InnerSelf

by Meryl Hershey Beck, MA, MEd, LPCC. It is time to stop being your own worst enemy and begin to become your own best friend. As a psychotherapist, I see time and time again the adverse effects of my clients' lack of self-care. In general...

by Marie T. Russell. Many of us have been holding back and storing unfelt emotions. What's the purpose? Unfortunately, the reason behind suppressed emotions is self-defeating. Holding back from "feeling your feelings" is usually how we try to protect ourselves from being hurt. However...

by Carl Alasko, Ph.D. Blame is a series of actions and reactions. They all work together to generate the Blame Syndrome. The three parts are: The Blame Attack (the initial criticism — no matter how minor); The Emotional Impact (negative feelings caused by being blamed); The Reactive Response (blame is fired back). Identifying the behavior is the first step.

by Rev. Daniel Chesbro.

Everyone has experienced an event that they’re sure was terrible. Then, when you think about it ten years later, you realize that if that hadn’t happened, you wouldn’t be here right now enjoying life. So how could that have been...

by Alan Seale.

We all have times in our life where we find ourselves caught in the middle of dramas or 'impossible' situations. Our first tendency mighty be to find who's to blame and/or how to fix it. However, Alan Seale suggests: "This situation has happened for a reason. It wants to tell us something — to help us clearly recognize what is not working or what wants to change or heal. The drama is a wake-up call..."

by Alan Cohen.

As Dee and I took our bulkhead seats on our flight home to Hawaii, we noticed a young newlywed couple seeking their seats in the row across the aisle from us. They were on their honeymoon. When they realized that they were assigned seats apart from each other, their countenance dropped like a five-year-old whose ice cream cone...

by Lynn Woodland.

The more we bristle at the idea of self-responsibility, the more likely it is that we were taught at an early age to feel shame. Blame and shame go hand in hand, one giving rise to the other. They both have to do with finding fault, pointing a finger of judgment, and defining something or someone as “wrong.” For those of us who’ve been taught to feel shame, it’s...

by John Ptacek.

Believing is as automatic as walking or talking or sneezing, and about as noteworthy. There was a time when I considered my beliefs to be something more than just an assemblage of thoughts. I thought they were me. Deprived of our-ists and -isms, would we behave differently than we do now? Who would we be without our beliefs?

by Marie T. Russell.

This year for the first time, I have planted zucchini in my garden. At first I thought people had  exaggerated... But now I have discovered something. You may check your garden in the afternoon and see some small...

by Deborah King.

Often, our most important beliefs are unconscious. Over 90 percent of those that we currently hold we took on as kids from our parents or caregivers, school, and culture. These views run the greater part of our lives and determine if we’re going to be...

by Pema Chödrön. Suppose there were a place we could go to learn the art of peace, a sort of boot camp for spiritual warriors. Instead of spending hours and hours disciplining ourselves to defeat the enemy, we could spend hours and hours dissolving the causes of war.

by Marie T. Russell. Sometimes it seems that commitment is a four-letter word. It is a word that oftentimes brings up insecurity, doubt, and fear. What is the underlying fear to our committing ourselves to an action, project, or relationship? Is it...

by Richard Carlson. There is a huge tendency to have way too much going on inside our minds, at the same time. Hundreds of thoughts and decisions about various things are all vying for our attention. There's also memory...

by John Kuypers. Twenty ways to become more present including getting enough sleep, listening to your body, and more.

by John Kuypers.

When you are living in the present, you know what's important for you, and you act on that knowing. You are able to see the big picture and the smallest detail all at the same time. Your sense of timing and your instincts become sharp. Great athletes show us just how true this is.

by Joan Borysenko.

It's frustrating to believe that peace is some distant goal, attainable only by a few fortunate souls blessed with good genes, superior brain chemistry, plenty of money, or a calling as a monk. But peace has not deserted even the crankiest and busiest among us.

by Shakti Gawain.

Difficulties we are having in our relationships often mirror parts of ourselves that we need to heal. Such difficulties may involve a family member, a close friend, a coworker, or even a clerk in a store. If you are having difficulty with a relationship take...

by Gerald Epstein, M.D.

The great paradox of our human existence is that while we yearn for and strive after freedom, in whatever way each of us may seek to define that word, we find that we are no closer to that elusive element than were our ancestors. We are in captivity -- either physically, mentally, emotionally, or socially...

As within, so without. Those four words compose one of the most powerful truths brought to mankind. What happens within is the determinant to what happens without. Carrying it one step further, in order to change our physical lives, we must look within for answers.

by Deborah Tyler Blais. In an eight-month workshop, which I went on to lead, we asked ourselves four questions each day. What did I notice that had nothing to do with me? What did I do today that I respect myself for? What did I do to help another person today (anonymously if possible)? What bothered me today, if anything? The assignment was to stretch beyond who you normally are.

Our spiritual evolution depends heavily upon our recovery from our worst addiction -- our addiction to the victim archetype, which traps us in the past and saps our life energy. For the sake of our spiritual evolution and of our eventual release from the victim archetype, we must bring the inner brat's life lovingly to a close. I, therefore, propose that you hold a funeral and pronounce him or her dead.

by Eve Bruce M.D.

