We are born into the world with a brain that first operates from instinct and feeling to promote survival during a relatively long vulnerable period, as the young child's body and mind develop together.  Young children unconsciously adopt thoughts and attitudes about their emotions in order to adapt to their environments and situations.  In many ways the mind sets preferences for some feeling states being more desirable (positive) than others, seeking behaviors (by self and others) that are somehow "rewarding" in this respect.  Although necessary in childhood, this system of labeling and reactively chasing or avoiding feeling states becomes subconsciously incorporated into our personal identities and carried forward into adolescence and adulthood.  It is then that we experience their limiting effects through work and relationship challenges and a wide variety of unfulfilling behaviors and life choices.  

So how can we unlearn the preferences and aversions adopted long ago?  By establishing a regular practice of compassionately sensing into the body and welcoming each element that appears, we can begin to observe the complex interplay of the mind's thoughts and judgments with bodily feeling and sensation. Grounded in the security of present time reality it is possible to unravel deep seated entanglements that trap, limit, deny, or control the flow of  life energy within us.  Courageously acknowledging sources of early childhood longing or fear that attached to ways of feeling or not feeling opens a doorway to deep self acceptance, as the innocence of childhood survival strategies are recognized and appreciated.  From this perspective, feelings now can be sensed freshly and, free of limiting judgment, their energy allowed to arise, move through the body, and pass.

In this age of individualism we have fallen away from deep personal relationships with each other.  Casual, superficial connections abound, being facilitated and driven by various forms of electronic media.  But something vital goes missing when depth is ignored: how to simply and truly be with another human being in ways that support openness, honesty, vulnerability, and freedom to change. 
 
The first step to reclaim this capacity is to deepen the relationship with yourself, facing the multifaceted nature of your own psyche, with all its puzzling and tangled inner relationships.  By affirming your worth and offering all parts of yourself compassion and unconditional positive regard (attention, acceptance, appreciation, affection, and allowing), something remarkable begins to happen.  Defenses become visible, knots loosened, formative memories recalled, and present moment awareness strengthened.   Welcome to a path toward  reintegration and wholeness, or, if you will, transcendence.  

It just so happens that this practice is best done in shared company with another trusted person who is interested in doing the same. In this way you practice being with yourself while your friend practices being with you and vice versa when roles are switched  In essence you and your partner (or your group) learn how to simply and truly be with each other in ways that support openness, honesty, vulnerability, and willingness to change.   Find out more about this process and how to adopt it in Books/Resources.

DISCOVER WHOLENESS WITH RADICAL ACCEPTANCE

My previous Journal entry, Suffering Happens, may seem to be rather dark and dense, and leave one hanging.  Well, that is exactly where Survival Mind (a mindset built on fear and insecurity) leads.  Kind of a dead end, of sorts, for many individuals and communities of human beings.  Adopting a secure, unconditionally loving mindset might seem like a complete fantasy or just another form of self deception based in simply thinking positively, thereby exiling 'negativity' into the shadows of the psyche, bound to rise again subconsciously in some form.

Instead, what is being proposed is an empathic, loving attitude that encompasses and transcends both negative and positive (dualism).  This may be hard to grasp, so think of it this way:  There is nothing inherently negative about any thoughts and feelings.  Just the fact that thinking and feeling is happening inside us is miraculous and inherently good.  But, built for survival first, our minds instinctively create positivity and negativity, from which we construct a sense of ourselves and others (personal identities).

By regularly observing inner processes with an attitude of curiosity and wonder, seeing how every part of oneself arising into awareness operates to inform, we can begin to unravel and untangle the complex narratives and stories unconsciously adopted to define (and therefore limit) ourselves and our expression of life energy.  The practice of observing our selves (and others) without judging starts the process of liberation from such identifications, revealing the power of being ever more present.