Wellness and Balance

Posted on November 20, 2015 by rick_ranum

As I update this blog page I am amazed that almost a month has passed since my last update. Spring is getting me outside on projects, projects such as maintaining our property, planting plants, and enjoying the sun. One project I am really interested in is wellness. I have been studying and making notes so that I can begin a new area of the website focused on wellness. The more I study the more I know how important it is to see our bodies as complex systems. When you think about it, there are few if any components of our bodies that we can do without. And that is most pronounced when considering internal components.

Our health is very dependent on harmony and balance. That harmony and balance begins in the mind. It is easy to realize our thoughts create our reality. There has been much research tying particular attitudes and emotional states to groups of diseases.

Our bodies take in food, water, and air. And then, they extract nutrients and assimilate those nutrients. If there is a problem assimilating any nutrient, there is a problem beginning or existing in the body because of the lack of assimilation. It is not possible to assimilate something if it is not available to our body and our diet is so important in providing the proper nutrients.

Our bodies take in nutrients and then have to eliminate everything not assimilated. Eliminations are another place where if the process of eliminating is not working correctly conditions will occur in the body that we consider dis-ease.

Circulation is another area of importance. Circulation includes the cardiovascular system and the lymph system.

So, as soon as I can, I am starting this section of the website. I wish you all a wonderful day.

Ideals, Healing, Purpose

Posted on November 19, 2015 by rick_ranum

If you are healed what will you do differently with your life? (Why correct the physical condition unless there’s also going to be an inner correction? People who are looking for both inner and outer healing are the best candidates for restored health and vitality.)

Why do some heal from a disease and others do not? Is healing some large biology experiment? Will changing this food, adding this vitamin, getting a massage or chiropractic adjustment, eating certain foods, or changing your mind bring healing? All of these and more can be helpful. My research and experience point to the necessity of reestablishing balance in the physical body to help facilitate healing from within. The first fundamental idea about healing requires a creative balance between two principles: 1. Being in attunement and harmony with our spiritual source. 2) Taking responsibility for our own healing process.

Illness can be understood as the result of dis-ease in life, that we are not at peace, or living our lives in accord with deeper purposes – we are out of balance. “Dis-ease” starts when one part of the body draws energy from another part. One portion of an organism may become overcharged with the creative life force, while another portion becomes undernourished. The result is a gradual disintegration of the body and the onset of illness.

With an understanding and application of deeper purposes rejuvenation is possible. Rejuvenation requires the creation and alignment with spiritual ideals, proper bodily assimilations and eliminations, skeletal alignment, full nervous system balance and alignment, and a purpose in life. In other words we need a balance of body, mind, and spirit. Balance will even keep the body rejuvenating itself.

Our thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and purpose in life contribute to health or illness. Yes – the attitude we hold regarding health and healing is important. So what do we do to heal. How can we create and maintain an ideal attitude for healing? There is an ideal attitude for healing for each person. An ideal attitude is derived from personal ideals which give stability, guidance and orientations and a criterion for judgments. I recommend the following cognitive-behavorial approach since it brings to awareness the attitudes and beliefs upon which a person is operating and links the mental dimension to concrete behaviors. That approach is to write down one’s ideals on paper. The process involves making three columns headed: SPIRITUAL, MENTAL AND PHYSICAL and listing words under each which signify the meaning of each category. The spiritual ideal is a person or concept which conveys the highest sense of purpose or meaning to which one may ascribe. The mental ideal is the mental attitude which is consistent with the spiritual ideal. The physical ideal is the behavior or physical manifestation of the spiritual ideal.

The use of ideals has important clinical implications. Persons who have high spiritual ideals, but whose mental attitudes and physical behaviors fall short of these spiritual ideals, may be prone to self-condemnation (and depression) for failing to live up to their own standards. Or, they may project their perceived shortcomings onto others. Self-blame or blaming of others is likely to lead to psychological and/or interpersonal problems. On the other hand, a person with low spiritual ideals (or the complete absence of them) may find life meaningless, boring and empty. A person without a sense of ideals will often experience illness as a tragedy (even life as a personal tragedy). Disease provokes fear and a sense of being victimized by something outside and beyond oneself.

Focusing on ideals shifts consciousness. We have to take some degree of responsibility for our situation. We must define a course of action that takes all aspects of our experience (spiritual, mental and physical) into consideration. People who are able to make such an attitude adjustment feel more empowered to deal with illness. They have a greater sense of purpose and meaning in life. They have a reason to be healed – to manifest a high spiritual ideal.

