The Game of Life

What Game Are You Really Playing?

The Origins of the Metaphor of Life As a Game

Since the 1600s, great thinkers have used the metaphor of life as a game or performance. Shakespeare famously wrote, “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.” This suggests that real people are like actors assuming alternative identities enacting various dramatic, tragic, and comedic scenarios.

Fast forward to 1925, and metaphysical teacher Florence Scovel Shinn gave the metaphor new spiritual significance in The Game of Life and How to Play It. She suggested that life isn’t random but a purposeful simulation through which souls evolve in a cosmic classroom of sorts. Expanding on this idea, some perceive life on Earth to be a simulation through which souls learn by assuming identities that are not ultimate truths but part of a temporary human experience. In this sense  life is intended as a journey in consciousness through which souls learn, evolve, and awaken.

Life As a Game

Much like a game, the journey of a lifetime involves choices, risks, outcomes, and a degree of chance. Indeed, we each make choices that have consequences and inform the possibilities to come.  The game of life is a temporary creative process with a beginning and an end. But, unlike a game, our life, once initiated is not optional. We will live it one way or another, even if we choose to end it prematurely.

What is the Nature of Your Game

If life is a game, what kind are you playing?

Are you:

  • Fighting for survival?

  • Competing for scarce resources?

  • Trying to make your dreams come true?

  • Seeking to expand your conscious awareness?

  • Awakening spiritually?

How would you describe the game of life that you are playing?

 

Your perception determines your playing field.

The game you see is the game you play. Some games are built around fear and lack. Others are quests for love, awakening, or understanding. Some perceive the games themselves to be hierarchical as in  Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. He theorizes that we must meet our basic survival needs before we can entertain other higher pursuits. As we achieve each level of desire and expertise, we gain the ability to perceive and participate in higher games. But not all of us will. Many are content to live life within the purview of the mind and ego pursuing the temporary sating of perceived material and emotional wants and needs.

 Or perhaps these games are multidimensional, where several “games” play out at once.

Multidimensional Games

I have come to experience myself as a soul pursuing a spiritual learning agenda while living life through the identity of Judith Johnson.

It has been my experience that I participate to some degree in multiple games simultaneously and to varying degrees. But I also notice an overarching trajectory whereby I have been focusing more and more of my attention on awakening my spiritual awareness and the process of transcending into soul awareness and beyond.

This typically requires inquiry beyond what is directly observable or measurable by the mind and senses. It delves into fundamental metaphysical questions about reality, existence, knowledge, the nature of being, consciousness, space, time, and causality.

As I elevate my game, what changes is largely a function of what I perceive to be real and what I value. For example, if I were a pickpocket seeing an angel, I would see pockets and if I were a critic I would look for something to criticize. But as I come to know God, other pursuits lose their pull.

Our difference in perception explains why people at different levels of awareness often misunderstand each other.

One interesting aspect of this multi-level game is that the more restricted our perceptual capabilities are the less we can comprehend or understand someone functioning from a different level of awareness. For example, Joe experiences life through his ego and denies the existence of God because he is looking at the world and asking, “how can a god let this kind of pain and suffering exist?” Through Joe’s eyes, Sam who speaks of experiencing God’s presence and love in his life appears naive. But Joe is making a common error. He is assuming that what he sees is reality itself rather than an interpreted reality perceived from a particular point of view.

One of life’s great lessons is that thinking something doesn’t make it true.

Another is that we assume that others perceive the same thing that we do.

So, What Game Are You Playing?

What do you value in your life? What do you believe is the purpose of your life? What are you seeking to experience or achieve?

Take a moment and ask yourself:

“How would I describe the game of life I’m playing?”
“What deeper game might be calling to me?”

When we begin to ask such questions, we move from being pawns of circumstance to conscious players in a sacred journey.

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?  If so, please share it with them. 

/by
,

The 5 Wisdom Teachings of the Oyster

The Metaphor of the Pearl

The oyster’s journey of pearl formation is a metaphor for overcoming adversity. Difficult situations can be the source of our greatest blessings and growth if we respond with courage and perseverance.

How and Why the Oyster Forms a Pearl

We tend to activate autopilot defense mechanisms to push away less than desirable experiences. Alternatively, consider how the oyster forms a pearl as a natural defense mechanism against irritants that get inside its shells.

When a foreign object makes its way into the oyster’s shell, it irritates the soft tissue surrounding the oyster’s internal organs. To protect itself, the oyster secretes layer upon layer of a substance called nacre (also known as mother-of-pearl). Slowly encasing the irritant, these secretions form a precious pearl of iridescent luster. 

The Oyster’s 5 Wisdom Teachings

Here’s how the wisdom of pearl formation can be applied in our lives:

Irritants as Catalysts: When we encounter challenges and adversity, we can use them as catalysts for positive change. Just as an irritant triggers the oyster’s response, we can engage in a process of personal transformation rather than trying to push away unwanted experiences. These challenges can teach us new skills of adaptation.

