Become all you can become by raising yourself higher on the Tree of Life

Public-authenticity. The racket. Responsibility… Oh my!

On my call with Paulo, my podcast partner for my Sunday call, I shared that I’d spent four hours in bed the night before. Sleepless. But in the end I did my breathing I learned some 40 years ago, and I fell promptly asleep.

As I was sharing I saw that it is obviously a racket I have, being an insomniac. All designed to gather sympathy… ugh. So I shared that insight too.

This was on Monday. It’s Wednesday now, and I fell asleep both nights in between within minutes of turning the light off. I just did my breathing exercise and that is that.

I didn’t beat myself up. Didn’t ‘shame’ myself, I didn’t brag about it. Instead I saw it, deeply, and acknowledged that I had power against insomnia that I wasn’t using. And that it was probably a racket.

And with that I turned back the power.

I call that public authenticity.

Now let’s contrast it with the things some of my students do, habitually. Continue reading “Public-authenticity. The racket. Responsibility… Oh my!”

Albert Einstein spoke about the levels of consciousness

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

I am very lucky: the questions my students send me have caused me to have a deeper understanding for my own work.

These students are often seeking new insights in their pressing circumstances from me. Lately it is all about making a decision to stay or leave, to let go or to fight.

It is a huge responsibility to talk to people who are looking for answers.
Continue reading “Albert Einstein spoke about the levels of consciousness”

A misunderstanding that clips a lot of people’s wings

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

There is a misunderstanding of how things work that clips a lot of people’s wings.

It comes from the ‘goalsetting culture’ that has proven itself a misery-maker. Being motivated with what you want…

You commit to a result.

But results are outside of your power. They will either happen if you do the right steps or they won’t.

Life is a lot more complicated than boiling water. You can promise that water will boil if you manage to give it enough heat that it reaches its boiling point. But if your promises are in that sphere of predictable, then you are not going to amount to much: you probably live a life of quiet desperation.

Anything you pursue is running from you.

The reason that of all the people on Earth the people of the United States are the most wretched is because of their pursuit of happiness. Continue reading “A misunderstanding that clips a lot of people’s wings”

You can get unstuck only if you see what keeps you stuck

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

My teacher, Robert Hartman famously said: to know good you need to study evil. To turn your life around, you need to study what keeps you stuck.

As I am gearing up to teach the machine that we call the racket, I am getting emails from participants, people who registered in the workshop.

Those who are smart (not many :-\ ) come prepared. Armed in having witnessed enough of the distinction and the process to be able to recognize it on themselves by buying the Racket Course… have questions.

I am sure the rest of them want me to do all the work, and make them good, pretty, slim, smart, happy, rich… did I leave anything out?

The racket is a machine. It has a trigger that is an on-switch… and it even has an off-switch. Continue reading “You can get unstuck only if you see what keeps you stuck”

What does the 99% do that the 1% doesn’t? Bread and circus

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Panem et circenses. That is Bread and circuses… in Latin, the language of ancient Rome.

Give the masses bread and circus (entertainment) and they won’t look at what you do on the top. Superficial appeasement. Continue reading “What does the 99% do that the 1% doesn’t? Bread and circus”

Questions that turn on your power, your personal power

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

What are the questions that awaken and pull things to yourself to become cause? To get access to your personal power?

Agreement 1: Be Impeccable With Your Word: question: was I impeccable with my word?
Agreement 2: Don’t Take Anything Personally: question: did I take something personally?
Agreement 3: Don’t Make Assumptions. question: did I make an assumption?
Agreement 4: Always Do Your Best. question: did I do my best?

I am not good enough. Other people are better than me

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

This was people’s sentence, predominantly, when I first did my Landmark Education programs, back in mid-1980’s.

I remember asking myself: in what aren’t they good enough? Compared to what?

I could see that they don’t ask those questions… It is a 3-year old, barely able to speak, who says those things.

The language of the ‘sentence’, sentence as in ‘you are sentenced to lifetime imprisonment without parole’ was made up by your 3-year old… And the problem is in the language on the intellectual level of a 3-year old.

Not good enough, if your child genes turned off when they were supposed to turn off, is a great guidance. It tells you where you need work, where you need to grow, where you need to get better.

But that is an adult speaking… Not a child. An adult who can look and see… Continue reading “I am not good enough. Other people are better than me”

Are you one who has asked me to adjust your baby-genes?

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Are you one who has asked me to adjust your baby-genes?

I get up in the morning and I have no idea what I am going to write about. None.

Sometimes my dreams hint, vaguely, what is maybe a direction, but dreams are clear as you see them, vague from the moment you open your eyes and reality seeps in and takes over.

I could go and see what I must write about, what I wrote about yesterday, but I am resistant to have-to’s, so I don’t…

I can see that lately I am not connecting to my readers… But I don’t know what exactly I am saying that has the power for people to say ‘nah, don’t want to read’ add frown, wrinkled nose, sign of disgust. Yours.

So this is where we are… So hell yeah, I don’t want to say what I should say, teach you, give you, lead you to the promised land… Obviously that is not what you want.

But what do you want? Add chuckling… Mine this time.

So I go to my trusty finger-on-the-pulse ‘thermometer’ called Reddit, to look and see.

Dude/dudette post a hand that is very wrinkled after washing the dishes for 20 minutes.
Continue reading “Are you one who has asked me to adjust your baby-genes?”

Fix Broken Sh!t First… AKA: remove what is broken

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Fix Broken Sh!t First; I got an email with that title this morning, so I am using it. This is the perfect title for this article…

You see, human nature is weird… It tries to fix everything by throwing stuff at it making it more broken. Add stuff…

When you have indigestion, or when you are sick, or when you are tired… You want to put food on it. You buy stuff… You throw sex on it. Coffee on it. Complaining on it. The kitchen sink on it.

I have noticed that anything anyone says about you or your stuff triggers a self-protection mechanism, as if you have anything about you that is not perfect means you are wrong, or don’t deserve to live, or maybe deserve to die.

Totally out of proportion reaction to the size of the threat. Continue reading “Fix Broken Sh!t First… AKA: remove what is broken”

The Pebble in your shoes: what keeps you from changing

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

This is the second part of this series about the pebble in your shoe… The one that cramps your style, spoils your efforts, and leaves you with less than you started, no results, no joy, no satisfaction.

So what is the pebble? Here is my definition, the result of a lot of looking, pondering… The Pebble is what you take as self-evident, therefore it’s invisible for you: it’s the concealed switch of the machine that you are…

It is what Ayn Rand refers to in Atlas Shrugged… Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong.

“Check your premises” is an injunction that runs as a subtheme through Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged , and it is a phrase that seems to be growing more pertinent every day. The meaning of the phrase is this: If you seem to be confronting a contradiction, then at least one of your relevant beliefs is false

Continue reading “The Pebble in your shoes: what keeps you from changing”