After you have done the ideals exercise above (do it on paper), use the following questions to help you discover your Ideal Attitude for Healing.

What is your purpose for being healed?
Is health merely a goal to be achieved?
Do you daily give thanks for whatever degree of wellness that you experience?
Do you truly desire to be well or merely to avoid pain?
Do you expect to be healed?
Are your thoughts and attitudes conducive to being healed?
Is your lifestyle (behaviors) conducive to being healed?
Have you included the spiritual, mental and physical aspects of the protocol into your ideals?
What is the ideal attitude to hold regarding health and healing?

What if you are not ill? Then now is a wonderful time to engage the processes above to allow a healthy life to continue unabated. This unabated healthy life flows from being in accord with your ideals and some simple principles such as:

Maintaining a well-balanced diet (high percentage of vegetables and fruits)
Regular exercise (walking very good, but anything that raises your heart rate)
The role of attitudes and emotions
Relaxation and recreation
Keeping our physical bodies cleansed – both on the outside and the inside

Hypnosis and Healing: I think of hypnosis as helping create harmony and balance in the lives of those desiring to change.

Where you are in your life right now? What do you think about? What do you do? How do you feel? Your inner voice, is it kind, angry, sad, happy, depressed, delightful, guilty, unworthy or other? Where are you physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually? Do you have a purpose? Are you all that you want to be? On a scale of one to ten, with one being very depressed and 10 being living in joy, what number are you? Could your life be more balanced? More purposeful? The wise ones all say life must be lived for something, not just lived.

So the role of hypnosis is to bring change. Change that helps to bring balance. Let’s imagine there is a goddess trapped in an onion. She could be a large onion, with many thick layers, or a small onion with fewer and finer layers. Imagine one of her behaviors is heavy smoking and the heavy smoking is stuffing some emotion or emotions, and the emotions are connected to events in her life. Lets say she is in an abusive relationship and her emotions about that are too much for her conscious mind to deal with. So, she smokes to stuff the feelings, to deaden her senses. Now, the guy in the relationship may not be the real issue. The real issue may be a childhood experience that was very traumatic and she is being run by that event on an emotional level with certain triggers she picks up on from people. She doesn’t know why she reacts the way she does.

To peel this issue from the onion, is going to require peeling one or layers; stop the smoking layer, changing or ending the abusive relationship layer, reframe childhood trauma layer, and more. Events are reframed so that she experiences forgiveness. Forgiveness is a necessary change in coming into balance.

That is just one example. The most important thing to realize, is that hypnosis is, at present, and in my estimation, the best way to produce change in the subconscious mind, then change occurs at the conscious level.

Stress

Posted on November 19, 2015 by rick_ranum

It seems these days that so many health practitioners from diverse modalities are citing stress as the major component in disease. We have just experienced massive stress in the Pacific Northwest from a snow and ice storm. Throughout all time entire civilizations have disappeared when some crucial variable changes. Today we have crucial variables in our energy systems. Having the power out for an extended period of time would bring our current version of civilization down. I believe on some primitive level of knowing, we know just how vulnerable a population can be. We remember Hurricane Katrina and many memories go much further back.

I think that disruptions like the one we recently experienced break the everyday trance like state we live in. When the power is out and people are trapped in their homes, fear and stress are a common response. If people were more prepared this wouldn’t be as much of an issue, however it would still have impact. From talking with people since the storm there seems to be a great desire to not consider how bad something like this could become — back to the prior trance state. Or as some would say, no point in dwelling on the past.

When a major event takes place, for example, the great depression, there is usually a shift in the thinking of the population. My parents because of being in the group experiencing the great depression, were forever changed in the way they conserved everything. They did without, saved money, and tended to be more prepared mentally and physically to deal with such stresses.

Currently our group experience of the change in the fortunes and the nature of America will have long lasting effects on most of us. In many ways we are learning what our parents knew. We are also experiencing a “mini-shift” in our consciousness from the storm.

So, stress is a very difficult thing to live with. In ancient times, stress was not as continuous as it is now. I mean, if a big storm was approaching we would not have days of broadcasts filling people with fear and anxiety, the storm would come and we would deal with it in the present, the now.

