This morning it was the coolest in a very long time.  This summer here at over 5000 feet next door to the Rocky Mountains has been the hottest in my memory.  It felt good to get on my bike and not get overheated.  Summer warmth is very comforting to me but baking at night is not much fun.  September is here however and that means Fall and cooler temperatures are not that far away. 

With Fall comes motivation to focus on new learning.  I have been in school or teaching for so many years that I get brain chemicals released that ups my interest in new learning.  Actual no chemical release takes place just an innate desire to grow and improve myself.  What I will explore and how I will grow has yet to become clear but I am confident opportunities will arise.

If I was to guess there are lesson waiting and some of these may be similar for yours:

• Patience - in this super speedy world, patience is a very positive quality and one I have nurtured for many years.  Yet I still see in my driving and in my social activism a need to be more patient.  Seems like the whole world could use a big dose of patience, doesn't it?
• Mindfulness - In my class last night I introduced the idea of becoming mindful of our thoughts and realize that all thoughts are just words we give meaning to and they should not run us but we run them.  Even though I am aware my thoughts are not reality, I still get caught up in the discomfort and emotions they stir up in me at times.  Mindfulness means I just watch what comes up with equanimity.  
• Peacefulness - One of my great passions is promoting peace, which I think begins inside of us and spreads out into our family, communities, countries and across the globe.  Sometimes I need to work on being more peaceful within and be more active in spreading peace wherever I can.  The current wars (actually all wars) seem so insane that I can't believe that we allow them to continue.  
• Hope - When President Obama came into office I felt much hope for positive change and now I see how much anger and fear is out there fighting change.  I now know I need a bigger dose of hope.  Hope for me comes from keeping my heart open and from focusing on what is going well.  I need to appreciate more of what is.
• Freedom - This is about having the time, the resources, and the opportunities to expand my expression of what is possible within me.  I feel time is too busy and resources too slim to have the freedom I want.  Freedom to me is starting each day with the time and means to be creative, be compassionate, be conscious enough to make a positive difference.
• Optimism - Maybe optimism is closely related to hope but in a way more about the view in which I interpret the world around me.  Optimism means I feel positive about myself and my interaction with others.  Some days my optimism is like a beacon that fills the room and other days it is a whisper pushing me step by step forward.
• Effectiveness - I want to do what I do even better.  I want to be a better therapist, a better supervisor, a better teacher, a better partner, a better social activist and a more awake and aware human being.  Effectiveness mean that who I am leaves the world a better place in ways that brings more light and happiness into the world.
• Compassion - The human heart’s capacity to love is infinite and too often very under realized.  I find there are moments when my heart is open and I love everyone and everything and that feels so alive.  Other times I know my heart is cautious and protected and that is mostly old stuff in me that needs to be kindly eliminated.  Compassion is the answer to most of the world’s problems
• Consciousness - This is the best secret ingredient for a better world.  Consciousness is humanity awakening fully to its potential to love, to create, to understand, and to expand into an even greater expression.  If all of us just woke up just 1% more each week then in 100 weeks the whole planet would be awakened.  That is my hope.  Would you join me?



Yesterday I wrote about not trusting the thoughts in our own mind and I stand by that as an essential way of living consciously.   The exceptions to this idea of not believing our own thoughts are: in moments of insight, when the light of awareness comes on, when intuition enlightens us, or when the heart guides us to a greater wisdom.  All these inspirational moments could be called thoughts but they are better described as knowing from our higher nature.  This knowing is not something we think about but something we know.  Yes we can intentionally have higher thinking if we know how to do that.

Let’s explore this higher knowing separate from ego-mind (which always thinks it knows but rarely does).  There is a part of us beyond our ordinary self.  That part existed before we were born into this life and will continue after we leave our bodies behind.  This infinite self comes equipped with a knowing beyond the limits of busy mind.

