Dualities: The Good, the Bad and the Earthbound

We have this strange, stratified, practically surreal paradox going on in the world at present.  On the one hand there are the power obsessed which range from individuals controlling their own mini-fiefdoms, resisting inclusion insisting on exclusion --to corporations and governments which are doing the same on a more macro scale.  Here, there is an aversion to relationship.  A more authentic relationship would mean, a willingness for an open tolerance that has breath in unoccupied spaces between people or entities and in oneself.  This would require a letting go, a willingness to be insignificant, a leap into the unknown, a relinquishing of personal resources and time.  At present, there is a lot of lieing, collusion, covert plotting/implementation, backdoor deals, conspiratorial setups to manipulate the external facade and the inevitable cover up of same.

This is a universal (cosmically lawful?) contraction of sorts; as opposed to an expansion or period of release witnessed in other eras or periods of time.  As was said, we are seeing this on all scales; from government, world politics to corporate institutions to even our friends and neighbor's conduction of personal affairs.  It's a proliferative, invasive and a toxic reaction to fear of being nothing.  It is a manifestation of a world bereft of a spiritual compass or conscience.  There is a resistance to this seen by other public power brokers.  Through humor, mobilizing masses of people or throwing money at the contraction through media or otherwise, there is an attempt to bring a transparency to the inequitablility.  From my perspective, this is the other side of this deeply troubled coin (even though I am entertained and often grateful for the latter's exposure attempts).  They are polarized to the other side of the coin, and also are unwilling to be insignificant, invisible and without their own wieldy (heady) power.

I am everybody and every time, I always call myself by your name.  --Pablo Neruda

And then we have, on the other hand, the legions of unsung hero(ines).  Those people who are off that power grid, living their life through a deeper guidance, a conscience that manifests in small, often invisible and insignificant ways to the world at large.  The family members who have put their own personal, well planned trajectory on hold to mindfully care for an incapacitated other, be it a family elder or physically/mentally challenged child, young adult.  What is inconsequential to many is significant to them.  Personally insuring the quality of life for a loved one who may never be a person of power in the world (pay back). And this is usually done at great financial expense and an abdication of massive chunks of personal time (never to be recovered).  There is no fanfare and rarely an acknowledgment of this noble endeavor.  It is an often silent, private, hellish (on some levels) navigation, touched by unspoken suffering, without remuneration and always at an exorbitant financial cost (in one way or another).  Prompted by a sense of deep obligation and almost always love, of the agape sort.  These are people who are both well prepared (financially and internally) and unprepared for such a commitment.  But they all take it on regardless because of their innate sense of integrity, justice and conscience.  It's a breathtaking choice of selflessness to make.

Let me embrace thee, sour adversity, for wise men say it is the wisest course.-- Wm. Shakespeare

Is this not a perplexing and unusual juxtaposition of universal energies?  Granted, it is probably not a new juxtaposition.  I think of India, the famous historical power plays/brokers of the past juxtaposed with Mother Theresa's work with lepers, the terminally ill and other outcasts, done mostly under the radar of public notice, the first few decades at least. There are countless vocationists who have dedicated their existence to educating and caring for underserved, unnoticed populations all over the world, for little to no pay.  And the unconscionable power mongering has indeed always gone on, as these other more conscience-centered activities, have too gone on.

Does the world require these two different cosmic energies to co-exist in the world?  The constant friction of these energies may be necessary to keep the planet turning? Or maybe its not the polar forces themselves, but the friction that is created as they inevitably dual while in co-existence.  There is a tremendous energy generated there.  Enough energy to catapult nations into revolution and/or war.  On a micro scale, it's enough for individuals to make a cataclysmic shift in themselves; stop drinking/drugging, take a serious life inventory that prompts a leap into another way of being.  Or is it merely, we are at the mercy of these inevitable paradoxes?  They cosmically do their contraction/expansion thing on cue, and we similarly on cue, do our response/reaction to these big lawful forces?

In a way the inner struggle to cultivate a conscience through a lifetime is related to the universal duality these forces manifest.

“This goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust?” ― William Shakespeare, Hamlet

Turning Toward: An Approach to Addiction

One of the wonderful aspects of navigating a wellness coaching business is finding my strengths along the way and attracting those that would resonate.  I am surprised to be surprised finding out who I am.  And I am even more surprised at the people who find their way to me for support and assistance.  There, more often than not, is a shared vibration which makes even the stickiest, difficult work a joy for us both.

