Friday, December 9, 2011

I’m still a bare foot cobbler

What follows is an entry in my journal that after finishing it I realized was relevant to many of us that at dedicating to Well-Being and making the world a better place for Human Beings to live in.
Remember to make an difference; post a comment about how this topic shows up in your Life.
12-09-11 I’m still a bare foot cobbler: I’m still working at doing for my Self what I advocate for others. This seems an odd sort of thing; yet is only the nature of the way Life is. Our own work has to be done while we help others do theirs.
A point in case is a conversation I had with a client earlier this week. In reflection I can see that I still have a ways to go yet to be as skilled as I want to be; awake in the moment so I could see what I was holding on to that was getting in the way of me being more precise and relevant to her need. While I did plenty well enough, I just think there was opportunity for me to have been simpler and more direct; thus getting to where we going sooner, easier, more fun.
I think I could have been more effective in helping her deal with her personal conflict if I was better at doing what I was guiding her to do: leave her boss’ angst over there with him and let go of her attachment to seeing her self through what she thinks he thinks of her.
As I write this I am not sure that what got in my way was my attachment to what others think of me. While that certainly shows up and is part of my unfinished development, I don’t think it was the active issue. And yet, I sense strongly that my own unfinished work reduced my effectiveness with her.
The real issue seems to be more in the area of where I focus: I tend to forget to shift away from the purely cognitive and analytical approach to a more hands on, physical and experiential, way of guiding my clients to where they needing to get to. I think I needed to have her do some deep breathing and visualization to calm her mind and center her passion; then do the cognitive analysis of how to address the conflict with her boss. I went, as I often do, straight to the intellectual strategic approach while her mind was still too agitated to function all that well. This frustrated me and likely confused the process.
Being more mindful of this tendency is a key opportunity for me. I think I could be much more helpful with my clients, as I am when I remember this, if I am mindful of first things first: don’t try to engage the strategy while the emotional gears are still spinning; the process won’t go there. I need to remember to let go of my attachment to the intellectual approach so I can see the
High-Point Way
to work; to do what Love would do if it was not so confused.
Here it is; my version of the letting go that I was advising my client to do. For me it was, and still is, let go of my attachment to the security of the intellectual approach to engaging Life’s turbulence. I am still learning to be comfortable with the vulnerability of direct experience with others; with being mutually present with them without the protection of intellectual concepts, abstracts, words, etc, between us. For me to use direct experiencing, such as guiding my client to experience their experience of breathing and directing their emotional experience with imagery, is quite intimate and thus makes me feel vulnerable. This causes me, at time, to forget to use the non-intellectual techniques that would work better.
I can see that I have a lot of protection around the intimacy of being mutually present with other people; not just with my clients, but with people in general. Thinking about it right here makes me feel very exposed. Perhaps more so than what is actually true. I don’t think I am actually exposed as much as it feels to me. Is there an illusion of risk here that isn’t real? I kind of think so. I need to explore the Truth of all this to find out what the real risk is. From there I believe I will know how to be more effective with my clients and have more rewarding relationships with others in general, my wife in particular.
This seems to nail it for me; it feels like I have found what I was looking for when I set down to make this entry. That being insight on how my feeling vulnerable plays out not only in the mastery of my work, but having more fulfilling relationship with people in general.
Once again journaling has done its job of bring me to clarity.

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Well-Being Agents: Calling all Well-Being Agents to Purpose

Hey everybody:
Is there anyone out there?

What do we need to do to have you folks join in the discussion? Remember, we can’t not make a difference; so all that’s left is to make the difference we really want to make.

Make a difference here; share your thoughts about how we can make the promotion of “Well-Being” an interesting conversation.

Have a fun and fulfilling day, Elder-Dude.
http://www.highpointconsulting.net/

Friday, February 23, 2007

Calling all Well-Being Agents to Purpose

Here's a note in a bottle cast to sea. The message is about Well Being as one's purpose for being as in Life Purpose. Should anyone find this please join in by posting a comment.
My plan is to create a space in which people can come together in support of each other in the propagation of Well Being. People I call Well-Being Agents. So I guess this is a call to Well-Being Agents all over the world to join with me in supporting each other by creating a Blog site that propagates Well Being.
If you have found this invitation please comment with your thoughts and feelings about my project. Even if you don't join me as a Well-Being Agent this is still an opportunity for you to make a difference by just sharing your thoughts.
Have a fun and rewarding day, Arlin.