Emotional Times

Anger Management tips

2009-04-29T14:19:00.001-05:00

Most anger management tips teach you how to manipulate, control, or avoid your anger. While this may seem desirable at first glance, in the long run it ends up being counterproductive, ineffective and potentially dangerous.

The basic problem lies with how we as a society view our anger and our other emotions. We've been taught and conditioned - almost from birth - to regard our emotions as a necessary evil, at best:

"Feel your emotions - in private - IF YOU MUST - and then hurry back to the real world and deal with your life."

We perceive emotions as a hinderance in our 'civilized' society; possessing little positive value but much negative value: they make you weak; they make you look bad; they make you less clear-headed.

Well guess what? It's true! You will be weaker, less attractive and less intelligent if you don't have a healthy relationship with your emotions. And you'll develop many other problems as well.

But emotions create none of those problems. Rather, the problems stem from the innumerable ways we've come up with to avoid feeling our feelings fully and then releasing them completely.

We're already manipulating, controlling, and avoiding our emotions, including our anger. We don't need any more tips on how to enhance that. We're already doing it!

You know how to manipulate your anger. You do it practically every minute of every day, if you're like most people in the world.

More 'anger management tips' are not the answer. Instead, it's time for a fundamental shift in the relationship that exists between you and your anger.

Anger is not a necessary evil. It's not a curse. It's not something to be ashamed of. It doesn't make you a bad person. And it's definitely not a weapon or a club with which to manipulate others.

Anger - like all emotions - gives you power. Any emotion which you feel fully and cleanly - and then release completely - leaves you with more power than you had before.

All emotions can be a source of power. Just like the food you eat.

But if you don't cleanly express your anger then it robs you of power and creates pain. And then out of necessity you go searching for anger management tips.

We end up thinking anger created the pain and problems, but really a faulty relationship based on faulty beliefs created the pain and the problems.

So the first step involves recognizing your current relationship with anger in particular, and emotions in general. How do you view your anger? Could you spend a minute or two to write it out on paper?

When working with anger your greatest ally consists of a sharp pencil and a stack of cheap paper.

First understand where you're at right now. What defines your current relationship with anger?

Second, understand the big picture. You've been reacting to your anger in the ways you've been taught and conditioned to by society. Many well-meaning and good-intentioned people shaped and molded your relationship with your anger.

Look to your parents. Look to other influences in your world. You won't have to search long and hard to find the formative forces in your life.

It's not your fault - but it is your responsibility!

Third, feel the impact of your current relationship with anger. What has it done to you? What has it done to others? And what's likely to happen if nothing changes?

Think about it - and then stop thinking and just feel. Feel it in every cell of your body. Let in the feeling of this impact.

The more you practice letting in the feelings, the more you'll return to your natural state of being - which is to simply feel the anger - without telling yourself a story about it, so you can then let it go.

Next, forgive yourself. Forgiveness provides the space for change. Forgiveness always comes before a conscious, meaningful change in your life.

Now you're ready for some anger healing tips. Here's the best two:

First, let go of the righteousness. In other words, let go of the need to be right.

Anger problems come from the stories we tell ourselves; the stories we use to justify our anger. Basically, "I'm right and they're wrong!"

If you'll drop the righteousness that surrounds your anger, you'll find the anger itself much easier to release. If you don't let go of the righteousness, anger becomes IMPOSSIBLE to release.

So how do you let go of righteousness? Be willing.

The need to be right compares to lugging a concrete block around with you everywhere you go. The heavy cumbersome block attaches itself not with chains of steel, but with your will alone. Your willingness imprisons you, and your willingness sets you free.

Why do you need to be right? What price do you pay to be right? Now comes the time to enlist the aid of your greatest ally.

Armed with pen and paper, write out your little story of righteousness in great detail. Write with gusto and flourish. The more you articulate it, the more clearly you see it and understand it. And hopefully, find the wisdom to let it go.

Just as awareness precedes willingness, so a greater awareness leads to a greater willingness.

You can also use your greatest ally to bleed off the static of anger that so often and so easily surrounds your body.

Have you ever noticed the static energy of anger that surrounds a person? Like a swarm of hungry gnats on a hot summer day, the anger creates frustration, irritation, even bitterness and resentment.

You can bleed off that static simply by sitting down and writing quickly - furiously - about whatever bothers you the most. You can release the irritation as if by magic. If you're willing.

Unlike writing down your righteousness, here the key involves not thinking or planning what you'll write. Just feel and keep the pen moving.

I used to scribble on the pages - page after page after page of furious scribbles - because I was feeling and releasing faster than words could form. And it worked wonders.

So let's review these basic anger healing tips:

1. Healing your anger begins with understanding your current relationship with it.

2. Once you have a solid grasp of the problem, really let in the impact of your current relationship.

3. Forgive yourself for buying into the lies about anger and other emotions.

4. Practice feeling your feelings - cleanly. Give yourself permission to cleanly feel with intensity and without melodrama. Simply feel!

5. Know your little story of righteousness; all the reasons why you have the right to be angry. Of course you have the right to be angry. Everybody does. Everybody has been wronged. But it's poison to hold onto it. Remember the concrete block analogy.

6. Use your greatest ally. Practice bleeding off the static anger by getting it out on paper. You don't have to write our sentences or even words. Just scribbling alone will work - as long as you write with feeling.

7. Last but not least - be mindful that anger is not bad or wrong. It's a human emotion. You're a human. It's only 'bad' if you hold onto it. Then it becomes a poison.

And remember, you get what you're willing to have. Willingness always leads the way.

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Emotional Insecurity

2009-03-24T14:14:00.002-05:00

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People often use the term 'emotional insecurity' without stopping to understand what it really means. While it implies a problem with emotions, such as fear of loneliness, the core issue lies much deeper.

Insecurity is rooted in faulty beliefs. It usually begins in childhood and continues as a pattern throughout a person's lifetime... unless steps are taken to end that pattern of insecurity and replace it with a new pattern: a pattern of empowerment.

Ending emotional insecurity begins with willingness. Are you willing to change? Well that's a silly question. Of course you are! Why else would you be reading this?

I would say the question of willingness needs to be looked at very carefully. You see, we're already living a life out of our willingness: what we're willing to be; willing to do; willing to have. Willingness always leads the way.

So often, people say they're willing to change when they really have no intention at all of doing so. Instead, they're willing to prove they had a rotten childhood, or they're willing to feel self-pity, or they're willing to avoid the responsibility that comes with change...

Or perhaps it's because they truly, honestly, are only willing to believe they can't change; they're willing to believe they must stay in an emotionally insecure state.

If I ask the question, "Are you willing to change?" and you say you can't change - then you haven't really answered the question. I didn't ask if you could change. We already know the answer to that! I asked if you were willing.

Please understand, willingness always leads the way. First, you're willing. Then you choose. Then - THEN comes the ability.

I know it doesn't seem that way. And I know how confronting it is to even contemplate the idea. It's so much easier - it's so much more comfortable - to believe I'm a victim of fate or a victim of circumstances beyond my control. Just so I'm a victim of something.

Victimhood is a pain factory. Based on faulty beliefs. One of those beliefs: "I must have the ability to change before I can be willing to change."

If you believe that statement, then you may as well settle in for a lifetime of emotional insecurity. Because it's a trap designed to keep you in a place of victimhood and emotional insecurity. It's a catch-22.

The answer starts with being willing to look at some of those beliefs and assumptions you're willing to die for.

It's true. Many people would rather die than question their assumptions. Many people do die from this lack of questioning. Or at the very least, they live a life of needless suffering.

Here's the key: Find your willingness! Get in touch with what you are willing to be, do and have.

"Okay, I'm not willing to stop believing I'm a victim - but I am willing to look deeper at this. I'm willing to stop hiding my head in the sand."

Or, "I'm not yet willing to let my parents off the hook and I'm not willing to give up my pity, but I am willing to someday be willing."

Take it one step at a time. Admit where your current willingness lies. Admit what direction it's taking you right now. Let it in: you can change your willingness and the whole direction of your life can change.

And that includes ending emotional insecurity. Remember, emotional insecurity is simply a pattern rooted in faulty childhood beliefs. All patterns can be changed. You just have to dig out the roots. You have to change the foundation upon which the pattern stands.

When you only attack the outward form of your emotional insecurity, you'll continue to be victimized by it. Changing the form - the physical circumstances - the symptoms - never produces the internal change inside yourself.

Without first changing inside, the outward changes are temporary and ineffective. But by changing inside, you'll likely find your external world automatically changes - as if by magic.

Ironically, it's so much easier to make changes inside. Rather than fighting the outside world. Here's two great ways to start:

1. Bleed off the excess fears - quickly and easily by following the simple technique in How To Reduce Fear, Escape Anxiety, And End Panic.

2. Get to the root of the problem and end it by learning how to change limiting beliefs in the e-book How To Create Your Own Reality.

Because no matter what, you simply cannot cling tightly enough to another person to make the fear and insecurity go away.

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Emotional Intelligence

2009-02-23T17:11:00.002-05:00

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The term emotional intelligence basically refers to the relationship you have with your emotions.

Two different schools of thought have emerged around emotional intelligence. One school believes the goal is to control your own emotions while simultaneously manipulating the emotions of others. I call this the 'domination theory' of emotional intelligence.

The other school believes the primary goal involves developing a healthy relationship with your emotions, and perhaps helping others develop a healthy relationship with their emotions as well. I call this the 'dominion theory'. As you might imagine, I'm camping out with this second group.

Not because I'm smarter, wiser, cooler, more spiritually evolved; not because of my disdain for domination and manipulation; but because - in the long run - it's the only way that works.

You might be able to get away with manipulating others your entire lifetime, but you won't get away with manipulating or controlling your own emotions.

And why would you even want to? Emotions make you alive. The healthier your relationship with your emotions, the more alive you feel. The more wonderful life becomes, and the more powerful you become.

Are you powerful? Are you alive? Are you wonderful; filled with wonder?

If not, you can be. That's the promise of true emotional intelligence.

But maybe you're like I used to be. I would do anything to keep from feeling my emotions. Not because I was stupid or unevolved; like a dilettante. No. I avoided my emotions because I just didn't know any better. I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought I was supposed to manipulate and control the way I felt.

I didn't know emotions were the source of my power. I didn't know they were meant to flow through me; giving me energy and aliveness. And I certainly didn't know the dangers of blocking that flow.

For example, blocking the natural flow of emotions results in fabricated, man-made, artificial, imaginary emotions. Imaginary fears, raging angers, wallows of pity and guilt, melodrama, even delusional thinking comes from manipulating the flow of emotions.

It's like crimping a garden hose. You can hold it for a while, but the pressure quickly builds. When you're blocking the flow, it's easy to believe emotions are the enemy that must be eliminated.

I used to believe emotions were bad and wrong, and it almost killed me. I didn't know any better. Nobody told me. In fact, everyone else seemed to believe as I did.

Eventually, I started thinking for myself. And I made some amazing discoveries about emotions. You might say I gained emotional intelligence, although I'd never heard of the phrase.

It's actually kind of a misleading term, since it implies a certain amount of intelligence is required. It's not. Remember, emotional intelligence simply refers to the degree to which you have a healthy relationship with your emotions.

It's like physical health. You can be dumb as a box of rocks and still have excellent physical health. As long as you inherently follow the habits and patterns that promote good health.

Unfortunately, just as society has a physical health crisis, we're also in the midst of an emotional health crisis. Very few people exhibit any degree of emotional intelligence at all.

So what does it mean to possess 'emotional intelligence'?

