AMERICA

Posted on September 30, 2023

America!! We have a great deal to heal and get done in the battle for the soul of the Nation. Our differences do not make us enemies; party of choice does not imply war against opponents; and we are not “Red States” and “Blue States.” Let us be open to infinite potential and possibilities and begin to unify our great country. Differences are a gift and appreciating differences and looking for similarities offers opportunity and challenge for peace-of-mind, happiness, growth, and evolution. Misery is optional! We are all Americans, and we can each choose to transcend and include others. A vision of our “mighty task” might look something like this:

VISION

Strategies

  • Evolve with solid core values and guiding principles.
  • Limited government for citizens.
  • Fiscal responsibility; economic stability and equity; and long-term financial security.
  • Public safety for all Americans, respect for law and order, and no one is above the law.
  • Top ten healthcare system and pandemic preparedness.
  • Programs, processes, and coalitions to dismantle systemic racism.
  • Controlled business ethical and moral issues.
  • Avoid war with strong military and space forces, global allies and networks, and dialogue.
  • Professional State Department and alliances coupled with reasoned foreign policy.
  • Helping others: churches, individuals, groups, institutions, and the government.
  • Judges: objective, uphold the Constitution and guiding principles, are ethical, and satisfy evolving cultural needs.
  • Marriage or children: citizen’s choices, current need, and level of culture’s evolution.
  • Respect for science.
  • Environmental awareness, control, and self-restraint.
  • Strength in diversity and sane immigration laws and regulations.
  • Respect for democracy and decentralized culture with empowered citizens.

Core Values and Guiding Principles

The Constitution is sacredly obligatory upon all. Our core values are truth to power, honesty, integrity, hope, love, and morality; and we put quality in all we are and all we do. We do not lie, cheat, or steal, nor tolerate those amongst us who do; and we respect law and order. We are committed to “walk the talk,” to action, and to the concept of 100% responsibility, life happens because of me and not to me. We are objective, not self-serving, and make decisions in the best interests of The United States of America.

Leaders: have a track record of success and are trusted; have a history of compassion, loving-kindness, and building coalitions; understand that great leaders have been good followers and that leadership is an influence relationship that energizes earned power and willingness to achieve mutually defined goals; are master of the self, mindfulness, awareness, and integral life practice and model the way as persons, in relationships, socially, institutionally, and by helping others; have high standards with respect to morals, ethics, guiding principles, and core values that are plainly manifested in candidate’s personality, character, mentality, and magnetism; have learned self-restraint and 100% responsibility; are visibly committed to health, wellness, and well-being personally and for all Americans; are well-qualified, listen, inspire hope, have faith, are empathetic, and who know where the country is and what it needs; will be surrounded by exceptionally well-qualified associates; will diligently work to create and maintain a compelling worldview vision and action strategies and plans for the country; and will lead the development of policies and programs to evolve this country for all Americans.

Policies and Programs

  • Leadership, management, and control of pandemics through the Centers for Disease Control, coupled with state public health entities and active support and interface with the World Health Organization.
  • Voting integrity with a viable and well led United States Postal Service.
  • Affordable healthcare and viable public health outreach (integral physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health, wellness, and well-being) coupled with honored per-existing conditions, decreasing drug prices, and necessary integral psychological health processes, including resolution of opioid addiction. Top ten measurable dimensions: history, coverage, financing, payment, delivery of care, prescription drug regulation, human resources, and future challenges. Considerations: consumer friendliness, choices for providers, innovation, generosity of coverage, and equality of care.
  • An economy for working, middle-class families that is teeming with jobs, union solidarity, small businesses, agriculture programs and processes, essential childcare, corporate sanity, sound trade relationships, and social security system.
  • A globally envied education system: facilities, teachers, curriculum, and schools of choice.
  • Racial and social justice, diversity, and anti-racism policies and programs that evolve dismantling the conscious and unconscious pillars of racism in the country: prison reform; human dignity and respect, all colors, all genders, all religions-integral spirituality. Civil rights are a must.
  • Communities are safe and teeming with peaceful activities, including protests; citizens and police are mutually respected, masters of the Self, and model the way as persons, in relationships, socially, institutionally, and by helping others. Violence on streets is not tolerated and is dealt with sanely.
  • Leading-edge military and space force, visits to military deployment areas, exceptional veteran and veteran spouse-family-children benefits, outreach, integral psychological health, and combat veteran re-entry-transition program.
  • Global climate change and environment
  • Intelligence and technology
  • National security and foreign policy with inspired State Department and allies: underwater, space, and military; and coalition building facilitated by trust, respect, and mutual goals.
  • An infrastructure re-building program: maintenance, re-building, and evolution.
  • Sensible gun laws.
  • Immigration reform and sanity.
  • Programs for the empowerment, advancement, and placement of women.
  • Abortion legislation recognizes women’s rights to choose.
  • Tax equity and sanity; and long-term care and financial security programs for seniors.
  • Freedom of religion and spiritual path.
  • Media are objective, tell the truth, and are respected.

That is a bunch of stuff to get done!! Let us unify; and transcend and include others. We are the United States and a beacon for the globe. “O beautiful for spacious skies…”

Posted on September 23, 2023

As the 2024 Presidential election unfolds; and as we witness the dark divide becoming wider, deeper, nastier, and darker, contrasting potential candidates for President is interesting. It appears the critical decision is to vote for the candidate who has a quality profile, i.e., 1) is objective and not self-serving and decides based on what is in the best interests of America; 2) is committed to common good, compassion, virtue, and integrity; and 3) can best transcend and include others and consciously evolve a sane American culture.

How one chooses to “show-up” in the world can be critiqued by researching, examining, and witnessing talents, skills, and experiences; making observations; and scrutinizing character, personality, mentality, and interests. Let us take-a-look at Former President Donald J. Trump.

