relax and succeed

Adding depth to common quotes

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Death and Equanimity

If the little things in life are stressing us, what will our minds do with the big things? We need a better way to use our minds. #reality #thinking #emotions

This is Mom and Dad’s black and white wedding photo that was touched up by a professional painter, as was common at that time. Since our growth and success is only achieved through facing challenges, it is not helpful for any person to treat common human experiences as though they are ‘problems’ just because they are not pleasant. Those experiences are valuable learning opportunities when it…

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Resistant Thinking

What if, instead of trying to get healthier, we just let go of most of our troubles? #mindfulness #overthinking

I would like to thank my readers for your patience. I’m sure I don’t have to say much more than: I’m dealing with some dental pain while looking after two 96 year old parents with dementia. It’s actually going well for what it is. But it does add a lot of chaos to life and that plays havoc with my schedule. I appreciate your understanding. This is a group of us overcoming the resistance of…

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Measured Feelings

Human emotion can be a dangerous quagmire that prevents growth. However our feelings are generally quite clear, and they tend to incite joy, or growth-inducing experiences. #reality #feeling #emotion

Note: Following the one post relating to peace, this post now returns us to the next section of the book that was begun at the start of the year.  The previous section illustrated how we all innocently misinterpret reality. We use our personal narrative thinking to layer a lot of unnecessary suffering over our personal reality. That’s why it’s important that we understand the intended use of our…

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Promoting Peace

Humans are at their best when things are at their worst. #Ukraine #peace

Note: this post is not part of the book started at the beginning of the year. It is written in response to the extreme situation in Ukraine. No matter who we are, or where we are in the world, most of us are thinking heartfelt thoughts about those currently suffering in Ukraine. Violence is a crude, old-fashioned attempt to solve anything. Especially now, when we all live in a world where many…

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The Vase of Consciousness

I will present several revolutionary ideas as this book unfolds. This is the first. #reality #emotion #mentalhealth

Our families and cultures may shape our vase. But they do not determine what we put in it. The first revolutionary idea contained in this book is this one: Humans do not have separate ‘good’ and ‘bad’ emotions. We have a very helpful measurement system that has been misunderstood by the human ego.  Think of ‘emotions’ the way we think of ‘colour.’ In reality, white light contains all of the…

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Sense Before Thought

Humans understood how to use our feelings until we invented language and started over-thinking. #reality #thought #emotion

Our ego’s tend to perceive us as interacting with a fixed, external reality. This means that, rather than seeing reality itself, we tend to see our thoughts about reality. As a result, we then tend to see our emotions as being logical responses to that perceived reality: something ‘good’ happens to me and I am ‘happy;’ and something ‘bad’ happens to me and I am ‘sad.’ Using that outside-in idea…

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Mirages of Thought

How exactly does our mind create the sorts of emotional illusions that conceal reality from us? #reality #emotion #thought

As was discussed in the previous section, we need word-based thoughts in order to construct our emotions. And because humans lived a long time before the invention of language, we can appreciate that these emotions are not a part of our natural sense of reality. Discerning ‘emotions’ from ‘feelings’ is critical for understanding, and effectively working within, reality. But in order for us to…

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Emotional Thinking

Emotional thinking creates a kind of busy-ness in our minds. Many people consider their ‘emotions’ and their ‘feelings’ to be generally the same thing. In truth, our ‘feelings’ exist to guide us through reality, whereas our emotions are an accidental byproduct created by the illusion of thought. If an ‘optical illusion’ is what tricks our ‘sense of sight,’ then ‘emotions’ are the thought-based…

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The Illusion of Emotion versus The Reality of Feeling

Emotions and feelings. Two different words for two different states of being. Which one do you spend most of your time in? #reality #feelings #emotion

To bee, or not to bee, that is the question. A human’s biological life is all about staying alive. Every base feeling we have is built around that pursuit. And because we have no fangs, claws, or shells to secure our food or well-being with, our angle on evolution has been a big brain and our instinct to cooperate. We are more ‘zebra’ than ‘leopard.’ Evolutionarily speaking, animals with…

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A Congregation of Perspectives

Most people have never put serious thought into delving into the nature of reality. But what if doing so could lead to our salvation as individuals and as a societies?