Whereas most nurses are very directive, that is not my favorite approach (although it has been fun to play the bossy role at times).  The bodyworker-artist in me finds my own and other's difficulties intriguing.  In relation to a healing or dealing with a habit, I can do all the linear list making a client could ever want, but what I really love and find most effective, is collaborating.  In regards to wellness, I don't personally like being told what to do, and I have found most autonomous, self-directed adults feel likewise.  I like figuring things out with the light guidance of others.  I like to be empowered in the process, not directed by an other's force (well meaning or not).  So, creating relationship with one whom helps and making relationship with that which needs attention is an adventure worth exploring.

One of the approaches I've used successfully as of late with addiction (in particular smoking) has been focusing compassion on the parts of oneself that needs smoking to survive.  Forget about the external addiction.  Who in this person needs, craves, longs for cigarettes?  Don't quit smoking out of inner/outer pressure from others or out of shame.  Quit smoking because you don't need it anymore.  Heal the original wound.

The parts of a client that need smoking are vulnerable.  The last thing they need is contempt, ridicule, disappointment  and rejection coming at them.  They hardly can admit their existence out of fear of being seen as weak, pathetic and pitiful.  Working with people to divulge these delicate areas in themselves, works best if  humor is in play.  Also, creatively using trance state, movement and play in venues that a client appreciates and relaxes in, is useful.  Buoyancy and play help in the suspension of fear and negativity.

What I have been finding in many people who depend upon smoking, is they do so because it takes the edge off of their loneliness, frustrations, sense of isolation, misery, grief, feeling of abandonment, or friendlessness.  People who smoke (maybe who struggle with any addiction or hard habit) have had a trauma around one of these mentioned areas that they could not then and have not since been able to navigate.  They started smoking when their girlfriend left them back in high school, or the kids went off to college or lost a job, etc.  Or they started smoking to quell a sense of self-inadequacy, disappointment, disillusionment.  Over time, smoking became inextricably linked to relief from these emotional states that are hard to admit to oneself or others.  Emotional states that are unbearable (without a cigarette).  This is the human condition.  In practice, this is what surfaces, the pictures that unfold, the stories that get told.  The feelings linked to the smoking are usually more shaming for the client than the actual smoking.

So, how does this compassion approach work?  What I do is set an intention with the client to not change anything overtly, but to watch, observe and even honor the need by caring for the needy-one.  This allows change to unfold organically, naturally, non-violently.  We watch the ritual of smoking; the reliable time around the urges, how a cigarette is actually handled from beginning to end, the thoughts and feelings in the inhale, the exhale, the smells and other sense involvement. I encourage practicing a suspension of judgement or self criticism during the study; it frees up that which is curious and interested.  Clients record heavy/light usage times, when is the best cigarette of the day, when is the time it is most negligible.  They record the sense of who in them requires a drag or two (the bored, defiant teenager, the lonely child?).   We also record the external and internal stressors, the hiding of it from certain places and people, when is it enjoyable and when is it repugnant.  In this process, they (and I) begin to become more familiar with what the habit of smoking is to this unique organism, what it means to all/most of themselves, the joy and sorrow around it, connected to it and the pleasure/displeasure present. And we are easy (even playful) about it.  Hell, brimstone and cancer threats are not required.

What happens in this approach is the person inside who has this habit is less shrouded in shame, becomes more self-accepted.  A curiosity is cultivated. It doesn't become about "breaking" the habit, it's more about the interesting self who participates in the habit and all the accompanying circumstances and history that support it.  It becomes an awakening of sorts that is freed from the previous inevitable guilt.  When clients start to emerge out of their shame and guilt over the addiction, I've witnessed a soaring sense of creativity and intuition from them, which then becomes like a beacon toward a movement of change.  Seemingly all of a sudden, they decide their living situation needs tweaking to abate their loneliness.  Or they acquire a pet, join a church, or take up an art class.  Experiencing this vivid creativity, they begin to feel what it is like to be more themselves.  This phenomenon by itself is enormously comforting.  And then, quite anticlimactically one day (in their own time) it is decided, "You know, I don't think I want to have smoking in my life anymore.  I don't need it." Like giving up old clothes that don't feel right anymore. And every time this happens for a client, there is a new Wow for me.  It's incredible how natural and non violent the action is.  The stopping wasn't based on withholding, denying, shame or judgement. It's based on a healing seated in a global sense of self love.