Talents, Skills, and Experiences

A narcissistic drama-seeker who covers a fragile ego with a bullying impulse and has taken democracy to the brink. (Maggie Haberman, Confidence Man, 506) Life’s goal has been to gain and maintain position power, at any cost. Witness a track record of business and government failures, investigations and numerous lawsuits and absolute chaotic disasters: most consequential president in history; puppet of Vladimir Putin; foreign policy bullying, badgering, and destroying; abandoned allies; personal business endeavors with several bankruptcies; North Korean nuclear weapons stockpile doubled; pandemic management and leadership was non-existent, dereliction of duty, passed buck off to governors who became blame targets; enlisted foreign interference in elections (Russia and China); several obstruction of justice charges; impeachment proceedings; insurrection; multiple legal cases lost and pending; accepts payoffs for positions; and has numerous Trump party cronies who are lost souls in search of a tribe and chief. No decisions are made based on strategic plans, strategies, goals, and objectives; makes decisions on how he feels at the time; can handle small projects and sign executive orders; not able to lead projects large in scope; selection of judges, environmental deregulations and deconstruction of institutions may be legacy; and immigration policy is inhumane. Is a master at using neuroses [The dark side of the psyche: denied, repressed, disowned and projected subconscious aspects of the Self.] to create stories (“fake news”) that strategically move the “lightning rod” from the Trump Party to others in order to trigger the psyche of perceived “enemies” and his base. Others become the personification of the wrongs and inexcusable of the Trump Party: Russian interference, Ukraine, racism, nativism, gloating, tax cuts for the rich, Supreme Court justices, bullying, outrages, fake news, etc., etc.  As Bernie Sanders has eloquently noted, “Nero fiddled while Rome burned. Trump golfs.” Accepting responsibility for anything is not his cup of tea. Blaming others is his ballgame. Just take him Diet Coke and wash his dirty laundry.

  • Track record of complicating the story narrative, throwing sand in the eyes of the onlooker, claiming that transparently implausible stories were true unless proven otherwise, and denying the obvious truth.

Observations

Donald J. Trump is a genius at networking and using the media to recruit, retain, and fire, at will, addicted surrogates, circles of friends, admirers, celebrity hangers-on, and wannabes who savor and long for safety and security sought by bonding together and identifying with a tribe in order to persevere and protect against outsiders. Allegiance and admiration are given to the chief and clan. Mystical signs, conspiracy, and desires of powerful spirit beings must be followed for the continued safety and well-being of the tribe. Years of behaviors reveal the following:

  • Does not understand duty, honor, and country.
  • A cheat, a liar, a fraud, a bully, a predator, a con man.
  • Racist, incendiary, toxic, casts hate, disruptive, name caller, and divisive, unfit for political office.
  • Repeatedly has disparaged the intelligence of service members: Americans who die in war are “losers” and “suckers.”
  • Deny, deny, deny; accuse, accuse, and accuse. The magic formula: D cubed—disease, disaster, division; and he continues to escape responsibility and being held accountable for anything by anybody.
  • Tax cuts were a corporate “boondoggle.”
  • Vision for country is merely to fix what his administration undermined, agitated, deconstructed, or destroyed during his time in office. Examples: intelligence, FBI, CIA, U.S. Postal Service, voting integrity, Supreme Court, and CDC.
  • Stokes fear, celebrity, and brand building; and show-photo opportunity is the foundation for his rhetoric. Is a stand-up comic.
  • Staff selection of addicted surrogates has been a disaster and revolving door; and demands loyalty even if unethical, yes sir, no sir, no excuse sir; or you are fired.
  • Surrounded by fixers and “yes men;” encourages rivalries and thrives on personal attacks.
  • Protected by political party sorted, partisan, power worldview associates of the Federal government institution he and his cronies choose to deconstruct and destroy.
  • Conspiracist (example QAnon) and guilty of political cowardice, blaming, passing the buck, and dereliction of duty; shirked constitutionally mandated duty and rewards misconduct.
  • Sexist and multiple lawsuits and misconduct behaviors.
  • Racist: a person who shows or feels discrimination or prejudice against people of other races, or who believes that a particular race is superior to another.
  • Dishonest, arrogant, and narcissist; uses position and financial power for personal gain.
  • Creates martyr complex, irrelevance, and distractions; misleads, boasts and is egotistical, promotes blamelessness of self, never wrong, and anxious to criticize.
  • People mistakes and poor interpersonal relations skills.
  • Lies, denies, blames, and spins; egotistical and self-serving; unqualified for the position.

Having been President and playing golf reveal the real person: you cannot hide. Read Commander-in-Cheat.

Character, Personality, Mentality, and Interests.

Low-functioning includes persons who “… do not exhibit polished and polite behaviors as a mask for their manipulations…may lack the education or interpersonal skills to control and deceive. Instead they might use threats, coercion, or intimidation to achieve their desired outcome.” (Source: Dr. Timothy J. Legg, “What Is a High-Functioning Sociopath?”, 5-28-2019, https://www.healthline.com, 1-3.)

  • Narcissistic sociopath: one form of antisocial personality disorder and is the result of environmental factors such as a child or teen’s upbringing in a negative household that resulted in physical abuse, emotional abuse, or childhood trauma. (Sources: Mary L. Trump, Too Much and Never Enough, 2020, Simon & Schuster; https://psychcentral.com, Dr. John M. Grohol, “Differences Between a Psychopath vs Sociopath,” 5-20-2020, 1-5; Dr. Tarra Bates-Duford, “Psychopath vs Sociopath: 16 Key Differences,” 9-7-2018, 1-3; https://www.health.com, Rosie McCall, “9 Ways to Spot a Sociopath,” 10-4-2019, 1-7.
  • Gangster, corrupt, and behaves as if above the law.
  • A stale, nasty breath of death, hate, narcissism, chaos, fear, conspiracy, norm erosion, “dark,” institutional deconstruction, and neo-facism.

