Got a stinking cold, -10 degrees outside, seminars to teach tomorrow, sleep deprived for the last 15 months, and Diane Ferraro goes and tempts me with her PJ’s. What’s a guy to do…
22/02/2012
The latest Yoga scandal? Or prefer to read about Truth?
30 or so years ago I lied to my Father and he caught me out. I remember being afraid, and tensing up in anticipation of a whack or a stern rebuke. But there was just a very long pause, a pause that felt like falling, falling through space – no roots, nothing to ground me. Then he warmly and simply said:
“There’s nothing I despise more than a lie”.
He looked at me kindly and left it at that.
He wasn’t always such a magnificent teacher, but that day, he nailed it.
I’ve spent my whole life since searching for Truth.
At school I sat in countless classrooms watching the parade of old men whose life-blood slipped away while they bullshitted themselves (and each other, and my parents) that they were teaching anything worthwhile. There was no truth to be found there.
On the television endless advertisements, people with too-white teeth and too-wide smiles, trying to persuade me that they were honest and good and that I needed what they were selling. No truth there.
On the streets and in the shops and buses and trains I saw everyone trying to convince themselves that they were alright, happy, safe. But I saw through their deception. No truth.
In Churches and in Synagogues I listened to readings from dusty old books and I felt the disconnect between what was being read, and the person reading it. There was no truth there, no true Faith, only blind, wishful-thinking, and the wise child that I was wasn’t fooled.
(When I finally realized that my parents weren’t superheroes) I saw my Father struggling to balance his dignity with the daily grind of trying to become – what? A millionaire? A billionaire? And I failed to see the truth in that.
I saw my Mother’s sense of unfulfilled, unrealized potential, and the emptiness inside that she occasionally tried to fill with wine, chewing gum, or television, and I knew that she hadn’t found the truth that I was looking for.
So I spent many years knowing only what I didn’t want. I didn’t want my life to be a lie. I knew that with all my heart. I yearned for a not-lie. But I had no idea what that was. I had no idea what the truth looked like, or how it felt, or even if I would recognize it if it were right in front of me, with a big flashing neon sign:
Herein lies TRUTH.
Actually, I would have turned away. When you are so conditioned by delusion and hypocrisy… when all you have ever known is deception… when the fabric of your society is woven with pretense… then the truth is something to be feared!
I have another, earlier memory. Mr Morton may have been a rare example in my life of a good school teacher. He seemed very old to me then, with grey whiskers and a stooped gait, and when he sat at the front of the class he would interlock his fingers, rotating one thumb around the other in what seemed like a frantic attempt to slow down time… I had the sense that there was a great energy about to bubble up in him, about to boil over… and if he didn’t keep on twiddling his thumbs like that he wouldn’t be able to stop it.
One of my peers must have lied to him one day, because he exploded, whiskers shaking, mouth foaming, eyes bulging. When he’d finished there were some nervous sniggers, but we all – each and every one of us in that room that day knew that we’d seen and heard Truth directly:
“When you start to tell lies you enter a very dangerous arena, a grey world where black and white blur into one, and right and wrong lose their meaning. And one day you will find yourself an altogether grey person, because you will have started to believe your own lies.”
We live in a grey world. Our society is very, very grey – phone hacking, money-makes-money banking, countries invaded under the guise of WMD that were never there. Soap operas and adverts and MTV and internet-filters and rigged elections and Arms Fairs and Oil dependency and Global Warming and… on and on. One scandal, one controversy after another.
This is what happens when spiritual practice is used as a vehicle for fame and fortune, when personal gain trumps respect for lineage, when the student proclaims himself teacher of teachers. (The link is to a post I wrote the other day about the corruption of Eastern spirituality by Western materialism, specifically – yoga teachers training more yoga teachers).
Does our society support a quest for freedom and truth, or does it encourage us to rejoice in the illusion of gossip and malicious rumor like pigs rolling in mud?
There is only one solution to the problem, and that is to stop relying on that society. It doesn’t mean that you can’t be part of it. You can still play the game – but by your own rules.