Post smoking cravings and urges are there, but taken in perspective, because they've been studied with compassion.  One senses one's dimension; no longer held in these mean, contemptuous pigeonholes of "weak", "addict", "hopeless, never to change",  "disgusting", etc.  The secret corners have been exposed to benevolence.  Someone loving, kind and occasionally funny has partnered up with them--- themSelf.  They truly are no longer alone or friendless or isolated.  They've evolved caring witnesses within in the process of courageously facing their history, undisclosed feelings and their truth.

This approach is really a larger commitment to know oneself, and yet also does happen to be effective in habit cessation.  People who appreciate this inside-out work,  are the types of clients I am interested in and whom seem to be attracted to my wellness work.  I can and have done the directed, linear approach. But, it is not that interesting to me.  It requires but a perfunctory formation of a relationship to self, other or the issue. If it is at all successful, it's almost always partially so.   Compassion work is a commitment but it lasts a lifetime; once you get a taste, a gist of it, it's pretty easy to access and keep as a consistent constant in one's life.  It actually becomes almost impossible not to actively know it.  It is Love in action, something one begins to find, they can't live without.

Taking Risks

photo: Ibrahim Lujaz

"Security is mostly a superstition.  It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it.  Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing."  
--Helen Keller

Go out on a limb....take a chance.....do some thing every day that scares you... These are sayings/invitations we've heard through our lifetimes no doubt, that perhaps piqued something in us but more often than not was dismissed. Why?

Is our illusion around safety and security so embedded, the human propensity to stick to a plan and not "rock the boat" so ingrained, that even the merest scary idea of acting outside my sensible norm becomes intimidating? Are we so wedded to our creature comforts, our (indoctrinated) sensibilities, ideas of a good life threatened by being something else not characterized by the usual?

I recently made a bunch of pacts with myself to do a series of things I haven't done since childhood.  Like dive head-first into water from an elevation or subject myself to a terrifying, stomach-turning roller coaster ride, skinny dip in broad daylight, walk in a downpour gladly, without being hunched and cowered, allowing my (adult) shoes to become saturated and squishy. I longed to grapple with a small something that secretly threatened aspects of myself, things I was sure I could not do, was afraid to fail at:  knit a pair of socks, terrifying for even an experienced knitter with all those yarn overs, dropped stitches and intimidating rounded heels, make a Baked Alaska (solid ice cream in a hot pastry? how is this possible?), eat okra with an open palate (there must be something else to it besides sliminess).  Why do even these small things imprison me in a type of fear and/or abhorrence for decades? What is so bad about being in a transitory state of discomfort?


My practically crystallized ideas of myself are challenged: I'm not as good a knitter as I like to believe.  I'm not that talented at baking.  I am uncomfortable being out of control, not "knowing".  What if someone sees me naked... what if I get arrested (!) I sometimes misunderstand directions given, therefore I must be stupid.  My life is channeled by my innumerous likes and dislikes and my sense of comfort/discomfort to avoid these challenges.  Something hangs onto these negative childish impressions and messages; my secret and not-so-secret sense of identity depends upon them.

"Those who are willing to be vulnerable move among mysteries."  Theodore Roethke

Photo: Xose Castro Roig

Something happens when I take something dreaded on willingly, with a glad (if not intrepid) heart.  The torture of the experience is still guaranteed (the ego after all, is my constant companion).  But the liberation which transpires each step of each agonizing step in the process of the dastardly event is also guaranteed.  The unabated interior railing that goes on in the process is astounding and somehow hilarious. One sees the humor in the folly of the long held belief being broken.  One experiences one's ridiculousness, awkwardness and revels (perhaps after crying a bit) in that.  Or one relives the old wound of self-disappointment but from a more mature perspective; a point of view that can rally, try it again but this time without self-recrimination, this time with more patience and compassion.  This is gold in one's pocket. This is a bit of a triumph; maybe bigger than a bit.  This is a life stepping up to a challenge, a life being lived,  a control freak being denied, a big spirit showing itself. 