Partisan politics is a dangerous duel of limited and partial truths; and binds party sorted folks to fixed, literal or otherwise limiting beliefs and frames of minds. Political party sorted, addicted surrogates make obvious excuses for candidates and excuse the inexcusable with respect to virtue, morality, judgment, intent, behavior, actions, ethics, and laws. W. Edwards Deming remarked, “If a person is not performing as expected, it is probably because they are miscast for the job.” Michael Cohen offers, “No one ever tells Trump the truth about his behavior and beliefs, or the consequences of his conduct and ignorance and arrogance, in business or in his personal life and now in politics. Trump is the boy in the bubble, impervious to the thoughts and feelings or others, entirely and utterly focused on his own desires and ambitions.”

Donald J. Trump is a power-hungry gangster who is unfit to occupy the Office of the President of the United States of America. Examine and deeply reflect on his profile. As a country, we need a President who will lead the country, improve the country, and set the stage for future generations, not one who will continue to deconstruct the many institutions that are the foundation and pillars of the America Americans desire.

GOLF COURSE BRAND

Posted on September 17, 2023

Have been reflecting on memorable golf course “brand” experiences over the years; and impression and guest service rise to the top of the heap of sensual brand attributes that create a residual, thirst to return.

Impression: clean, well-maintained, and fun place to be because it inspires a “feel good” sensation.

  • Grounds and facilities: plush green turf and well-manicured landscape; parking lot is clean, well-striped and has a good surface. Note the number of cars and license plates to become aware of who the customers are, and from which states they have traveled.
  • Signage and identification: useful—what and/or where, in good taste and well-placed: parking, bag drop, club house, rest rooms; warm-up, practice and instruction area; practice golf balls; 1st and 10th
  • Warm-up, practice, and instruction area: unobstructed, inviting, and spacious. Range has available practice balls and ball baskets; accurate distance markers and golf balls are visible from the teeing area; distances are marked at teeing area and changed as teeing area turf is managed; putting green accommodates several golfers; short game area has targets at 10, 15, 20, 25 and 30 yards; and a bunker that allows sand shots to be made either to the range or to a safe putting green is available.
  • Pro shop: customer friendly with open and spacious feel. Has good selection, tasteful merchandising, and new merchandise from recognized manufacturers; offers club fitting, club storage and club repair services; and present are flyers offering golf lessons, clinics, demonstrations, seminars, and golf car service.
  • Postings and feedback requests: today’s pin locations are visibly posted; local rules, pace-of-play and etiquette reminders are posted and available as handouts for golfers. Guest service evaluation surveys are available at check-in counter. A suggestion box is clearly visible.
  • Food and beverage area: organized, attractive, clean, and not cluttered. Menu is visible and inviting.
  • Course: flat, well-groomed teeing grounds with attractive hole number markers, ball washers and tee markers; good greens, fairways, and roughs; manicured and recently maintained bunkers with good rakes; and course is free of mixed grasses and weeds.
  • Drinking fountains and rest rooms: clean, well-maintained, and well-serviced.
  • Maintenance facility: not cluttered and organization is noteworthy; equipment is clean, not worn-out, appears serviceable, and expresses pride of mechanics and groundskeepers.

Guest service: guests are well taken care of by professional, experienced, courteous staff who pay attention to details that make sparkling, positive, and lasting guest experiences. The feeling is that of a guest, perhaps one of the family, not just a number.

  • Initial contact and attitude: friendly, upbeat, happy, and enthusiastic. Individuals make eye contact, smile, greet, enquire, offer products and services, respond to requests, follow-up and do not make excuses and blame others. Reminds of Tolstoy’s diary comment, “I cannot describe a person to you; however, I call tell you what effect he (she) has on me.” Folks do not remember what you did or what you said. They remember how you made them feel.
  • Leadership and management: impression and felt energy that is witnessed.

A round of golf is a simple “slice of life” and a field of friendly strife where seeds are planted to bear fruits at future times and places. George Heard, a great golf partner and friend, always said on the first tee, “Golf is just a slice of heaven.” Simply embrace the challenge and opportunity for perfect response to life, or heaven on earth. Stop what you are doing, breathe deep, be, become and feel the emotional experiences! Have a FUN round of golf!

INTERNAL TEAM

Posted on September 2, 2023

Have been coaching the internal team and it is exciting to share that the learning, perking, and experiencing journey is evolving! As previously mentioned, through work with a quantum energy coach, the author has realized that John most likely would have been a better child, teenager, student, parent, partner, subordinate, soldier, and leader if the 50-year self-awareness and self-development commitment had included coaching for “digging deep” into inner, buried, repressed subconscious aspects of the self. Selected literature refers to these subconscious aspects as shadow,

… the dark side of the psyche-those aspects of ourselves that we’ve split off, rejected, denied, hidden from ourselves, projected onto others, or otherwise disowned. In the language of psychotherapy, the shadow is referred to as the ‘repressed unconscious’-repressed because we’ve pushed or ‘pressed’ it out of our awareness, and unconscious because we’re not aware of it! [Integral Life Practice: A 21st Century Blueprint for Physical Health, Emotional Balance, Mental Clarity, and Spiritual Awakening, Wilber, Patten, Leonard, and Morelli, 2008, Boston: Integral, 41]

The most recent awareness tool has been Introduction to Internal Family Systems written by Dr. Richard C. Schwartz (2023, Boulder, CO: Sounds True). Dr. Schwartz offers,

…IFS is a collaborative process. Your Self and your therapist’s Self set out together on a healing journey inside your system of parts. You are the expert on your experience—what you encounter on the journey—and the therapist is an expert in helping you hold Self-leadership during the journey. (136)

Anticipation of confidence, wellbeing, clarity, and calmness was inviting, and an evolving definition of Self-leadership surfaced: leadership by Self is an earned, team-based influence relationship between the Self as leader and inner personalities who intend ethical relationships and mirror common purpose, sparkling, energized stars (mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual) in a quantum universe. Dr. Schwartz calls  the inner team players, the system of inner personalities, exiles, managers, and firefighters; and each player has a protective role to play for the Self. The quantum coach’s role is to facilitate a teambuilding process between the leader and his-her team players through evolving awareness of the Self as leader, identification of internal team players, and helping iron out conflicts between team players and between the leader and respective team players. Reminds of General MacArthur, who in the context of football, remarked, “Upon the fields of friendly strife are sown the seeds that at other times and in other places, bear the fruits of victory.” In the case of IFS, the TD’s are less stress, more energy, improved relationships, better listening, and simply improved peace-of-mind, joy, and quality of living and life.