Here's my definition:

1. You can distinguish between real and imaginary feelings.

2. You use techniques to eliminate the imaginary emotions while you embrace the real ones.

3. You love and accept and embrace ALL your feelings.

4. You don't place emotions on a hierarchy - where some are 'good' and others are 'bad'.

5. You don't seek to avoid your feelings - in fact you go out of your way to embrace them.

6. You inherently know emotions are the very source of your power in this lifetime - all emotions.

7. You take the time to release the trapped emotions from the past, because you realize your power is also trapped in that past.

8. You realize that trying to block the flow of unwanted feelings never works. There is no 'selective filter' to block certain feelings. Instead, you feel less of ALL your feelings when you attempt to block the ones you don't want.

9. You understand emotional pain comes from blocking or manipulating your feelings. The pain comes from crimping the hose, not from the water that passes through the hose.

10. Real emotions last only a short time - and always leave you feeling 'more'. Fabricated emotions linger on and on and drain you of power and aliveness. They hurt you and leave you feeling 'less'. When you possess emotional intelligence you inherently know this.

11. And finally, in my opinion, if you have emotional intelligence the last thing in the world you'll want to do is to manipulate others.

Because you feel wonderful. Even when you're miserable. That's a paradox only the emotionally intelligent understand.

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Top 10 Ways To Improve Yourself

2009-01-06T11:47:00.000-05:00

Let me share an embarrassing story with you. I'm sitting in the airport terminal waiting for my flight. I'll be changing planes in Las Vegas before heading on to the West Coast.

I'm looking around the lounge at all my soon-to-be fellow passengers. One guy in particular stands out; a blustery, boorish man bedecked in gaudy jewelry and loud clothes.

"Ha ha. I hope I don't sit next to that guy!" I was thinking.

Well, you know the rest of that story...

Sure enough, I end up on an aisle seat with the buffoon in the middle next to me. And the airplane's full, so I have no chance of moving. At least he wasn't sweaty.

I immediately constructed an imaginary wall between the two of us and by some miracle he must've sensed it. He starts blathering to the poor soul in the window seat. Meanwhile, I'm mentally welding some extra steel rebar to my wall. Just in case.

It's a long flight from Florida. In spite of myself, I hear his story. He's a high-roller in Vegas. He owns a big construction company. He loves to party. He's big, he's obnoxious, and he's still not sweating. Amazing.

Eventually the guy next to the window starts melting into his seat. Right on cue, the buffoon turns to me. I guess verbally beating one man into submission wasn't enough.

"So what do you do?"

It sounded more like a challenge than a query. I don't know why I felt intimidated. Maybe it was due to the ease with which he breached my imaginary wall. I knew I shoulda added more rebar.

"Uh... I write about self-improvement." I muttered; already not liking where this conversation was going.

"Self improvement?!" he sneered. "That's all a bunch of crap. Tell me how to improve myself!"

Great. No matter what I say he's just waiting to tear it apart. I mumbled something about feeling your feelings and being more aware of your thoughts.

"That's it?!"

He looked incredulous. I really hadn't given him enough to sink his teeth into, so after a few sneers (just for good measure) he wandered off into his own mind. Which, I would imagine, resembled the cold, dry, lonely Nevada desert we slowly approached.

The time seemed to drag on forever, but eventually we reached Las Vegas. My antagonist strutted away to the bright lights and glitter while I continued westward.

But my little contretemps - my embarrassing encounter - has stayed fresh in my mind ever since. I've spent way too much time thinking about what I 'coulda' said or 'woulda' said or 'shoulda' said... if only I'd been prepared. If only I'd taken the time. If only...

It's been a few years now. And if I could give my best advice, here it is.

The Top Ten Ways To Improve Yourself:

1. Process your emotions.

Get some paper. Get something to write with. Get somewhere quiet. And get to writing! Nothing compares to free-association writing when it comes to learning more about yourself. It's fun, it's easy, it's free - and it really works!

For more details, review the free e-book - The Emotional Healing Quick Start Guide.

2. Question your assumptions.

The next time you find yourself with a difficult situation or problem, you might want to stop and look at your underlying assumptions. We're so skeptical of everyone else and their assumptions, but we never stop to look at our own.

What are you assuming about your problem? What is so obvious it doesn't need to be examined?

I can't overstate the value of looking at your assumptions. Your life functions out of what you assume to be true. If you find your faulty assumptions and change them, your life will change. Often with little additional effort.

All problems, as well as all success, rest on your assumptions.

3. Know your story.

Everyone creates a 'little story' to explain why things are as they are. The little story justifies and rationalizes a mediocre life. It explains your limitations: why you're not more successful, why life is a struggle, why you're in pain.

Why not get out your paper and pen and write out your story of how outside influences and outside authorities have forced you to live a life below your potential?

If you'll get it out on the table and stop hiding it, then you can get about the business of changing it.

4. Feel your feelings.

It sounds so obvious. And it is. But as a society we've been taught and conditioned almost from birth to block, stuff, repress, depress and manipulate our feelings.

We end up with imaginary, man-made fabricated emotions rather that real, genuine ones. Genuine emotion makes you more powerful. It enlivens and exhilarates. Imaginary emotion hurts you and limits you.

To heal, you need to feel.

5. Heal your past.

Many people live in the past because they're using it for some hidden reason... usually to punish themselves or others.

It takes energy to keep the past alive. It makes you weaker and robs you of power.

The best way to heal your past involves forgiving yourself.

Forgiveness paves the way for change and healing. As you heal your past you become like a fountain; allowing more love, power, aliveness and self-acceptance to flow through you.

6. Release your payoffs.

The main reason we don't get what we say we want is because of our payoffs - the secret energies we really want instead.

Examples of payoffs include self-pity, manipulation, blaming, and avoiding something. We might say we want success, when we really want to feel sorry for ourselves or blame someone for our failure. Or perhaps we want to avoid responsibility.

Payoffs come in all shapes and sizes. For more information on what they are and how to deal with them, refer to the e-book How To Create Your Own Reality

7. Embrace your responsibility.

You're always being responsible. Or rather, some part of you must be responsible at all times.

While you're sleeping your subconscious mind runs the show. But what about when you're awake? Who's in charge then? Who's responsible for your day-to-day existence?

Who makes the choices and decisions in your life?

Most people force their ego or inner child to inner adolescent to take charge. But if you don't know what your ego or inner child sounds like or acts like, how would you even know?

You can learn more about these different 'aspects of you' in the e-book How To Create Your Own Reality .

They're also covered in the Forgiveness Manual.

8. Seek your spirituality.

Everyone has a spirituality; a relationship with their Creator. The more you seek it out, the richer your life becomes.

You don't have to do it alone. You don't have to be alone. In fact, you never are. From my experience, reality is only a thin veneer - an illusion. Beyond the illusion stands an infinite, divine love.

The older I get the more I realize the value of love and spirituality. I seek to make spirituality my only priority in this lifetime.

9. Build your value.

Ultimately, value comes from knowing you're loved by your Creator. But while we're waiting for that 'knowing', your personal value consists of seven parts: awareness, worth, esteem, love, confidence, respect and realization.

For an introductory look at personal value go to Build Your Personal Value .

For the complete, in-depth look at how you build your self-esteem, go to Self Esteem Secrets .

10. Enhance your mindfulness.

When I say 'mindfulness' I mean greater awareness of your thoughts, your feelings, and your actions.

What am I thinking? What am I feeling? What am I doing? Simply becoming more aware of what's going on in your heart, in your head, and in your environment can lead to numerous benefits.

Mindfulness exists as an integral part of self-improvement. Maybe I should've listed it first, because without mindfulness it's hard to make much progress on these other activities.

At any rate, I consider this a list of the most important actions we can engage in to improve our lives. And if I'd been more mindful myself, then maybe I would've thought to ask that clown on the airplane:

"Hey, if you're so special, why are you back here in coach with us commoners? Why aren't you flying first class?"

See how valuable it is to be mindful?

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How We Block Love

2008-08-27T18:59:00.001-05:00

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The older I get - and the more I work on healing and improving my own emotional state of being - the more I value love.

I used to be so cynical of love. Oh, if you told me it was important, I'd smile and agree with you. But on the inside I was a raging cesspool of acrid cynicism. I had no more use for love - than I did for the man on the moon.

Or so I thought. But I was a coward. Through and through. I lived the coward's life. In every thought and deed I reflected the fact I was unwilling to face myself.

A coward is someone who won't face the truth.

I couldn't - or wouldn't, to be more precise - face one of the truths about love:

Love is essential for human survival.

We must have some degree of love in our lives just to survive. And it always starts with self-love.

I believe we come into this world loving ourselves completely. We possess total self-love. But we quickly learn that's wrong - that's selfish. It's practically a sin to love yourself unconditionally.

Because it's so easy and so natural to love ourselves, it takes great effort to change. But change we do.

We learn to build walls around our heart to keep out the love. Walls of pain and shame. Walls of pity and judgments. Walls of bitter anger and helpless rage. Walls of fear.

When you're a small child - and you feel INTENSE emotions - you end up learning the hard way you're not supposed to express what you feel - especially not intensely.

But the intensity is real. And you're a blank slate. You're like an empty little book - just waiting to have the rules written down on your virgin pages.

Children process their emotions by actively expressing them; acting them out. The behave like little light bulbs. When the electricity of emotion surges through them - they light up.

No matter what it is, they naturally want to express it. Happy, sad - or anything in between - they just want to act it out.

We, as the wise grownups, fear they'll never progress beyond this natural state of being, and we start clamping down.

We teach them, by hook or by crook, "they better stop acting that way - or else!"

Of course I'm over simplifying this aspect of the parent-child relationship to make the point. Namely, children naturally need to express their feelings. Like little light bulbs. If they can express it cleanly, they can 'burn off' the emotion. And be healthier for it.

(I'm not talking about when they learn to manipulate with their feelings as a way to get what they want. That's an entirely different topic. There's a world of difference between tantrums and clean expression of emotion.)

What's important to understand is that the emotional intensity is REAL. And it must go somewhere. Either it gets expressed and released (like the light bulb analogy I can't seem to stop mentioning...!) or it gets repressed.

If it gets repressed then it must be stored in some capacity. It has to be stored. It's not going to just bounce around inside until it dissipates itself. It doesn't 'ground out' into the earth.

Emotions don't work that way. Either you deal with them in a conscious state, or else your subconscious and your unconscious will have to deal with them in their ways.

They'll have to clean up your mess, in other words.

That's where the walls come in.

You've got several different forces at work here. First, you've got all this emotional intensity inside, and it has to go somewhere. It's also a raw material. That's what emotions are - raw materials. Building materials. You build your life out of this raw material.

Another force at play is the intense desire to start shutting down the flow of emotion. If you want to 'get by' in this world - if you want to be 'normal' - then you've got to stop feeling your feelings so much!

That's starting to change a little bit now, and hopefully future generations won't be as crippled as we are, but still - few people see emotions in their true light.

Instead, we learn to block the flow. This involves using the very raw materials we're trying to block! Like blood that coagulates around a cut - so the very emotions themselves form the barrier that surrounds our emotional heart.

And what are we most trying to not feel as a child? The pain and shame and hurt and all the other unpleasant feelings.

The emotions we don't want to feel end up as a barrier around our heart.

When you use whatever materials you have at hand to build something, it's called bricolage. And that's what we do. We build a painful wall around our heart that makes love seem painful.

The wall blocks love. And, the love that does make it through can often seem painful.