For example, when a relationship becomes unpleasant, seek to understand how the disturbance is being triggered inside of you rather than trying to eradicate the discord. Chances are the nature of the upset for you is probably familiar from past experiences. Use the current situation as a motivation to better understand the origins of this pattern of reactivity inside of you so you can  break free of it.

 

The Power of Response: The oyster’s response to an irritant involves surrounding it with a protective substance which in turn forms a precious pearl. Similarly, individuals have the ability to choose how to react to adversity. This can be an opportunity for growth.

For example, I recently watched my hot temper rise up in response to a situation where I felt I was being mistreated by a company I was doing business with. I caught myself in the act and took the time to figure out how to respond with simply my point of view and not my anger. That generated a better response than I even hoped for.

 

Transforming Pain: The oyster transforms the irritant into a pearl. This mirrors how individuals transform painful experiences into valuable lessons and inner strength. Overcoming challenges shapes individuals into stronger, more compassionate, and wiser people.

A client recently had a surprisingly unpleasant encounter with her grown    daughter. Rather than reacting in the moment, she chose to wait till we had a chance to unpack the situation together. We explored the fact that the daughter was being heavily influenced by her husband who had a dislike for my client. Rather than simply reacting to being hurt by her daughter, my client was able to see that she was doing the best she could in a difficult situation. As a result, she gained compassion for her daughter and a greater tolerance of the unpleasantries of life.

 

Hidden Treasures: The pearl emerges from within the irritant. The most valuable lessons and blessings in life are often within struggles. By persevering, individuals can discover these hidden treasures.

For example, I spent years in an intractable discord with my neighbors. Whenever it erupted, there was an urgency inside of me to get away from them as fast as possible. I finally noticed the depth of my pain was disproportionate to the situation itself. Looking inward, I realized this experience was triggering the feeling associated with an unresolved issue from my childhood. As a child that same feeling had been unbearable forcing me to run away from what was happening. The fear of experiencing that same feeling was being triggered with my neighbors. Once I recognized this, I was able to separate the two situations. I found myself appreciating that the current discord had brought me awareness of my old emotional fear still being active within me. By releasing that buried fear I was able to transform the nature of my relationship with my neighbors.

 

Embracing Adversity: The oyster must accept the irritant’s presence and work with it. Likewise, individuals must accept adversity as a natural part of life and navigate it with resilience. Embracing challenges provides opportunities for growth.

For example, I struggled with obesity for most of my life. I lived in shame, self-blame, and jealousy of naturally thin people. Finally, an endocrinologist discovered that I have an extremely low metabolism that is the real source of my body weight issues. Knowing that it wasn’t my fault liberated me. I was then able to find solutions that made it possible for me to maintain a healthy body weight and release my emotional baggage associated with this issue.

 

Life is full of surprises. Remember that pearls of great price are often created through friction. It is wise to build resilience by embracing all of life.

 

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?  If so, please share it with them. 

/by
,

Souls Onboard

 

Recognizing the Sacred in Every Life We Encounter

            In aviation and maritime communication, the term “souls onboard” is used during emergencies to communicate the number of living human beings onboard a vessel. It’s not just a headcount. It’s a recognition of lives, of beings, of souls. The language reminds us that those on board aren’t cargo or statistics. They are people. Whole lives. Each one sacred.

What If We Used This Lens in Our Lives

What if we moved through the world aware that everywhere we go, we are surrounded by souls onboard—fellow travelers navigating the skies of their own lives?

Every human being you pass on the street, meet in a meeting, sit beside on the bus, or scroll past online is a soul onboard this great collective journey we call life. And like you, they are trying to make sense of it. Some are stumbling. Some are shining. All are worthy.

It’s easy to forget this when we’re overwhelmed, annoyed, or afraid. It’s easy to reduce people to their behaviors, opinions, or affiliations. We mentally divide the world into “us” and “them.” We are inclined to categorize others based on whether they agree with us. We value some and avoid others. We believe some deserve kindness and others do not.

A Call to Recognition

If we are truly spiritual beings, as so many of us claim to believe, then we cannot make exceptions. The soul is the essence of every person, regardless of how they show up. And while not all behaviors are acceptable, every being is a soul onboard.

This is not a call to spiritual bypassing or naïve tolerance. It’s a call to recognition. It is a reminder that behind every face is a complex, feeling, sacred being, shaped by stories we cannot see.

What Would Shift in Our Lives If We Truly Saw This?

  • What if the person who cut you off in traffic wasn’t just a jerk but a soul in distress?
  • What if the relative who pushes all your buttons was seen as a soul still finding their way through their own distorted perceptions and wounds?
  • What if we experienced our disturbances with others as an invitation to practice reverence, not just reaction?
  • What if we went so far as to see that person who irritates us or the one we fear as Jesus or Buddha testing our ability to love and honor each other?

We don’t need a spiritual emergency to remind us of our shared humanity. We can bring that awareness into each ordinary day.