I have become acquainted this higher nature in myself over the years of inner practices like meditation, tai chi, yoga, mindfulness, study of these higher states, and variety of awareness provoking experiences.  These practices have opened me up to seeing and sensing beyond my normal perceptions. My openings have also come by way of my heart and a deepening relationship with my spirit.  These experiences are definitely about opening because my higher nature is only recognizable by expanding my awareness beyond ordinary thought. 

I want to share some hints for opening to your more expanded nature:

Breathing – there are numerous breathing practices that will alter your state of mind in expansive ways. 

Tuning In – within you is a deep knowing that can only be discovered by listening to the quiet wisdom inside.

Nature – being in nature naturally expands your perceptions and sensitivities to the world around you and within.

Slowing down – when you break the cycle of speeding through life you begin to relax and see the vastness of all of life around you.

Mind altering substances and practices – there is long history across cultures of using substances and practices to alter states of mind, find a guide if you want to go exploring here.

Beauty – viewing and experiencing beauty has a way of opening by moving you past the familiar into realms which invite you to live in wonder and awe of creation.

Love – think of being in love and how altered you feel.  Those “in love” states are natural and how love really is until your ordinary mind closes these feelings down.

There is much to explore here and I will be back with more to share.

There are so many examples of thoughts gone wrong in politics, religion, business, society, in families, and in our own minds that makes no sense at all.  We are often run by false beliefs and ideas and we don’t know that is the case.  Too often thoughts hold us back from creating the life we want or close our hearts down, or cause us to live in judgment of others and ourselves.  Thoughts are not worth ruining our lives over.

Let me give you some examples of thoughts that make a mess out of us and the world: 

• People who kill others in the name of God like the Crusades, like modern day extremists, like people who bomb clinics.  These are insane actions caused by disturbed thoughts and out of control minds. 
• In politics people make things up and spread fear regularly for their advantage and no one calls them on it, like Glenn Beck and all the others who shout with fervor their beliefs, which are just crazy thoughts.  These shouting heads actually believe their own thoughts and many of the people who listen to them believe their crazy thoughts and make them their own and none of them are real.
• My brother is an elected official for a county and they harass my Dad and his wife because my brother is a member of another political party than my Dad is.  These are crazy thinking people that consider it ok to harass another because his son thinks different than they do.  
• Families often pass faulty thinking down through generations.  They pass beliefs, values, fears and biases as if they are real onto the next generation.  These family thoughts are not real and many in the family actually never question these thoughts and live their lives according to this mistaken thinking that was passed on to them. 
• In corporations they talk how much they value their workers and yet fire employees to increase their profit margins, or mismanage the worker's retirement funds, or take away their health care benefits of loyal employees, or ship their jobs overseas, or deny claims and so many other products of thinking gone very wrong. These are minds stuck on greed and rationalizing heartless behavior and these people actually believe their own thoughts.  All damage to humanity and the planet has been caused by people who actually believe their own thoughts.

I could give you millions of examples of thoughts that are wrong, mistaken, incorrect, destructive and crazy and yet people believe them.  All our thoughts are not real, they are just words passing (often obsessively) through our minds.  These are just words we give meaning to, which are nothing more than a collection of words strung together and we have some kind of belief they are real.  Most thoughts are not real, they are never concrete or substantial, or something we can put our trust

If this isn't confusing then you are missing the point.  All thoughts are confusing in the regular ego mind. This mind is mostly chaos driven with hopes for the future and thoughts about the past.   Almost all of our thoughts are not even about what is going on in the now.   So please be aware and alert enough to know that all thoughts should be examined and then re-examined and then most often ignored.

There is however a greater knowing and that will be addressed soon here at the Explore Life. 



In these times when there are many who seem confused, angry, fearful and full of blame, I wondered how would you and I know if we are doing ok?  So I did some exploration and came up with 12 personal characteristics of healthy human beings:

1.         Self-exploring – healthy people understand that life is an endless exploration of who we are and how we fit into the world.  Self-exploration is about lifelong growth, expanding awareness and becoming more conscious, which continues until our last breath.

2.         Self-respecting and appreciating – if we have a respect for who we are than we are ahead of the game for a healthy life.  If we appreciate who we are and our uniqueness we allow ourselves great freedom for even further expression.

