Living On Purpose

I am nearly finished writing an  ebook  all about the dietary reasons some people may end up depressed. What we eat or refuse to eat can determine whether we will feel weepy, grumpy, or irritable later! Of course, nutrition isn’t everything when it comes to clearing up depression, so I have posted an outstanding interview with a facilitator of The Work, a process of self-inquiry that has helped lots of depressed people. If you haven’t yet seen the interview with Clear Life Solutions about The Work, it’s online now:
Interview with Carol L. Skolnick

One of my favorite authors in the self help arena is James Lane Allen, author of As a Man Thinketh. I point to all the reasons why I love this philosophy of life on this page:
As a Man Thinketh

Both of these pages are about self-inquiry, or self-examination. This is a very important part of spiritual growth (or however you want to call it: growing up, maturing, evolution of the soul…). When I am no longer afraid to face the very parts of myself that I am hiding from, I can move past any emotional blocks stopping my growth. I love the feeling I get when I actually notice that I’m not bothered by something that years ago would have sent me to my room crying. All the time I spent with various meditation styles has paid off, but I’m nowhere near done! All of us are works in progress.

As you may or may not know, I’ve used meditation for much of my adult life. When I found Holosync back in 2003 or so, it saved my marriage! I had sunk to such negative thinking in terms of my marriage, that all I could focus on was a separation. Once I began using the Holosync CD, I could change my thinking and solve my problems from a different angle. I have stuck with it over the years, although recently I seem to be having technical difficulties in keeping a functional CD player in the house because of my “curious” toddler. I believe that Holosync also gave me the courage to build and write this web site, because I have grown in numerous ways over the years I’ve been using it.

So it is not lightly that I recommend this program to you. I am an affiliate, meaning that the company Centerpointe will pay me a small commission for sending you to try their program. So with all honesty, I send you to a new video Centerpointe has created to explain their program. Take some time to watch it, then order their free demo or the first level risk-free, if you want to experience results like I have experienced.

Meditation Benefits Video at Centerpointe

By the way, Bill Harris of Centerpointe has agreed to add some special, unannounced bonuses for my readers, so please make sure to use this link so he knows you’re with us. I want you to get all the extras he’s promised to my readers.

Now, here’s just a “taste” of what The Holosync Solution can do for you…

1) It can allow you to effortlessly reach states of super-deep meditation–even the very first time you use it…

2) It can dramatically accelerate your mental, emotional, and spiritual growth, giving you the results you always THOUGHT you were supposed to get from meditation (but, if you’re like most people, never really got)…

3) It creates healing of emotional traumas and self-imposed limitations forever, even for people who have been unsuccessful with other methods…

4) It actually slows the aging process by stimulating the production of many neurochemicals and other substances in the body that are associated with longevity, well-being, and better health…

5) It can dramatically raise your threshold for stress and cause stress-induced dysfunctional feelings and behaviors (including anger, depression, fear, anxiety, substance abuse, and many others) to fall away…

6) It can increase your self-awareness, inner peace, and happiness, as well as your ability to connect with other people and create successful relationships.

If you’ve tried meditation, or some of those other personal growth approaches that just didn’t deliver, or want to go MUCH deeper, with faster results… or if you just want to grow and improve your life at an accelerated pace, I know you’ll love The Holosync Solution.

I don’t recommend things to my friends and clients lightly. But I’d be doing you a grave disservice if I didn’t urge you in the strongest possible terms to check this out.

There’s no risk to check it out, and I know you’ll be glad you did.

Remember, you can get a FREE Holosync demo CD, a FREE Special Report, and a special offer to try The Holosync Solution program, at no risk, by going to:
Meditation Benefits Video at Centerpointe

I found an archived news article on the BBC about meditation. I find the tone of the article curious, and a little funny. I have accepted meditation into my life for the last twenty years as a matter of fact, and although I don’t do it every day any more, I know it focuses my brain, lowers my stress and blood pressure, and can increase my immune function. Since all this is ingrained in my mentality, I find it humorous to read an article written for a different audience; one that does not believe mediation could help anyone. It’s called:

Meditation ‘Good for the Brain’ BBC News, Feb. 5, 2003.
(imagine someone using air quotes when they say Good for the Brain, and rolling their eyes!

There was a small scale study comparing two groups of people; those who were just trained in mindfulness meditation and those who never meditated. After eight weeks, the meditators had more activity in their frontal lobes, and more antibodies after a flu shot. So the doctors say…

“There is increasing evidence that meditation is a useful and, for some people, a powerful therapy…”

This statement is like saying that getting rest is good for you when you have a cold, or that scientists have finally validated that cranberries really do help with urinary tract infections, or that doctors now finally believe that vitamin c can boost your immune system.