The “dig deeper” quantum coaching for evolving, authentic John and little John has led to a wish that this challenge, opportunity, coaching, and learning to “dig deeper” had begun 60 + years ago! Moreover, it offers that young adults who are considering partnership, becoming parents, having kids, and raising kids may benefit from quantum energy coaching mentally, physically, spiritually, and emotionally. The vison is that the world is exponentially, positively evolving for generations to come because our parenting is improving.

Steve McIntosh contends,

Although America is plagued with abundant problems and challenges, most of these problems have pragmatic solutions that are within our power to implement. Almost none of these solutions, however, can be realized within our current political environment. Our frustrated, stymied, stalemated, and hyperpolarized political process is stuck in its tracks, and this gridlocked condition is now beginning to cause our social regression. Hyperpolarization is really the mother of all our problems because very few of the serious challenges we face can be adequately addressed until we ameliorate the fractious and frozen state of our body politic. [Developmental Politics: How America Can Grow into a Better Version of Itself. 2020. St. Paul, Minnesota: Paragon House, xiii]

The only way to effectively solve this ugly problem is to evolve our collective human condition. A judgement is that polarization can be traced back to programmed subconscious issues with our parents, our parent’s issues with their parents, their ancestors, etc., etc. Folks who are considering parenting need to resolve personal issues and relationship issues before they choose partners, opt to have children, and become parents. Choosing otherwise, the mental-emotional loop will continue, and the predictable result will be more polarization.

If you are anxious to get started, find a meditation coach and learn to meditate. If you are ready to “dig deep” into that shadow, look for a quantum energy coach who is a good fit, while at the same time passionately committing to a balance of integral health, wellness, and wellbeing. Additional literature that may be of interest: Dr. Joe Dispenza, You Are the Placebo; Evolve Your Brain; Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself; and Becoming Supernatural. In closing, a “make new stuff stick” process that really works for the author is contemplating the new learning: write about it, reflect on it, perk it, exercise with it, think about it, chat with others about it, sleep with it, and “simply sit” with it to experience it. Along the way it is important to remember to take good care of yourself because one cannot love others absent love of Self, your team leader.

 

 

 

AUTHORITARIANISM

Posted on August 27, 2023

Today’s media platforms reveal that America’s three-legged democracy stool is missing its third leg. Economics and politics are alive; and the missing third leg, morality, rears its head daily. In the rear-view mirror are values, virtue, ethics, compassion, leadership, character, decency, common good, honesty, integrity, and common beliefs. Witness suppression of voting rights, pandemics turned political, media untruths, cyber and space warfare, infrastructure decay, inequitable wages, healthcare and childcare shortcomings, systemic racism and casts, LGBTQ+ rights questioned, abortion rights removed, Congressional investigations about insurrection, environmental degradation, untreated mental health, home grown terrorism, immigration overload and inhumanity, thriving white supremacy, education state-of-the art, history and funding deficiencies, insane gun control, deterioration of government credibility—SCOTUS, Congress, and Office of the President—and the list continues. The danger is continued and deepening division, fear, autocracy, and fascism. The opportunity is to improve common good, helping others, and caring about others; and merge and participate in interactive dialogue and collectively manifest the missing third leg of the stool, morality, or common good and caring, for America, Americans, and the globe. As Jonathan Sacks offers in Morality: Restoring the Common Good in Divided Times,

Recovering liberal democratic freedom will involve emphasizing responsibilities as well as rights; shared rules, not just individual choices; caring for others as well as for ourselves; and making space not just for self-interest but also for common good. Morality is an essential feature of our human environment, as important as the market (economics) and the state (politics), but outsourceable to neither. Morality humanizes the competition for wealth and power. It is the redemption of our solitude. (20)

Authoritarianism has gotten us where we are; and unless we do something different, we will stay where we are and eventually destroy ourselves. In The Passionate Mind Revisited Joel Kramer and Diana Alstad offer, “Authoritarianism has two basic traits: a person or ideology that claims to know what’s best for others; and second, the authority is unchallengeable-not open to feedback and change when shown to be wrong.” (15) If the old, traditionalist worldview wins there is little likelihood the species will survive.

Yes, it feels like the country is a mess and that post truth, and consequently mistrust, is bubbling with conspiracy, spins, lies, partial truths, and more lies! Simply unhealthy ego, work-in-process human condition and shortcomings that are offering platforms for tomorrow’s challenges, opportunities, and evolution. An analytical glance reveals a least common denominator to be polarization, nurtured by festering, unhealthy selves that unleash pain and suffering in many forms.

Digging deep into the dark side of the psyche, contemplation (learning, perking and meditation), and collective, interactive dialogue offer a breath of evolutionary optimism and hope for Americans. Subsequent results can offer productive, interactive, authentic dialogue to build coalitions; teamwork; creation of evolutionary beliefs and values; nurturing and building visions for generations of children; and experiences of compassion as the antibiotic to confront a nasty infection. No one needs to suffer, and no one wants to suffer. We need to transcend and include and not undermine the human desire to evolve and survive.