Be aware that Truth is the gateway to freedom. And don’t compromise in your search for, and expression of, that truth.
Not long ago a student asked me the secret to happiness. I answered:
“Never compromise”.
She was somewhat surprised, because let’s face it, most of us grew up being taught the opposite – that compromise is an integral part of happiness!
How many times were you told:
“’You can’t have it all’… ‘choose one or the other’… ‘dreams don’t come true’… ‘better the devil you know’…”
or variations of the above?
But I’m here to tell you differently: by all means, compromise with your partner over which movie you watch, or what you have for dinner; compromise with a colleague over how you go about completing a task. Compromise on the little things. Compromise your desires.
But when it comes to something big – love, work, your aspirations and dreams: don’t compromise – not one iota. Don’t take a single step off the path of meaningful, intentional life. Know what you want, and go for it, with 110% of your energy. And when something gets in the way, either jump over, or go around, or wait patiently until it moves away again, because it will move if your intention is strong.
Don’t lose sight of what is important to you – your values – and don’t compromise on them. If you do, the day will come when you look back on your life and see only a lies. I can’t imagine anything worse.
Mr Morton was right.
One lie leads to another. What starts out as a simple excuse for why you stay with the partner who doesn’t totally rock your world leads to a whole world-wide-web of self-deceit. That’s just the beginning, because next you have to convince the rest of the world about it too!
Before you know it, life is grey and foggy.
It takes a great deal of courage to be really honest with yourself. The very reason we deceive ourselves is because we’re afraid. So to be honest means to be doubly courageous – you have to have the cojonesto confront your fears, and to then carry on in spite of them. You have to ‘feel the fear and do it anyway’.
That might mean leaving a partner, or a job, or a home, or a college. It might mean coming out about your sexuality, or travelling the world, or learning a language, or whatever. These are big, scary things. But they are gateways – you can either go through that gateway to freedom, or you can stay hiding behind the door.
Hide behind that door and remain in a dark, shadowy, grey world where the search for love, peace, and freedom is utterly pointless. Death will come for you full of regrets.
But step through that door and be dazzled by full-spectrum multi-chromatic rainbow-colored Glory.
The choice is ours to make, and we are all making that choice, every moment of every day.
What do you choose?
If you’re feeling it, share it. ‘Like’ it up on FB, and leave a comment, please.
Why I don't train Yoga teachers.
Swami Vishnu - he flew over war zones in this plane throwing flowers out the window. A true hero.
As a child my heroes were the khaki-clad men and women who gave their lives in WW2 (for a cause greater than themselves). I was completely in awe of anyone who put their own comfort and safety aside in order to ‘fight the good fight’. I believed there was no greater life to be lived.
Many years later I travelled to India for an intensive Yoga Teachers Training course. It was the most challenging thing I’d ever done – physically, emotionally, mentally, and above all, spiritually. I wrote about it here.
On that course, I found new heroes.
The ochre-clad men and women who gave their lives, day after day, for a cause greater than themselves.
The Swamis are the people we may thank for the access that we now enjoy to the ancient wisdom of Yoga. For thousands of years they have taken vows of brahmacharya – mastery of the senses, and renunciation of the fruits of the senses – as they put their personal comfort and ego safety to one side in order to transform the world. There is no greater sacrifice.
Towards the end of my time in India I resolved that I would one day be a Swami. 5 years later I did indeed give away all my ‘stuff’: my old man got my ipod. My brother got my Raybans. A recent TTC graduate got my small yoga business including 20 yoga mats, my classes, students and mailing list… and with just a small bag of clothes I entered an Ashram and began training. Why am I not there today? The fist person I met in the Ashram that day was the beautiful Goddess who is now my wife. But that’s another story…
Altogether I taught Yoga full time for almost a decade.
