5 Fertile Thoughts for Personal Growth: Thinking about Thinking

Personal growth depends to an unknown extent on our ability to be aware of, and think about, our thoughts, feelings and behavior. However if we don’t ‘do internal work’, think deeply about this vast uncharted area, we are certainly going to lead a life that is more lifeless and robotic.

If we lead our life as if the world is only outside of us, repeating patterns of behavior, with no self-reflection, what is effective for us at one point in our life cycle, sooner or later, loses it’s effectiveness.

Below are five ideas to fertilize thinking about our internal worlds: Read the Rest of This Article »

Who Am I? 5 Steps To Reveal Your True Self

We endlessly discuss and gossip about questions of: What am I? Who am I? What is my self?

Layers of Fear hide answers to these questions. They must be lifted off to live in the essence of an effective life. Read the Rest of This Article »

Wean it and Weep?

Each of us begins in total dependence: the womb. From the moment of ‘delivery’ into the awesome beauty and terror of the world we struggle to come to grips with separateness and the emotions that go with it.

In this piece I raise questions and discuss what is not a frivolous question. I do this to help you assess where you are in your own emotional life journey. Read the Rest of This Article »

WORDS THAT OVERCOME FEAR II

In my last piece I outlined the place that the sale of fear is taking in our life. I noted the role fear plays in creating illness. I highlighted the major role of particularly guilty industries: the pharmaceutical companies, politicians, insurance companies and the news and advertising media, to name just five. These are entities that go out of their way to create a culture of fear to sell their products.

Because it is not a one-way street, however, this is not the whole story. Here in FEAR II, I outline the role we play in putting our self at the mercy of fear and dread and the personal responsibility we must own to manage these feelings. If you are interested, I explain this in greater detail, with clinical examples, in my book.

The first difficult and complex reality is that fear and dread are a very large and significant part of being human. These feelings and others, like a sense of doom, are essential elements of the human experience. Repeat this to yourself: “If I want to be fully human then I accept that fear and dread are a part of what I am.” Only by accepting this can you utilize your essential inner energy and at the same time ward off salesmen selling you more fear. You already have a plentiful supply. Read the Rest of This Article »

Words That Overcome Fear And Dread

Everyone knows sex sells. Greed sells too, and again, this is something we all know. But little did we know that the really big, best seller of all is FEAR and it’s companion, dread.

Here are some current ‘epidemic’, ‘impending’ ‘catastrophe-in-the-making’, brilliantly-marketed FEARS: Fear of recession, depression, terrorists, war, disease, food, air, climate change, computer crashes, natural disasters, breast size, impotency, break-ins, drug czars and addicts, immigrants and aging.

Here I focus on an area closest to my own experience as a physician-psychiatrist: the fear of illness and dying. As you read about overcoming and transcending this fear, think of it as an effective metaphor for the other fears listed above. When you come to the end reread the piece substituting each fear.

Start with this fact: To fear our body is a powerful way to create disease. Why is this? Because fear is about being attacked and when you think you are going to be attacked you are both hard-wired and soft-wired for flight or fight. This, in simple terms, is bad for your physical health when carried on continuously or repetitively on an intermittent basis. Your body is not set up to be constantly on the alert for danger or shocked repeatedly by the unexpected. It is not necessary to go into the physiology of why this might lead to high blood pressure, heart attack, stroke and even cancer. Here is the rub: If fear can be created it leads to disease thereby proving that the fear was warranted. This is every politician, salesman and businessman’s dream: to create a need for snake oil. Read the Rest of This Article »

Words that HEAL and EMPOWER

Every moment of every day is a new beginning for your life through the words you choose to use.

Words make up your thoughts and ideas. They shape the images in your mind, coloring what you perceive and believe.

In the world around you, words make up text messages, tweets, and on your Facebook page they explain your pictures, your past and your plans. They make up the laws that rule much of your experience.

Yet all this being true, we seldom stop to think about the ongoing power of the words we use and string together, the empowerment of words at our disposal when used effectively, or the power unleashed against us at our peril when words are used without awareness.

Our mind is the light we shine second by second on the words we choose from the infinite lexicon before us. It is critically important that we be alertly aware: The words we choose to shine the light of our mind on, shape our very life and its quality.

Now if we stop for a moment and think of the avalanche of words we are inundated with from without, never mind from the running dialogue within, it is easy to see the confusion this can lead to. Which words to choose and will they lead to an effective direction in our life? Read the Rest of This Article »