People frequently ask me; “Why did you get involved in this work?”
In one sense, it was a direction I was moving in all my life. I have always felt a deep connection to “God;” perhaps not the white bearded one I learned about in church, but to a higher source of creativity, compassion, and energy.
I read about religions, spiritual thinkers, and inspirational leaders all my life. In college I pretty much inhaled everything I could get my hands on about religion, philosophy, and spirituality. I had the great privilege of studying with several inspiring teachers, among them the world renowned theologian Huston Smith.
I’ve always been a writer and my early writing work in broadcasting, advertising, and marketing wasn’t about “selling” for me. It was about communicating; touching people deeply, uniquely, creatively. Politics and government was also about that for me; touching people’s lives in meaningful and helpful ways.
So, it was a natural next step for me to grow from political leadership to spiritual leadership. ln Neale Donald Walsch’s Friendship with God, from the Conversations with God book series, Neale quotes God as saying, “your political viewpoint is your spirituality demonstrated.”
My political viewpoint long before it became recognized was “How can we set aside counterproductive, bi-partisan politics, restore people’s faith in their government, and create an empowering partnership with them?” These were the seeds of ideas now becoming increasingly necessary in American politics today.
The next logical step for me was, “How can I assist people to experience, expand, and enjoy their lives more fully? How can I help them evolve?”
I know I speak for more than just myself when I say people want more. But the ways in which we have sought more often hasn’t proven beneficial, fulfilling, or truly sustainable. It’s not because we are weak or broken, bad or unintelligent. In the simplest of terms…it is because we have lost our balance.
We have lost the balance between our physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual aspects. We have become victims without hope or warriors without compassion. We have made our minds our God. And, we often relegate our physical bodies to either compulsive control, or abject neglect.
Our emotional bodies have been anesthetized into submission by addictions to everything from substances, sex, running, and money to yoga, technology, gurus, and relationships. Courtesy of the internet we can either pursue these “needs” to excess or numb ourselves completely. Or, we simply ascribe all our discomfort and pain to those pesky emotions and we pop antidepressants and other drugs without really searching to see what lies beneath the need for them.
On the one hand, we want to “not feel” so much that more than 1 in 10 American are now using antidepressants. That number has increased 100% in the last few years.
On the other hand, we wonder why we need a little blue pill, a couple of drinks, or internet porn to experience physical, emotional, and sexual connection and fulfillment.
We’ve stopped genuinely experiencing…our selves, our lives, and one another. We've lost our ability to truly connect - intimately - with our self and with others.
one touch (poem)
People want meaning, fulfillment, and enjoyment in their lives. And while the internet, smart phones, texting, and tweeting have their value, our technology is out of balance with our need for authentic connection, intimacy, physical touch, conversation, community, exercise, and nature itself.
It is simple physics. We are physical beings in a physical body - in a physical reality - and we need the balance of the physical world to be healthy, fulfilled, expanding, evolving human beings.
We need connections; not needy, enabling, co-dependent connections. But rather, we need to create a balance of our minds, bodies, emotions, and spirits if we want to experience joy and explore all this life has to offer us. And now more than ever, we need this balance to navigate the rapidly changing and increasingly challenging world around us.
We have come to believe that because we have information, we “know.” True knowing is a function of what we have experienced – within our physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual aspects – not what we merely know intellectually or what science can prove empirically. Why?
Quite simply, as human beings we are composed of energy; we are energy. We are physical beings in a physical body, in a physical world. Therefore our experiences in the physical world - not just our intellect - are the gateway to our evolution as human beings. They are our critical connections...to our shared humanity.
We have however, accumulated many layers that impede our enjoyment, expansion, and evolution. We have many beliefs and emotions - thoughts and illusions - that keep us from balance; that keep us from becoming more of who we are; that keep us from truly enjoying our lives.
On the one hand, we don’t want to feel our hurt, anger, discomfort, anxiety, or fear. On the other hand, we truly want to feel passion, peace, tenderness, and fulfillment. You cannot have one set of experiences without the other. It’s a package deal!
I possess the experience and expertise to assist you to unwrap that package and discover what is truly within you. I can assist you to find your most real and profound self. I can support you to detach from, resolve, and heal what limits you.
But please be clear, I am not your leader. I am not a guru. In fact, I find the term repugnant. Gurus are about power, manipulation, and control rather than enlightenment, empowerment, and enjoyment.
People often ask me, "What is the difference between a guide and a guru?"
A guide asks you, "Where would you like to go? " And, "How can I assist you?"
The guru says only,"follow me."
I am a guide and a mentor. This simply means I have scouted out the path ahead and I have a breadth and depth of experience and expertise to assist you to undertake your own journey; to become more of who you are; to become more of yourself.
And also, if you so choose, to fulfill your service to humanity.
This work is not about narcissism, but it is about learning to love yourself well. Why? Quite simply because when you love you well, you have plenty of you to share. That serves you, your goals, your God, and humanity.
So, in answer to the initial question, “Why did you get involved in this work?”
This work is my “spirituality demonstrated.”
This work is my expression of Self.
This work is my service to the world.
I like to say, “What I do for me, I do for humanity.”
This too, is true for you.