These beautiful things are all defined as ‘weeds’ in many cities. Almost no one seriously considers the origins or nature of ‘reality.’ With rare exceptions, we accept the version of reality we are taught. If we had been at a wedding and someone asks us about it, they are asking about reality. And we would answer them in a sincere attempt to tell them about ‘the wedding.’ But what is our brain…

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The 'Gap of Consciousness'

As a child, I became aware of my own reality generation process by accidentally becoming aware of the gap in which reality 'happens.' #reality #consciousness #meditation

Reality is out always there waiting, if we choose to look for it. When I was five years old I suffered the sort of massive head injury that should have left me dead. Instead, my mind was literally and figuratively opened. My age and stage of brain development likely played some role, along with the accident itself. But I now know that the bulk of my realizations about reality flowed more out of…

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The Beginning

Many people feel things look very bad right now. But in truth, these issues actually represent a remarkable opportunity to revise our notions about what reality really is, and how it really works. #reality #mindfulness #consciousness #thought

There is a general sense that individuals, groups, society, and the environment are all struggling like never before. But what if this sense is misleading? And what if revisiting our notions about reality led us to find a much more valid model that, in an entirely new way, ‘dissolved’ many of our apparent issues? In short, what if things do need work, but that they’re much better than we think…

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A Renaissance for Mental Health and Human Relations

What if your own life experiences could prove to you that you had misunderstood reality? And what if almost all of your suffering was attached to that misunderstanding? Because that is what's happened. #reality #mentalhealth #consciousness

(Note: This post does not represent the official start of the book, but it does allow me to live up to some promises established last year, and to set a context for what will follow. I will try to keep future posts as short as possible to ensure each idea is easily digestible.) Even a noxious weed can be beautiful if seen in the right light. Amidst the parents, writers, researchers, teachers,…

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The Resolution Revolution

What if the Buddha was right about reality, and the problem isn't us? What if we have just innocently been living inside an illusion? Join us. Starting Monday, I will begin to uncover the illusion. #reality #resolutions

The problem isn’t you. It’s not your psychology, or your history. It’s not sociology or politics. All of our individual and group struggles are rooted in basic misunderstandings about how reality is formed. I realize that is a bold assertion, so I will commit to solidly proving that is true using irrefutable examples from your own life. In the end, I suspect you’ll have a harder time accepting…

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Walling Ourselves In

Our thoughts are reflected in the world we build around us. We should stay conscious of where our thinking is leading. If we're not careful, we might end up right where we're headed. #fear #security #connection

As cities grow, the relative crime rate generally goes down. It’s true that the total number of crimes for a named area could go up by 20%. But if the population grew by 50%, that would actually represent a relative drop in crime. What confuses people is that news agencies report major crime for an entire city. So, the 20% increase appears to readers, listeners, and viewers, as though the rate is…

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Feelings: The Great Equalizer

What if your life was potentially as great as the greatest life you knew of, but you just hadn't realized it? #confidence #mindfulness #mentalhealth

Our feelings have always evolved from our thoughts. The reason we don’t have to waste our time wanting to be other people is that they have the same collection of experiences that we do, theirs are just triggered by different narratives. For example, we might assume being in the Beatles was a really wild and fun gig. Beauty, talent, recognition, love, money. A person can appear to have it all.…

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Permission to Relax

It is a healthy thing to work hard. But it is also a healthy thing to know when we should rest without feeling guilty. #guilt #work #tired #vacation

Without something bizarre happening, (like my accident), there are no reasons for young people to aggressively pursue the source of their thoughts. Yet, by having done that, I’m aware of the fact that one of the biggest differences that sort of intensive study creates, is in how our minds understand and manage ‘language.’ When we’re awake to reality, words get sorted less by their universal…

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