 

Here we are, all of us,

doing the best we know how.

Some of us rising. Some of us hurting.

Some of us lonely. Some behaving badly.

Each of us trying to love, to be loved.

To belong, to matter.

We may not understand each other. We may not always agree. But we are traveling together.

So let’s tread gently. Speak kindly. Extend compassion and respect not just to those we love, but to those we don’t yet understand.

Every soul counts.

Every soul is worthy.

And every soul is onboard.

 

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?  If so, please share it with them. 

 

/by

The Power of Questions: Why Curiosity Changes Everything

Have you ever noticed how a single question can completely shift your perspective?

So often, we are looking for answers, solutions, fixes, and explanations to alleviate our discomfort. But what if the real transformation begins not with the answers we find, but with the questions we ask?

Whether we’re trying to understand ourselves, navigate a challenging relationship, or make sense of the world, the way we frame our questions determines the path our thoughts will follow. Each question opens a door and closes others. This is the quiet power of inquiry.

The Hidden Force Behind Thought

Our minds are constantly in motion. Thoughts come and go, many driven by unconscious questions we don’t even realize we’re asking.

Questions like:

  • “What’s wrong with me?”

  • “Why is this happening to me?”

  • “Will they ever change?”

Without realizing it, we often narrow our focus through these kinds of inquiries. They carry assumptions, they trigger old patterns, and they limit what we’re able to see.

But there’s another way.

When we bring our questions into conscious awareness, we can begin to shape the direction of our attention with intention. We can shift from judgment to curiosity, from blame to understanding, and from limitation to possibility.

Asking Better Questions of Ourselves

Self-inquiry is one of the most powerful tools we have for healing, growth, and clarity. Try asking simple, gentle questions like:

  • “What am I feeling right now?”

  • “What do I need in this moment?”

  • “What is this really about for me?”

Questions like this invite us inward. They create space for reflection, self-compassion, and a deeper understanding of our emotions. They help us respond with care instead of reacting with confusion or fear.

What Happens When We Ask with Curiosity

In my work with couples, I’ve seen how dramatically the tone of a conversation can change when we shift from defensive statements to open questions.

Instead of:

“Can’t you see I need your help?”
Try:
“Can we talk about what happens for you around bedtime for the kids? I want to understand.”

Instead of:

“Are you mad at me?”
Try:
“Can you share what you’re thinking and feeling about this?”

Open-ended questions are invitations. They say: I want to know you. I care about what’s real for you. And in that space, trust can grow.

Questions That Build Connection

Here are a few questions that can gently deepen connection and emotional safety in any relationship:

  • What matters most to you in this situation?

  • How can I support you right now?

  • What are we both not seeing yet?

  • What do you need from me in this moment?

  • Is there another way we could look at this?

The goal is not to “get it right,” but to stay curious. When we lead with curiosity, we soften the ground between us and invite discovery instead of defensiveness.

The Soul of a Question

A question is more than words. It carries intention.

Is your question meant to control or to understand?

Is it rooted in fear, or in a genuine desire to connect?

Is it trying to prove a point, or open a door?

When asked with presence and care, a question becomes a mirror, a flashlight, a bridge.

It is a sacred tool. One that can gently illuminate what was hidden, and return us to what matters most.

 

Reflection Prompt:

What question has been guiding your life lately?
Is it opening you up or closing you down?

 

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?
If so, please share it with them. 
 

/by

Consciousness Ecology: Inner Clarity In a Noisy World

 

Our world is overflowing with the noise of media, other people’s opinions, and the demands and distractions in our lives. It’s easy to lose touch with our own inner compass. Yet, amid this external chaos lies an extraordinary opportunity: to cultivate inner clarity through a practice I call Consciousness Ecology.

What Is Consciousness Ecology?

Consciousness Ecology is the art and practice of tending to your inner environment. Just as an ecosystem depends on balance, so too does your state of mind and heart. This practice invites us to look inward and examine the beliefs, stories, habits, and emotional patterns that silently shape how we see the world and navigate our lives.

As Plotinus wisely said, “Withdraw into yourself and look.” Consciousness Ecology is this very invitation—to return inward and tend to the landscape within.

Why It Matters

Many of us carry internal “clutter” from unresolved experiences, outdated beliefs, and unconscious fears. These internal dynamics distort how we interpret situations, how we treat others, and how we treat ourselves. Over time, we may find ourselves reacting to life rather than engaging with it consciously.

We are not victims of our conditioning unless we choose to be. Consciousness Ecology offers us a pathway out of unconscious living and into empowered awareness.

5 Core Practices of Consciousness Ecology

  • Releasing Unresolved Perceptions
    Let go of emotional residue from the past that clouds your ability to be present.

  • Reframing Your Perspective
    Learn to reinterpret events through a more compassionate, expansive lens.

  • Redefining Inner Values
    Reassess what you value and fear and update the filters that shape your worldview.

  • Practicing Healthier Ways of Being
    Integrate new thought and behavior patterns that support emotional well-being.