We are immersed in stressful lives. We are bombarded by the media. Something made me open Bruce Lipton’s book The Biology of Belief last night and he wrote: “We live in a “Get Set” [on your mark, get set, go] world and an increasing body of research suggests that our hyper-vigilant lifestyle is severely impacting the health of our bodies, our daily lives (particularly the media) are constantly activating [this stress] priming our bodies for action…. Almost every major illness that people acquire has been linked to chronic stress.”

Stress, fight or flight, strong emotions, fear masked as anger, hurt, fear of pain or loss; what are we to do about it? Back to one of my favorite book titles again, Your Body Believes Every Word You Say, it also believes what you think and remember consciously and unconsciously. You become what you think, you become what you say, as ever is your mind the creator of all aspects of your reality. (consider psychosomatic possibilities)

And, as much as I focus on our minds and important causal agents in our lives there is something else to consider. Sometimes stress, fear and anxiety are coming from physiological conditions already created by our thoughts and actions. Choices can result in injured bodies. Diet can lead to imbalances. The functioning, health, and balance of the nervous system and the endocrine glands is another important area.

Stress is a very big subject area.

“If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading.” Lao Tsu

Posted on November 19, 2015 by rick_ranum

Last week was wonderful! I heard from two clients that life was going very well. One released over four months of debilitating anxiety in one session and the other is finding joy in life after a crisis of meaning in four sessions.

Victor Frankl was a survivor of Nazi concentration camps and he learned and shared during his life in books and Psychotherapy. One of these learning’s was, that there are many things in our lives we have no control over, we do have the choice of how we respond to those things.

I worked with a client once who would get so mad at her husband if he changed his plans after saying he was going to do something. She couldn’t see that she did the same thing and allowed herself that flexibility. She would take his changes as directed personally at her. Her anger and name calling only served to make her ill. She said she didn’t like being ill. It appeared from her actions that she liked feeling mad, right, and victimized. Anger and similar emotions will make most anyone ill.

Our glands secrete according to impulses from the emotional and nervous system. Anger, resentments, contention, hate, self-condemnation, animosity, and related nervous tensions in turn deplete bodily energies, block eliminations and generally create a condition which predisposes the system to disease. Attitudes and emotions involve nerves and glands.

Here is some good news: Joyful thoughts create the opposite effect in our bodies. We get healthier.

Lao Tsu is one of my favorite people.

If there is to be peace in the world,
There must be peace in the nations.
If there is to be peace in the nations, There must be peace in the cities.
If there is to be peace in the cities, There must be peace between neighbors.
If there is to be peace between neighbors, There must be peace in the home.
If there is to be peace in the home, There must be peace in the heart.
Lao Tzu

The Link Between Meaning and Depression

Posted on November 19, 2015 by rick_ranum

If someone believes there is no meaning in the universe, can there be meaning in their life? One of my clients is an atheist. Hers is a belief system with similarities and differences to other atheists. She chooses to do the right things in her life just because it feels best for her. I know of two brothers one of whom believed he created his reality. The other brother would punch him and say “how did you create that?”

I am reading a book by an MD who has used hypnosis throughout his many years as a doctor. In it he expressed something I think about all the time and have rarely seen in writing by other hypnotherapists. He has observed that there is a link between depression and meaninglessness of life for some clients.

Here is what he said: “Spirituality is very different from religiosity. One does not need to belong to any organized denomination or sect to wonder about the meaning of one’s own life. It is psychologically depressing to lead a meaningless life, and many of my depressed patients have lost track of the idea that all of our Creator’s children are precious even though none are perfect” Dabney Ewin.

I don’t preach to clients and they are not coming to me to change their religion. I am just very interested in their core beliefs in how their universe functions and their place in it. Where I grew up the prevailing religion was that of a male god, that was demonstrating some pathological psychology. He loved us and created us. We then had one chance at either going to heaven or hell. Having a god who would create a system like this, and then could not forgive us, or give us another chance before casting us into hell, to be tortured for eternity for not being good enough, started to seem crazy once I was old enough to reason such things. A god that would cast us into hell for eternity is one unevolved god. This is a god to be feared. I began to wonder how God could be anything but pure love and that there is a loving meaning underlying the universe no matter what is happening.

If someone grows up in such a culture of retribution fear and unforgiveness, how does this affect their life? How do they treat others? How do they treat themselves?

If one believes that the world is flat and ships fall off somewhere into some unknown abyss, she or he is not likely to take up sailing. If someone knows there is a continuity to the ocean, that they will be able to sail around the world and return, there is a strong tendency to manifest courage and anticipation over fear, to then set out and have new experiences.

