Posts Tagged accountability
TftD: Changing your Character, Changes your Life
Posted by Doctapaul in Astrology, Coaching, Healing, Leadership, Life's Changes, Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Quirky Ideas, Relationships, Self Development, Selling, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Tip for the Day, Training & Development on April 5, 2013
Image courtesy of Blaze Institute
…All that happens is the result of character; the only manner in which the destiny can be changed is to change the character…..
the chart of birth….is merely a map of character…..
(and) can be markedly altered in any direction desired.
CC Zain
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Quick Guide: How Top Salespeople Sell, Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
What Does It Take to Coach a Top Executive or Performer?
Posted by Doctapaul in Business, Coaching, Leadership, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Self Development, Selling, Tip for the Day, Training & Development on April 5, 2013
Any form of business improvement, be it personal or strategic, is a journey, 2 parts emotional to one part intellectual.
I was a guest of Kevin Price, on the Price of Business radio talk-in show on Thursday, 28 March 2013.
What does it take to increase the effectiveness of someone who’s already the best (or at least very experienced) at what they do?
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Quick Guide: How Top Salespeople Sell, Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
Follow @paulburr
Quick Guide: How Top Salespeople Sell
Posted by Doctapaul in book, Business, Leadership, Marketing, Self Development, Selling, Training & Development on March 30, 2013
Ebooklet – Quick Guide: How Top-performing Salespeople Sell – for new or seasoned sales professionals, managers and CEOs. You can now download this first in a forthcoming series of business articles from Smashwords.
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
Follow @paulburr
TftD: Truth Goes Hand in Hand with Trust but Ultimately Surpasses It
Posted by Doctapaul in Coaching, Healing, Leadership, Life's Changes, Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Relationships, Self Development, Selling, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Tip for the Day on March 26, 2013
Honesty
Being honest often requires courage. And courage is about letting go of fear and trusting yourself.
Trust is the gap between what you know to be true and what you have faith in.
And truth drives out falsity.
Have faith in, and be true to, yourself (“above all else” as the Bard once said.)
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
Follow @paulburr
Beowulf: Warrior, Magician & Therapist
Posted by Doctapaul in Healing, Myths, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Poetry, Self Development, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Tip for the Day, Visions and Dreams on March 23, 2013
Written some 1500 years ago, by an anonymous bard, Beowulf tells the story of a gallant hero who travels north to Denmark to slay the swamp beast, Grendel.
(Image: first page of Beowulf manuscript)
Grendel would visit the local King Hrothgar’s castle and set about killing all whom it encountered, carrying severed limbs and bodies back to its lair at the bottom of a deep dark lake.
Beowulf slays Grendel. That night there is much merriment and feasting, Beowulf and his men retire to a far part of the castle. A second creature enters the hall where many still celebrate. The creature, Grendel’s mother, the source of the problem, wreaks her revenge. Like Grendel, she retires to her lair and Beowulf sets off after her.
The presenting problem is never the real problem. The real problem lies behind all the presenting problems. When the real problem disappears, so do all of its presenting problems.
Beowulf approaches the edge of the lake. Below him in the deep dark abyss lies the beast in her lair. Before he descends there is great temptation to withhold and draw back but with courage – afforded by the finest sword, shield and armour – Beowulf steps forward and descends into the darkness, his darkness. Below, he and the beast engage in battle. He finds the magnificent sword, shield and armour – that protect him so well on the surface – serve no use in the darkness. Beowulf casts them off. He reveals his unprotected self, his complete vulnerability. Beowulf and the beast become one in combat and as they wrestle, Beowulf finds a luminous sword of light that hangs on the wall of the lair – a sword with which he slays the beast.
As Beowulf rises to the surface to reveal the beast’s head, he finds that the luminous sword dissolves. The luminous sword that worked in the darkness has no power in the known world. It leaves Beowulf unable to demonstrate its power. For others to understand the sword’s power, they must descend into darkness and find it for themselves. They must experience their own victory. They must choose courage.
We cannot stare at the sun in a noon-day cloudless sky.
Light cannot be seen in the light.
At midnight, the cloudless sky reveals infinity.
By clouds, I mean ‘clouds of emotion’ – shame, anger, sadness and fear.
Glory comes from our journey into the darkness.
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
Follow @paulburr
Shame, Not-self-love, Is the First Step toward Mind Control
Posted by Doctapaul in Healing, Life's Changes, Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Relationships, Self Development, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Tip for the Day, Training & Development on March 21, 2013
As a child I was taught to (do things that) please God and fear the Devil. By the age of 12, I allowed a cleric’s sermon to make me feel ashamed for all the ‘wrong’ things I did, thought and felt – like most young folk do, think and feel as they reach puberty. Much later I realised that guilt or shame is half of the ‘carrot and stick’ deal that parents, governments and some religions use to ‘control’ children, the populace and followers respectively.