Joel Kramer and Diana Alstad offer,

Humanity has displayed great creativity in most domains, except for relationships. Most of our problems are a function of unworkable relationships between people, groups, religions, regions, and countries, and humanity’s relation with the Earth. Because killing, or the threat of it, is and has been the bottom line of power, and has given the nature of power and wealth to coalesce and expand, and given that children need lengthy nurturing, humanity has not yet constructed a social system that can sufficiently promote the general wellbeing of large populations…We need an evolutionary leap in relationships to match our extraordinary recent leaps in science and technology and the resulting juggernaut taking us we know not where. Developing our relational and social capabilities must include the global dimension by replacing traditional unlivable, authoritarian ideals with more viable pan-cultural values that can flexibly meet accelerated change. We must learn how to be global social animals at last, through deepening, exploring, and building on the untapped potential in our nature, broadening our awareness, and emotionally maturing-all of which are possible if we care enough about surviving. (357)

Simply, we all need to grow our individual and collective mindfulness, awareness, and self-restraint and put “care” into all we think, say, and do. As good leaders understand and practice, transcending, including, and evolving implies a willingness to listen to and accept those who are different and have belief processes that are different.

 

 

 

PURPOSE-FUTURE

Posted on August 20, 2023

If one is mission [purpose] and vision [future] driven, to evolve sparkling, energized stars in the quantum universe offers infinite challenges and opportunities. And each sparkling, energized partnership can move America closer to the overwhelming task of being united for generations to come.

America is at a crossroads between a democratic republic—freedom, and autocracy—control. As American partners we need to decide what type of country, individually and collectively, we desire; and what each of us can do to facilitate the strategic, competitive, commonsense battle with our global competitors. Some folks will pitch-in and make things happen; some folks will watch what happened; and some folks will wonder what happened.

There are a bunch of strategies and stuff that need to get done: non-political voting rights management, technology building, environmental leadership and management, infrastructure maintenance and improvement, jobs creation, healthcare, childcare, immigration reform, countering systemic racism, LGBTQ+ rights, minimum wage, climate control, confronting home grown, white supremacy, terrorism, fair share tax reform, COVID-19 vaccinations and preparing for future pandemics, education funding, leading and managing web3, the metaverse, and blockchains, sane gun control, policing in communities, foreign policy, et al. As the two Japanese characters for crisis offer on the tattoo, with danger comes opportunity. The danger is continued and expanded division and autocracy; and the opportunity is to dig deep and work on our unhealthy personal and collective issues, participate in interactive dialogue and coalitions, and get done what is good for all Americans and America.

An opinion is that cultic-tribal addiction—political party sorting—is simply unresolved discomfort within the emotional body, the unhealthy deep stuff, or as offered in Integral Life Practice: A 21st Century Blueprint for Physical Health, Emotional Balance, Mental Clarity, and Spiritual Awakening (Wilber, Patten, Leonard, and Morelli, 2008, Boston, MA: Integral, page 41, 92-93),

…the shadow or dark side of the psyche, those aspects of ourselves that we’ve split off, rejected, denied, hidden from ourselves, projected onto others, or otherwise disowned…repressed unconscious…because we’ve pushed or pressed it out of our awareness, and unconscious because we are not aware of it…But the fact that we are not conscious or aware of the shadow does not mean that it has no effect: it just expresses itself through distorted and unhealthy means-or what is typically called neuroses…

In Never Finished, David Goggins offers an eye-opening comment, “…one day, you wake up owned by the person who is destroying you.” (103)

Digging deep, uncovering, balancing, and reintegrating this repressed and denied unconscious to improve our psychological health is process and is not easy; however, the work can free energy that has been spent shadowboxing with the self, making excuses, spinning, blaming, and telling stories. An initial step is simply passionate intent, a sense of openness and a commitment to 100% responsibility (Life happens because of me, not to me.), a willingness to face everything and fear nothing, and taking time out to just sit in the flames of the unresolved discomfort and give birth to penetrating insight, self-restraint, and skillful means. Deep dialogue chats with partners and friends can uncover deep scars and offer learning and reflecting experiences, challenges, and opportunities.

This is simply the evolution of our human condition, and with patience, persistence, education, compassion, learning, common good, loving kindness, virtue, and spirituality, we can move, individually and collectively, forward together. The alternative is further division, closer to autocracy, more lying, zero leadership, orchestrated overthrow of elections, bypass of constitutional order, accelerated division and violence, racism, and direction of a violent insurrections. Individually and collectively, we can grow common good, compassion, virtue, mindfulness, awareness, and self-restraint, and quiet the insatiable, unhealthy ego; and the dampening of anger, egotistical pride, jealousy, envy, doubt, ignorance, attachment, and fear can begin to free energy to nurture peace-of-mind, a sense of happiness and joy, and purpose and relationships created on a solid foundation of compassion. Let us get this job done for all Americans, not just a select few. Casts, conflicting political messages, and deliberate, negative words that separate, attack, and divide are simply wrong.

If open to the challenge, ready for the opportunity, and in need of a boost to get started: 1) In her Mindfulness Journal, Catherine Price recommends, Buy a pack of small stickers—any kind will do—and place a dozen or so around your home and office in noticeable places, such as your bathroom mirror, your computer, the back of your phone, the wall behind your kitchen sink, your alarm clock, or the cover of (your) journal. Every time you see one of these stickers, STOP WHAT YOU ARE DOING, BREATHE, AND BE. 2) Locate a credible meditation instructor and learn to meditate. 3) Questions for reflection and journaling: What unlocks compassion? What manifests happiness, joy, and peace-of-mind? What are the personal, predictable behaviors that show up daily? Do I have a thinking-feeling loop that has been showing up for a few years?

The individual and collective mission is to evolve sparkling, energized stars and sparkling, energized partnerships in the quantum universe. And each sparkling, energized star and partnership can move America closer to the overwhelming task of being united for generations to come.