People have been meditating for thousands of years. There are as many types of meditation as there are variations of tea. You know, there is chamomile, black tea, green tea, bancha tea, earl grey, english breakfast, lemon zinger, rose hip, matcha tea, and so on. Just like you take an immunity tea when you feel a sore throat coming on, you can do a different form of meditation for your different moods or phases in life. Those who want to lose the ego usually start with transcendental meditation, but those who need to lower their blood pressure may try mindfulness meditation; a form of thought dropping. You can use meditation as a tool in your life to help you get where you need to go. That includes lifting depression, reducing your blood pressure and stress, reducing anxiety, reducing cholesterol, and solving your problems with more creativity!

If you want to read more articles about meditation in the news, I have a page dedicated to that:

Meditation and your health in the news

The scientist John Hagelin appeared on interviews in “What the bleep do we know?” He explained a project dealing with random number generators. The thing these machines do best is to randomly throw out the digits 0 or 1, like flipping a coin. Teams of researchers around the world have these random number generators and they run them during specific world events. Amazingly, the findings are that at times when the world is focusing on a single event (like the O.J. Simpson trial, or the September 11 tragedy in New York) then the random number generators become less random. They throw out statistically either more 1’s or more 0’s.

This brings up the question, “Does human consciousness affect the world?” While not a complete answer, or even a definite answer, the trend scientists are finding with these machines is that when meditators gather together for group meditation, there may be a calming effect on the environment.

There have been many world meditation events in the past ten years, so the researchers have used the data from the machines to see if they could tell when the meditation occurred just from looking at the numbers.

The researchers have been able to label  the odds against chance at these events to be 20:1, 50:1, and even 100:1 or more.

Here is the Global Consciousness Project web site. Since it’s a Flash-based site, the address bar never changes, so you’ll have to use the search bar. The search bar is at the bottom of the page, and you will have to type in “organized meditation” to get to this page:
Interpretations of results for organized meditations (Princeton)

It is the Global Consciousness Project which led me to BrainPaint, featured in my previous post. Use the link above, then find the search bar and type in “Global brain”. You will find a link to the images created by Global Brain.
Bill Scott, founder of BrainPaint speaking about the Global Consciousness Project:

We’re ready to begin global consciousness feedback. The data coming from your servers is very complex and lifelike. I have a server up and running taking a minute of your data and updating an image every minute.

Being that complex systems are infinitely sensitive they ideally lend themselves to feedback of this nature. These images from your data are quite profound!

Teams of scientists from major universities around the world are spending time analyzing data about consciousness and extrapolating that data to something meaningful on a global level! To me, this indicates the time is ripe for each individual who feels ready to start his/her own journey towards self discovery. Start meditating, or praying, and even if you don’t feel results, they will be so incremental that you won’t notice you’re changing. The steps an individual makes towards living a life more at peace with oneself and the world will help propel the world into a more peaceful state. And that’s living on purpose!

This web site, Live on Purpose, is popular with people looking for desktop wallpapers. I found a very cool source for desktop wallpapers, but don’t stop there. The web site BrainPaint features a new biofeedback method that just blows my mind. These images were painted using neurofeedback from the patient’s brainwaves. They look reminiscent of fractals; some are beautiful and some are disturbing. The practice of neurofeedback is now getting press because children with ADD or ADHD can use it as an alternative to the medical standard prescription of Ritalin.

Neurofeedback helps in concentration, focus, and retraining your brain! I’d say this should be the first line of treatment for ADD, not some “alternative” therapy!

BrainPaint desktop wallpapers

There is a biofeedback video game that I played only for several minutes at a conference. Journey to the Wild Divine uses finger clips to read your pulse and you control the game entirely through your willpower. Their own byline: The Wild Divine Project provides entertaining, multimedia solutions to promote self-care
and personal wellness. Our training tools use your body’s own biometrics together with our creative, computer-based tools and techniques, to help you learn to relax and reduce stress.

Wild Divine

I have been a step-parent for about twelve years, and I’m also a mother, so I’ve had the chance to reflect on the differences between the two roles. I have encountered numerous frustrations with being a step-parent, and I have realized that in order to be comfortable in this role, you have to be okay with you first; or as I said it: “I have to be okay with me, and that’s very important.”

I say this because your step-children will be testing you from day one! As you encounter their teen years, there will be rebellion and contrary attitudes. Of course, your own birth children will also test you, and rebel when they are teens, but the step-children tend to use the “you’re not my Mom” approach and they may end up asking your spouse to take sides, or they may simply ignore your rules.

I have a friend who asked me, “Wow, you’ve got more experience than I do in parenting teens…what’s your advice for me? I have twins who are about to be teenagers!”