I taught Yoga in exclusive hotels and gyms, hostels, schools, and festivals, to Hollywood celebrities and millionaires and old age pensioners. I once taught a guy who’d (to coin the wonderful Ram Dass expression) ‘been stroked’. The whole left side of his body was paralyzed. So in Sun Salutations he would grab his left leg with his right hand, and put it into position. It took a long time, but he did them, and he loved every minute of it. I’ve never met a more smiley and determined person in my life, and it was a great privilege teaching him. The classes he was in were some of the most memorable I’ve ever taught.
I must have taught many thousands of people during those 10 years.
I never had a single student get injured. Not one.
And my style of Asana teaching is dynamic and physical! So how is it that some people believe Yoga to be ‘dangerous’?! Many times over the years I’ve been asked this question:
“Why don’t you run your own Yoga Teacher Training Course?”
In our materialistic society it seems to be a real no-brainer! After all, that’s where the money is in Yoga! We all know that. So why not do it? I’ll tell you why:
I won’t pee in the well.
The well of pristine ancient wisdom kept by countless generations of Swamis.
Swami Sivananda - a Hero
Swami Vishnu-Devananda had a vision in meditation of the world in flames. It was that vision that led him to create the Sivananda Yoga Teachers Training Course (the oldest TTC in the West – around 15,000 graduates over 40 years). His main intention was not so much to create yoga teachers – rather, he intended to create world leaders with integrity. He wanted to create a generation of yogis who would be able to steer the world away from its current crisis with integrity, compassion, and service.
In India, before I realized I wanted to one day be a Swami, I knew without a doubt that I would try to honor Swami Vishnu’s intention – I would do my best to repay the debt I owed him.
So when I’m asked why I don’t run TTC’s what I say is this: there are places I can send my Yoga students to become Yoga teachers. Places run by people who are completely dedicated to doing just that. People who haven’t got kids, aren’t in relationships, and don’t go on vacation. They just train Yoga teachers. Day in, day out, all year round. Total heroes.
So how could I take it upon myself to train other people to be yoga teachers, when I know that I would be depriving them of the best training available? I would feel that I was cheating my students, and betraying the lineage that I am honored to be a tiny part of.
That lineage comes from a land whose entire culture is founded on spirituality.
Our entire culture is founded upon materialism.
Different worlds.
So I understand completely what has gone wrong – people who lack a profound understanding of the spiritual essence of Yoga are running TTC’s.
So the graduates of those TTC’s are even further removed from the lineage. The pond is polluted further and further.
No wonder there is endless controversy in the Yoga ‘blogosphere’. No wonder there are articles suggesting that Yoga may be dangerous. No wonder people really are injuring themselves!
I’ve seen many suggestions that the reason yoga has become dangerous is that not enough attention is paid to anatomy.
That’s a side issue. It’s also something that householder Yoga teachers who run TTC’s will say to justify what they do (“I teach good anatomy so that my student teachers are safe”). But in reality, to teach Yoga properly only a basic understanding of anatomy is required. You don’t need a degree in anatomy to teach yoga, because
Yoga is not gymnastics.
Yogasana is intended primarily to prepare the body to be comfortable sitting for meditation. If it’s taught as such, with emphasis on breath and inner awareness rather than physical ‘shape’ and external competition then it’s totally, 100% ‘safe’. Actually, it’s more than safe, it’s healing.
It is also, of course, a wonderful physical exercise – but that is a secondary benefit.
Yoga is a spiritual practice.
There are true heroes on this planet.
Find them.
Because the world needs one more.
If you feel it, share it. Please leave a comment. Spread the love!
23/01/2012
Low Self-esteem (and what to do about it)
“I wish I could show you, when you are lonely or in darkness, the astonishing light of your
own being”
~ Hafiz
You may suspect that you have low self-esteem,
but you probably have no idea what to do about it!
Most articles about self-esteem talk about thinking positively, making affirmations, smiling a lot, etc. These things are just band-aids – they will only serve to suppress the truth about how you feel about yourself for a short time. I am not interested in band-aids. I am interested in prevention and cure…
In this post I’m going to tell you what self-esteem is really all about; how it is negatively affected; why I think it’s hugely important that we do do something about it – and what to do.