 

 

 

SPARKLING ENERGIZED STAR

Posted on August 12, 2023

Today it feels like we humans are stuck chin deep in the past, nurtured by a mental-emotional loop that offers more of the same predictable outcomes. A frequent judgement is that cultic-tribal addiction—political party sorting—is simply unresolved discomfort within the emotional body, or as offered in Integral Life Practice: A 21st Century Blueprint for Physical Health, Emotional Balance, Mental Clarity, and Spiritual Awakening (Wilber, Patten, Leonard, and Morelli, 2008, Boston, MA: Integral, page 41, 92-93),

…the shadow or dark side of the psyche, those aspects of ourselves that we’ve split off, rejected, denied, hidden from ourselves, projected onto others, or otherwise disowned…repressed unconscious…because we’ve pushed or pressed it out of our awareness, and unconscious because we are not aware of it…But the fact that we are not conscious or aware of the shadow does not mean that it has no effect: it just expresses itself through distorted and unhealthy means-or what is typically called neuroses…safety and security are sought by bonding together and identifying (fusing) with a tribe in order to persevere and protect against outsiders. Allegiance and admiration are given to the chief…emergence of a sense of self (ego) distinct from the tribe, although it often acts impulsively on behalf of its favored group.

Undoing and reintegrating this repressed and denied unconscious to improve our psychological health is process, is not easy, and can be painful and scary; however, the work can free energy that has been spent shadowboxing with the self, most often since we were kids. An initial step is simply passionate intent and a sense of openness and a commitment to face everything and fear nothing. Just sit in the flames of unresolved discomfort and evolve with sparkling, energized presence in a quantum universe. And because we harbor emotional junk does not make us bad folks, it simply shows up as stress, sucks our energy, harms our relationships with others, and the body keeps the score.

Dr. Joe Dispenza, in Becoming Supernatural, offers,

Integral to this process is not squandering our energy by emotionally reacting to leaders or people in power. When they capture our emotions, they capture our attention, and thus they have captured our energy. This is how people gain power over us. Instead, we must make a stand for principles, values, and moral imperatives like freedom, justice, truth, and equality. When we achieve this through the power of the collective, we will unite behind the energy of oneness rather than be controlled by the idea of separation. This is when standing up for truth is no longer personal, but through unifying and building community, becomes personal. (Pages 321, 322)

Quality, common good, compassion, and virtue can indeed become our partners. Recent digging deep with a quantum healing coach has been quite challenging. Learning to coach perfectionist Little John has orchestrated the reflection juices, the sitting turbulence, the mental gymnastics, and the emotional canoe in the ocean absent a paddle. At times it has been difficult to simply take a time out, listen to pineal activation music, and just be present. Recent curiosities have been what “happy” feels like and whether the current path is just another adventure on the awareness journey. Dispenza contends, “To stand up for justice and peace, then, you must first find peace within yourself. You must then demonstrate peace to others, which means you can’t make a stand for peace or be peace while you’re warring with your neighbor, hating your co-worker, or judging your boss.” (Page 321) Choose peace starting with peace-of-mind! It might just offer a sparking, energized star in a quantum universe.

 

 

 

QUANTUM COACHING

Posted on August 5, 2023

Through work with a quantum energy coach the author has realized that John would have been a better child, teenager, student, parent, partner, subordinate, soldier, and leader if the 50-year self-awareness and self-development commitment had included coaching for “digging deep” into inner, buried, repressed subconscious aspects of the self. Selected literature would refer to these subconscious aspects as shadow,

… the dark side of the psyche-those aspects of ourselves that we’ve split off, rejected, denied, hidden from ourselves, projected onto others, or otherwise disowned. In the language of psychotherapy, the shadow is referred to as the ‘repressed unconscious’-repressed because we’ve pushed or ‘pressed’ it out of our awareness, and unconscious because we’re not aware of it! [Integral Life Practice: A 21st Century Blueprint for Physical Health, Emotional Balance, Mental Clarity, and Spiritual Awakening, Wilber, Patten, Leonard, and Morelli. 2008. Boston: Integral, 41]

The “dig deeper” quantum coaching for authentic John and little John has led to a wish that this challenge, opportunity, and learning to “dig deeper” had begun 60 + years ago! Moreover, it offers that young adults who are considering partnership, becoming parents, having kids, and raising kids may benefit from quantum energy coaching mentally, physically, spiritually, and emotionally. The vison is that the world is exponentially, positively evolving for generations to come because our parenting is improving.

Steve McIntosh contends,

Although America is plagued with abundant problems and challenges, most of these problems have pragmatic solutions that are within our power to implement. Almost none of these solutions, however, can be realized within our current political environment. Our frustrated, stymied, stalemated, and hyperpolarized political process is stuck in its tracks, and this gridlocked condition is now beginning to cause our social regression. Hyperpolarization is really the mother of all our problems because very few of the serious challenges we face can be adequately addressed until we ameliorate the fractious and frozen state of our body politic. [Developmental Politics: How America Can Grow into a Better Version of Itself. 2020. St. Paul, Minnesota: Paragon House, xiii]

The only way to effectively solve this ugly problem is to evolve our collective human condition. A judgement is that polarization can be traced back to programmed subconscious issues with our parents, our parents’ issues with their parents, their ancestors, etc., etc. Folks who are considering parenting need to resolve personal issues and relationship issues before they choose partners, opt to have children, and become parents. Choosing otherwise, the mental-emotional loop will continue, and the predictable result will be more polarization.

An opinion is that student curricula need to include the opportunity and challenge to begin to resolve personal parental relationship issues with quantum energy coaching. Quantum energy coaching can help an individual begin to identify, perk, and experience personal parental issues and coach the person through resolving the issues by uncovering and being present with the issues while at the same time learning self-restraint and “how to” tactfully coach others. The result will be better leaders and parents, if the choice is to have children.

Long-term, while training future leaders for America, institutions can also be leaders in beginning to solve the polarization issue and support evolution of our collective human condition. It simply must begin with how our leaders are trained and kids are raised. The goal is authenticity and expressing love, gratitude, hope, trust, common good, and compassion felt in the heart as well as speaking truth and personally empowering reality through verbal and non-verbal language and energy. Lots of warm fuzzies, compassion, common good, virtue, and loving cold pricklies!