"Knowledge implies ignorance of what lies beyond what is known.  Knowledge is always limited."
--Sri Ramana Maharshi

The human condition for all of us on some level, is reaching middle or old age and finding ourselves nailed to an unexpected misery, fear of the future, deep discontent despite being surrounded by all the imaginable comforts the world could possibly provide.  It in some part is related to not having evolved a deeper trust in the experience of living a life.  Material wealth has meticulously been accrued by being well practiced at putting our noses to the grindstone (no small feat, but often not life-giving).  Somehow, facing our rigid attitudes and the armor of our likes and dislikes, doesn't merit an exploration of further examination.  This would involve taking small risks; risks like being physically or emotionally uncomfortable, especially when it is not ostensibly necessary to do so.  The human fear of the unknown and especially sensory dislikes stop us dead in our tracks.  Why?  Why are we afraid of life?  This unwillingness to suffer (even temporarily) binds us up.  It without a doubt, halts knowing who we are and probably what we might be here for.  Whether it be clearing the throat chakra so we can speak our truth to ourselves or to others or subjecting oneself to serving in a soup kitchen because one has been unnerved by the indigent or the mentally ill in the past.  There is exploring to do.  Take a risk.

Laughter: the Best Medicine

As written previously in Humor and Health, laughter kicks in our parasympathetic nervous systems (the relaxation response) as well as our endorphins (the“feel good” hormones).  Laughing releases tension and gives us a different perspective, lightening our load.  Laughing just really feels great; you’d think we’d be cultivating this healing modality intently through our adult life.  Unlike the masters of this cultivation, the Tappet brothers on NPR’s radio show, “Car Talk”, most of us don’t.

Statistics say adults laugh an average of 5 times a day; children laugh 30 times more  than that amount, approximately 150 times a day.  Children obviously do not have a discretionary funny bone.  Evidently they think everything is funny.  Either that, or they are not practiced at attaching to beliefs (if they have any).  Most adults are masters at attaching to their beliefs, a talent which can also make them morbidly serious (aka: righteous).

In my life coach and stress management instructor capacity, many people ask, "Well, what do you mean by 'laughing;'?". (Of course, an adult would ask this question.) “Do you mean ‘ha ha’ chuckling or falling on the floor laughing or somewhere in between?”  And then the follow-up question would be:  “How long do you have to laugh for it to be therapeutic?”.  (Aren’t we sad, we adults?)

All types of laughing are great for any length of time.  However, if you want to see a change in your tension levels and general well being (including sleep patterns) you want to be guffawing (or at the very least in extreme merriment) for 10-20 minutes if not everyday, every other day. Pioneer researcher Dr. William Fry - Just Laughter, laugh sounds, laughter CD compared exercise to laughter, concluding that just one minute of “hearty laughter” elevated his heart rate to the same level it reached after 10 minutes on a rowing machine.  And Norman Cousins attributes surviving a major illness with a regimen of hard laughing for 20 minutes a day, in his ground breaking book written several decades ago, Anatomy Of An Illness by Norman Cousins - Reviews, Discussion ...    With Laughter, something inside frees up, an alignment happens; one can almost feel the parallels matching up.

Alignment? Parallels?  Of what?  Experientially, it feels like a unification of sorts;  fragmented parts of myself coming together, in one action (tension collecting and eliminating?).  In a post-laughter bout, a lightness transpires in body, mind and spirit.  One feels clean. Our awareness broadens, small things are noted with a felicity of feeling.  A panting smile of a dog on a sidewalk, a bee feeding from a floating Coreopsis head, the change in the air quality after thunder has rumbled through.  Ah, the lightness.

Yes, a lighter outlook is a wonderful thing to have.  But if you are one of those people really invested in being serious, especially about your life difficulties and are determined not to “lighten-up”, there is good news.  The benefits of laughter and having a sense of humor can be gotten by simulating laughter.  This is true.  By manually shaking your belly and pretending to laugh this helps the body get into it's physiological relaxation responses. However, if you are annoyed to have to do this (and who could blame you), it probably won’t work.  You have to want that feel good feeling (or go through the trouble of going to Laughing Yoga or a Qigong class that does this simulation practice).  Fake it ‘til you make it. (You can fool Mother Nature, at least in this case.) You know how it is, if you answer the phone with a “pretend” smile on your face, you almost always end up genuinely smiling, and enjoying the cascade of good feeling the body is wont to give you if you give it half a chance (by triggering the nerves/neurons in your ‘smile’ muscles in the face to do the real thing and send those endorphins on down to receptor sites that need the coverage).

This seems like a lot of (unnecessary) work.  Better to just find yourself and your sense of  humor and get to some hearty laughing.

The Jester and the Healer

In the history of healing, it has not been an uncommon parallel that connects the healer to the priest(ess) or the healer with the artist or midwife.  Lately, it appears to me there is a direct relationship between the Healer role and the Jester of old.