This wall was one of the reasons I loved myself so miserly. Once I learned how to break down that wall - I was able to feel everything more fully and completely. Including love

I ended up breaking that wall down. I busted it to pieces. It was like a breath of fresh air. You can learn all about it by going to:
Remove The Wall That Surrounds Your Heart

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Cognitive Therapy Self-Help

2008-08-16T09:02:00.001-05:00

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Cognitive therapy represents one method you can use to help yourself become a better person. Basically, it involves greater conscious awareness of your thought process so you can modify it, as a way to feel better.

One assumption of cognitive therapy: people commonly think distorted, faulty, or inaccurate thoughts. I believe everyone does this to one degree or another. For example:

1. Viewing events as either good or bad - never both. And never as shades of gray.

2. Magnifying insignificant events to artificially inflated importance.

3. Taking an unpleasant current event and applying it to all other areas of your life or to all future events.

The first step to cognitive therapy self-help involves becoming consciously aware - or more consciously aware - of these types of thoughts.

The second assumption of cognitive therapy: your thoughts create your feelings and your behavior. If you can change your thoughts, then you can improve your feelings and modify your behavior.

I see it differently. I believe thoughts and feelings are both raw materials. As such, it would be impossible for thoughts alone to create feelings because one raw material cannot create another raw material.

I experience a constant flow of both thoughts and feelings bubbling up inside me. I call it the wellspring of emotion. From this wellspring of emotion comes our so-called 'stream of thought'. And also our stream of feeling.

Due to the twists of chauvinism, thoughts have been exalted while feelings have been devalued - even despised - as an unnecessary evil. We've become so adroit at shutting down our feelings that we now can scarcely believe a constant stream of feelings even exists.

In this paradigm of devalued feelings, it's no wonder so many people experience so much emotional pain. I cover this topic in much greater detail in the free e-book on emotional healing.

Working with thoughts alone can produce desirable results. However, considering and applying the following two factors can enhance your self-help efforts:

1. I would suggest the feelings you feel are not a product of your thoughts alone, but instead they come from something more.

The individual feelings you feel - as you dip into your flow of raw material - are a product of your self esteem. Your self esteem acts as a filter to block certain feelings and allow other ones through.

Self esteem is the evaluation you make of yourself. Your thoughts obviously play a major role in your self esteem. Hence the assumption that thoughts create feelings.

But it's not that simple. For a complete understanding of self-esteem- what it is, where it comes from, why it is so important, and most importantly- how to build it- go to Self-Esteem-Secrets.com

2. The main stumbling block to cognitive therapy - whether it's through self-help means or not - lies with the underlying resistances many people have towards making changes.

These resistances often go unrecognized, unacknowledged, and hidden from view. For good reason: they're usually ugly to look at, and hard to admit to.

For example, we may simply prefer to feel sorry for ourselves rather than improve our lot in life. Or we may wish to avoid more responsibility. Or we want to punish someone. Or maybe we prefer to manipulate others in some way. I cover these and other resistances (and what to do about them!) in the e-book on
creating your own reality.

Another resistance may be a reluctance or difficulty in letting go of the past. "I've been wronged" and I just can't seem to let go of what happened. And if I improve myself - through cognitive therapy self-help or any other way - then it might negate what happened to me. Because on matter what I say to the contrary, I don't really want to let go of that past. I'm using it. I'm getting some sort of 'hit' by keeping it alive. It's valuable to me. Therefore, cognitive therapy appears not to work; if I even try it at all.

A final resistance I'll mention is simply fear of change itself. Change scares people. No matter how much we want it, we also resist it. Because every change involves chaos.

You must experience at least a little bit of chaos for any type of change. The bigger the change - the greater the chaos.

When you go through chaos, you temporarily lose touch with your anchors. When you emerge from chaos, you take back those anchors. Depending on the degree of change, some of those anchors will be new while some of the old ones will be gone.

For example, it's possible to let go of the anchors to pity as you create new anchors to love.

As you work on your cognitive therapy, keep in mind the short-term nature of chaos. It's temporary.

And if you forgive yourself first, you'll find change comes easier and more elegantly. You can find out more about forgiveness by going to Forgive-Yourself.com

You can make positive changes in your life with cognitive therapy - and you can do it on a 'self-help' basis. Because the more you examine your thoughts and feelings the better off you'll be.

Any time you question yourself - good things can happen!

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Pursuit Of Happiness

2008-08-04T17:42:00.002-05:00

In some sense, we're all in the pursuit of happiness. Why do anything- if not to feel better for doing it?

So why does there seem to be so little happiness in the world? And why do we have to pursue it? Why can't happiness chase after us? Then we could be the fickle ones:

"Not today happiness. You haven't done enough to deserve me. Come back tomorrow and try harder."

And this leads us to the first reason for a lack of happiness:

"I can't be happy until 'this' happens." Whatever 'this' is...

We make demands upon happiness, that it can't possibly fullfil. So if you're in the pursuit of happiness, the very first question to ask yourself is, "What has to happen for me to be happy?"

And that's not a rhetorical question. Seriously look at it. Get out your paper and pen and write that question at the top of the page. Then write down your answer.

After you've done this simple exercise, now here's the sneaky part: Let yourself be happy now as a way to get what you say has to happen before you'll let yourself be happy. Let happiness help you. Let it lead you to what you want. And resolve it this way:

"Okay, I know I'm not supposed to be happy yet. But I'll just try on a little bit of happiness- like trying on a new outfit at the clothing store- to see how it fits; to see how it suits me."

You don't have to 'buy' the happiness- just borrow it for a little while.

Now, do you see the really sneaky part here?

I'm presupposing you can be happy anytime you want.

I'm assuming you're in charge of your own happiness. All you have to do is choose it. And for some people, it's true. For others, it seems impossible. It's like chasing down a squirrel, and the squirrel always gets away.

"Always in sight: never in hand."

Happiness eludes us for several reasons. First, it would appear we're actually hard-wired in our very DNA to not be happy. So we won't get complacent. So we won't get too lazy. So we'll 'try harder'.

Even if we're not genetically programmed, we're certainly taught and conditioned to never ever admit to being happy. Because if we're happy, we won't get any grease, so we have to squeak. At least a little bit.

Plus, if you're happy- you must be a sucker, a simpleton, a chump; a shallow person easily conned by all the wiser, miserable people circling overhead.

And who wants to be thought of as a fool?

Another less obvious reason to not be happy: "What will be expected of me if i found the happiness I'm pursuing? Will I have to sit up straight? Will I have to bathe more often? Will I have to donate money to the poor?

What is the price of happiness?

Well, it's true. You will have to give up something. You will have to pay a price. Maybe it's your own misery. Or your lies. Most likely it's that corpse- that dead body called 'your past'.

It's hard to be happy with a bag of rotting flesh on your back. But carrying the past seems a little too enticing for many people:

"Yeah, I know it's dead, it smells bad, it's heavy and no one wants to hear about it...but I was wronged."

So maybe- just maybe- if the whole world knew how hard I've had it- then I can be happy. Maybe.

Is this the price of your happiness? When everybody knows how terrible your past was, or how terrible your life is now?

Once upon a time, you knew- you lived happiness. You never thought about it, you never questioned it, and you never pursued it. You were too busy enjoying it.

No matter what your childhood was like, you had your moments of happiness. And you can have them again- once you stop blackmailing yourself.

So many times, we'll want to be happy- but then that little voice comes in:

"You can't be happy. Look at this, look at that, look at all the problems you have."

Then we start focusing on all those reasons that prove we have no right to be happy. We have no right. And it seems so much easier to focus on the misery- the unhappiness- than to let ourselves be happy.

That's blackmail. We might call it 'being realistic'- but being realistic would be focusing on those problems afteryou allowed yourself to be happy. Because when you're happy you'd see more options and more potential solutions. You'll be coming from a more powerful position. And you'll want to create more happiness.

While anyone can be happy- for some people it truly will require more effort. It comes down to a few factors:

1. How willing am I to pay the price of happiness?

2. How strong are my neurological pathways that lead to misery? Meaning- how easy is it to focus on the parts of my life that result in feeling unhappy?

3. How much have I shut down the flow of my feelings?

These are the types of questions you want to ask yourself if you sincerely wish to be in the pursuit of happiness. And not only do you want to ask those questions- but also spend time to find the answers unique to you.

Also, because happiness is so important to creating what you want- I've included more information on what it takes to be happy, as well as how to use that happiness to generate a better life, in the e-book How To Create Your Own Reality

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Getting Rid of Guilt

2008-08-02T16:44:00.002-05:00

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Getting rid of guilt can seem like an impossible task. The reason lies with your subconscious mind. Your subconscious acts like a rudder underneath a boat. The rudder points you in one direction, while you may want to go in a different direction.

Before I explain how to get your subconscious to work with your conscious mind so you can get rid of guilt, lets first look at some of the reasons it's so alluring... and so hard to end.

1. Guilt is an expedient motivator.

What gets you up in the morning? What motivates you throughout the day? If you haven't yet developed your character, then most likely you're using guilt to motivate yourself. When character is lacking, guilt often substitutes for your character.

"If I don't do this job, I'll feel guilty."

That's one of countless examples of using guilt to force yourself to take action when character is lacking.

But by developing your self esteem, you'll also be developing your character. For a complete discussion of what character is and how to strengthen it, go to self esteem secrets.com

2. Guilt is an anesthetic.

Guilt numbs you. It can even put you to sleep and/or paralyze you. In a way, it resembles self pity.

As an anesthetic, it separates you from yourself and your world. It's a way to avoid the pain and to avoid your own true feelings.

On the surface, this may not seem like such a bad idea. Who wants to feel pain?

The problem is, the pain never goes away. Instead, it silently spreads. Pain left unattended always grows.

Plus, pain locks up your power. The longer you stay in pain, the more powerless you become. And more powerless you become, the more painful it gets. It spirals downward - so the longer you put off dealing with it, the worse it becomes.

Pain is best dealt with the same way you deal with your feelings. You feel the pain as fully and completely as you can. You surrender to the pain instead of fighting it. You feel it - so you can let it go.

You let it in, instead of trying to push it away. You go through the pain. Or, let the pain go through you. However you see it.

3. Guilt is a way to manipulate.

Many people love to manipulate. Both themselves and others. The more obvious example is when we try to manipulate those around us. But more common, perhaps, is when we fool ourselves into thinking that feeling guilt is the same as feeling remorse.

It's not. Remorse can be a powerful stepping stone to forgiveness and thus change. With guilt, on the other hand, you're only spinning your wheels. Nothing changes.

4. Guilt has a short half-life.

When you feel guilty - that guilt never lasts very long. It quickly putrifies into resentment. So if you're attempting to make someone feel guilty - watch out! They'll soon resent you.

Because of this characteristic of guilt, you end up finding and creating more things to feel guilty about. It's the only way you can keep the pattern of guilt alive.

5. Guilt is often a substitute for emotional intensity.

Because we can feel so guilty, and it feels so uncomfortable - if not downright painful - we often believe we're in touch with our true feelings, and the intensity of those feelings.

But we're not. Pain and uncomfortability do not equal emotional intensity. When you really truly feel any emotion - cleanly - with no story attached - it's invigorating.

It's like the adrenaline rush from seeing a snake, or the body rush that comes from looking down from a tall building. Clean fear comes and goes quickly. While the imaginary, painful fears - that come from the fear stories - can last a lifetime if not engaged, handled and ended.

The imaginary fears drain you and leave you weaker. In the same way, guilt drains and weakens you.