I told him, as I tell all of you, “You and your spouse have to be a united front when it comes to parenting decisions. If there is any division between you about how to parent your children, they will find it and use it against you! That means you actually have to have meetings with your spouse and talk about your differing parenting styles.” (How do you think I learned this? That’s right, because my husband and I have completely different parenting styles and the children saw it in our behavior–read in: bickering.)

So, why do I have to be okay with me? This phrase is something I learned from Bill Harris and the support materials that come with the Holosync CD meditation system. It implies self-forgiveness. Sure, I’ve messed up in the past. All I have is right now, and my best option for now is to be okay with myself as I am, so I can make the best decisions in regards to my children and step-children’s lives. My own guilt, fear, and negative reactions get in the way of effective parenting. Who knows, I may not even be very effective with my step-children, because they tend to come and go between their two parents, but in the long run, I hope that my “teaching by example” style will help them somehow.

When I’m stressed by the choices my children and step-children make, I say this prayer:

• God grant me right thought, right speech, and right action today.

When I’m calm, I say it like an affirmation:

• I demonstrate right thought, right speech, and right action.

And, of course, my time spent in meditation with the Holosync CD, linked above, helped me to “chill out” from my typical over-reactions to some of the distressing behaviors I noticed in the children. Now I lose my temper much less frequently than I did four years ago.

Here are some online resources to help step-parents with their blended families:

Blended Families

National Stepfamily Resource Center

A List of helpful links for stepfamilies

What kind of mental image does the word “meditation” conjure for you? Some think it means chanting in a foreign language, twisting your legs into the lotus position, or even idol worship. These are stereotypes! I have spoken to several Christians who would not like to consider taking up meditation because of their misconceptions of it. Verily, you do not have to sacrifice your religious beliefs to take up meditation; you will not be doing anything sacrilegious.

If you are a Christian, know that I found mention of meditation in many places in the bible. It is suggested that you find a quiet place to go within and think about The Lord! That’s meditation! Throughout Psalms, there are verses that say I will meditate on your decrees, on your wonders, on your unfailing love, on all your wonderful works. Here’s a nice one:

My meditation of him shall be sweet; I will be glad in the Lord. Psalm 104:34

It seems to be in vogue now for the medical community to suggest meditation for stress relief. Long-time meditators who started for the end-goal of enlightenment may suggest that the best and only reason to meditate is for the dissolution of the ego, and all that health stuff comes in second place.

So what do you think? If a person starts meditation simply for the health benefits like reduced stress, controlling your thoughts, happiness, and increased concentration, will they also gain enlightenment?

Here are two links to read about that.

Pick the Brain

Will Holosync make you enlightened?

Well, there is officially a “movement” going on about finding one’s life purpose. Jim White, author of What’s My Purpose? and creator of The Circle of Success, a customized, yearlong leadership and management transformation process has launched a blog about finding one’s life purpose. He’s looking for a million people who want to commit to finding their life’s purpose. I was the 92nd person to comment, and to date, there are 218 comments; all from people affirming that they are committed to the same goal. He will host a free teleseminar this Saturday, July 12, and it proves to be interesting.

What’s my purpose?

In order for a person (let’s say you) to arrive at a state of being where you can find your purpose (and live it, to boot!), there has to be awareness. This kind of awareness is internal, but it can start with external things. If you find yourself living on automatic, it will be beneficial to begin to develop a new habit of watching your thoughts, and even watching what you do with things (like the toothpaste cap, your keys, or the top to your peanut butter). If you realize that you’re thinking about stuff unrelated to what you’re doing while you perform daily tasks, (and then just focus on the task at hand) you’ll lose less things!

Zen philosophy: When you’re sitting, just sit; when you’re eating, just eat; and so on. According to Zen, existence is found in the silence of the mind (no-mind), beyond the chatter of our internal dialog.

Did you know that even the act of acknowledging your troubling thoughts can help you feel better?

The zen tradition focuses on bringing awareness to the breath during meditation. This, in turn, brings more awareness of the types of thoughts and reactions you’re having throughout the day. You can begin to actually watch thoughts, label them, choose to follow them or drop them. Wow, with thousands of thoughts happening during the day, this seems tedious, and lots of people give up after being overwhelmed.

There is a method of meditation, however, that is not so tedious, and can help you gain awareness like a Zen Master. It uses binaural beats to train the brain as you wear headphones and listen to a soundtrack, and after time your brainwave patterns become more symmetrical, meaning that you are calmer and not as easily swept into drama as before. I’ve already written a testimonial about my experience with Holosync here.  It really works for me. If you want to skip my testimonial, and read about Holosync from the source, here it is: Centerpointe.