Taoist Story In today’s podcast we use a classic story from Taoism to illustrate the content from the previous 3 podcasts. They say a picture is worth a 1000 words, so I use this story picture in hopes it will help my listeners feel more ease and comfort with shifting their own physiology Fear of the tigers Tigers of the past and fears of the future can make us miserable and take all of our focus away from the goodness and safety of our daily life. Focusing on the tigers causes us to live in chr...
May 23, 2019•11 min•Ep. 37
FLIP THE COIN To pick up where we left off in the last podcast, ‘what must we do to get out of threat/stress physiology?’ Here are some tools that tune our bodies back into the other side of the “coin,” out of threat physiology, back to calm sense of safety. The podcast will share four tools today. Just for fun and for ease of memorizing, they will all begin with an S. TOOLS THAT WORK The 4 tools are; Slow down, Silence, Shift focus and Self-Awareness. Listen to the podcast to learn how these si...
Apr 17, 2019•19 min•Ep. 36
Does life sometimes feel too heavy and overwhelming? Can you relate to the feeling that there is just so much going on you are about to combust with stress? Have you been there, recently? Threat Physiology In today’s podcast we talk about Stress and Threat physiology, a somatic state our bodies go into outside of our conscious awareness and choice. Another words, our bodies go to a scary place and we don’t have any say in the matter. Coin only has 2 sides The metaphor of a coin helps explain thi...
Mar 18, 2019•11 min•Ep. 35
THE "FELT SENSE PRAYER" I am flying solo in today’s podcast as my interviewer and dear Friend Giovana is out of town sailing in the Caribbean! I bet her felt sense is more enjoyable than mine right now. What is the Felt Sense? Today’s podcast is about the Felt Sense, a term coined by Eugene Gendlin years ago when studying successful therapy outcomes. He found certain clients were able to connect to and speak from a non-conceptual, bodily felt experience of the issues that troubled them. These cl...
Mar 08, 2019•6 min•Ep. 34
Sand of my heart Yesterday at the beach, I saw imprinted in the sand many different bird tracks. Just by looking at the unique shape of each track, I could tell what species of bird left them behind. This visual stimulated some thoughts about how things other than birds can leave tracks in the “sand” of my life. Even “intangibles" like Love and Anxiety, or especially these two. Tracks of love When I am deeply loved by another human, it leaves a tangible imprint on my heart and in my life. It hel...
Jan 22, 2019•8 min•Ep. 33
Do you LOVE yourself? Last podcast we talked about feeling gratitude for our humanness. Being grateful that we are not perfect, but messy and beautiful all at once. Today’s podcast ups the ante! We suggest taking a BIG step forward from just plain gratitude into Self Love. Today we talk about loving ourselves! Do you confuse self-love with selfishness? For some of you this is a big duh and not an issue at all. But I know there are plenty of you out there that may find this suggestion too challen...
Jan 15, 2019•13 min•Ep. 32
GRATITUDE FOR OUR HUMANNESS Are you grateful to be a human being? That may sound like an odd question since it seems to be our only option. But what I am really referring to is gratitude for our human messiness and imperfections. Some of us would perhaps prefer to be a perfect, limitless, robot. Someone who is always efficient, effective and never makes an error. STORIES HELP US CHANGE I am reading Barbara Brown Taylor's book "Leaving Church: A memoir of faith." It is a great book about being hu...
Jan 05, 2019•10 min•Ep. 31
Christmas is a time for happiness and joy, or is it? It should be but sometimes we are not joyful, we are not even content with our lives, much less this holiday season. Contentment vs. mindfulness There is much talks bout mindfulness but very little about contentment. Are we a contented culture? I would say not so much. One of the definitions of Contentment is ease of mind. I think we all could use a bit more ease of mind. Blocks to Contentment What blocks us from contentment? Some people fear ...
Dec 22, 2018•11 min•Ep. 30
Poetry What is the first thought you have when you hear the word poetry? What do you think about poetry? Do you read it, write it, enjoy it? What does it do? Some people think poetry is so "last century", while others deeply appreciate it. My perspective is that Poetry is a gift and a wonderful means to connect our awareness to deep and powerful emotional experiences. Sometimes a poem allows you to really feel the depth of your feelings in a way that help you make sense of them. Not an intellect...
Dec 10, 2018•15 min•Ep. 29
Today's podcast is an example of how the principles we have been sharing, stress management, anxiety reduction and listening to your body, actually work in the real world. Gio and I have been podcasting about these and other subjects for a while now and last month brave Gio overcame her fears and got certified to scuba dive and went on 10 dives in the Caymans. She is claustrophobic, and had panic attacks at the thought of being trapped somewhere, including underwater. But by connecting with her ...