6. Guilt keeps you focused on the past.

Because guilt comes as a reaction to a past event, you're always looking backwards. Guilt forces you to focus on the past. It keeps the past alive.

Why would we do this?

Here's two basic reasons: First, we have a tendency to try to fix the past. To 'get it right' this time. Second, we have plans for that past; such as using it to manipulate or punish someone.

Again, forgiveness is a good way to help let go of a past that's ended - and needs to be put to rest once and for all.

7. Guilt keeps you from responsibility.

You can't be responsible when you're feeling guilty. Ironically, some people feel that guilt offers a form of penance; a repenting of sins.

"If I feel guilty - I'm paying my dues."

But two wrongs don't make a right. Guilt takes you further away from responsibility, rather than closer to it. Besides, responsibility has nothing to do with 'righting wrongs'.

Responsibility requires you to 'clearly' respond to your life. And it's hard to be clear when you're feeling guilt.

8. Guilt comes from the 'shame of being'.

I used to feel guilty so much of the time. For me, as present as these first seven characteristics were in my life, I lived with one more overriding factor: Shame.

Guilt formed as a never-ending byproduct to the never-ending shame. I often felt guilty for no reason at all. But surely I must have done something wrong... to feel this guilty... something...

That's the nature of shame. You feel guilty just for being alive.

Shame. While related to guilt, shame stands as it's own separate issue. Shame is much more complex than guilt. It requires more effort to end. And it's way beyond the scope of this article.

Fortunately, you deal with each separately. So now lets get rid of that guilt!

Getting Rid Of Guilt

The following technique helped me to virtually eliminate guilt - almost overnight. While I still can feel a tiny bit of guilt every now and then, it's only a whisper. And I can easily laugh it off.

What helped me was knowing:

1. Guilt is a substitute for real emotion. Usually, it's anger we don't feel we have a right to have. For example, lets say you invite me to lunch. I don't really want to go. And I end up arriving late. I can't really get angry - so I'll feel guilty instead.

2. While I'm feeling guilt - I can't feel love. And yes, I'm aware guilt often becomes a substitute for love. We feel guilt - and think that means we're being loving in some way.

Trust me, you are not loving - you are not being loving - during the time you feel guilt. Guilt and love cannot coexist. You feel either one or the other, but never both simultaneously.

Anyway, to most elegantly get rid of guilt, you'll want to work with your subconscious mind. Your subconscious mind resembles a super-computer. While it contains much more consciousness than your conscious mind does, it cannot make choices. It never decides what to do.

It only follows orders. So your responsibility - first of all - is to clearly understand what you really want. (This is a major part of the Create Your Own Reality program.)

Once you're clear - then it's time to communicate - effectively - with your subconscious mind Your subconscious mind communicates mostly through imagination and feelings.

It's easier than you think to communicate with it. You're already doing it, and you've been doing it your entire life. Admittedly, you did it much more effectively and efficiently as a child... but it's a natural ability and a skill to be developed.

The best way I've found so far is to sit or lie down, close my eyes, relax my body and take conscious control of my breathing. This sets the stage.

Then I'll count from 5 to 1 - as a signal to my body and my mind and my subconscious that I intend to enter a slightly-altered state of consciousness. This also sets the stage.

Next I create images in my mind, and bring in as much emotional intensity as possible... or as much intensity as the situation or scene calls for.

And that's the framework - the basis - the context - for what I call 'visualization exercises' or 'meditation'.

So how can be use this to end guilt?

It can be easy and straightforward. I did the following exercise one time and ended about 90% of my guilt. (But first I had to really let it in - guilt is a fabrication, a manipulation, an expedient motivator, etc.)

So here's what I did:

I sat down, relaxed, closed my eyes, etc. - and counted from 5 to 1. Then I imagined myself getting an egg out of the refrigerator. As I imagined myself holding the egg - I started thinking of things that made me feel guilty. I started remembering the times I had felt guilty.

I made myself feel as guilty as I possibly could. This went on for several minutes; as long as I could stay focused on the guilt.

Then I imagined all the guilt flowing from me and into the egg. Filling the egg... filling the egg... filling the egg with guilt. I did this as long as I could stay focused.

Finally, when I felt like I'd completely filled the egg with my guilt - then I imagined myself walking over to the sink and breaking the egg. Then I slowly, carefully, deliberately imagined the guilt drain down the sink.

The egg represented my guilt - and breaking it into the sink, while watching it slowly drain away - was a message to my subconscious that I wanted the guilt to drain away. I did this with as much clarity and focus and power as I could possibly muster.

Then I ended the meditation.

As you can see, it's simple and straight-forward and worked quite well for me. I suppose some people would want or need to do this exercise several times to really get the message across.

Finally, I went out and bought some eggs and did it in the 'real' world. And since then, I've felt very little guilt. Maybe it was just my time to end guilt.

If you've read my free e-book on emotional healing- then you know what a big believer I am in the power of processing your thoughts and feelings.

But when it comes to guilt- to getting rid of guilt- you really don't need to 'process' it out. Because guilt is a fabrication. There's nothing of substance to process.

Instead, it's more of a 'flushing' like the pity flush. Or, in this case, it's more of a 'draining away'

Try it. Just remember to keep those characteristics of guilt in mind- and make sure you really wantto end it.

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Social Anxiety Disorder

2008-07-11T15:42:00.002-05:00

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S.A.D. Social Anxiety Disorder

Those who suffer from Social Anxiety Disorder, or S.A.D., feel they must hide from other people: "I can't let other people see me."

While the intensity of those feelings varies widely, those who suffer from social anxiety disorder share one common underlying premise: "There's something wrong with me, and I can't be fixed."

Maybe not those exact words, but you get the idea. When you have S.A.D., you feel flawed and defective to the very core of your being. You feel 'bad and wrong' and nothing you can do will help.

So the only viable option- the only thing that makes sense- is to HIDE! Because the more you're noticed, the more likely someone else will see your 'defectiveness'.

You have two basic problems here.

1. The underlying shame that was dumped onto you. Usually it starts in childhood, but it can continue throughout your lifetime. Shame comes from mental, emotional, verbal, physical, and sexual abuse. It also comes from abandonment. Even if a parent dies when you are a child, you can feel shamed because of it.

Shame holds enormous complexity. There is nothing simple about it. Shame destroys many lives. Very few people truly overcome their shame.

Fortunately, it can be completely healed. In a nutshell, it involves 'bundling up' the shame- like collecting dirty smelly clothes into a burlap bag- and mentally returning the bundle to the offender, not once but many times.

It also involves healing the inner child, which means 'returning to the scene of the crime' in your imagination. Powerful, life-changing results can be achieved by working with these two steps. Reading the works of John Bradshaw- a pioneer in the field of shame- is an excellent place to start.

And as you work with healing your shame, it's equally important to look at the shame you dump onto yourself. This often becomes more entrenched and more insideous than the shame dumped onto you by others.

Shame is like a hot potato. When someone dumps their shame onto you, your natural reaction is to dump it onto someone else. And especially, you start dumping it onto yourself.

You create a story to make sense of the abuse: "I must really be a bad person, or else they wouldn't be doing this to me."

You create a 'little story' to explain to yourself why you're being abused. You start lying to yourself, and you start believing the lies. Not because you really are bad and wrong, but because that's the nature of shame. Now we come to the second basic problem:

2. You create a faulty story to explain the abuse you're enduring.Unfortunately you end up believing you're 'rotten to the core', rather than telling yourself the truth:

"I'm like a brilliant, dazzling diamond , who's beauty has been hidden by a paper-thin layer of crud. And I an the only one keeping that crud in place."

I'ts not possible to be 'rotten to the core'. It's so far from the truth that you must keep repeating the lies or they would fall away on their own. You must keep lying to yourself.

It's the only way to keep the shame in place. And out of this repetition, social anxiety disorder is born. It becomes part of the package of lies.

And the shame and the anxiety become habituated. It becomes ingrained, it becomes more and more internalized. It becomes 'the way things are'. It becomes 'the way Iam!

Shame and social anxiety disorder intertwine into a painful, tangled mess. Like being trapped in the middle of a briar patch; no matter what you do, it hurts. Life becomes more and more painful.

The first step to healing involved recognizing the complexity of the problem, and to be mindful of the shame you dump on yourself. Also look to any abusive relationships you may be involved in now.

(It may be time for drastic action!)

Once you're in a place of safety, then you can start working to heal the shame and anxiety. I've laid out a complete, step-by-step plan to escape anxiety. It works, but to keep the anxiety from coming back, you'll also want to end the shame- by returning it to the original offender, healing your inner child, and finally by stopping the shame you dump on yourself.

Shame won't end in a day-or even a week- but it can start ending today.

Anxiety can be dealt with much easier and faster than shame. Just go to reduce-fear.com for all the details.

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7 Human Emotions

2008-07-02T15:01:00.003-05:00

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While dozens of human emotions exist, each of us has one of seven root emotions.

(For a general list of emotions, go to this page.)

Before I list the 7 human root emotions, it might be helpful to understand a little more about what the word 'emotion' really means.

An emotion is a package of thoughts and feelings. Nothing more- nothing less. You experience a never-ending flow of thoughts. (No surprise there!) But you also have a never-ending flow of feelings.

Out of these two streams- the stream of thought and the stream of feeling- come the artificial labels we call 'emotions'.

Anger is a package of thoughts and feelings. Fear, joy, happiness, sadness; they're all labels we use to try to explain and understand our thoughts and feelings. Emotions are labels we use in an attempt to gain some bit of control over what we're feeling.

Obviously, labels have their place. It's good to be able to describe what we experience. But it's much more important to understand the streams of thought and feeling.

Let it in: a never-ending flow of thoughts and feelings constantly and continuously bubble up inside you

Now let's look at those root emotions.

The 7 Human Root Emotions

The root emotions:

Shame.
Anger.
Fear.
Despair.
Lonliness.
Hurt.
Pity.

One of these seven is your root emotion.

It may be the one you feel the most, but it doesn't have to be.

Your root emotion resembles an anchor. It's the one you 'return to' as you go through your trials and tribulations.

You use it to justify and rationalize and explain to yourself 'why things are going the way they are'.

Oftentimes, it's the emotion you 'wallow' in. It's the one you're most comfortable with. It's the one that makes the most sense.

And usually it's the one emotion you never question:

"Of course I'm angry! Look what they did!"

"Of course I'm scared! Look what might happen!"

"Of course I feel shame! Look at my childhood!"

"Of course I'm lonely! Look at..."

Obviously, all of the 7 human root emotions are felt by everyone at one time or another. Because thoughts and feelings are a gift, as humans, we have the right to feel and think anything we want. Nothing can take away that right because it's a 'human gift'.

But you've latched onto one of those emotions. You've made it more than it was meant to be.

Start by going over the list of the 7 root emotions. Let yourself feel each one- one at a time. Like trying on a new outfit. Give yourself permission to feel each one with wreckless abandon. Immerse yourself. Fill yourself- fully and completely- with each one. Let it absorb into your skin. Imagine yourself as a sponge.

Now here's the key point:

While a sponge will just sit there filled with water, you can channel that emotion right through you.

Imagine your eliminatory canal. You take food and water into your mouth, the nutritive value is extracted by your digestive system, and the waste passes right through you and leaves your body.

In a similar fashion, you can take in each emotion, extract power and energy from it, and release it. When you 'clearly' feel any emotion, you'll always feel more alive. And it always releases.

As you go through these 7 emotions, look for the one that seems a little too familiar, a little too strong, a little to deep. Most likely, that's your root emotion.