Illustration by Andrea Kurucz
When you allow someone else to make you feel not good about yourself, you accede to their first step in mind control. Their intent is that you do their bidding, not your own.
To avoid mind control, you need to understand the nature of your own shame; you need to venture into your own ‘underworld’ to find the sources of that shame. Especially those things your parents did that made you feel ashamed as a child and perhaps hid away deep within you unknowingly.
You may not know consciously all the sources of shame you possess and may need some form of ‘plutonic’ awakening to unearth them. Shame is a gap between how you perceive you are and how you’d like to be. In my life I’ve been ashamed of being overweight, of hurting people but the deepest and most profound shame (that I’ve only recently discovered) was that I was not worthy of my parents’ love. And if I was not worthy of their love, I was not worthy of self-love. And if I was not worthy of self-love then I was worthy to love someone else – because I can’t give what I don’t possess. My shame stultified my capacity to love and be loved in return.
When you do something out of shame you may allay feeling that shame, but you never rid yourself of it. You can’t atone shame – but you can release it. You release shame by practicing self-forgiveness.
I’ve shared how my understanding of forgiveness has evolved in two previous blogs (Replace Forgiveness with Accountability and Client:-”I Can’t Forgive Myself.” – “You Don’t Need To.”).
In a nutshell:
Self-forgiveness is not about one part of you saying to another, “Even though you did wrongly I forgive you”. It’s about releasing all judgement.
Shame is a form of not-self-love that lives in your head, rent free. Self-forgiveness is allowing that not-self-love to leave completely.
When not-self-love leaves, all that remains is self-love; what’s in your head aligns with the love you hold in your heart.
You become love wholly.
You shine!
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
Follow @paulburr
May ‘La Force’ Be With You
Posted by Doctapaul in Business, Coaching, Healing, Leadership, Life's Changes, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Self Development, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Tarot, Tip for the Day, Training & Development on March 19, 2013
Willpower + Commitment + Self Trust = Faith in Yourself
Slightly revised extract from Defrag your Soul
Hu-man did not invent the wheel, the steam engine, the aeroplane or the nuclear bomb without the capacity to imagine each invention in the first place – along with willpower, commitment and trust in its own ability to create such inventions. The same holds true for the future you seek for yourself.
To invoke such ‘magic’ you need to perceive your ‘image-in-ions’ as highly desirable and have faith in yourself. You may find you need that faith in yourself for many other reasons:
The road can be long and hard.
I found thousands of ways how not to make a light bulb.
I only needed one way to make it work.
(Paraphrased from) Thomas Edison
You can meet many setbacks and stumbling blocks. Being a Leo, I’ve found affairs of the heart to be the biggest area of learning. The area, more than anywhere else, where in the past I have disowned facets about myself. Such setbacks and heartaches required a vast amount of patience with myself as well.
You may be ridiculed, ignored and isolated.
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
Revolutionaries: Albert Einstein, Mahatma Gandhi, Oscar Wilde and Pink Floyd were all ridiculed either by their peers or the media before the world accepted the beauty and wisdom of their works.
When truth attempts to usurp not-truth, those protectors of not-truth in power often do all they can to suppress it; without bringing it or the truth tellers to the public’s attention.
Although I am a typical loner in my daily life, my awareness of belonging to the invisible community of those who strive for truth, beauty and justice has prevented me from feelings of isolation.
Albert Einstein
In my early years when I first got into spirituality, I was prone to be outwardly enthusiastic about my journey within. Most of the people around me were not into ‘it’ at all.
When, for instance at a wine party, I started spouting off about “shining light into my inner darkness”, I would get different types of response. The minority would show interest but the silent majority would remain quiet and walk away to join another group who talked about ‘normal’ things. Some who objected strongly to what I was saying would let me know of their views in no uncertain terms. Others would ridicule me face to face or behind my back. It is often easier to ridicule something than to face it; especially when that something invokes fear in you.
There’s a paradox too. If I’m attracting ridicule, is it because I fear it? Probably yes. In the meantime, I do my best to avoid responding to ridicule with ridicule or any other animalistic response. Sometimes I fail.
You may choose to isolate or distance yourself.
I go to the occasional reunion where others see changes in me. I no longer take much interest in ‘normal’ day-to-day small talk, like who is going to win ‘the current Saturday night TV contest’ or get thrown out of some ‘reality’ show. Many of my interests have changed and, perhaps more significantly, my perspective has changed.