If you are anxious to get started, find a meditation instructor, and learn to meditate. If you are ready to “dig deep” into that shadow, look for a quantum energy coach who is a good fit, while at the same time passionately committing to a balance of physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health, wellness, and wellbeing. Some literature that may be of interest: Developmental Politics: How America Can Grow into a Better Version of Itself. 2020. St. Paul, Minnesota: Paragon House; Integral Life Practice: A 21st Century Blueprint for Physical Health, Emotional Balance, Mental Clarity, and Spiritual Awakening, Wilber, Patten, Leonard, and Morelli. 2008. Boston: Integral; and Dr. Joe Dispenza, You Are the Placebo; Evolve Your Brain; Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself; and Becoming Supernatural. In closing, a “make new stuff stick” process that really works for the author is allowing the new learning to perk [write about it, reflect on it, think about it, chat with others about it, sleep with it, etc.], and “simply sit” with it to experience it. It has been routine for the author to be open to receive new material and quickly move on having the new learning not stick. Along the way it is important to remember to take good care of yourself because one cannot love others absent love of self.

 

 

 

FORMER PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP

Posted on July 29, 2023

As the 2024 Presidential election unfolds; and as we witness the dark divide becoming wider, deeper, nastier, and darker, contrasting potential candidates for President is interesting. It appears the critical decision is to vote for the candidate who has a quality profile, i.e., 1) is objective and not self-serving and decides based on what is in the best interests of America; 2) is committed to common good, compassion, virtue, and integrity; and 3) can best transcend and include others and consciously evolve a sane American culture.

How one chooses to “show-up” in the world can be critiqued by researching, examining, and witnessing talents, skills, and experiences; making observations; and scrutinizing character, personality, mentality, and interests. Let us take-a-look at Former President Donald J. Trump.

Talents, Skills, and Experiences

A narcissistic drama-seeker who covers a fragile ego with a bullying impulse and has taken democracy to the brink. (Maggie Haberman, Confidence Man, 506) Life’s goal has been to gain and maintain position power, at any cost. Witness a track record of business and government failures, investigations and numerous lawsuits and absolute chaotic disasters: most consequential president in history; puppet of Vladimir Putin; foreign policy bullying, badgering, and destroying; abandoned allies; personal business endeavors with several bankruptcies; North Korean nuclear weapons stockpile doubled; pandemic management and leadership was non-existent, dereliction of duty, passed buck off to governors who became blame targets; enlisted foreign interference in elections (Russia and China); several obstruction of justice charges; impeachment proceedings; insurrection; multiple legal cases lost and pending; accepts payoffs for positions; and has numerous Trump party cronies who are lost souls in search of a tribe and chief. No decisions are made based on strategic plans, strategies, goals, and objectives; makes decisions on how he feels at the time; can handle small projects and sign executive orders; not able to lead projects large in scope; selection of judges, environmental deregulations and deconstruction of institutions may be legacy; and immigration policy is inhumane. Is a master at using neuroses [The dark side of the psyche: denied, repressed, disowned and projected subconscious aspects of the Self.] to create stories (“fake news”) that strategically move the “lightning rod” from the Trump Party to others in order to trigger the psyche of perceived “enemies” and his base. Others become the personification of the wrongs and inexcusable of the Trump Party: Russian interference, Ukraine, racism, nativism, gloating, tax cuts for the rich, Supreme Court justices, bullying, outrages, fake news, etc., etc.  As Bernie Sanders has eloquently noted, “Nero fiddled while Rome burned. Trump golfs.” Accepting responsibility for anything is not his cup of tea. Blaming others is his ballgame. Just take him Diet Coke and wash his dirty laundry.

  • Track record of complicating the story narrative, throwing sand in the eyes of the onlooker, claiming that transparently implausible stories were true unless proven otherwise, and denying the obvious truth.

Observations

Donald J. Trump is a genius at networking and using the media to recruit, retain, and fire, at will, addicted surrogates, circles of friends, admirers, celebrity hangers-on, and wannabes who savor and long for safety and security sought by bonding together and identifying with a tribe in order to persevere and protect against outsiders. Allegiance and admiration are given to the chief and clan. Mystical signs, conspiracy, and desires of powerful spirit beings must be followed for the continued safety and well-being of the tribe. Years of behaviors reveal the following:

  • Does not understand duty, honor, and country.
  • A cheat, a liar, a fraud, a bully, a predator, a con man.
  • Racist, incendiary, toxic, casts hate, disruptive, name caller, and divisive, unfit for political office.
  • Repeatedly has disparaged the intelligence of service members: Americans who die in war are “losers” and “suckers.”
  • Deny, deny, deny; accuse, accuse, and accuse. The magic formula: D cubed—disease, disaster, division; and he continues to escape responsibility and being held accountable for anything by anybody.
  • Tax cuts were a corporate “boondoggle.”
  • Vision for country is merely to fix what his administration undermined, agitated, deconstructed, or destroyed during his time in office. Examples: intelligence, FBI, CIA, U.S. Postal Service, voting integrity, Supreme Court, and CDC.
  • Stokes fear, celebrity, and brand building; and show-photo opportunity is the foundation for his rhetoric. Is a stand-up comic.
  • Staff selection of addicted surrogates has been a disaster and revolving door; and demands loyalty even if unethical, yes sir, no sir, no excuse sir; or you are fired.
  • Surrounded by fixers and “yes men;” encourages rivalries and thrives on personal attacks.
  • Protected by political party sorted, partisan, power worldview associates of the Federal government institution he and his cronies choose to deconstruct and destroy.
  • Conspiracist (example QAnon) and guilty of political cowardice, blaming, passing the buck, and dereliction of duty; shirked constitutionally mandated duty and rewards misconduct.
  • Sexist and multiple lawsuits and misconduct behaviors.
  • Racist: a person who shows or feels discrimination or prejudice against people of other races, or who believes that a particular race is superior to another.
  • Dishonest, arrogant, and narcissist; uses position and financial power for personal gain.
  • Creates martyr complex, irrelevance, and distractions; misleads, boasts and is egotistical, promotes blamelessness of self, never wrong, and anxious to criticize.
  • People mistakes and poor interpersonal relations skills.
  • Lies, denies, blames, and spins; egotistical and self-serving; unqualified for the position.
  • Having been President and playing golf reveal the real person: you cannot hide. Read Commander-in-Cheat.