What is self-esteem?
(other than a term that is much used and little understood)
My definition of self-esteem is 5 words:
~ ‘how deeply you love yourself’ ~
So, how deeply do you love yourself?!
(Don’t worry, I’ll help you answer that question quite accurately in just a moment)…
17/01/2012
Newspaper interview re: RPT
I was interviewed recently about Reference Point Therapy for a national newspaper. The journalist asked some excellent questions, so I decided to write up the transcript of the interview for a blog post.
Here it is:
Here it is:
- RPT is the fastest and most
efficient method in the world for healing trauma. On what is it based?
It is based on two things – the science of
epigenetics (which has proven that ancestral trauma directly affects our own
life), and the ancient wisdom of many spiritual traditions, which assert that
the essence of the human being is pure consciousness.
-
What kind of traumas can be
healed in this way? Is this specific traumas – like car accidents or death – or
can there also be subconscious traumas that block the individuals development.
Well, so far it seems that any kind of
trauma may be healed with this method. The only kind of trauma that we have no
experience trying to heal yet is the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder of soldiers
returning from combat (we simply didn’t have the opportunity to work on this
yet). But car accidents, grief, serious abuse trauma (sexual, physical,
emotional, etc), childhood abandonment and neglect… I have not come across any
kind of trauma yet that was not healed with this method. And yes, subconscious
traumas do block our development, and it is the very purpose of RPT to unblock
our development!
-
Do you perhaps know the answer
to the question “ why some people are more prone to accidents / bad things
happening to them”. Is this perhaps to do with subconscious blockages, energy
which attracts these things?
As a matter of fact, I do! The human being
is made up of energy (consciousness). When we experience our highest potential
(pure consciousness), we vibrate energetically in ‘tune’ with the world around
us. But when our experience is blocked by the effects of unresolved trauma, we
vibrate at a much lower level – and there is no ‘flow’. Being ‘in the zone’ is
a well known expression – some people live in the zone. Others experience is fleetingly,
but we all understand that it is possible. Ultimately, the extent to which we
are able to live in the zone is the extent to which we have resolved our
trauma. So yes, it is very much to do with subconscious blockages that attract
‘negative’ experiences. Although life is messy, and there will always be
experiences that we would choose not to have – but a person who has a high
level of consciousness will cope much better than someone who has many
unresolved issues.
-
How does the session look? How
long is it on average? How is it different from other therapies, which are
recommendable for eliminating traumatic events, (for example classical
psychotherapy).
The session is entirely talk-based. On
average it is 90 minutes, but this depends on the therapist. It is most notably
different from other types of trauma therapy in that the actual trauma (what
happened) is not ‘relived’. The therapist only needs to know that something
happened (trauma). The nature of the trauma is irrelevant – because actually, we
cannot heal the trauma itself (we cannot make it go away – because it happened,
and we can’t change that!). What we can change is how it makes us feel now (the consequences of the trauma). Another
notable difference is that unlike many other methods that take a long time to
heal trauma (for example classical psychotherapy), RPT is very fast. Trauma can
often be healed permanently in just one session – this is because we get right
to the cause of the problem. And the cause of the problem, in case you are wondering,
is survival instincts.
-
People often are not aware how
traumas from the past define us. And they can’t even put them into words. In
what way does the therapist pull out trauma from a client which he isn’t even
aware of.
First of all, part of the training of an
RPT therapist is in the development of intuition. So in the rare case that a
client really has no idea what causes their problem, I am always able to tell
them! However, I find that almost every client knows just as much as they need
to know in order to heal themselves (with my help). If something is forgotten,
it is because it is no longer needed. And RPT gives us the precise tools to be
able to access exactly what we need to access in order to heal our problems and
raise our consciousness.
-
Can you perhaps give an example
of the positive effects of the therapy (of course without names) or maybe in
general. How does the person who came to the session with deep trauma feel when
it’s no longer there. How perhaps does his thinking change, and his behavior?