Remember- the root emotion is the one you always return to. The problem is, it's also the one that can clog up your streams of thoughts and feelings.

As I mention in my free e-book on emotional healing, you have a well-spring inside you. The thoughts and feelings come through the well-spring.

Well, your root emotion is sort of like a layer of rocks that impede the flow of those streams. By learning about your root emotion -the 'heaviest' emotion you experience- you can work to alleviate its influence.

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The Psychology Of Guilt

2008-06-06T13:36:00.002-05:00

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Guilt exists as a fabricated emotion. It holds little or no realness. It's hard to call it a real emotion.

You see, a real emotion is one that has both a positive and a negative side.

Love, fear, hate, anger, sadness, happiness and so many other emotions all have both a positive and a negative component. Not guilt.

Guilt is all negative. It adds nothing to your existence.

Sure, many people use it as a motivator:

"I'll feel guilty if I don't do this."

It's called an 'expedient motivator'. Meaning, it's used when you lack principle-based motivation. It's a cheap way to inspire action in yourself and others.

Guilt basically comes down to manipulation. The function - the purpose - of guilt involves manipulating yourself and others to take some sort of action or to feel some sort of way.

Guilt punishes. Both yourself and those around you. Guilt contributes nothing. It only takes.

So why do we feel it?

We've been taught and conditioned to feel guilt. Often, by well-meaning, loving, authority figures in our lives. Guilt becomes a substitute for love.

Unfortunately, guilt dissipates quickly. It has a short half-life. It turns into resentment. So if you're manipulating another with guilt - attempting to make them feel guilty - they will resent you.

Because guilt often comes down to anger you don't have a right to have.

For example: if we're arguing, but I know you're right and I'm wrong, then I don't have a right to get angry. So I might feel guilty instead.

To work with guilt, first understand the psychology of guilt:

It's a substitute emotion when you're unwilling to feel what you're really feeling.

When you're feeling guilty, you're not in touch with your true feelings.

Secondly, understand we've been taught and conditioned to feel guilt by very well-meaning people. Those who loved and cared about us the most were the ones we learned guilt from.

Thus, guilt is often intertwined with love. Or rather, it's intertwined with our conception of love. We all have strongly-defined, deeply-entrenched beliefs and attitudes and assumptions about love.

Often times, guilt seems almost inseparable from love. Especially when we're afraid of love and afraid of losing love, we'll surround our love with guilt. Because it's much 'safer' to feel guilt than to feel love.

It takes courage to love. While guilt sometimes surrounds love, fear always surrounds love. True love always brings up fear. Not because that's the nature of love, but because that's the nature of our society.

It also takes courage to stand up to your assumptions and question them. Very few have that courage. Fortunately, all the courage you need is already available to you. That's the nature of courage. All you have to do is open up and let it in. Then...

Guilt can be ended.

Guilt serves no useful purpose. It's a distraction from your true feelings. It separates you from yourself. It's a cheap way to punish and a cheap way to motivate yourself. Guilt manipulates you and others.

When you find yourself feeling guilty, the key is to go beyond it:

What am I not wanting to feel?

What am I hiding from?

By asking yourself these types of questions you can start breaking free of the habit - the pattern - those neurological pathways of least effort that lead straight to guilt. Then you can get in touch with what's real.

The knee-jerk reaction to feel guilt can be replaced with the natural order of feeling what's real.

That's how you deal with the psychology of guilt.

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Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

self-esteem-secrets.com

forgive-yourself.com

create-reality.com

reduce-fear.com

healing-emotional-pain.com

release-emotions.com

How I Found A Positive Attitude

2008-05-15T09:11:00.005-05:00

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I've got someone inside of me. I call him the Negative Guy. Here's how it all started:

You see, as a child I experienced pain, and I didn't know how to deal with it. It would get a little too intense sometimes.

But I had to put the pain somewhere.

Emotional pain must go somewhere.

So I started making judgments (among many other things). I started judging myself and other people and God and the world and everything else I could think of.

Judgments freeze.

It's like putting your pain in the freezer. It doesn't end the pain - it doesn't make it go away - but it does help you cope.

For a child growing up with few tools and resources, it's a way to survive.

In my case (and I suspect, for many others) judgments were a receptacle for the pain.

Eventually, that freezer took on a life of its own.

A lot of power lies hidden in your intensity; and pain can be intense. A lot of power was locked in my freezer. So I guess it was inevitable the freezer would come to life. My pain came to life; like Frankenstein's monster; as the Negative Guy.

The Negative Guy

I've lived my life; I've functioned out of him. I became him. For periods of time, anyway. He was always there for me. He became my anchor. I knew I could count on him. He was safe and comfortable and oh-so-familiar.

Like a pair of worn-out shoes. Doesn't look good. But at least I know what I'm getting. It's comfortable.

And the safest answer is always 'NO', right?

That's what I believed.

It wasn't until the last few years I even realized I had a receptacle for my pain inside me.

A living, breathing, part of me who always says NO. Who always believes it won't work; that things won't go well. Because life's a bitch and then you...

I never thought to question it. Because I was so immersed in it; I didn't realize I could CHOOSE whether to function as a Negative Guy or not.

The Negative Guy has no choice. All he knows is a negative outlook on everything. Getting him to change would be like trying to get an eagle to stop flying. Or to get water to start flowing uphill.

No, he has no choice. But I have a choice as to whether or not I will function as the Negative Guy.

You see, he has a counterpart; a positive guy. I call him my Expectant Self.

The part of me who's always expecting the best, no matter what.

"We'll expect the best in every situation. And we'll deal with whatever happens, in the best way we can."

Of course I'll still have my ups and downs. But I feel so much better with a positive expectancy! It takes me out of the prison of negativity.

Unfortunately, I have decades of experience being negative. And a rather short time seeking positive expectancy.

At first, it actually felt uncomfortable being positive. It was WAY TOO easy to sink back down into the familiar negative expectancy.

The Positive Self Is Real

And he's eager to help me. If I'm feeling negative about a particular situation, I can bundle up the energy of the negativity, and hand it over to the Expectant Self to heal it for me. That's one way he helps me.

I also ask him to be more present in my life. To fill me with positive energy. To stand next to me, and whisper in my ear when I start to sink. To give me a pep talk when I need it.

I ask him to be my eyes, so I can see life in a new way.

Positive Expectancy brings with it many gifts; Wonder, Joy, Love, Freedom, Enthusiasm.

Life works better. I feel better.

The Negative Guy will always exist inside me. There will always be a space for him; just as the termite tunnels remain after the termites have been exterminated.

Working with the Negative Guy involves working with my own pain.

But the juice - the power - the energy - MY energy - does not have to flow into him. He can be like a hollow shell. A mummy. In a strange way, he can be an ally - with just enough power to warn me when I'm getting off track. He can whisper in my ear.

But no more. That's my goal.

And for more information on creating a Positive Expectation, check out the e-book How To Create Your Own Reality.

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Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

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Drop Obsessive Thoughts

2008-05-12T06:31:00.002-05:00

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I've written before on how to end obsessive thoughts. As well as how to heal a relationship.

How to end the burdens we bear.

And how to heal the pain caused by others.

Today I want to take a slightly different approach to dropping the obsessive thoughts you may be feeling, especially as it relates to an ended relationship. In other words, how to let go of the feelings you may still have that cause you to obsess about someone you're no longer with.

But you could just as easily apply this to ANY obsessive thoughts.

If you're obsessed about someone - say you've broken up with your boyfriend - then it's time to step back and analyze the situation. You first need to see and perceive it the way it really is:

You're either imprisoned in your thoughts...

or maybe it's like a ball and chain...

or perhaps you're just lugging the obsessive thoughts around like a concrete block.

Or maybe you're spinning on a hamster wheel.

So the first step it to objectify your obsessive thoughts and feelings. Spend the time - as much time as necessary - to visualize the object that makes the most sense to you.

It could be an object like one of the examples above, or it could be something totally different.

The point is: when you have obsessive thoughts, they can and should be objectified as the first step towards ending them.

Don’t gloss over this important first step!

In fact, if you've been dealing with those thoughts for any length of time, I'd suggest spending a whole day mulling it over. Not every minute, of course. But throughout the day, as time permits, spend a few minutes thinking about it.

This on-again-off-again activity; thinking of the object and then going back to your daily routine; gives your subconscious mind time to provide its own input. Which is very important!

Because ultimately, the object is sourced in your subconscious mind.

By focusing on it throughout the day, in engages your subconscious mind. In fact, you don't really have to come up with the image on your own. You can let it come to you from your subconscious.

Another option (rather than thinking of it throughout the day) is to ask your subconscious to help you as you're drifting off to sleep at night.

Start by taking conscious control of your breathing. In other words, breathe slow and deliberate. This draws the attention of your subconscious.

Spend a minute or two taking slow, deep breaths. Then say:

"Subconscious, my subconscious, come here and listen to me.

"Subconscious, listen to me.

"Subconscious, listen to me.

"As I sleep tonight, give me a symbol, give me an image, of my obsessive thoughts about (whatever you're obsessing over).

"Give me the image that best describes my obsessive thoughts about ...

"When I wake up in the morning, I want to see the symbol - the image - the object - that best represents the thoughts and feelings I'm holding onto about..."

And the next morning, you should have a pretty good idea of the symbol of your obsessive thoughts.

Now you've got something to work with.

Now, rather than fighting off those obsessive thoughts, you can work on the symbol instead.

Why bother to do this?

Because those obsessive thoughts and feelings most likely are sourced in your subconscious. At least partly, if not totally. It's quite possible your subconscious is locking you into those thoughts and feelings that won't end. Especially if you really want to end them, but can't.

(Forgiveness also works well to end obsessive thoughts and feelings, by the way.)

By working with the symbol; by changing it, breaking free of it, or ending it somehow, you are talking to your subconscious in a way it can understand. You are speaking its language.

Your subconscious understands images and symbols. If you let it give you the symbol that best sums up your situation, then you have the greatest chance of making the changes you want to make.

Once you have your symbol, the next obvious step involves working to break free of it.

If it's a prison; understand you created the prison, you hold the key, and you can walk out any time you want. If it's a ball and chain; understand you placed it on your leg, and you can unchain it any time you want. If it's a concrete block you're lugging around with you; realize you can drop the block when you're ready.

In fact, with any object, the first thing to understand is that you created it. It was not created by the other person, or any other source but you.

I know that's obvious, but it's important to really let it:

I created this object which now limits my freedom. I started it, and by making it too real, it solidified in my subconscious mind.

And that's good news! Because if I created it, that means I can change it. (Your subconscious, by the way, works for you! It gives you what IT thinks YOU want.)

Sometimes, simply walking out of the prison is enough. Or dropping the concrete block. Sometimes that's all you have to do to be free. Or perhaps you need to mentally seek and find the key to unlock your prison. Maybe you need to slowly stop the spinning of the hamster wheel. Maybe you need to imagine yourself with a hacksaw, cutting through the ball and chain over the course of a few days. (Be inventive!!!)

Other times, you can drop that block a hundred times and nothing happens.

Why the difference?

It all comes down to your willingness.

That's it. There is no 'hidden power' that can keep you locked in obsessive thoughts. There is no 'inherent weakness' in you. You're not flawed or defective.

You're simply not willing to let them go. Yet.

And that's okay, as long as you recognize what's going on:

"I'm holding on for some reason."

"I'm getting something out of these obsessive thoughts."

A specific, unique, and attractive reason exists for holding onto obsessive thoughts. Sometimes, if you're just plain sick of the thoughts, you can end them quickly and easily by working with your symbol. Other times...

