea on what addiction is and isn’t. Very seldom do those caricatures do any justice to what addiction entails. So sometimes a deeper dive into the mysterious nature of addiction is helpful. That’s what I’m doing in this post.

Even though addiction seems to be a hotly debated topic, most people would agree that it’s a formidable force that’s cunning and shrewd.  And in its wake; kills, steals, and destroys one’s quality of life, relationships, and even one’s very own sense of Selfhood. This is often done in secrecy and isolation, until it cannot be contained there any longer. This can often be an invitation out of hell, albeit an abrupt and harsh one, that can at first feel like total defeat. 

I’ve found that most people don’t want to be labeled by another as an addict. That’s tantamount to name-calling. If they identify themselves as an addict, that’s different. And sometimes identifying what addiction is, who has it and who doesn’t, can be chanted to a sneering beat of: “I know you are, but what am I”.

from

I believe that addiction is fundamentally a spiritual condition of disconnection; from one’s very own self, others, and to the ever-increasing uneasy parts of reality we would rather just make disappear.  Its symptoms are deception (first to self, then others), discord, and disruption from receiving life-giving force or energy.  This is why I believe addiction is fundamentally spiritual in nature: it’s initially invisible to merely physical metrics but will manifest its occupancy in the physical domain in only a matter of time.  Just wait.  Once it’s successfully enticed you and occupies your mind, body, and soul it won’t just stop there.  It’s far too ravenous.  Addiction is characterized by a spiritual energy which has an unsatiable hunger that doesn’t discriminate. It’s often been said that addiction is an equal opportunity destroyer. 

from

Addiction is far more inclusive than any of the most inclusive anti-bigot activists out there.  Truly, all are welcome. It doesn’t give a shit about how smart, stupid, rich, poor, educated, uneducated, conservative, liberal, socially privileged, marginalized, religious, non-religious, gay, straight, one gendered or non-binary gendered, physically or mentally abled, disabled, single, divorced, married, remarried, polyamorous, vaccinated, non-vaccinated, Black, White, Yellow, Red, Brown, Multi-racial, Bi-racial, young, or old, etc. etc. etc., you are.  If you’re alive, it will accept you with open arms.  It will take you in and devotedly take you down and not only that, but it will want to take down your loved ones as well.  The more you love them and the more they love you, the more it will want their mind, body, and soul too.  Addiction is a family contagion because family is often whom you love and care about the most.

And, when addiction has fraternized and colonized your mind, body, and soul without a good enough fight and push-back surrender to a Higher Power greater than itself by the one it occupies, you will remain under its control and governance.

This is all so easily disguised and therefore denied until the destruction is far more replete and obvious and stretches beyond the spiritual domain and manifests into the physical domain.  Although, it’s admittedly baffling to witness people still denying its presence even when it’s so thoroughly manifest in the relational and physical domain.

This is a very cunning, formidable, and relentless thing. Dis-ease.  Call it whatever you want or don’t call it anything other than addiction.  It doesn’t matter what you label it or name it.  And if you deny it, all the better, for “it”. 

What I’m experiencing, little by little, is that the more spiritually perceptive, discerning, keen, awake, and surrendered you are; the sooner addiction can be arrested.

I believe that being human, makes you higher risk and more susceptible to addiction, although there are varying degrees of protection and varying degrees of affliction on an individual basis.  Some may disagree because addiction or dependency/withdrawal symptoms can be replicated in lab animals.  While I believe that animals are also spiritual beings, for some reason they are naturally less vulnerable to addiction unless they are being manipulated by people. Naturally they seem less susceptible, and I think it’s because they don’t appear to morally judge themselves or others, and therefore don’t struggle with the human affliction of shame and pride.  Of course, to argue for or against that theory is insignificant. I can’t talk to rats or get into their consciousness. But I digress…

The point is: to win this battle and live in the solution is found in something that is pretty counter-intuitive to human survival.  It’s quite the uncomfortable human paradox. 

The solution is found in surrender. 

from

Not to the addiction of course, but to a Power greater than it, and greater than you, whatever you name or call that Power doesn’t matter. I once heard someone refer to this Power as “Not Me“. What matters most is that you can see or even slightly believe, that this Power could truly set you free and do for you what you cannot do for yourself, but which you believe you “should” be able to do. And by all means, if you can do this for yourself and you truly do not need a Higher Power than yourself to do this, then I reckon you are not dealing with addiction. Not everything that’s hard to quit is an addiction, that could merely be a bad habit. There’s a difference.

The way I’m finding it works is this: This Higher Power will not go against my minimally cooperative, ideally enthusiastically given, consent. That is how surrender differs from compliance. Surrender to a Higher Power, not comply. This involves trust and desire, even if it’s very very small at first. It can grow, but you can’t grow something out of nothing. You need something to start with. This is the parable of the mustard seed (see Matthew 13:31-32). This is the solution. It is simple, but not easy. Not at all. But like most things, surrendering becomes easier with practice, one day at a time, and not always in a row.  

With this concept of addiction, it doesn’t matter what the chains are tied to.  It could be to a substance, a behavior, a person, or a belief system.  It’s usually to something impermanent, and what isn’t impermanent?

I’ve also observed that the more abstract in nature that the chains are tied to is, the more disguised its occupancy can be, and often more socially acceptable because it’s simply more common by that very disguisable fact. But do not be deceived.  The proof is in the pudding, and that pudding often is spiritual in nature and in how much or how little you’re surrendered to a Higher Power that gives you freedom and not chains.  Surrendering to addiction as your higher power gives you shame upon shame, or even harder to detect; pride upon pride, until you are leveled with reality.

As human beings, we are vulnerable, meaning we are surrendered beings. We are not the most Powerful beings or forces of nature in the universe or even on earth. It’s hard to remember especially when we’re so far removed from being intimately connected with nature. But the fact remains: there are powers and forces greater than us, so know your place and that surrender is unavoidable.

So, what are you surrendered to, and how is that working out for you?

If you scoff at the idea that you are addicted to anything, consider this before your dismissal: The addiction you might have may be revealed with a confrontation of losing something specific, against your will, that others live without and are OK without it. If you had to give this up and learn to be better off with its absence or at minimum, its non-guaranteed presence in your life, would you be, OK? Just something to consider.

Nonetheless…for all of us it’s good to reflect on and choose your surrender, wisely.

Iguazu Falls – the world’s largest waterfall. from
Posted in Addiction, codependency, personal growth, personal healing, recovery, Recovery, Uncategorized, Wisdom and tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Post Navigation

← Older Entries