  • Exploring Expanded States of Consciousness
    Open to the higher frequencies of awareness that are available to all of us.

The Role of Your Attitude Filter

Think of your mind as equipped with an “Attitude Filter” that functions as a gateway that processes everything you see, hear, and experience. This filter is shaped by family conditioning, cultural messages, past wounds, and personal conclusions. If it becomes too clouded, it distorts your view of reality.

By conducting regular mental and emotional audits such as  journaling, self-reflection, or using guided questions you begin to “clean the filter.” Over time, your perception becomes clearer, your reactions more grounded, and your choices more aligned.

A Gentle Audit for Greater Awareness

When you feel stuck, reactive, or off-center, pause and explore:

  • What am I believing in this moment?

  • Is that belief absolutely true?

  • What feeling or past experience might be fueling this reaction?

  • What might I choose to believe or feel instead?

Awareness, curiosity, and self-compassion are your allies in this process.

From Reaction to Reintegration

Much of our inner struggle stems from exiled parts of ourselves. We may have pushed away shame, fear, anger, or grief because we didn’t have the tools to face them. Through Consciousness Ecology, we return to these parts with kindness, and welcome them home.

As spiritual teacher Robert Waterman describes, healing comes through reintegration. We remember who we are, not in fragments, but as a whole being capable of healing, clarity, and peace.

Making Consciousness Ecology a Way of Life

Like brushing your teeth or nourishing your body, Consciousness Ecology is a form of hygiene for the mind and heart. It doesn’t eliminate life’s challenges, but it prepares you to meet them with resilience and presence.

You might begin by:

  • Starting a weekly self-reflection journal

  • Holding regular emotional “check-ins” with a partner or trusted friend

  • Noticing and shifting negative self-talk in real time

  • Asking: What energy am I bringing to this moment?

The more consistently you practice, the more you will experience clarity, peace, and personal power.

The Invitation

You don’t need to wait for a crisis to begin. You can start today. Look within. Ask the questions. Listen to your inner world. Reclaim your clarity and wholeness.

Your inner environment shapes your outer life. 

Nurture it well.               

 

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?
If so, please share it with them. 
 

/by

When Your Dreams Don’t Come True

How often are you disappointed? Do your disappointments tend to be about life-altering things or just not getting what you want in daily life? Just because we want something doesn’t mean it will or should show up in our life.

The problem with dissatisfaction is not what you didn’t get.  It’s what you created in terms of negative thoughts and feelings about it.

Acceptance is the key here because it allows you to move on to figuring out what to do next rather than being upset about what didn’t happen.

A 12-year-old contestant on America’s Got Talent taught me a powerful lesson about this recently. While singing her heart out, she was interrupted when Simon Cowell stopped the music. He told her the background track was awful and would she please sing her song a cappella. She looked like a deer in the headlights and after a moment simply said, “Well, that just happened!” She regained her composure and sang beautifully. 

There is a fundamental dynamic that occurs when we encounter disappointment. As depicted below, Point A is where you are and Point B is your unfulfilled dream.

When reality falls short of your desires, do you accept that? Or, does your mind create a static of negative thoughts and feelings as it tries to connect the dots. When we are attached to our desires, we get caught in the dissonance of trying to bridge the gap between where we are and where we want to be. 

Alternatively, like the girl mentioned above, we can acknowledge where we are, gather our composure and capabilities, and do our best in the moment. This way we don’t postpone and limit our potential happiness by being attached to a particular dream coming true. Maybe there is a better dream trying to come forward. 

No matter how much you want your dream, holding onto it too tightly diminishes your ability to do your best with what is so for you in the present moment. Here’s a typical example. Cynthia is in her early thirties and has always wanted to get married and have children. She is aware of her biological clock ticking away and is distressed that she hasn’t yet found a partner. She believes she has done everything “right” to make her dream come true, yet she remains alone and sees her chance to fulfill this dream slipping away. 

Holding on too tightly to her dream has prevented her from appreciating the life she has. Some part of her believes she can only be really happy if her dream comes true. The flaw in her approach is that she is preventing herself from finding happiness in her actual life.

When you hold reality up to the standard of an unfulfilled dream, it will always fall short and be a disappointment.

A perpetual state of disappointment can easily lead to depression and despair. I’ve had clients who were so devastated by their unfulfilled dreams that they numbed themselves from feeling their despair. Some got caught in substance addictions. Others distracted themselves with unrealistic To-Do Lists and saying “Yes” to whatever anyone else wanted them to do, just to avoid feeling their accumulated misery. 

It is critically important to be honest with yourself about how you feel. Doing so will bring you home to the present moment. I often suggest that clients throw themselves a pity party for 10 minutes or so and really wallow in their misery. Give voice to it and cry a river if you need to. Just do so with the intention of releasing the pent up and unexpressed disappointment. Then, get on with being where you are in your life and making delicious lemonade out whatever lemons you think life has dealt you. 