Nov 29, 2018•10 min•Ep. 28
In Today’s podcast we will talk about the values of community vs individualism. Which is better, to focus our energy on the collective (we) like the Japanese culture? Or, to focus on the individual (me) like our US popular culture seems to suggest? Balance is key As with anything, balance is important in this equation. I know people, and I was one of them, who focus so much on the We, there is no room for the Me. No room for self-care or self-identity. Just an almost obsessive focus upon other p...
Sep 25, 2018•12 min•Ep. 27
What are sensations in our body and why are they important? That is the topic of today’s podcast. And, the answer is simple, our body sensations are the physiological shifts that underly our emotions. Listening to sensations as they occur will help us better deal with our emotions, especially the ones we deem unpleasant. Sensation Language To help get you better listen to your body’s message, think about sensation as a language to re-learn. As children we spoke the language of sensation so well....
Sep 25, 2018•12 min•Ep. 26
Today we finally drop Part 2 of this podcast. We continue our exploration of the human body with respect to Feelings/Sensations and Emotions. Living Embodied To really be able to feel our emotions and deal healthily with the challenges in our lives, we need to experience embodied living. That is, to live and be present in our minds and whole bodies while experiencing each situation in our daily lives. Watch a child really live in his or her body and not in the head like grownups tend to do. Chil...
Sep 21, 2018•16 min•Ep. 25
Feeling is an aspect of humanness Today is part 1 of To feel or not to feel, and we will talk about the body’s language, sensation and why it matters for your life. In my title, I am borrowing a bit from the famous old Bard here. But to feel or not to feel is almost as important of a question as to be or not to be. Feelings, sensations, and emotions are an embedded and embodied aspect of our humanness and an outcome of living in a body. So not feeling at all is not an option. But to smother thos...
Aug 28, 2018•10 min•Ep. 24
Multi-tasking, not all it’s cracked up to be In Today’s podcast we debunk the myth that Multi-tasking makes people automatically more effective and efficient. When we do more than one thing at a time, our focus is necessarily diluted and often diverted away from what is most important. One is sometimes better than Two. I am suggesting today that staying present and mindful whether you are engaging in tasks, chores, or interactions with other humans, is a superior way to live. Living this way wil...
Aug 01, 2018•10 min•Ep. 23
Pacing vs. Racing Do you remember the fable, “the Tortoise and the Hare”? What does that have to do with our lives? Quite a bit actually. Are you chronically racing about in your daily life or do you have a specific pace that works well for you and helps you feel happy and productive? Many of us race through our lives, I call it “waterskiing on the surface of my life”, something I used to do on a regular basis. Moving that quickly helped me feel productive and successful. It also nicely kept me ...
Jul 26, 2018•14 min•Ep. 22
Perfectionism Today’s podcast is about the evils of perfectionism! Ok maybe trying to be perfect is not evil but when I used to struggle with this habit it made me perfectly miserable about 100% of the time. Perfectionism causes us to miss the good in our lives, focus on what we didn’t do perfectly which is almost everything because, news flash, NO ONE is perfect. Setting an impossible standard to meet sets us up for failure, and feeling terrible about ourselves. It also often blocks us from ris...
Jul 25, 2018•12 min•Ep. 21
Do you remember the old See Saw’s or Tetter Totter’s from childhood playground days? Well if you are under 35 you may not even know what they are. They used to be a fixture on school playgrounds. Today’s podcast uses the analogy of a See Saw in relationship to the states of Love and Anxiety. Love and Anxiety are likened to riding a See Saw. We are either in one state or the other. Moving from Love to Anxiety and VV. But we also talk about how these states can work together or against each other....
Jun 29, 2018•15 min•Ep. 20
Today’s podcast is about the States of Fixity and Flow. Fixity and Flow in life and in our bodies, and how they engage in life. These states are highly correlated with feelings and sensations of Love and Anxiety. This podcast will explore these states as well as define the meaings of the terms fixity and flow. Body States/ANS Many of us are familiar with the term flow in relation to creativity. But I will be using these terms in relation to the states of our body. Specifically, the way our physi...
Jun 28, 2018•15 min•Ep. 19
What is the nature of the Universe? Einstein said, “The most important question a person can ask is, Is the Universe a Friendly place?” Using the material from our last podcast, we will talk about how Love, Anxiety, and Spirituality interact. How does the early treatment you receive from your primary caretakers impact your view of the world? Spirituality For the podcast today I define Spirituality as a sense of engaging with something/someone larger than ourselves, and something that gives life ...