3.         Aware of values – if we know our values than we can live at peace with ourselves.  Our values are unique to us and when followed we feel uplifted by our daily living.  Values can change with time and higher consciousness.

4.           Open to change – if we are open to change than we have endless possibilities.  Change is a given in the life of a human being and to go with change in a receptive manner allows us to find joy in most experiences.

5.           Living life fully – living life with all the gusto we can means we have lived fully.  No one was put on this planet to hold back, to be less than we are capable of being.  Where can we live more fully is a great question to ponder today.

6.         Authentic, sincere, honest – these three seem to go together well if we are authentic we must be sincere in our expression and honest in our actions.  Authentic people are a pleasure to be around.  Honest people can be trusted and sincerity is always appreciated.

7.         Sense of humor – what a huge mess humanity would be in if there was no sense of humor.  Humor takes us out of our unnecessary seriousness and brings a lightness to the challenges we face.  Imagine real humor in politics and religion and the world would be a better place.

8.          Loving and compassionate – Our capacity to love, to care for, to have compassion for and to be kind towards other is limitless.  If there is one reason we are here in this life according to the great wisdom traditions of humanity, that reason is to love.

9.           Living in the present – there is no tomorrow or yesterday.  A person who is healthy knows that today is all we have and to live it with the force of intention that can only come from being fully present.  Now is where all the action is.

10.         Accepting of others – if we can put to rest the endless judging of our critical mind, we can free ourselves to enjoy the world and our life.  Accepting others allows them to be who they are when they are with us, which is very liberating to them and enriching to us.

11.         Sees life as meaningful – daily living gives us an opportunity to live with purpose.  A meaningful and passionate life comes from tuning into self and expressing our uniqueness and potential for the betterment of the world.

12.         Seeks fitness of mind, body, emotions and spirit – healthy people understand that self-care is about nurturing and growing our mind, caring for our body, respecting our emotions and exploring our spiritual nature.  Each aspect of a whole person’s well-being is to be cared for to insure a life of balance and harmony.

What of the 12 characteristics do you do well?  Which ones could use some further growth?  Imagine a world where most human beings nurtured these 12 qualities in themselves and each other.



The sun was setting and soon it would be too dark to continue but golf can be a hard thing to give up even if it is getting hard to see where the ball is going.  Golf is one of the ways I de-stress and sometimes I play until dark after work.  Last night, while playing with three others foolish enough to continue even though it was dark, I hit a ball into the cup I could not see from about 80-90 yards away.  The only reason we knew it went in was because one of the guys checked the hole hoping his had gone in.  Instead he found my ball.  I got handshakes from the three I was playing with who appreciated my luck with me.  Our disappointment was that we all had wished we had seen the ball go in.

Life can be like that sometimes.  We make amazing things happen, we get lucky, or surprise comes our way and we get to celebrate even if we don't know how it happened.  I wonder how many amazing things have happened in our lives that we didn't see, we took a shot in the dark and it had positive results.  In my work I have taken lots of shots in the dark with people and their minds hoping a question or idea might turn the light on or awaken some aspect that needed to be understood or realized. 

Sometimes I hear from people that something I had said, or an idea I had shared took hold inside and changed their lives.  These moments are one of the reasons I do my work, to help people make the changes they need to enrich their lives.   It is my great joy that I get to cross paths regularly with people I have helped.

What ideas have you planted in your own mind that have affected you profoundly.  If you are a parent you are a seed planted from the beginning of your child’s life.  If you teach you know you take make shots in the dark hoping they will set into your students way of seeing the world.  Your co-workers are also recipients of you ideas, your thoughts and your insights and they too can be positively inspired.

The point here is that you never know what ideas, what acts of kindness, what words of wisdom and hope you spread will have a profound affect on those you are around.  Maybe its best to assume that your connection to others on a deeper level is more than you might think or be aware of?  Making that assumption means your heart and your words are powerful tools to encourage the best in others and a better world for all.

Have a good weekend and may the conscious being that you are spread your light wherever you go.