One typical illulsion some of us get caught up in is the belief that our lives should be easier than they are. We often make an assumption that getting from here to there will be uneventful and easy. Chances are it won’t be. Life is full of twists and turns. 

Assumptions and expectations often blind us from what is actually going on in our lives.

Take your life as it comes. Do your best. Let it be a great adventure. Keep your focus on the present.  Respond to the reality of your life rather than trying to force your dreams to come true. 

My spiritual teacher, John-Roger, taught me to express my hopes and dreams in a prayerful way that asks, “May this or something greater that is for my highest good come forward.” Then, let it go, and put one foot in front of the other, staying present in my life. 

***

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?
If so, please share it with them. 
/by

Do You Feel Like You’re On The Outside Looking In?

One theme I have noticed with many of my mentoring clients is the feeling of being on the outside looking in. This might be how they feel in a particular social situation such as with their family, at work, or with a particular group of friends. For some, it is what they repeatedly experience. For many, this began during school days and has been with them throughout their lives.

The isolation and devastation of feeling like you are the only one who doesn’t belong or fit in can overshadow all else in one’s life. It can become a repetitive self-fulfilling process.

It’s a pervasive experience of wanting to be on the inside, but standing alone watching others being connected to each other. Some believe they have been selectively and intentionally left out.

I remember feeling trapped in this position in high school. The “in crowd” seemed to really be having a fabulous time. I watched from the periphery wondering what was wrong with me that I didn’t authentically want to be doing what they were doing. And, why didn’t it matter to them whether I was part of the group or not?

I wanted the fun they were having, but I knew that I would have to fake it to be a part of the group. I wasn’t good at that.

I wanted them to want me. I knew that forcing or inserting myself into their activities wouldn’t accomplish that.

Feelings of not fitting in, not being chosen, and just not belonging anywhere dominated my experiences in high school.

As life marched on, I noticed myself experiencing this outsider phenomenon repeatedly. It was my norm in social situations until I started to take a good look at it. I noticed a few important things that became my opportunity to break free. And, eventually I began to help others to do so as well. Here are some keys to moving away from the experience of being the outsider looking in:

Observe your experience, but don’t make it wrong.

It’s easy to fall into the false assumption that because they are having fun and you aren’t that “they are right and therefore you are wrong.” That’s a dead end proclamation. It robs you of the opportunity to consider other possibilities. That’s why observation rather than judgment is so important.

Our negative feelings are feedback to us of being out of balance inside. They are not cause for judgment of ourselves or others. Observation leads to neutral conclusions that allow us to explore our options.

Neutral observations might look like “I want to have fun. Standing here watching them is not fun for me. What else might I do to have the experience I am looking for? What is fun for me? What would be more fun for me than standing here watching them have fun?”

It stands to reason that if you put your hand over a burning flame, it hurts and the healthy response is to move your hand away and learn not to do that again. So, apply that logic here.

Look Inward, Not Outward.

When you find yourself distressed watching others seemingly having a good time, notice that you are doing that. You are creating that perception and reaction inside of you. Choose to look at that inner process of creation rather than outward at what others are doing.

Work with the information in a healthier way by using it to explore the resonance within you that your feelings are tapping into. Is this current experience tapping into some unresolved hurt from the past? If so, take a look at that and see if you can make peace with it. Seek understanding and healing of any past disturbances so you can be free and healthy in encountering new experiences.

Consider the Possibility That You Are Creating a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

If you keep having this same experience, consider the fact that it is a matter of faulty perception. When you repeatedly make yourself wrong each time you encounter the feeling of being disconnected from others, you simply pile on more bad feelings on top of old, unresolved feelings.

The pain gets bigger and bigger because each encounter touches into a mother load of unresolved feelings you carry around you. Convinced that you are “right” in your interpretation of being “wrong” (having never considered an alternative) makes your perspective a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Pay Attention to What Works for You and What Doesn’t

Keep paying attention to your inner experiences. Notice how you perceive and react to outer situations. Do you see patterns? Create more of what works for you. And, get to work on dismantling repetitive negative patterns of perception and behavior. That’s called mastering the art of living. It will bring you much more fulfillment, joy, and satisfaction. Lovingly attend to your own sense of imbalance.

Look Elsewhere.

Explore what other options are available to you. Stop wanting to be part of something that doesn’t make you happy. If the shoe doesn’t fit, try on a different shoe. Go for what fits, not for what you wish would fit, but doesn’t.

Go for the feeling and experience you are looking for, don’t demand the conditions under which those feelings will manifest. Be committed to finding your own form of happiness where you fit in and feel good about yourself. Don’t settle for anything less.

Live inside your own experience. Honor your own truth. Trust that you belong in this world just the way you are. Love yourself madly and deeply!

***

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?
If so, please share it with them. 

/by

Are You Suffering Unnecessarily?

Do you often find yourself saying “It isn’t fair” or thinking you have more than your share of suffering?

Do you play the story of “what happened to you” over and over in your mind like a hamster running in his wheel?

