Stephen Dinan’s Amazing Gift to Me
The purpose of this blog is to both acknowledge Stephen Dinan for the coaching he gave me about the Global Wisdom System and to acknowledge Rachel Besserman’s coaching in helping me to interpret Stephen’s advice. Rachel is my Global Wisdom System co-mentor. (Click here for an index to blogs and other links about the Global Wisdom System.)
Based on Stephen’s and Rachel’s advice, I will be changing to the way I work with and advertise the Global Wisdom System at this early stage. More specifically, Stephen challenged me to overcome my poverty mentality about money, provided me with feedback about how some of my presentations to SIA have been interpreted, and suggested some specific things that I could do to address these interpretations. I’m announcing this today because I’m going to have some of these changes in place by the time of this Saturday’s Web cam group meeting.
The Problem—Why I Will Transform My Relationship with Money
The Make-Wrongs that Masquerade as Nonattachment
I've been avoiding the nonattachment chapter in the Global Wisdom System Handbook for some time. While meditating on what's stopping me, I was inspired to write the following section. Since it is so different from my normal style, I'm still uncertain about it. I would therefore especially like to request feedback about it. Thank you.
Many people who gravitate towards the practice of nonattachment do so for absolutely the wrong reasons. Perhaps, for instance, you’re pissed off that someone is depending on you, and you’d like to simply dismiss their neediness as an unhealthy attachment. You ask, “Who made me responsible for their problems, anyway? I’m not attached to them, and they shouldn’t be attached to me. There’s something wrong with them that they project such unhealthy expectations onto me.”
When you think this way—and I believe that we’ve all been like this at some point in our lives, it’s probably because at that moment, you’re being a jerk.
My New Year's Resolutions for 2007
My New Year’s Intention is a Resolution of Inner Conflict
Tana and I worked for twelve hours to prepare for our New Year’s ritual. By the time we were sitting in front of the fire, the clutter was gone from most of our home. We had set aside a few momentos to burn as we released energy from the past that no longer served our highest good.
I cast a circle of banishment with my athame (a ritual knife). A circle of banishment in the Northern hemisphere is cast counterclockwise (or widdershins), which is opposite to the spin of the earth.
Then Tana and I each invoked energies that we work with. Tana’s pantheon for this evening included Obatala, Oshun, Inanna, and Bridget. Mine included Bridget, Horus, and Helios. The reasons for my choices are that Bridget married us (Click to read.), I channeled Horus at our handfasting, and I’m a priest of Helios in a two-year Eleusinian Mysteries Cycle.
Being Congruent About My Multiple Sclerosis
I can’t really say that I feel blessed that I have multiple sclerosis. But even though I saw my mother quickly progress from diagnosis to wheelchair and eventually die from MS-related complications, my illness causes me far less anxiety than you might expect.
On occasion, I have been able to say to others—and mean it—that my illness has been a truly great teacher. I’ve never been able to stay in that grateful place for a very long time, but I have been there. When I’ve been there, I was close to praising the illness for its existence. I just wish that I could congruently stay in this grateful state for longer periods of time.
Will I ever be able to develop a congruent position in which I truly cherish my disease completely? Perhaps—if I can accomplish everything that I describe in this blog. Or perhaps I can truly cherish the path itself for what it is, no matter what I’m personally able to accomplish in my own heart.
We’ll see.
What I Learned About Getting Things Done from a Noetic Perspective
The first international Chrysalis Wisdom Council on December 9 felt historic to me, and the technical impediments and interruptions that occurred probably contributed to this historic feeling. We were on opposite sides of the globe, and yet we could all see each other and hear each other throughout——including myself from California, Jeff DeCelles of Colorado, Rachel Besserman and her husband Damon from Massachusetts, and Pete Adams from Turkey.
But in spite of the glitches, we kept at it, and I’m truly very grateful for the effort that we all made. As Rachel said near the end, “It’s all of our perseverance together that allowed this to actually happen, isn't it?”