For example, I feel distanced when people complain about being the victims of an economic recession that we have collectively created. At the same time, I ask myself, “Why have I attracted this conversation? I wonder where I am not being accountable for what I receive in life; whom or what am I blaming?”
I do not consider myself superior in any way and do my best not to come across as an evangelist. It’s that I’ve moved on. If people ask my opinion about the latest TV game show, I probably don’t have one. If we’re discussing global events, I speak my views.
I prefer to distance myself from day-to-day chatter or ‘complaining about the system’ – both of which I might have engaged in once upon a time.
I still ‘rabbit on’ a lot about two of my passions though: football and music (probably more than I do about spirituality J) and, undoubtedly, I distance a few people from myself in the process as well.
You may be opposed violently.
When all other attempts at their suppression fail, truth tellers face their sternest test; to stand firm and risk physical harm from those who stand to fall by truth. I could cite religious, political and civil-rights leaders, pacifists and innocent people – all whom have been attacked, beaten and some murdered ignominiously to prevent truth from being revealed to, or sustained in, the world.
What others do not do to you, you may do to yourself.
Without willpower, you limit the depth of your learning; you only go so far and you only get so much in return. When you commit yourself 100% to a project, that’s what you can receive in return, 100%. On the other hand, if you commit less than 100%, you get at best what you put into it and sometimes you get nothing. Ask any seasoned salesperson.
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Act as if you make a difference. Act as if you count. Act as if and you will…
Notice the focus is on your journey, more than the outcome.
From Warrior to Magician
By Paul C Burr
Toward the flower in full bloom,
Full Truth in the noonday sun.
Devoid of ego, it casts no shadow.
With no nooks and crannies to hold darkness,
All it can now do is give of itself.
Unafraid of being cut down (crucified) by those, in power, who fear Truth.
The Warrior stands bereft of armour, sword and shield,
Secure in what they know is Truth.
No words of explanation required.
No fear to control or manage.
The darkness embraced.
The fear dissolved.
Armed with only Truth and compassion,
The Warrior thus becomes the Magician.
This is the way of the Tarot.
This is the true definition of White Magic.
Tis called redemption.
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
Follow @paulburr
TftD: Coincidence, Synchronicity, Clairvoyance and Magic
Posted by Doctapaul in Fun and Laughs, Personal, Self Development, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Tip for the Day, Visions and Dreams on March 16, 2013
Happen to the world rather than have the world happen to you.
Keep a log of your life’s little (and big ) coincidences. Reflect on the mindset you hold that invokes these coincidences.
Image from The Police
Two days ago I was watching my favourite football team Newcastle United play Anzi. It was 0-0 with about a minute of normal time to go. I turned to the guy next to me and said, “It would be great if Cissé scored in the 2nd minute of extra time again” (as he’d done in Newcastle’s previous game, last Sunday against Stoke). Lo and behold, you know or can guess what happened next.
The same evening I was at a meeting where we discussed the ‘kill-all-bacteria’ panacea that hospitals deploy these days, rather than simply use hot soapy water and keep things clean. (Personally I’d rather learn to live with bacteria rather than encourage the mutation of the super-bugs we find in hospitals these days – but that’s another blog.)
Subsequently, the next morning, I was deep in thought about the Black Death plague that swept throughout Britain in 1348. (This was a time when people would deposit their chamberpots out of the bedroom window???) Ten minutes later I switched on the TV news to see that a mass grave full of Black Death victims had been unearthed during digging work on a new railway system in London.
I’ve experienced ‘coincidences’ regularly like these in recent years. So I’ve decided to keep a log of my (Law of Reversibility?) experiences and will keep you posted on what I learn. Please share with me what you learn should you choose to do this exercise.
It’s no coincidence that you’re reading this!
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
Follow @paulburr
Tip for the Day: Truth in a Relationship
Posted by Doctapaul in Business, Coaching, Healing, Leadership, Life's Changes, Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Relationships, Self Development, Selling, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Tip for the Day on March 15, 2013
Truth drives out falsity, the mother of lack-of-trust. When trust, the bedrock of a relationship, crumbles you have nothing to build on.
Image sourced from Jeff Beck
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
Follow @paulburr
Self-Coaching Tool about Relationships.
Posted by Doctapaul in Business, Coaching, Leadership, Marketing, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Relationships, Self Development, Selling, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Tip for the Day, Training & Development on March 14, 2013
Rather than seeing success as a specific outcome, change your focus to seeing it as a network of ’10 out of 10′ relationships. When everyone who can stop you achieving success is onside – there is no one and nothing to stop you.