One client had a 20-year history of
clinical depression, and had attempted suicide. When she came to me she had
tried countless different types of medical and alternative healing / therapy,
including pharmaceutical drugs. Nothing helped. After one session she was
healed (the cause had been childhood abuse trauma), and when I saw her again 18
months later (recently) she remains free of depression. I also found out that
she had been diagnosed (18 months ago) with a serious thyroid problem that required
surgery. After our session, her thyroid was also healed, and remains so to this
day, as evidenced by regular medical check-ups. This is just one example of
many such ‘miraculous’ cases. It seems miraculous on the surface, but actually,
when you understand that trauma is responsible for most of our problems, it is
no miracle at all!
How does the person feel after healing –
lighter, less burdened. The feeling is usually subtle (no fireworks or
hysteria!), but there is a definite transformation. They will notice that the
change is apparent in every area of their life: relationships, self-esteem,
clarity of thought, emotional reactions… because what has changed is the person
themself. They are more themself now. So everything changes, in a subtle, but
powerful and positive way – and most importantly, the change is permanent.
-
Some people, on certain points
of their lives, can no longer go on. They are controlled by fears, for which
they don’t have a reasonable explanation. Can these blockages have as their source,
unconscious trauma.
Almost
all subconscious blockages are caused by the
effects of unresolved trauma.
-
The therapy is based on the
science of consciousness. Does it work in spite of the fact that the client
does not believe in it.
It is not necessary to believe anything for
RPT to work! Any therapy that requires belief
on the part of the client in order to be successful relies on the placebo
effect. RPT recognizes the placebo effect, and is far more successful than
placebo based therapies. One of the reasons for this is that with RPT we also
recognize that a person can only heal a problem when they take responsibility
for it – in fact, taking responsibility is the first step (and the hardest). So
taking responsibility is what is necessary, and actually, it is the opposite of
belief!
-
Can we help ourselves with this
therapy also with physical problems.
Yes, because the physical body is also an
expression (albeit, a material expression) of consciousness. Problems that
manifest in the body are almost always first experienced on the mental and
emotional level, but we suppress them. The body then has no choice but to show
symptoms on the physical level. All aspects of us are made up of consciousness,
and when we heal the subconscious blockage, all aspects of us are healed –
mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual.
-
In what way can we use the
method in our profession and maybe also in general in more positive way of
living or acting?
This is a very good question. Really, you
are asking whether this technique is only for people with ‘problems’, and the
answer is emphatically ‘no’! Despite enjoying wonderful physical, emotional,
and mental health, I continue to practice this method on myself. Why? Because
as we raise our consciousness by becoming more aware, and by releasing our
fears, we enjoy greater levels of joy, inner peace, and abundance. For me, RPT
is much more than a therapy. It is a unique method of personal development and
spiritual growth.
02/12/2011
Funny '2 Cows' thing.
This popped up in my Facebook 'newsfeed'. It's from the page of one K.C.Locke, who got it from a Matt McNeil. Neither of whom are my 'Facebook friends'. So I have no idea how or why it came to my attention...
I have no idea how Facebook works, and I'm very happy for that. Social Media is insidious and dangerous, and yes, I know, it's also great in many ways too, but I'm happy I'm not a Social Media expert. Or maybe it would be better if I was. I. don't. know.
Anyway, this is hilarious, and I hope it makes you laugh out loud (LOL) as I did.
25/11/2011
Profound healing: transformation of physical and emotional problems in 1 session. But what about 18 months later?
Last night I gave
a presentation near Ljubljana.
Nataša came.
I barely
recognized her, but as soon as she said her name I knew which Nataša it was.
She’d been
suffering from depression and (to put it mildly) ‘dark thoughts’ for most of
her life.
Despite seeking
help from multiple doctors, psychiatrists, therapists, and healers, nothing and
no one had been able to help her.
When she came to
me she had also been having serious problems with her thyroid and was due
surgery to have it removed. That was actually the catalyst that led her to me.
The result of that
single session:
total transformation...
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