Consider the possibility that there IS something you can do about that.The place to start is by distinguishing between unavoidable suffering which is a necessary part of life and the kind of suffering we create for ourselves.

“Necessary suffering” seems like a strange concept to most people. But, consider the fact that no one gets to escape some form of pain in response to the trials and tribulations of life.

  • You fall and skin your knee – ouch!
  • A friend lets you down or disappoints you in some significant way – sadness.
  • Someone you love and treasure dies – deep grief.

A certain amount of suffering comes with the territory of being alive. If we are lucky, we learn to use these experiences as steppingstones to greater wisdom and understanding. They also have a way of getting us to draw closer to one another. We instinctively comfort one another in ways that are deeper and less common than we find in everyday life.

The unnecessary kind of suffering, according to psycho-spiritual teacher, Robert Augustus Masters, is a direct result of the stories we tell ourselves about our painful experiences. Some people obsess about their suffering. Their tales of woe become a constant irritant, like a stone in your shoe that you don’t realize you can remove.

Portia was a client of mine. I don’t think she ever made it through a session without needing to recite the litany of trials and tribulations she had faced in her life. Suffering had become her central identity. She didn’t know herself without her suffering. She kept it alive in the present by talking about it all the time like a broken record. When I attempted to show her what she was doing and invited her into the process of releasing her attachment to suffering, she left. She interpreted that as my not being supportive enough of her.

We cause ourselves to suffer more than we need to. Our distress is intensified by focusing our attention on feeling and reliving the pain again and again.

Ironically, we minimize our suffering by facing it, entering into the pain that comes our way, and moving through it.

A great example of necessary and unnecessary pain can be seen in the contrast between two ways a woman might experience giving birth. One woman actively works with her breath to move through the pain of her labor. Another is busy resisting her pain and screaming about how much it hurts.

The path through our pain is to accept its presence rather than to resist it by trying to get away from it.

Ironically, we create unnecessary pain by the very act of resisting pain. In other words, through resistance, we focus upon our pain, draw it to ourselves, and attach ourselves to it.

Our point of view – our attitude toward suffering makes all the difference in terms of how much we suffer.

In a TED Talk, BJ Miller referred to perspective as “that kind of alchemy we humans get to play with, turning anguish into a flower.”

So, next time you start throwing a pity party for yourself, change your point of view so you can change your experience. Try one of these methods:

1. Expand your perspective to entertain the good news that is coming with the bad. In other words, appreciate the half full part of the glass you are only seeing as half empty. My friend, Barbara Sarah, founded the Oncology Support Program at HealthAlliance of the Hudson Valley in Kingston, NY. She shared with me a list that one of her students in a Constructive Living program made. It was a growing list identifying all the people who she was grateful to for helping her care for her hospitalized husband. 105 people and counting! As the list grew, so did her gratitude to these people. The list included such people as:

  • the person who supplies the “lollipop” mouth moisturizers
  • the pre-admission secretary who greets you and sets up your test schedule
  • a gardener who cares for all the plants in the public areas
  • the staff who buzz you in the surgical ICU

When we are encountering life’s challenges, it is important to acknowledge that our glass is not only half empty. It is simultaneously half full. So make a list of all the things in your life that are also true blessings while you are suffering. See if you don’t find yourself becoming so grateful that you forget a bit about your pain. This is about finding and restoring balance inside yourself.

2. Give yourself a deadline to finish your pity party. Give yourself 5-10 minutes or three hours to really get into all your complaints and suffering. Exaggerate the immensity of your pain and feel really sorry for yourself until the timer goes off. Then, choose to shift your focus onto doing something really thoughtful or supportive for yourself or someone else. Don’t allow yourself to start grabbing onto your pain again. If it hurts, breathe into it and keep going. Ask yourself, “Is there anything constructive I need to do about my pain?” If the answer is “yes” then do that, if it is “no” then make the choice to place your focus elsewhere.

3. Pray for your highest good. Prayer, in its highest form, is about trust and laying down your burdens. It is a surrendering to that which is beyond our comprehension. This kind of prayer is beyond personal preferences or judgments of what “should” or “shouldn’t” be happening. It acknowledges that there are forces present in our lives that are beyond our understanding. By praying for the highest good, we appeal to the benevolence of whatever forces are at work in our lives. We surrender our burdens to these forces. In other words, we acknowledge that what will happen is beyond our control. We accept that and go on about our business of living the best we can.

4. Decide to make fabulous lemonade out of your lemons. My spiritual teacher, John-Roger always advised using everything for our upliftment, learning, and growth. That advise has served me very well in the hardest of times. This is a matter of choice. We have the option of shifting the message we send ourselves about our suffering from “poor me, this is terrible” to “I wonder how I can work with this to lift myself up, to learn, and to grow.”

The bottom line is we have far more power over the degree of our suffering than most of us imagine. When we stop accentuating the negative, we make more room for better options to be the focus of our attention.