Image sourced from Think Holistic, Act Personal
You cannot achieve success without forging equally successful relationships – starting with the relationship you have with yourself.
Think of a business or personal situation that’s important to you right now.
Who are all the people (include yourself) who can stop you from being successful (i.e. they have the power of veto)?
Give your relationship with each person a score out of 10, where 10 means ‘the relationship with this person is exactly where we both want it to be’.
To get the relationship to a 10, what does each person on the list want from you?
Are you willing to give it? (And what might you want in return?)
If so when?
Go give.
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul
Follow @paulburr
The Psychic Vampire, Unseen in the Mirror
Posted by Doctapaul in Healing, Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Relationships, Self Development on February 20, 2013
They suck you in. You[1] don’t feel their fangs puncture your neck. One minute you are drawn to the creature’s alluring charm. The next, you are smitten by their mesmerising power that deceives and lulls you into submission. You allow them under your skin and your life-force starts to bleed out of you.
What was the attraction to someone so beautiful, in dire need of your help? Was it ‘noblesse-oblige?’ What reward did you seek for your chivalry and kindness? Did you hope that you would receive a thank you in the form of love – be it physical, emotional or spiritual? If not, did you seek the dependency of another to satisfy your own false-ego? Either way, you belong to them for now.
You feel an urge to rescue the creature from all its woes. You pay each ‘bill’ they send your way – in the form of time, money, physical and emotional energy. You submit to the creature’s will. You allow yourself to become psychically enslaved. You, the ‘rescuer’, become their ‘victim’. They, ‘the victim’ become your ‘persecutor’. The deeper you allow their ‘bite’; the greater the duress, intensity, frequency and duration of the energy that flows out from your life-force.
You chastise and remonstrate with them your frustrations but you still hold back – for fear of losing them completely. They tell you how wrong and misguided you are – but not for too long. They feign a weakening of spirit. They reveal their inner hurt to you and place themselves at your mercy. Duped, you feel worse for their suffering than you do your own – and so they ensnare you again. You give all your power to them once more and they take it, only more voraciously than ever.
They may not even be wholly aware of the powers they have over you and others like you. It’s as if they can’t help themselves. They possess an insatiable desire for all that you (and others) have to give and more. Yet they show no signs of giving you that one thing you want most from them, love. They show no willingness or capability to love you, the way you want them to love you.
For they can only love someone (or something) that they can’t have. They are doubly bound by not-love – as by now are you. Loveless, they feed on the life-energy of those like you so that they don’t face their biggest and most misguided fear… the fear of love itself.
They choose not the courage to love and be loved. They can only conjure an illusion of love-liness. Love, to them, is a game of smoke and mirrors. Unresolved issues from their childhood cast too dark a shadow in which for them to venture to find love. And so they live in a half light, capable of hypnotic power but incapable of love – not there, right now, with you.
And still you persist with the vision of light that you see inside the creature; wishing, hoping, or perhaps convinced, that they will share it with you one day. But no inner-beacon shines your way. You sicken and tire. You live from minute to minute in servility. You give when you have no more to give and still the blood-letting of your life energy continues until…
You sicken and tire of being sickened and tired by your addiction to this illusory hero/ine. The day comes when you bid “begone!” and hold nothing back. The creature leaves knowing that you truly have nothing more to give.
You both suffer. The habit is not broken yet – ‘cold-turkey has got you (both) on the run[2]’. Given the chance, the vampire returns to test your mettle. They try to ensnare you again but this time it’s different, you’re different. They realise that all you can share with them is your truth – the truth of your feelings (regardless of the correctness/incorrectness of your perceptions). And truth drives out all falsity, including theirs. You thus bid a farewell that is ‘final and definite’ – and so the task of grieving really starts.
Day by day, week by week, month by month, the hurt lessens; the clouds of anger, sadness, shame and fear dissipate. Slowly but steadily, you regain your power. You seek to learn from the devastation you allowed to be inflicted upon you. As you reflect in the ‘mirror that was you’, you begin to realise (real-eyes) the nature of a now-familiar dark energy within yourself.
You account for how it was you who attracted the creature. You recognise a like-for-like, psychic and vampiric part of their nature within yourself. You appreciate more fully the depth and nature of the pain you have caused, or been capable of causing, others.
You see more clearly the definition of love, innately incorrect, given to you by your parents. You bring to the surface unresolved issues with your parents that you’ve carried all your life. And now you can bid farewell to these issues from your past.
Now you have the chance to resolve the unresolved. Today you ‘throw those curtains wide’ and allow the light (the same light that you saw hidden inside the creature) of the sun within you to shine throughout your whole body and radiate beyond. Through willpower, patience and courage you release the psychic vampire inside. Once gone, it never needs to return.