Jun 12, 2018•15 min•Ep. 18
Attachment Theory How do our first experiences of nurture and family encounters shape the way we view Love as adults? How do we understand relationships and our place within them? Attachment theory, around since the 1940’s brings us answers to these questions. Love templates The human mind learns in templates. We cannot remember every experience or every object we encounter. So our brain makes a template when we are young to help us put events and objects in proper categories. This includes the ...
Jun 06, 2018•15 min•Ep. 17
How does your facial expression impact feelings of love or anxiety? What is Flat Affect and how does it impact your relationships? We will answer these questions in today’s podcast. When we feel an emotion, it is normal to show that emotion on our face. And, showing that emotion allows those around us to intuit via Mirror Neurons our mood. As well as how we feel about them. This emotional exchange deepens relationships and increases our intimacy. The face has many muscles and it is suggested the...
Jun 01, 2018•13 min•Ep. 16
Today in our podcast we will continue sharing how Love and Anxiety can war for dominance in our body and brain. One day I came across a family walking at the beach and overheard the 2 younger boys frantically whispering about Stranger Danger. This made me curious about how we determine whether a new person, a stranger, is safe or dangerous? How do we know if they will become a wonderful addition to our life> Or, if they are scary and dangerous and should be avoided? Once again we need to unde...
May 30, 2018•13 min•Ep. 15
So how do Love & Anxiety counteract each other? What allows love to win over anxiety? It helps to understand the way the Brain works to answer that question. So today we will talk more about Paul D. MacLean’s model of the Triune brain. By explaining what the differing parts of the brain do, I will show how they interrelate in ways that can cause Love and Anxiety to wrestle for domination in our lives. The brain of course has many more than 3 parts but these are the main 3 areas that are most...
May 22, 2018•11 min•Ep. 14
How do you live your life? Open and trusting, expecting good and doing good? Or, do you live tight and braced in your bodies muscles, tense, scared and closed off to anything new? Or anything you are unsure of and don’t want to try. Life can be stressful and frightening. The News only seems to focus on dangerous situations, criminal activity, and the selfish crazy antics of politicians. And, we are bombarded with news and negativity every where we turn. It pops up on our devices and social media...
May 17, 2018•18 min•Ep. 13
One of the challenges of our fast paced busy lives is that we have so much stress we have trouble calming and settling down. When we move too quickly our bodies go into stress mode and too much adrenaline and cortisol are released into our nervous systems. (I.e. think of a car with the gas pedal all the way to the floor.) The racing mind is one of the consequences of this situation. When the mind races it is very hard to settle back down. There are two main ways to calm down our minds and bodies...
Feb 19, 2018•17 min•Ep. 12
What you you think about conflict? Do you feel it is important for a healthy relationship? Do you think of it as a necessary evil, or do you avoid it like the plague? Conflict is a normal part of the human existence and fearing conflict just adds an unneeded amount of stress to our minds and bodies. Unless the person you plan to have conflict with is a sociopath or a raging manic, conflict should not be that difficult or frightening. Whenever 2 people want different things there will be conflict...
Jan 25, 2018•13 min•Ep. 11
No, I am not reciting a portion of the alphabet but sharing a CBT helpful exercise from a famous 20th century psychologist. Today’s podcast is about the anxious, racing mind. And, about our tendency as humans to fret, obsess and worry. While I talked about worry in the last podcast, I did not share much about how to specifically deal with an obsessive thought loop. So today we talk about what to do to make the worry evaporate. ABCDE is an oldie but goodie exercise from Albert Ellis. He came up w...
Jan 25, 2018•13 min•Ep. 10
Many people struggle against worrying and being stuck in negative, fearful thoughts. This is a big problem, and a time-wasting habit. The bad habit of negative “future-izing” or worrying, can ruin our happiness and over the years, our physical health. As we continue our series on Love & Anxiety, I will share some simple brain anatomy. I will tell you about the Brain Stem, the Limbic system and the Cerebral Cortex. A lack of understanding of how these brain regions work allow us to stay stuck...
Jan 23, 2018•12 min•Ep. 9
Today we are continuing the new series; Love & Anxiety. Where we focus our attention is the second critical factor in how much anxiety we experience in our daily life. And, if love calms or causes anxiety. Many people struggle with looping negative thoughts or worrying. On a regular basis the mind is spinning out awful scenarios that usually are not even realistic. When we focus on scary thoughts, our primitive brain regions turn on stress hormones. These hormones cause internal sensations o...
Jan 19, 2018•15 min•Ep. 8