Character, Personality, Mentality, and Interests.

  • Low-functioning includes persons who “… do not exhibit polished and polite behaviors as a mask for their manipulations…may lack the education or interpersonal skills to control and deceive. Instead they might use threats, coercion, or intimidation to achieve their desired outcome.” (Source: Dr. Timothy J. Legg, “What Is a High-Functioning Sociopath?”, 5-28-2019, https://www.healthline.com, 1-3.)
  • Narcissistic sociopath: one form of antisocial personality disorder and is the result of environmental factors such as a child or teen’s upbringing in a negative household that resulted in physical abuse, emotional abuse, or childhood trauma. (Sources: Mary L. Trump, Too Much and Never Enough, 2020, Simon & Schuster; https://psychcentral.com, Dr. John M. Grohol, “Differences Between a Psychopath vs Sociopath,” 5-20-2020, 1-5; Dr. Tarra Bates-Duford, “Psychopath vs Sociopath: 16 Key Differences,” 9-7-2018, 1-3; https://www.health.com, Rosie McCall, “9 Ways to Spot a Sociopath,” 10-4-2019, 1-7.
  • Gangster, corrupt, and behaves as if above the law.
  • A stale, nasty breath of death, hate, narcissism, chaos, fear, conspiracy, norm erosion, “dark,” institutional deconstruction, and neo-facism.

Partisan politics is a dangerous duel of limited and partial truths; and binds party sorted folks to fixed, literal or otherwise limiting beliefs and frames of minds. Political party sorted, addicted surrogates make obvious excuses for candidates and excuse the inexcusable with respect to virtue, morality, judgment, intent, behavior, actions, ethics, and laws. W. Edwards Deming remarked, “If a person is not performing as expected, it is probably because they are miscast for the job.” Michael Cohen offers, “No one ever tells Trump the truth about his behavior and beliefs, or the consequences of his conduct and ignorance and arrogance, in business or in his personal life and now in politics. Trump is the boy in the bubble, impervious to the thoughts and feelings or others, entirely and utterly focused on his own desires and ambitions.”

Donald J. Trump is a power-hungry gangster who is unfit to occupy the Office of the President of the United States of America. Examine and deeply reflect on his profile. As a country, we need a President who will lead the country, improve the country, and set the stage for future generations, not one who will continue to deconstruct the many institutions that are the foundation and pillars of the America Americans desire.

HEADY GOLFER

Posted on July 23, 2023

In 1999 the self-awareness journey took this golfer to downtown Denver and the Tattered Cover bookstore, near Coors Field, home of the Colorado Rockies. The search was to uncover a connection between the body and the mind. Having recently read Sacred Hoops by Phil Jackson, Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman and The Warrior Within by Bruce Lee, the mystery of the Tattered Cover bookshelves seemed to have awaited literature that would gallantly reveal the secrets of the mind-body connection. Secret: 24 years later the secrets of the mind-body connection are still time-space away, simply evolution-in-process.

Wandering to the Buddhist literature offered The Art Happiness by His Holiness The Dalai Lama. This book was to unfold a fruitful journey to Naropa University, three years of Tibetan Buddhist meditation training, study of the five Wisdom Traditions, Study Abroad in Sikkim India and, thanks to son Doug and wife Cindy, a renewed connection to the game of golf with a necessary learned skill of self-restraint. As this perfectionist-reformer golfer came to realize, two shanks into a lake on the right of a fairway can quickly mess with the golfer’s monkey mind and put it on the verge of insanity with a fit of anger and a dose of fear.

In Beyond Religion: Ethics for a Whole New World (2011, NY, NY: Houghton, Mifflin, Harcourt, 130-34), the Dalai Lama offers,

…it is helpful to consider the onset of destructive emotion as a kind of causal chain, which starts with an external stimulus and ends with our behavioral response. The aim of emotional awareness is to bring our attention or mindfulness into this split-second process, and thereby to gain control over it.

This split-second process—a series of actions or steps taken to achieve a particular end—is like a speeding train with five cars:

1) A trigger-stimulus: a shanked golf ball goes into the lake on the right of the fairway.

2) Perception of the stimulus: we see the golf ball flying toward the lake; and we see and hear the ball plopping into the water leaving a nice circular ripple.

3) Interpretation: less than a millisecond later, arising in the mind is the exaggerated judgment that the golfer stupidly shanked the shot into the lake.

4) Emotional response: quickly followed by anger, annoyance, or irritation, the inner cauldron is beginning to bubble.

5) Behavioral response: very quickly, we say something, or do something in retaliation…nasty words, a club slammed into the ground, a thrown club.

Once the golfer understands this causal chain, the challenge is to interrupt its flow, catch the self, and bring awareness to the process evolving the skill of self-restraint. The Dalai Lama offers,

…it is easiest to start near the end-between the emotional reaction and its behavioral expression. Then, as we become more familiar with the process and our emotional awareness develops over time, we can work our way back along the causal chain, with the ultimate goal of quelling or eliminating the afflictive emotion altogether. (132)

Give it a try! It is such a thrill to catch oneself before the irritation ruins the hole, a relationship, or the round. Self-restraint can be like a 15th club in the golf bag. Stop what you are doing. Breathe. Be. Acknowledge the reflection-trigger-stimulus; and respond instead of reacting. It just feels better! And the next shot is much easier and more fun. Self-restraint is a wonderful, learned skill. The nice thing about a golf ball, even though it may occasionally hide, is that it is always honest and offers honest, authentic feedback. A nice question: When was the last time you received authentic feedback from your best golf buddy? Was it golf ball like feedback? The mind-body connection is still time-space away and evolution-in-process. Perhaps they are simply connected and quantum, and this golfer just chose to separate them.