You graduate from the Wisdom School to the Love School – and that’s another story.
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Follow @paulburr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul.
A Common Business Issue: Lack of Accountability Is a Symptom. The Problem is Fear
Posted by Doctapaul in Business, Coaching, Healing, Leadership, Life's Changes, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Relationships, Self Development, Selling, Training & Development on February 19, 2013
When we are over-performing, the stage of success is filled with major players and acolytes; all accountable for their right to stand in the blazing footlights. On the other hand, when we underperform; the stage is often deserted apart from the chosen few, caught in the beam of a single spotlight, being asked to account for themselves.
The idea of measuring people to improve ‘accountability’ is also a hierarchical myth. Over-performers apart, it results in form filling to meet the ‘numbers’ and dodge the truth if needed – be it in the private (e.g. sales forecasting) or public (e.g. centralization of schools/hospitals statistics) sectors. A corporate board member of the world’s largest IT company referred this phenomenon to me as “…‘management’s perfumed pig’. What we need instead is truth!”
You, I, we, tick the boxes with answers so that hopefully, in management’s eyes, we aren’t singled out from the crowd. So where is the truth found?
Image courtesy of the Nikki Thomas Network
The journey starts by a commitment to treat successes and setbacks, as opportunities to learn what to repeat and avoid, with equanimity. Secondly, we answer fundamental questions about our behaviour and its effect:
- What is it we do that aids/abets and what is the effect of this ‘helpful’ behaviour?
- What is it we do that inhibits/hinders and what is the effect of this ‘unhelpful’ behaviour?
- In the latter case, what could we do differently and what effect might that have?
- Overall, what do we do/don’t do; knowingly/unknowingly that creates or somehow contributes to the successes and setbacks of ourselves and others?
- And even if we were wise to all the answers to the above questions, do we choose the courage to act upon ‘the wisdom from failure’?
Lack of accountability is only the symptom. The problem is fear.
People are fearful of being perceived as failing or incompetent (by themselves as much as others). People thus fear being accountable.
If management were to have only one task, it’s not about measuring, it’s about releasing the fear in their organization and filling the subsequent void created with wisdom and courage.
An organization releases its fear and gets wise one person at a time, each of their own volition.
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Follow @paulburr
Taking Spir(itu)al Steps
Posted by Doctapaul in book, Healing, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Self Development, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Tarot on February 16, 2013
“When you achieve mastery at one level, you become a blithering idiot at the next level up, at the same time.”
Dr Thomas Maughan, Chief Druid, The Druid Order, London, 1964-76
Read more….. in Kindred Spirit magazine
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Follow @paulburr
Author of Learn to Love and Be Loved in Return, 2012: a twist in the tail and Defrag your Soul.
If you want a successful relationship you need to feel good about yourself.
Posted by Doctapaul in Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Relationships on February 4, 2013
The seed of a strong relationship, its foundation, must grow into a solid root(ed in truth). Otherwise, we create an unsustainable imbalance. The relationship will eventually topple or die on the vine because it lacks equilibrium.
Lack of equilibrium between two people, develops when:
- One partner destabilises the other by bringing them down (and keeping them there).
- The ‘stronger’ reinforces this and reminds the ‘weaker’ partner of the consequences of their actions
- The ‘stronger’ provides the ‘weaker’ with the solution to their ills. But this is the ‘stronger’ partner’s will and bidding, not the ‘weaker’ partner.
Like a seed, a relationship starts its life very much in the dark. We know not of what lies ahead – nor appreciate what it (the seed of the relationship) can become. After the flush of ecstasy during the first few days/weeks/months together, something unexpected happens. One or both partners find themselves getting upset.
People, who get upset easily, will not succeed in the onerous setbacks that most relationships (or challenging journeys) bring from time to time. The more upset we get, the more we do not feel good about ourselves and the more we often hide about ourselves.
We may bottle our feelings up at first. We keep quiet. We fear that we will upset (or not be seen as good enough by) our partner. Eventually, when we reach exasperation point, we can boil over and let our negative emotions fly. It’s not love that lets fly, it’s fear.
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As real as it feels, fear is illusory. And illusion is only dispelled by truth. For a relationship to fulfill its potential wholly, it must pass through the stage in its development called ‘truth’, in which there are no hidden agendas. Feelings and intentions are shared openly and honestly.
We observe a spiral effect. As fear is dispelled, (and as) more truth is revealed, more fear is dispelled, and so on. Counter-wise, fear serves to hide the truth, which when hidden creates more fear, and so on. (Such a fear-based relationship thus cannot get past the hidden agendas that hold it back.)