 

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?
If so, please share it with them. 

/by

How to Maintain Your Inner Well-Being – Part 2

Did you know that your brain gives preference to visual information?

Researchers L.D. Rosenblum, Harold Stolovitch, and Erica Keeps refer to our senses as learning portals. They offer the following statistics regarding the percentage of data processed by each of our five senses:

Sight (both through our eyes and unconscious visual perception) accounts for an estimated 83% of the information we process.  Another 11.0% comes through hearing, 3.5% through smell, 1.5% through touch, and the remaining 1.0% through taste.

Why is this significant?

By design, our eyes focus our attention outward. The fact that the vast majority of our sensory data is visual therefore predisposes us to an external frame of reference that focuses on the physical world.

Unaware that we are “seeing” the projection of an internally-filtered reality, we misinterpret our perceptions of reality to be reality itself. Consider the heated arguments between individuals of opposing political points of view. Each sees a different reality and believes that they are “right” and those on the other side of the aisle are “wrong.”

Until we become aware of how our internal data processing determines the reality we perceive, we think we are reacting to an external reality, rather than determining what that reality appears to be.

For most of us, our socialization includes indoctrination into a binary model of consciousness. In other words, we are taught to sort people and experiences into right/wrong, good/bad, beautiful/ugly, desirable/undesirable and so on. In fact, life is far more complex and messy than that.

Learned biases and preferences short-circuit the process of developing curiosity about those differences that we are taught to reject. There is a built-in bias against diversity in this way of encountering unfamiliar people and experiences. Therefore, diversity requires a new way of perceiving beyond our autopilot right/wrong sorting process.

In a binary approach, there are only two choices. That means if we encounter someone who is different, we can’t both be “right” or “OK.” As a result, we develop very narrow tolerances for differences, rather than nurturing our curiosity and openness to all kinds of people and experiences.

Would you like to know the best way to tame your inclination to judge anyone who is different than you or any experience you don’t like? It’s to become really curious and to call upon your inner detective. When we are quick to judge, we shut ourselves down. We also close ourselves off from additional information available to us. Our myopic view blinds us from alternative ways of seeing ourselves, the other person, and the situation itself.

When we become curious, we open ourselves up and draw ourselves closer to those we don’t understand rather than shutting them out or pushing them away.

 By about the age of five or six, we have the foundation of our self-image in place and we begin to unconsciously protect, conceal, or improve our image of ourselves and to become competitive with the self-images of others. We spend most of our time focused outward through our self-image as we negotiate and navigate our way through the world and relate to the imagined self-images being projected by others.

We learn to live in a world that is a collective figment of our imaginations in which we attempt to defend and elevate our status relative to that of others.

We selectively see things that support our existing beliefs and filter out things that do not agree with our way of seeing things.

Another paradox of our visual orientation is that it makes it very difficult for us to verify and trust the existence of non-physical reality. This is the territory of self-knowledge, intuition, and spiritual awareness.

It is interesting to note that when physical things come into being we refer to them as being born. When we refer to entering or increasing spiritual awareness, we call it awakening. We become aware of something that already exists. In physical form, we exist as separate beings. Spiritually, we exist within oneness. It is our mind and emotions that have separated us.

Paying attention to non-physical reality is a bit like being a salmon swimming upstream against the current. It requires an intentional redirection of our focus. To turn inward, we must engage in a more intimate relationship with ourselves. To awaken ourselves spiritually require a different state of mind.

The external orientation of our attention, coupled with the bombardment of unconscious sensory data, makes it extremely difficult to awaken our spiritual awareness. It requires a different state of consciousness to comprehend that we are at once one and the same. We are both singular and separate.

Learning how to become more conscious of our own unique data sorting process is essential to mastering the art of being who we authentically are.

Spiritual awakening involves consciously and intentionally developing our ability to override our usual way of being and perceiving. It requires looking within rather than being drawn to an external focus by the dominance of visual sensory input we are receiving. It means cultivating a non-judgmental perspective towards differences and an awareness of a level upon which we are all the same.

This requires cultivation of a childlike curiosity rather than a defensive and competitive stance regarding our perceptions versus those of others. It requires an entirely different kind of awareness — not based on sensory data. Rather it is a matter of attunement to something greater than our physical form that is shared by all. Language and empirical science fail us in speaking clearly about such matters, but do not negate their existence.

Ludwig Wittgenstein concluded in his monumental book, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, “whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.” This German, philosophical heavyweight is reputed to have put down is pen and become a gardener after writing that.

Each of us has our own unique life to lead.  As we learn about the power of the Reticular Activating System (RAS) it becomes clear that the quality of our consciousness determines how we experience our lives.

Ghandi said, “My life is my message.”  What does your life say about you? How skilled are you at being an active co-creator of your life?

In case you missed it, here is the link to Part 1 of this blog post.

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?
If so, please share it with them. 

/by

How to Maintain Your Inner Well-Being – Part 1

If any of the following sound familiar, you will be delighted to know you can eliminate them all!