Your secret reason holds too much allure.

Maybe you feel the need to prove your loyalty. Maybe you refuse to let the love die. Maybe you want to avoid the natural grieving process that always accompanies a death. (Obsessive thought is not the same as grieving!)

Maybe it's a hidden fear around the loss of love. Maybe it's a way to feel sorry for yourself. Maybe it's a way to get others to feel sorry for you.

Or do you simply not want to feel the INTENSE anger underneath the obsession? There could be any number of reasons why you hold on; both positive and negative.

Just because you keep holding on, doesn't make you bad or wrong or somehow defective. It just means the holding on seems a better alternative.

The key is to find that hidden reason you're holding on to the obsessive thoughts..

One way is to work with the symbol as you normally would - finding a way to be free of it.

And carefully note the thoughts and feelings that come up as you imagine yourself being free.

Those thoughts and feelings that come up as you're, say, unlocking or walking out of your prison... they hold the key to understanding why you would resist.

Give yourself permission to let those thoughts and feelings come up... and give yourself permission to feel them and release them.

Whatever they may be - you need to embrace them to truly be free of your obsessive thoughts.

Finally, keep this in mind:

Obsessive thoughts are a smokescreen - a distraction - from the REAL thoughts and feelings lying underneath. It's almost like you're choosing to hide in your obsessive thoughts rather than to feel your REAL feelings.

And most likely, it's because the REAL feelings are too intense. And intensity scares us.

Obsessive thoughts are shallow.

But your power lies hidden within the intensity.

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all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

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Dominion: A Friendly World

2008-04-11T08:32:00.002-05:00

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One thing I've found - when I’m in dominion, problems disappear. Pain and suffering are non existent. There is no punishment or blame or conflict.

All is right with the world.

I know most people can't even hear about the concept of dominion. They won't let themselves listen... much less actually imagine that the experience of dominion can really happen to them.

Because we live in a world of domination.

I used to hang onto my problems so tightly. It's like my knuckles would turn white. My jaw would get sore. My back would ache. I was determined to hold onto domination no matter what.

Not because I was stupid or unevolved. But because I bought into...

The Biggest Lie Of Society.

The lie of chauvinism.

Domination stands on the lie of chauvinism.

I believed I was doing the right thing by suffering and struggling. I wasn't trying to destroy the world. I just wanted to do the right thing.

And I didn't know about dominion!

Now I do know, so I really don't have any excuse. And I still spend most of my time in domination! After ten years of knowing the sheer ecstasy and joy and thrill of dominion.

Dominion is a state of being.

Well, it's really much more, but that's where it starts.

Dominion is your natural state of being.

It's not foreign to you; or to anyone on this planet.

You knew dominion once. You knew dominion as a child. It didn't last. But you did know - however fleeting - the sheer joy of being alive.

It had to be pounded out of you the way it's been pounded out of everyone.

You had to learn domination.

You never had to learn dominion, because it's the natural order. But now - 20, 30, 40, 50 years later... dominion has been completely forgotten. And now, at this time, dominion seems non-existent.

Everyone - everywhere you look - tells you that you must dominate or be dominated. The Law Of The Jungle. Only the strong survive.

It's true. If you're in domination, then domination is the only answer. Domination is the law. It truly is a dog-eat-dog world when you're in domination.

Everyone is out to get you. You really do have to struggle and suffer when you're in domination.

Your choices really are impotent.

There really is an outside authority.

That's what domination demands of you. That's the price you pay for believing the lie and playing the game.

But I've had glimpses of a different world. A world completely free of domination. A world where domination doesn't even make sense.

A friendly world. Filled with friendly people. A world where people treat each other with respect; because they respect themselves. Because it's the right thing to do.

I've had glimpses - and I've even functioned out of that world. At first it was only for a few seconds. Then I got up to a minute. Now, it happens for ten, fifteen, twenty minutes at a time. Someday soon it will happen for a whole afternoon.

Then I'll step back into the ugliness of chauvinism and domination.

But I know it's possible to live in dominion all the time. I believe it's my birthright. I believe I deserve it. Just like I believe you deserve dominion.

I believe dominion is a resonance I can step into any time I want.

Dominion exists as a resonance residing somewhere deep inside me. I won't find it by trying to surround myself with friendly people. No matter how nice they truly are.

It's not in a far-away exotic location. No matter how romantic it seems.

It's not found in nature. No matter how beautiful the setting.

Dominion is not limited in that way. It's not a function of physicality.

Let me leave you with this vision:

It's like I'm living my life inside an egg. I am surrounded on all sides by an eggshell. Outside the eggshell lies the wonderful, beautiful existence of what you might call utopia. A glorious world filled with adventure... and friendly people. A world of love.

But all I can see is the wall of my eggshell. I can't see, touch, hear, feel or smell the glorious world. All I know is the eggshell; my cramped little prison.

It hurts. It's uncomfortable. But it's all I know. It's all I believe in.

But it's just an eggshell.

Someday I'll have the courage to break that eggshell. Someday I'll let go of my little story of pain and shame and struggle and hardship. A story of the past - a story that keeps the past alive and all-too-real.

I can dream of a world beyond my eggshell of domination... a future world.

Someday I'll have the courage.

After all, it's only an eggshell. The walls of my prison are paper-thin.

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all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

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What's The Use?

2008-03-30T15:01:00.019-05:00

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When I was about 20 years old, I was consumed with feelings and thoughts of 'what's the use?'.

As a result, I functioned as an extremely apathetic person towards life; and towards everything, really.

I didn't care about myself or anything else.

And I never stopped to look at the energy behind those thoughts and feelings. I just lived and functioned out of them.

Recently, they surfaced again.

I'm grateful they did, because it gave me an opportunity to reflect. First, to go back to that 20-year-old in meditation. To remember what he was feeling, and to help us both heal.

I know those intense thoughts and feelings from the past don't resolve themselves. More likely, they get buried alive... only to come back and haunt - whenever something today triggers them.

Those past events take today's energy. Which makes me less powerful. Until they're resolved, that is.

So I'm always grateful when something like this comes up, because I know the end result is that I'll be more powerful.

Anyway, I'd forgotten how EXTREMELY apathetic I used to be. Once the hubris of adolescence completely wore off, that's when the apathy set in. After I lost my adolescent passion; after the teenage years ended.

And I didn't even realize it at the time. Now, 30 years later, I got to take it apart and see how it all worked.

For me, the apathy came from a lack of mattering.

"No matter what I do, it really doesn't matter. Nothing matters."

The reason nothing matters is because I don't matter. So why bother to do anything?

The basic problem was a lack of mattering.

There were specific and unique reasons for my lack of mattering:

Shame. Lack of deserving. Feelings of not good enough. All a result of specific childhood experiences. Out of which came low self esteem and a loss of self worth.

No mystery there.

I've already done the work of healing the inner child and releasing those painful energies. ( A good introduction to healing the inner child can be found in the e-books The Magic Of Forgiveness and How To Create Your Own Reality.)

I've found my self worth. And I've come to understand I'm continuously building my self esteem. Or rather, I'm either building it... or it's slipping away.

It's almost the opposite of self worth - which is given. Which can only be lost, or found, but never built. Everyone is always 100% worthy. All you can do is lose touch with it. Or reclaim it.

But I digress.

Today, I want to explain how I first came to be filled with mattering. And how you can too. Mattering becomes an ally if you let it.

The energy of mattering is a force you can use to re-find and rediscover and reclaim your passion. Passion brings the juiciness to life. It adds complexity. Passion makes life fun!

And ironically, you can use mattering to clear up the very problems a lack of it creates. When you're filled with the energy of mattering, for example, you feel better about yourself. You feel more of your self worth. Self esteem comes easier. And it's easier to know you deserve. Those are some of the rewards of filling yourself with the energy of mattering.

***

Before we look more closely at mattering, I also want to briefly emphasize those forgotten, neglected, abandoned parts of you from your past.

Because they don't die, and they don't really go away. And it keeps taking more and more of your energy to try to push them away. But they keep influencing.

In fact, I'd say most people function almost exclusively out of their inner child or inner adolescent or even their inner parent. Or their ego. Or some other inner voice.

Well, it this case, it was my inner 20-year-old. From a very traumatic time in my life.

If you'll look back at your own life, and identify those ages when the greatest trauma took place, then you can bet there's a part of you still living at that age. A part that's scared, lost, confused, abandoned, betrayed, etc. (Besides the inner child and adolescent, the other parts such as ego can develop problems as well during these traumatic times.)

By personifying that part of you (seeing it as a person) and letting it speak to you (in quiet meditative times) then you can open the door to PROFOUND changes in your life. Again, here's two resources which describe how to begin:

The Magic Of Forgiveness and How To Create Your Own Reality

***

Okay, now back to the mattering...

First I let that 20 year old speak to me; telling me how lonely, dejected, rejected it felt. How consumed with apathy it felt. I let it talk and talk until it ran out of things to say... as I sat in a quiet meditative place.

Then I asked if it would be willing to heal. It said yes. (If it had said no, I would've done the rest myself.)

Anyway, I imagined the two of us going to...

The Crossroads Of Mattering.

I see it as an intersection of two quiet country roads. In my case, they're dirt roads, but you can imagine them any way you like.

I stood in the middle of the intersection with my 20 year old, and looked in all four directions.

To the south, in the distance, I saw a huge bonfire.

To the west, I saw water; waterfalls, mist, a stream, a lagoon. Water everywhere.

To the north I saw a hill, with an outcropping of rock, and beyond it I saw deep woods.

And finally, to the east, I saw wide open space - representing the element air.

I've traveled to all four directions, but since I'm an earth-type person, I usually go to the north to find my mattering. You can go to any and all of them if you choose.

So, the two of us went into the hill; into the rock that stood to the north of the intersection.

Whichever directions you go to find your mattering, here's the two steps to follow:

First, let the element remove the reasons 'why-not'. Why you don't matter. Why you lack mattering. Why your life lacks mattering. Let the earth suck it out of you like a poultice. Let the air lift you, blow you apart, and blow away the limitations. Step into the bonfire and let the flames consume all the limitations. Go into the waters, and let the water wash away your apathy, your undeserving, or whatever is there.

Give yourself to your element to let it heal you. Allow the healing. Receive the healing.

Second, now let the element fill you with mattering. Let it be mysterious and unknown.

You'll never know how it happens, or how it's even possible. But if you'll surrender to your element in this way - especially if you do it several times - you will notice a difference.

It can change you if you'll let it.

The trick is to be willing to receive. And open yourself up. Open up your heart. Open up your mind. Open up your essence. Open up in any way you can imagine.

Open yourself up to your element. For a minute or two, 'become one' with it.

That's how you get results.

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all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

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Creating Alliances

2008-03-24T15:47:00.004-05:00

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On this fourth video, I talk more specifically about creating an alliance with your doctor, your medications, and with nutritional supplements.

I list three main activities you can do to start creating an alliance.

One of the activities involves measuring your power throughout the day.

Another involves retrieving your power from your ally.

NOTE: If the video stops playing and then starts back, try this: Turn down the sound (so it won't annoy you!) then let it play all the way through without watching it. Then hit REPLAY and this time it should work okay.

And the nutritional supplements I recommend can be found here.

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Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

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Retrieving Your Power

2008-03-24T15:29:00.005-05:00

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This is my third video and in this one I talk about taking your power back.

First I review the ways we give our power away, and then I talk about how to start taking it back.

It's all based on our intention. Your power flows through your intention. I explain how it works on the video.