We choose with every decision we make, which way the relationship travels the spiral, up or down, truth or fear, oneness or separateness, love or power (control).
Real love is borne inside out. We need to feel good about ourselves from the inside, and not solely because someone else (i.e. our partner) makes us feel good about ourselves. We thus free ourselves to stand in our truth without any shield behind which to hide our fears. It can appear that we are making ourselves defenceless. But truth drives out falsity. Our defencelessness is thus our strength, to share a relationship rooted in truth.
Shine on…!
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Paul C Burr
Follow @paulburr
You Will Walk Alone, One Day
Posted by Doctapaul in Healing, Life's Changes, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Relationships, Self Development on January 18, 2013
At some stage you isolate or distance yourself from others.
I have been accused recently of becoming too isolated. The accusations were well meant because my accusers missed my regular company.
Photograph copyright tinavandenbongardt
Just last week I read some words of Lord Buddha which, in modern day speak, went along the lines of….
Hermits/ascetics do not isolate themselves from the world outside in order to pay penance. They do so to become happier. External things, that at one time they used to enjoy, no longer stimulate or fulfill their desires. They thus seek happiness within.
I’m no ascetic. I enjoy my creature comforts. I love eating out in posh restaurants, staying in 5-star hotels and travelling first class. But maybe I have become a hermit in certain ways.
I go to the occasional reunion where others see a superficial change in me. These days my hair is long as is my wispy goatee, unlike the corporate clean cut image I used to portray years ago. My appearance often places me ‘outside the flock’. Conversations have, on occasion, become slightly stilted.
I no longer take much interest in ‘normal’ day-to-day small talk, like who is going to win ‘the current Saturday night TV contest’ or get thrown out of some ‘reality’ show. Many of my interests have changed and perhaps more significantly, my perspective has changed.
For example, I feel distanced when people complain about being the victims of an economic recession that we have collectively created. At the same time, I ask myself, “Why have I attracted this conversation? I wonder where I am not being accountable for what I receive in life; whom or what am I blaming?”
I do not consider myself superior in any way and do my best not to come across as an evangelist. It’s that I’ve moved on. If people ask my opinion about the latest TV game show, I probably don’t have one. If we’re discussing global events, I speak my views.
I prefer to distance myself from day-to-day chatter or ‘complaining about the system’ – both of which I might have engaged in once upon a time.
I still ‘rabbit on’ a lot about two of my passions though: football and music (probably more than I do about humankind’s return to oneness) and, undoubtedly, I distance a few people from myself in the process as well. Furthermore, I don’t yet attract that many people who want to talk about things ethereal. And I’m ok with that, for now.
Eventually, at some stage in our journey within, we come to a cross roads. We discern the habits, people and situations that no longer serve to make us happy.
If we don’t discern, we become bored. If we don’t switch out those habits, we become irritated. We can become ‘not-fun-to-be-around-anymore’. We get annoyed at ourselves for taking the well trodden road that’s no longer fun for ourselves to be on. We go back to the crossroads where we give ourselves the option to take a different route, a road ‘less travelled’.
There are people at the crossroads who offer us drinks, holidays, nights out on the town, parties and the like. There are others: advisors, suitors, groups, authority figures…. all trying to ‘sell’ a system, a solution or a ‘way to do it’. Both camps offer you a way to avoid hard (emotional) work and pain. They promise you a path, a ‘golden road’. They will want to be with you, every step of the yellow-brick way, success or failure, for a fee.
You may be offered maps, charts even a lighthouse that points the way. But the onward and inward journey must be trodden alone. No-one can bestow intelligence on you. Every question you have is already within you. You just need the external world to reflect it back to you.
Those people at the crossroads, and I include me, have not travelled your journey. Because that’s what it is; it’s your journey and no-one else’s. Your journey will require that you demonstrate similar characteristics to those teachers/pioneers who have gone before you. It will require courage, patience, self trust, curiosity and many other enabling inner qualities BUT the journey itself is yours to take alone. Even the crossroads you stand at is your crossroads – no-one else has ever stood precisely at the same point in time, space and dimension – as where you stand now. And so…
There comes a point when you put aside: the advice of experts, the norms of acceptable behaviour, the protection of staying inside the flock, the expectations of those nearest and dearest to you…………. and you realise that no-one can teach you truth, you can only know it by experiencing it for yourself.
You allow the feeling of good to become your guide. You listen to the voice that speaks between thoughts – that you, perhaps, have been drowning out but has never gone away. You trust and act upon your intuition, the words of spirit.
Shine on…!