  • Feeling like an outsider
  • Never feeling like you are good enough
  • Being aware of an inner emotional heaviness or depression
  • Experiencing a repetitive pattern of disappointment
  • The emotional heat of perpetual anger
  • The inability to deeply connect with other people
  • Blaming and judging yourself and others when things don’t go “your way.”

Each and every one of these is the direct result of specific beliefs, fears, or misconceptions through which you are filtering new experiences in your Reticular Activating System.

The Reticular Activating System (RAS) is truly a marvel of human design. Here’s what it does:

  • regulates our sleep-wake transitions
  • coordinates and integrates our cardiovascular, respiratory, and motor response to external stimuli
  • controls our coordination
  • processes the vast majority of our incoming sensory information

Do you have any idea how much new information your brain is constantly processing? In his book, Strangers to Ourselves, Timothy Wilson quantifies the human brain’s unfathomable ability to process information as follows:

The unconscious processing abilities of the human brain are estimated at approximately 11 million pieces of information per second.  Compare that to the estimate for conscious processing: about 40 pieces per second.

Without our RAS, this barrage would quite literally blow our minds! We live in a constant state of data bombardment.

The fact that the vast majority of our data processing is unconscious is a great kindness in human design. However, this unconscious filtration system runs on autopilot while determining what incoming information we value, devalue, or fear based on our accumulated past reactions.

 Like the default settings on our computers, our past data processing decisions function as self-fulfilling prophecies of our present and future data filtration, unless and until we bring them to awareness for reevaluation. 

Mosby’s Medical Dictionary, 9th edition © 2009, Elsevier

The RAS is located in the brainstem. It consists of a network of nerve pathways. They form a link between the brain stem, which controls most of the body’s involuntary functions and reflexes, and the cerebral cortex, which is the seat of consciousness and our thinking ability. By connecting these two regions of the brain, the RAS functions as a filtering system for the mind. It controls our attention, awareness, thinking, and emotions. It quite literally causes us to construct our own internal worldview.

While we share our physical world, we each have our very own unique inner world. What we are seeing is not as it is in the physical world. We see the world as it is after being processed through our inner filters. Our sense of truth is relative to our inner filtration system.

The good news is you have the power to change the settings on your filtration system. Through increased awareness of how this system works and by paying attention to all forms of imbalance you experience, you have the power to change your inner and outer experiences.

We are biased to the status quo of how we already see things.

Believing that this internally-generated version of the truth is the empirical truth blinds us from reality.

One of the consequences of this misconception is that we believe that anyone whose perspective or way of being is different than ours is “wrong.” What we imagine to be our perception of empirical truth is merely a reflection of an aggregated inner point of view.

Within the privacy of our own consciousness – in the theater of our mind – we create our own sense of reality, which we inhabit and relate to as if it is REALITY.

It is important to remember that no one else on this planet has an identical inner world to the one you live in. The assumption that others see the world as we do is the source of an enormous amount of our misunderstanding about ourselves and each other.

The majority of our perceptions and thoughts are merely the product of our primarily unconscious sensory data filtration system. They exist only in our private inner world.

Understanding the design of the data processing function of the RAS empowers us to do some renovations to the mental and emotional scaffolding upon which we are living our lives.

We access this opportunity by paying attention to where things are not working well for us in our lives. To bring our autopilot ways of responding to our experiences into conscious awareness, we need to identify what is on our filter. So, take a good look at your underlying conditioning, beliefs, assumptions, expectations, prejudices, preferences, fears, memories, judgments, illusions, delusions, hopes, and dreams.  Only then, do we have the option to challenge our default settings and change them as appropriate.

Another way of saying this is we need to clean our data processing filters. In doing so, we can update our default settings. Our freedom lies in recognizing that our RAS makes our lives a self-fulfilling prophecy. It is simply doing what we tell it to do. When we update our default settings, we are redirecting the perspective of our RAS so that it will now validate our new point of view.

Consider this simple example. While on a weight loss journey, I got to within one pound of what I viewed as a major threshold. I plateaud there for six weeks. I was doing everything “right” in terms of complying with my program. What was going on? Upon evaluation of my RAS filters, I noticed that I held a belief that crossing this particular one-pound threshold would put me into a level of success that I had not previously experienced.

Underneath that I discovered that I was fearful and did not trust myself to maintain this success. In this context, my weight loss plateau made perfect sense. Once I  identified the source of resistance to further progress, I was able to bring more of this pattern into conscious awareness and to challenge myself to see my situation through new eyes.

When we get stuck, we need to look to see exactly what beliefs and fears have been preventing us from moving forward. Then, we can choose to replace them with new, affirming beliefs and assumptions.

Bringing unconscious patterns into awareness empowers us to upgrade our default settings in such a way that upgrades the quality of our inner life.

If you would like to know more about me and my work, please explore my website here.

Do you know someone who might benefit from reading this article?
If so, please share it with them. 

/by