NOTE: If the video stops playing and then starts back, try this: Turn down the sound (so it won't annoy you!) then let it play all the way through without watching it. Then hit REPLAY and this time it should work okay.

And the nutritional supplements I recommend can be found here.

If you liked this post; if you got anything out of it; then please click on the BOOKMARK link below, which brings up a list of social bookmarking sites. Then add this article to your favorite site.

Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

self-esteem-secrets.com

forgive-yourself.com

create-reality.com

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Withdrawal & The Grand Promise

2008-03-21T10:56:00.005-05:00

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In this, my second video on antidepressant withdrawal, I want to step back and look at the big picture.

I want to set the context of how a person would get into this position in the first place.

It's all based on 'the grand promise'.

You can learn the fundamental principle by watching the video below. If you have a specific question about the grand promise, then feel free to leave a comment below and I'll do my best to answer it.

NOTE: If the video stops playing and then starts back, try this: Turn down the sound (so it won't annoy you!) then let it play all the way through without watching it. Then hit REPLAY and this time it should work okay.

And the nutritional supplements I recommend can be found here.

If you liked this post; if you got anything out of it; then please click on the BOOKMARK link below, which brings up a list of social bookmarking sites. Then add this article to your favorite site.

Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

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Antidepressant Withdrawal Intro

2008-03-20T12:51:00.005-05:00

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I just uploaded a video to youtube.

It's my very first video and in it I explain how I came to understand and work with antidepressant withdrawal.

NOTE: If the video stops playing and then starts back, try this: Turn down the sound (so it won't annoy you!) then let it play all the way through without watching it. Then hit REPLAY and this time it should work okay.

And the nutritional supplements I recommend can be found here.

If you liked this post; if you got anything out of it; then please click on the BOOKMARK link below, which brings up a list of social bookmarking sites. Then add this article to your favorite site.

Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

self-esteem-secrets.com

forgive-yourself.com

create-reality.com

reduce-fear.com

healing-emotional-pain.com

release-emotions.com

Why You Won't Change

2008-03-16T09:33:00.004-05:00

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Why won't you change?

Oh, you'll talk about change. You'll talk a good game. But usually, what we really mean is we want something or someone else to change while we stay the same.

"If I just had more money..."

That's an example of wishing for outside change which will - magically, if not unspokenly - transform us. Somehow.

But it never works. Changing anything in your life - externally - really doesn't change you one bit.

And frankly, I'm sick of trying to prove otherwise. I've tried so hard, for SO MANY YEARS, to change my environment as a way for me to change. (Here's my little trick to avoid change.)

You can move across the country. You can change your physical location. But it won't, by itself, change anything inside.

Now sometimes making an external change will shake things up enough inside so you really do change. It can happen. That's what they tell addicts to do.

"Change your old physical environment to remove the triggers of your addiction."

It's good advice. But it's at least as important to simultaneously make internal changes as you're making those external ones.

On a less dramatic level, sometimes it truly helps to remove your old anchors - your familiar physical surroundings - as a way to help the changes along.

Just don't think a physical, external change will be enough to change you.

It won't. It can't.

True change comes from the inside out.

But it's so tempting to chase money to attempt to be happy. Or to chase a relationship to attempt to feel love.

You can be happy with money. You can feel loved in a relationship. Especially if you know: happiness can create money. Love can create a relationship. But money never creates happiness. And relationships never create love.

"If I can just find a man - or a woman - then I'll be happy and feel loved."

That's a trap. That's a lie.

Instead, you could use the power of your love - the power of your happiness - to create the relationship you want. Or whatever you want.

Which may involve making some changes internally. It may involve work. Effort. Focus. Self-discovery. Facing up to things you'd rather not face about yourself.

Seems so much simpler to go join a dating service or a singles club. And it is simpler. Put on some nice clothes. Go have some fun. Kick up your heels. Maybe you'll get lucky... Maybe not. Just don't count on a whole lot changing.

Change comes from facing up to what you're currently not facing up to.

Cause if you faced up to it - you'd change!

And your world would change.

Your little world - what you experience in your day to day life - will indeed change.

The more you face up to what you're currently avoiding - the greater your life will change.

It's called working with your shadow. I've seen it in my own life time after time after time after...

The sad fact is, it's really not hard or difficult or even that unpleasant (usually) to face up to yourself. It might be painful or uncomfortable, but at least it ends the pain and the discomfort. Like removing a splinter.

Most would rather dance around - trying to avoid dealing with the splinter. It's a sad dance that never ends, as we keep repeating the pain of the past... while trying to avoid the pain and discomfort. Because we don't want to change; we want the world to change.

All to avoid facing ourselves.

When you really look at it, it seems so senseless. But we've been taught and conditioned to seek change in the world rather than from within. You're practically ridiculed if you think changing yourself is the way to change your life and your world.

Instead, we were taught to place our trust - and give our power away to - some external authority.

"Just elect the right president; that's how change happens."

Do you see how society plays on your fears of facing up to yourself? We're so geared to look outside ourselves for change. While giving 'lip service' to changing ourselves:

"Oh yeah, change yourself too."

But who even knows what that means, or how to do it?

Change comes from becoming more of who you are, and letting go of what you're not.

It comes from facing up to those things you hold onto that aren't really a part of you.

First work on the inside. Then go to the singles club. That's how you get lucky.

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all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

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create-reality.com

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Create A Vision

2008-03-11T12:50:00.004-05:00

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One of the biggest problems when you're lost in depression - or anxiety - or any number of unpleasant, painful feelings...

is that you just don't have anything positive to look to - to grab hold of - to focus on.

You just don't have a vision to inspire you.

I know what it's like to be so lost; when you can't see anything anywhere that looks good. It all looks so bleak.

"What's the use?"

You ask. With the inevitable answer:

"There is no use. There is no reason."

Because there is no positive vision.

A vision is something you know to be true.

Which contrasts with a dream: Something you wish to be true.

Both can inspire you. For now, lets look at vision.

A vision is a living image infused with feelings.

You already know how to create a dark vision. It seems to come a little too easily. Just look at practically every single science fiction movie set in the future. All too often they involve pain, strife, struggle, suffering, destruction, evil, bleakness, darkness..

We all know how to create a dark vision. And if we didn't we could just go watch the new movie coming out next week!

Is a dark future vision more realistic? Is it easier to create?

Many would say so.

I would say the dark vision simply gets more attention. Period.

Certainly it's been pounded into our heads - the unspoken message of society - that humans, by their very nature, are evil sinister bad and wrong. Left to our own devices... why, we'd kill each other off.

We'd kill each other off until no one is left. Or, we'll kill all the people who are different from us. Or, we'll destroy the planet; making it uninhabitable.

So of course a dark vision is the only realistic conclusion a reasonable intelligent person could come up with.

I disagree. Even in the United States, the most war-loving nation in the history of the planet, most people are opposed to war.

But the only way to change things is if you and I both create a vision - a positive vision. Not based on hiding our heads in the sand - pretending there is no suffering in the world. Not being Pollyanna.

Humanity changes one person at a time; one human heart at a time.

It begins right here right now. It starts by creating a vision; your personal vision. Not a vision of world peace necessarily. Not of saving the planet.

But it starts with a small, quiet simple vision. Remember, a vision is something you KNOW. Not something you wish would happen.

A vision starts with a single spark.

Like starting a fire in the woods when all you've got is a piece of flint and a piece of steel... and it's getting cold and dark. The sun's going down...

What do you know?

You know you can strike the flint with the steel.

You know you can create a spark.

You know you've got a handful of tinder - that just maybe - can start to smolder and burn.

Your vision starts small. Later it can grow as you feed it with your attention. But first you find your spark. Admittedly, that can be tough.

But if you're alive - and I'm guessing you are - then you do have a spark to serve as the beginning of your vision.

It could be the remembrance of seeing a single act of random kindness between two strangers. (A very powerful magical event, by the way.)

It could be the memory of happier days. It could be the scent of a flower or the smile of a newborn. Or any of a million other things.

Something that touches your heart; stirs your soul; awakens your spirit.

You can find your spark. If you truly want to. You can hold it in your hands and feed it and watch it grow. You can place it in your heart. It can be a living breathing energy that grows and changes and evolves. Ever shifting. Ever alive.

When you feel your best; when you need it the least; that's the best time to work on it.

Or if you feel so lost - as I once did - when your whole world and your whole life looks gray... and heavy...

Then ask to receive a spark.

As you go to sleep at night ask for a spark to come to you in the morning when you awake. Some tiny image or feeling or vision that INSPIRES you. Something that, when you think of it, when you focus on it, it makes you feel better.

If you sincerely want it, you'll most likely get it. Even if it takes a couple of days. Then you can add to it; make it bigger.

You feed it with your love and attention.

My vision resembles a ball of light the size of a football that I keep in the center of my chest. I've fed it so much that now it feeds me whenever I need to be inspired. Or if I just want to feel good.

Or if I'm standing in line at the post office...

It's not about saving the planet. It's about healing yourself. Sometimes it's about getting through the day.

If you liked this post; if you got anything out of it; then please click on the BOOKMARK link below, which brings up a list of social bookmarking sites. Then add this article to your favorite site.

Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

self-esteem-secrets.com

forgive-yourself.com

create-reality.com

reduce-fear.com

healing-emotional-pain.com

release-emotions.com

The Burdens We Bear

2008-03-07T13:11:00.003-05:00

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All children feel like victims. The feelings may or may not last - but at one time or another, we've all felt like we were a victim to forces beyond our control.

If those feelings do continue, the logical progression is to feel like a martyr. Not in the religious sense, but rather in the archetypal sense.

A martyr is someone who's burdened with problems that cannot be solved while feeling unappreciated and misunderstood.

It's an archetypal energy; meaning the same feelings can be felt by anyone anywhere. It's universal, in other words.

While victimhood starts in childhood, martyrhood usually starts in adolescence.

The keyword to being a martyr: burden.

I know burden. I know the helplessness of it; the hopelessness of it.

Burden comes from demanding that someone else must be responsible for my life.

Since it's not possible for anyone else to be responsible for your life, the tendency is to take on more and more burden. Which leads to all sorts of unpleasant feelings, such as bitterness, rage, depression, and so forth.

Because when burdens become a way of life, they don't end; they just change form.

I'll get rid of this job, but end up with a new job that creates the same feelings.

I'll get rid of this person, but attract another person who engenders the same unpleasant feelings.

Or I'll stop working - stay home - and be burdened by my kids.

Form changes. The feelings don't. That's the nature of burden.

Burden comes from a resistance to change.

In adolescence, massive changes occur almost on a daily basis. It's a scary time.

We learn to manufacture burdens to feel safe. Not that it works well, but it's about all we can do to attempt to slow down the changes.

Change is frightening.

Change brings impact.

Burdens are an attempt to control the impact of change.

The problem with burdens is they make you feel powerless.

It's like you take a chunk of your power and wrap it in thoughts and feelings of disempowerment. For example, by blaming someone else for the way you feel.

"They're doing this to me!"

If you're feeling burdened, the message behind the burden is: it's time to change.

Change is continuous. You could imagine it as a flow; like the flow of time.

Sameness does not equal safety. Sameness brings stagnation.

The ideal is to be in the flow of change. Like your body. Your body is in a continuous state of change.

Change is natural.

Change is like removing a splinter.

If you want to end burden, first realize you've developed ingrained habits that create burdens. All the habits have one thing in common: an attempt to demand that someone or something else be responsible for my life.

So the solution starts with taking back your power from wherever you've placed it:

I take my power back from my job.

I take my power back from my spouse.

I take my power back from...