/|\
Paul C Burr
Follow @paulburr
Health = Mind and Body at Ease. Not-Health = Dis-ease (extract from Defrag your Soul).
Posted by Doctapaul in Healing, Personal, Self Development on January 16, 2013
Let me start by announcing:
- I have no medical qualifications whatsoever.
- Before you make any decision about your health, you should seek advice from an appropriately qualified health practitioner.
My interest in the mind-body connection to physical well-being really took off in 2006 when attending an Introduction to Meta-Medicine® course facilitated by Susanne Billander[1]. I submitted myself to and delivered (under supervision) basic therapy sessions. I found out first hand that there was something to the relationship between mind, body and the environment we live in.
Photo from The University of the West of England site.
Thousands of client case studies of the ‘mind-body connection’ causes of ill health have been researched. The links between significant emotional events (singular points in time triggered by a traumatic or near-traumatic experience) and the diseases that can ensue as a result are well established. The International Meta-Medicine Association®[2] (IMMA) now offers training and certification as an Integrative Health Consultant in mind-body healing. Integrative Medicine is still not regarded seriously by many of the mainstream scientific, medical authorities, healthcare and pharmaceutical industries. Interest is growing though, thanks to people like Rob Van Overbruggen (author of The Healing Psyche), Susanne Billander (author of The Secret of Cancer and Other Diseases), Dawson Church (author of The Genie in your Genes), and Bruce Lipton (author of The Biology of Belief).
Professor João Magueijo[3] writes how science has an “argumentative tradition” and “has no shortage of very clever people who love to show off”. In fairness, Professor Magueijo extols how such an environment has merits. It increases the rigour and diligence by which new science sets out to prove its worth. But… (and this is a deliberate but)
There exists a conflict of interest, especially a financial interest, between Allopathic (conventional) and Integrative (alternative) Medicine. One cannot help but suspect that ‘very clever people’ (scientists, marketers and politicians) are using their talent to defend against, if not attack, Integrative Medicine – and corner the supply of herbal remedies to the public in the UK. In the name of ‘science’, they seek to protect and expand the financial and illusionary sacrosanct ‘turf’ of multi-billion dollar industries in pharmacy and healthcare.
Meta-Medicine®, in my mind, is now a well grounded science.
The nub of the scientific research reveals that all disease is linked to significant emotional events in our lives. The onset of every disease is preceded by an unexpected, unwanted, deeply upsetting event.
Put another way, the ontology of this research implies that all disease (= dis-ease) begins in the mind – which means: to heal we first need to put our minds at ease, i.e. we must change our interpretation of the significant emotional event that we attracted before the onset of our disease.
In practise we are often unwilling to talk about significant emotional events or the symptoms of the disease.
- The event may be so traumatic that we refuse to acknowledge it. We literally blot it out from our conscious thinking or, at very least, we refuse to talk about it.
- We may feel shame about the event. It weakens or destroys a self image that we dearly wish to hold on to, and project on to others.
- We may feel shame about the ‘weakness’ we would reveal by talking openly about our malady. We feel embarrassed. We don’t wish to be seen as a second class citizen.
- We may fear the consequences of being told that we have a serious health condition. We fear possible ‘future fear’. We fear a possibility that we don’t want to happen. We ignore early symptoms. We stick our head in the sand, metaphorically speaking, and hope the symptoms go away.
- We may even lack the self worth needed to call out for help. We may feel we don’t deserve others’ attention. We don’t want those that we love and care about to worry about us. We place their emotional wellbeing before our own.
- We may be in a Machiavellian environment (for example, in corporate business or politics) where problems translate into weakness. Where there lurk many, envious of our power, who will seize the opportunity to brings us down, and hopefully gain our power.
If there is one piece of wisdom to counteract all the above, it’s this:
Love and care for yourself wholly so that you can love and care for others wholly too. You cannot give to others that which you do not give to yourself first.
(Continued in Defrag your Soul)
/|\
Paul C Burr
Follow @paulburr
[1] Susanne Billander, META-Medicine® Master Trainer, META-Health Coach, Master Practitioner of NLP, Time Based Technique, Vortex Healing®, Soulrealignment® ref: http://www.metamedicine.se/
[3] Faster than the Speed of Light, by João Magueijo, cosmologist and professor in Theoretical Physics at Imperial College London. He is a pioneer of the varying speed of light (VSL) theory.
Temperance
Posted by Doctapaul in Healing, Life's Changes, Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Self Development, Soundbytes of Wisdom on December 19, 2012
…does not mean ‘do without or prohibit’.
It means balance.