By the time my patients pick up the phone to make an appointment with me -- or to call any healer, for that matter -- two very important steps have occurred first. First, they have decided that something is awry in their life, something is not as they want it to be; and second, they have decided to do something about it. They are at a gateway...

by Stuart Alve Olson. One of the most effective systems for using sound was developed in the fifth century A.D. by the famous Taoist physician T'ao Hung-ching. T'ao discovered that vocalizing different sounds while expelling the breath could cleanse and restore the organs, regulate the blood circulatory system, and stabilize the central nervous system.

The present is what is happening when you strip away all the resentments of your past and all the worries you have about your future. To live in the present is to live as if the past never existed and as if the future were irrelevant. Living in the present is a vision for life that is achievable in any...

by Marie T. Russell. The other day I reflected on the general public's increased interest and acceptance of past-lives. The question that came to mind was "Does knowledge of who you might have been 500 or 3,000 years ago help you in your life NOW?" I recall experiencing a...

by Michael Levy.

Balance in all things is the correct way to live. So how do we balance our scales to get the correct perspective of life? We must weigh up each situation that comes into our lives and balance our minds to understand what feels good and what doesn't. 

When you are able to detach yourself from the areas of stress, tension, and pain in your body and just be aware of them without the interference of your analytical mind, they have room to unwind and release. This is not to deny or ignore pain; it is to be present with it in a relaxed, open, non judging way.

by Denise Linn.

As a child, I was afraid of so many things. I was terrified during my parents' violent arguments. I was afraid of my mother's rage and my father's simmering undercurrents. My childhood was defined by my fears. As I grew up, I suppressed fear and denied its existence. But it shaped my life in hundreds of ways.

It is important to understand that to develop awareness in daily life we do not need to go around with an empty mind. Rather, we strive to be awake and centered in the present, clearly knowing at each moment what we are doing. For instance, if thoughts, plans, or memories come into the mind, the mind is aware of them

by Karen Bentley.

The biggest problem with a mistake that's not forgiven is that it becomes a piece of garbage cluttering up your mind. The longer you dwell on the mistake, the more it magnifies and distracts you. Soon, all you think about is this horrible mistake and how much it's impacted your life. Since we rarely, if ever, throw out our mistakes, our minds become a giant toxic dumpsite for all these things that we've done or had done to us. It results in perpetual unhappiness.

by Andrew Weiss.

Our actions have consequences. Most of the time, we are unaware of any except perhaps the most immediate of these consequences. We are like a person who has dropped a pebble into a pond and can only see, at best, one ripple the pebble made in the water. We know from our experience that the pebble actually causes many ripples...

by Jerry Minchinton.

Although most of us don't mind doing favors now and then, hardly anyone wants to make a career of it. Unhappily, some people have no qualms about inconveniencing others if doing so helps them achieve their goals. Although helping these people may give us some pleasure initially, our good feelings vanish when we finally realize we are being used.

by Peter and Helen Evans.

Do you ever think that you're not good enough to act compassionately? Not quite holy enough, so maybe you would rather leave that sort of behavior to the saints and sages, the ministers and priests. After all, aren't these the people who are in charge of communications with God?

by Jasmin Lee Cori.

The real riches lie in the kingdom within, yet many people live their whole lives not knowing how to find them. Their energies are absorbed in the outer world, keeping up with the demands of a busy life. The only inner life they know consists almost entirely of their emotional and mental involvement with the world around them...

by Ric Giardina.

Some of the first things that often need to be overcome when seeking to engage a higher degree of balance in one's life are the all-too commonly-held myths and misconceptions about Life Balance and how to achieve it. Here are four of the most prevalent ones in our society...

by Susyn Reeve.

 Habit patterns provide a structure that enables us to easily perform routine things. The danger is we often continue with the habit pattern because we are used to it, even when it is no longer effective and satisfying. The idea of taking a new path is to be awake to our patterns and create new...

by Ric Giardina.

If you have any hope of making changes to the way you are living your life then you will have to start taking a close look at what you are actually doing at the present time. This will require a new level of mindfulness about your thought processes, your choices...

by Shubhra Krishan.

I have a policy: On Sundays, I don't allow myself to come within five hundred yards of the computer; the phone goes on voice mail; and the cell phone gets to snooze in my purse all day. My friends know how I am about Sundays, and they respect my need for solitude. This soothing Sunday routine means a lot to me...

by Wyatt Webb.

 A couple of years ago, I was privileged to hear a speech by Don Miguel Ruiz, author of The Four Agreements. He stressed repeatedly that the most important thing for us to watch in regard to our conversation is not so much what we say to others, but what we say to ourselves...

by Thubten Chodron.

We don't always see what we're doing as complaining; in fact, we often think we're simply telling the truth about the world. What constitutes complaining? One dictionary defines it as, 'An expression of pain, dissatisfaction, or resentment.' I would add that it's a statement of...