And mean it!

Next step.

If you were a bird, what kind of bird would you be?

Not a turkey or a chicken or a penguin. A bird that flies.

Imagine yourself as this bird. Imagine yourself spreading your wings and lifting off the ground. Not as a way to escape, but as a way to feel the flow of change. As a way to gain a new perspective on your life. As a way to end your burden.

Imagine yourself taking off, and flying into the energy of change.

It sounds so simple, but if you really get into it, the experience can blow your mind. Seriously.

Don't worry about changing the content of what burdens you.

If you'll allow yourself to enter the flow of change - free of resistance - either the things that burden you will change, or else they simply won't bother you anymore.

You can fight change. But why?

It's so much more fun to soar.

If you liked this post; if you got anything out of it; then please click on the BOOKMARK link below, which brings up a list of social bookmarking sites. Then add this article to your favorite site.

Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

self-esteem-secrets.com

forgive-yourself.com

create-reality.com

reduce-fear.com

healing-emotional-pain.com

release-emotions.com

Why I Don't Work For Free

2008-03-05T17:12:00.004-05:00

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Recently, someone asked me -

"Why dont you do mankind a favour and reveal your secrets to help the unfortunate ones who dont have the money to purchase books?"

Since it pushed so many buttons in me, I figured I'd take a little time to process it out. And you can join along with me for the ride!

First of all, if someone is so unfortunate as to not be able to buy a book, they have much greater problems than I can solve anyway. I've never known anyone who could not buy a book.

The question is, how badly do they want the book?

Apparently, not very badly. Apparently, I haven't demonstrated the value of my books. Because anyone can get money if they're sufficiently motivated to buy something.

I've known homeless crack addicts who - somehow or another - managed to get a good bit of money on a regular basis. A lot more money than any of my books cost.

It's not a question of money.

Anyone can get money if they want it. Or at least, anyone who has computer access can get money. If you're savvy enough to get onto the internet, you can find a way to get money if you really want it. At the very least, you can write articles for people who will pay you.

Start with this site: associatedcontent.com. But there are many more sites that will pay you to write. Did you know there are many sites that pay you to blog?

I could go on and on about money, but that's not the issue. Because if you needed one of my books, and you convinced yourself my book could solve your problem, you'd get the money.

(Or else, you'd write me the right kind of email and then I would give you a book for free. I do give away a lot of books. But only to people who ask in the right way. Most people don't ask in the right way.)

No, it's really a question of entitlement.

"I've suffered so I should get it for free."

"I'm special."

"I shouldn't have to pay."

Boy, do I know entitlement! I LIVED it for most of my life. Which probably explains why this whole situation of 'just give it to me for free' pushes my buttons.

It could be the unresolved issues inside of me:

Maybe I'm still looking for a free ride myself? Maybe I still want someone else to take up my slack? Maybe I still think I'm special?

I don't know.

What I do know, is that entitlement is a dry well.

Entitlement never gets you anything worthwhile. Believe me, no one was more entitled than I was! (Not that I want to swap lies with you...)

Entitlement always leaves you thirsty. Always unsatisfied. It always leaves you empty. It's no fun. You have to keep remembering your little story. All the reasons 'why not'.

Finally I just got so sick of it, I decided to pick myself up and get to work on being responsible. What a difference it made!!!

The answer to entitlement is to tell yourself the truth:

Nobody in the world is capable of being responsible for your life. Nor would you really want them to be.

Another thing that bothers me about this issue: I'm already giving away quite a bit of valuable information as it is. Most of the work I do, I don't make a penny for it.

Not that I'm complaining. I love what I do and I do what I love.

Just getting positive feedback means at least as much as making another sale. You'll probably never find anyone who cares less about money than I do.

Unfortunately, I can't go to the grocery store and tell them:

"Hey, you got all this food here. Why don't you just give me some of it?"

Or go to the barber shop:

"Hey, it's not costing you any money to cut my hair. Why don't you just do it for free?"

The hairdresser is going to be insulted. Why?

Because you don't value them. You don't value their expertise. You don't value their time. You don't value their worth. You don't value their life - and what they're doing with it.

But unlike the hairdresser, I do give a lot away for free already. And I had to pay dearly for what I know. Sometimes with money. Mostly, though, I paid by giving up the things I held so dear. Like my pity.

If it had been 'free' - I doubt I would have valued it anyway. I doubt I would have paid attention. I doubt I would've really learned anything.

That's why I wouldn't really be doing mankind a favor by giving all my 'secrets' away for free. People pay much less attention to what they get for free.

The greater the perceived value, the more someone pays attention.

Try this little experiment: Go buy a cheap bottle of wine, and ask the sales clerk to put a really high price tag on the bottle. Then go take it over to someone's house. Don't say a word about the price. (They'll see the tag!)

And watch what they say about the wine.

I did this myself, at a party for medical doctors. It fooled them all.

Also, life is not about taking.

To get anything, something must be given up.

Life is about exchange. Sometimes money is involved, sometimes not.

I value myself. I'm honored when someone buys one of my books. They've demonstrated their trust. They've honored me.

Very, very few people have ever returned anything I sell on the internet. I'm proud of that fact. Because I know how much garbage is out there. Sometimes the garbage comes with a very high price.

I like to think I give a lot of value.

If you want a free book, you'd be much better off thinking, "What can I give?" rather than, "What can I take?"

Doors open when you truly give of yourself.

If you liked this post; if you got anything out of it; then please click on the BOOKMARK link below, which brings up a list of social bookmarking sites. Then add this article to your favorite site.

Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

self-esteem-secrets.com

forgive-yourself.com

create-reality.com

reduce-fear.com

healing-emotional-pain.com

release-emotions.com

How To Die Faster

2008-03-03T23:19:00.004-05:00

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(Or, how to end franticness. Your choice.)

Maybe you've heard of the new movement taking place. It's called the Slow Movement and it aims to help people reconnect with their basic needs.

The Slow Movement was born out of a protest against McDonalds opening a new restaurant at the Piazza di Spagna in Rome.

I guess to some people that was the last straw. Something had to be done to remind people the only thing a fast life does is put you into a grave quicker.

I've been as guilty as anyone of frantically racing through the day, so I understand the allure towards franticness.

And I know a wonderful technique to end franticness.

The basic problem with 'fast living' is that it takes you out of the present moment.

When you're not in the present moment, you're giving away your power and you're not being responsible. Which leads to all sorts of unpleasant results.

But hey, if you slow down, you'll get run over, right? Or everybody else will get ahead of you; pass you by. You'll be left behind if you don't hurry.

These were my unspoken, unrecognized assumptions about life.

Plus, you can't slow down. There's too much to do. Or so it seems.

I'd say the real issue is we have so many more options available to us. So many more distractions.

The real issue is - what are you going to choose to do with your time?

It's easy to fall into the trap of believing we have no choice; because circumstances determine what we can and cannot do.

When I believe an outside authority (or, usually, MANY outside authorities) determine MY life - I've already lost. Even time can be an 'outside authority'.

Must keep up must keep up must keep up...

Must hurry...

I don't have time...

We've all become slaves of time. The clock rules our lives. We're a victim of time.

And a victim of all the other outside authorities in our lives.

I think it's a great idea to slow down... IF it's done in the right way.

If you live a fast-paced life - and you all of a sudden slow it down - that will produce anxiety.

Besides, it's not a physical slowdown you're really after. What you're really after is peace of mind.

And peace of mind has nothing to do with physical activity.

You can physically rush through life and still have peace of mind. And being slow - by itself - does nothing whatsoever to help calm you down.

The physical world is just illusion, right?

It's a reflection of the 'more-real'. What's more real is your own resonance. You can hold a resonance of calmness no matter how busy and hurried your life appears.

First step: Get rid of the franticness.

Here's how:

Get alone for a few minutes.

Calm yourself as much as possible.

Take a few deep breaths.

Relax your body.

Count from 5 to 1, as a way to enter a slightly altered state of consciousness; a meditative state.

At the count of 1, find yourself in the middle of a rushing, raging river. Feel yourself - helpless against a swift, frantic, uncaring current of water. Hear a waterfall up ahead. Know that if you don't do something - fast! - you're going to plunge over the waterfall and into some catastrophe.

Feel the helpless franticness. Be consumed by it.

And then simply stand up!

And realize the water was only a few inches deep to begin with.

Now see the water rushing over your feet, which are firmly planted on the solid rock bottom of the river.

See what you thought was a waterfall - in reality - was only a rock in the middle of the river that the water was rushing past. There is no waterfall. You were never in any danger.

And the water is only a few inches deep!

Now walk over to the shore and sit and laugh at how silly you must have looked lying down in the middle of the river in six inches of water.

Now continue to sit and ponder about how you got so off-track, so off-balance, so off-center.

See your hectic, frantic life reflected in the raging shallow waters.

When you're ready, count from 5 to 1 to return to your life. With a new perspective and a renewed vigor.

If you liked this post; if you got anything out of it; then please click on the BOOKMARK link below, which brings up a list of social bookmarking sites. Then add this article to your favorite site.

Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

self-esteem-secrets.com

forgive-yourself.com

create-reality.com

reduce-fear.com

healing-emotional-pain.com

release-emotions.com

Reduce Your Fears Now

2008-03-02T19:55:00.006-05:00

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I wrote an ebook on How To Reduce Fear, Escape Anxiety and End Panic.

And in that ebook, I make the claim that you can cut your fears in half in the next 15 minutes.

Then, you can cut the remaining fears in half.

In other words, you keep whittling away at your fears. You don't end them in one fell swoop.

I explain exactly how to do it in the first few pages of the ebook.

And now, I want to give you that information for free.

I'm doing this for two reasons.

1. I have people writing me all the time - describing their fears, and asking for help.

In almost every single case, this free information is the first step they need to take.

The trap we fall into is thinking our fears are different; somehow, they're bigger, stronger, more powerful than other people's fears.

"My fears are special."

Which means, 'harder to end'.

Well, I think you'll be amazed how quickly and easily it is to reduce your fears.

Anyway, from now on, I can just refer people to this free info when they ask for help. It'll save me a lot of time.

2. I'm betting once you read and actually APPLY the information in the first few pages of the ebook, you'll want to go ahead and buy your own copy.

See, this is just the beginning of the ebook. You'll find TONS of more information - useful information - you can use today.

You'll understand fear on a much deeper level -

why it's necessary, why you need a little bit of it, why it's impossible to completely end it, what it takes to conquer fear, where fear comes from, and much more.

Panic, on the other hand, can be completely ended.

Fear has value. Panic does not.

I'll show you how to end panic for good.

And anxiety?

Anxiety is not the same as fear. They are separate emotions which need to be dealt with in different ways.

I often say, "Cleanly feel your emotions so you retrieve your power from them and they can release".

In some situations, that's quite difficult. Anxiety is one of those situations.

Anxiety takes specialized knowledge.

I provide that knowledge in the ebook.

So remember, the info you're about to read is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to fear, panic and anxiety.

You'll learn so much more in the ebook. But you can start here. It's free! Just click on the link below:

reduce-fear.com/intro.html

Or if you're ready to go all the way, click here.

If you liked this post; if you got anything out of it; then please click on the BOOKMARK link below, which brings up a list of social bookmarking sites. Then add this article to your favorite site.

Thank you!

all the best,

Mark

Mark Ivar Myhre
The Emotional Healing Wizard

FREE E-Book on Emotional Healing

self-esteem-secrets.com

forgive-yourself.com

create-reality.com

reduce-fear.com

healing-emotional-pain.com

release-emotions.com