The tarot depiction of the Fool (jester) includes a person juggling unconcernedly or otherwise distracted, sometimes found in the act of unknowingly walking off the edge of a cliff, precipice or other high place.  The jester is symbolic of common sense and of honesty and is a character used for insight and advice on the part of the monarch. Jesters would have had to have a bevy of “tricks” at their disposal, be able to turn on a dime, change-up the pattern of delivery and be extremely keen on sensing the receptivity to her offerings. Also, the jester would probably enter the court’s arena with a modicum of uncertainty of what would be asked or needed of him from the always new population of others and have a knack for turning upside down general expectation at often great personal risk. The jester’s strategic use of subtle (and not so subtle) humor would be part of their offering and a use of highly developed wiles imperative.  In all of this, the Healer is really no different.

We have our ideas of who we are and what we have to offer, even who is our target market.  But when it comes right down to it, it is always surprising as to what is needed, what is being asked for.  And in that light, often new skills or unknown skills are born.  The healer, like the jester is someone who has a child’s point of view.  They are open, receptive, often having an unlikely approach and is somewhat separate from the dysfunction, illness or pain that is present.  It is this very lack of attachment that makes a healing possible.  Like a child who has no expectations of being of direct help, the healing comes in being able to have a direct perception. And that often, is enough.

Humor and Health

Humor is an under rated aspect in the healing experience.  Who hasn't had a thigh-slapping laugh fest, or a few minutes when the laughing was so deep in oneself, the body just shook with no sound coming out?  How does one feel after?  Like all of one's "pipes" have been cleared, a sense of release, often followed by the arrival of a deeply satisfying containment.  Humor is healing; it lightens the load, shows us the other side of the tragic, breaks up the held tensions and provides the body with vibrational ease.

What soap is to the body, laughter is to the soul.  Yiddish proverb

In Healing and the Mind by Bill Moyers on Audio Download, Audio ..., Candace Pert (The Research of Candace Pert, PhD | Healing Cancer) said the emotions are registered and stored in the body in the form of chemical messages (known as neuropeptides, or amino acids, the building blocks of protein) which is the healing connection between the mind and the body. These neuropeptides is the way all cells in the body communicate with each other, including brain-to-brain messages and brain-to-body messages. One's emotional state effects whether we get sick from a virus or not depending on the kind and number of emotion-linked neuropeptides available at receptor sites that a virus' might visit.  The more humor and laughter in your life, the more chemical messages are working for you and your health.

Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.  Abraham Lincoln

Robert releasing

An increased positive attitude reduces pain levels as well.  Hope and optimism clinically increases your chances to survive catastrophic illness, heal wounds and have an overall better health picture than those who choose fear, anger, resentment and negativity as a general approach to life.  Our immune systems, T-cell mobility are all enhanced by a lighter attitude, due to lymphocyte activity and the increased production of antibodies.  Negativity disrupts production of neurotransmitters and only increase cortisol and other hormone production which inhibits healing.


It's a bit ludicrous that humor would be a help when in ill health or spirit.  When you are not feeling great, laughing is seemingly the last thing at one's disposal.  However, if humor is cultivated in one's life as a matter of routine prior to illness, it is a resource to draw upon when illness arrives.  A sense of humor is not a silver bullet, which will cure disease and illness.  Rather, it creates internal conditions, which support the body's basic healing and health-maintaining mechanisms.

The art of medicine consists of keeping the patient amused while nature heals the disease.  Voltaire

If you are a serious type, the question is how to bring more belly laughing, lightness and play into one's life; to rediscover what we knew as young children-- simple humor.  Many of the stress management, humor related materials suggest 60 minutes a week of comedic entertainment (funny movies, videos, etc).  Collecting cartoons and keeping a book of them is a helpful reference.  It also is an exercise in finding out what is really funny for you.  Humor is different for everyone.  The Marx Brothers send some into fits of guffaws, whereas Stephen Colbert's ludicrous irony leaves others smiling for hours.  It is interesting to locate your specific funny bone and then feed it.  Maintaining relationships with those you laugh with a lot is smart.  There is a QiGong exercise of healing sounds that ends in a belly laugh.  Three full breaths of "Ho Ho Ho" in a deep register while shaking your dantien, hand over hand.  When done in a group especially, there are generally peels of "real" laughter that follow.  It's hilarious, ridiculous and effective.

I wish my identity weren't so wrapped up with who I am.

Amazon.com: Healing and the Mind (9780385476874): Bill Moyers ...
Healing and the Mind with Bill Moyers 1 - The Mystery of Chi - Part 6 ...
"Molecules of Emotion: The Science Behind Mind-Body Medicine"