Temperance: Major Arcana card no 14, from the Ancient Tarot Deck of Marseilles by Jean Dodal, 1718.
Remove balance in life and you limit your perspective. The workaholic might not give themselves the time to enjoy a healthy personal life. The addict can’t see outside the control of their habit. The drunkard inebriates themselves from sobriety. In all three cases, the protagonist lives their life in denial.
Should you avoid temperance, not only do you limit your learning, you can do yourself harm – physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. As such, you harm the environment you live in and those nearest and dearest to you. Lack of temperance, by definition, means an excess of, or gluttony for, one thing over another. Be it work, alcohol, drugs, mindless TV or computer games – the excess means that you deny yourself health, which has consequences.
Have you ever watched downhill tobogganing on TV? The more often a sleigh hits the wall, the more it slows down through friction. And when it bounces off sideways the team are using their energy laterally to get back on track. Whilst it’s traversing it has to travel farther than a direct descent down the middle of the run. The middle way is the fastest and smoothest.
Study the Temperance card, from the 18th Century, Ancient Tarot Deck of Marseilles, by Jean Dodal. You observe a grounded female angel clad evenly in red (fire, hot, male) and blue (water, cool, female). Her arms are dressed in red, to signify strength and power of Mars. Her blue covered torso signifies the love and beauty of Venus. Water from the higher cup flows into and cleanses that of the lower. Not a drop is spilt or wasted; the flow is steady and harmonious. Her wings reveal she is an angel who may advise, guide and protect us. Her work embraces the harmony of opposites.
The Angel of Temperance teaches us that life’s direction leads eventually to the middle path. We do not need to swing extremely and continually between feast and famine, peace and war, love and hate, mercy and severity, prosperity and poverty, abundance and scarcity, riches and debt, victory and defeat, mine and yours, property and theft. When we embrace both aspects of duality as one, we create oneness. Something is only good for one, when it is good for all. There is no us and them, there is no me without not me. There is only us, together we become oneness.
When we bring temperance into our lives, we exemplify oneness.
(extract from my forthcoming book, from Defrag your Soul, due out next week.)
Shine on…!
/|\
Paul C Burr
Follow @paulburr
2012 – The Return to Oneness
Posted by Doctapaul in Astrology, Current Affairs & The Economy, Healing, Life's Changes, Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Poetry, Quirky Ideas, Relationships, Self Development, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Visions and Dreams on December 1, 2012
The Return
“Enough! I’ve had enough of winning and losing.
I can only exert a limited amount of power.
I can only spend a limited amount of money.
I can only create so much suffering before I kill off those over whom I am victorious.
I can only suffer so much when I lose.
I have exhausted all the possibilities of winning and losing in the material world.
I now choose temperance.
I return to the harmony of opposites, the yin and yang, the will and imagination, to return to oneness.”
Defrag your Soul: audio recording of talk about parts of the this forthcoming book, due for publication Summer 2012
Posted by Doctapaul in book, Healing, Life's Changes, Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Self Development, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Training & Development, Visions and Dreams on May 14, 2012
Click here: DEFRAG YOUR SOUL
Transform your Consciousness:
a practical guide for the beginner and seasoned traveller within…
Illustration by Andrea Kurucz, selected as part of a gallery of drawings for Defrag your Soul.
Extended extract from a talk I gave to the National Federation of Spiritual Healers, on Saturday 12 May 2012, in central London. The talk contains some topics from my book, Defrag your Soul, due for publication in Summer of 2012.
Parts of the talk include:
- Beyond NLP
- What is your purpose in life?
- Duality
- How do you take spiritual steps on your journey within? How do you know you’ve taken them?
- The Etheric Body aka The Vital Body
- The links between the Etheric Body and Health
- The path to magic
Shine on…!
/|\
Paul C Burr
Follow @paulburr
Your Inner Child Has a Message…..
Posted by Doctapaul in book, Healing, Life's Changes, Love, Personal, Pitfalls I've Fallen Into, Poetry, Relationships, Self Development, Soundbytes of Wisdom, Visions and Dreams on April 11, 2012
By listening carefully to the voice of your inner child, you develop your intuition. You tune into its messages. Call it “intunition.” At the same time, you become aware of the feeling when you veer away from the child’s advice. You detune. You cease to trust yourself.
Self trust is the “engine oil” to give and receive the very best, to and from the world around you. Not-self trust means you give and receive second best at best. You undervalue yourself and your immense power.
Extract from my forthcoming book, 2012: A Twist in the Tale, that I intend to serialise on its own blogsite. Watch this space.
Image sourced from Abused Empowered Survive Thrive
Shine on…!
/|\
Paul C Burr
Follow @paulburr
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