There are twenty major religions in the world, each a belief system that programs a holistic movie into the consciousness and unconscious of those brought up in any of those religions. How did we end up being born where we were born? How would we think, feel, and see the world today if we were born somewhere else, and into another religion, philosophy, or no religion at all?

Whatever one believes, it is a good belief, if this belief, makes him or her, a kinder, and more loving human.

Television: Opiate of the Masses

Posted on November 19, 2015 by rick_ranum

I just found an interesting article about television (and video games) written ten years ago. It is quite interesting so here it is most of it.

“Alright junkies, I know you don’t like staring at long strands of motionless text, and I know it’s a struggle for you to analyze and comprehend the meaning of complex sequences of words. But if you give me just a few minutes, I will let you in on a little secret that marketers and governments have been relying on for decades. That television you watch every day, your secret best friend, is an addictive opiate, and not only that, it’s one of the most potent mind control devices ever produced. And I’m not just basing this on intuition. I have the neurological evidence to prove it.

Although the definitions are vague and somewhat misleading, the word “addiction” usually refers to a psychological or physical dependence on a particular experience that must be repeated in order for a person to be comfortable. Usually, we think about this in terms of chemical addiction, which occurs when the addict’s chemical of choice reorganizes the nervous system so that it requires the presence of that chemical to operate smoothly.

Of course, not all addictions are chemical. Any behavior that leads to a pleasurable experience will be repeated , especially if that behavior requires little work. Psychologists call this pattern “positive reinforcement” . This is what we mean, technically speaking, by addiction. In this sense, television certainly fits into the category of an addictive agent.

When you watch TV, brain activity switches from the left to the right hemisphere. In fact, experiments conducted by researcher Herbert Krugman showed that while viewers are watching television, the right hemisphere is twice as active as the left, a neurological anomaly. The crossover from left to right releases a surge of the body’s natural opiates: endorphins, which include beta-endorphins and enkephalins. Endorphins are structurally identical to opium and its derivatives (morphine, codeine, heroin, etc.). Activities that release endorphins (also called opioid peptides) are usually habit-forming (we rarely call them addictive). These include cracking knuckles, strenuous exercise, and orgasm. External opiates act on the same receptor sites (opioid receptors) as endorphins, so there is little difference between the two.

In fact, strenuous exercise, which produces the nominal “runner’s high”- a release of endorphins that flood the system, can be highly addictive, to the point where “addicts” who abruptly stop exercising experience opiate-withdrawal symptoms, namely migraine headaches. These migraines are caused by a dysfunction in opioid receptors, which are accustomed to the steady influx of endorphins.

Indeed, even casual television viewers experience such opiate-withdrawal symptoms if they stop watching TV for a prolonged period of time. An article from South Africa’s Eastern Province Herald (October 1975) described two experiments in which people from various socio-economic milieus were asked to stop watching television. In one experiment, several families volunteered to turn off their TV’s for just one month. The poorest family gave in after one week, and the others suffered from depression, saying they felt as though they had “lost a friend.” In the other experiment, 182 West Germans agreed to kick their television viewing habit for a year, with the added bonus of payment. None could resist the urge longer than six months, and over time all of the participants showed the symptoms of opiate-withdrawal: increased anxiety, frustration, and depression.

The signs of addiction are all around us. The average American watches over four hours of television every day, and 49% of those continue to watch despite admitting to doing it excessively. These are the classic indicators of an addict in denial: addicts know they’re doing harm to themselves, but continue to use the drug regardless.

Recent studies on laboratory rats show that opioid-receptor stimulants induce addictive behaviors. The evidence is conclusive: all opioids are addictive! Even the ones your body produces naturally. The television set works as a high-tech drug delivery system, and we all feel its effects. The question is, can an addiction to television be destructive? The answer we receive from modern science is a resounding “Yes!”

First of all, when you’re watching television the higher brain regions (like the midbrain and the neo-cortex) are shut down, and most activity shifts to the lower brain regions (like the limbic system). The neurological processes that take place in these regions cannot accurately be called “cognitive.” The lower or reptile brain simply stands poised to react to the environment using deeply embedded “fight or flight” response programs. Moreover, these lower brain regions cannot distinguish reality from fabricated images (a job performed by the neo-cortex), so they react to television content as though it were real, releasing appropriate hormones and so on. Studies have proven that, in the long run, too much activity in the lower brain leads to atrophy in the higher brain regions.

It is interesting to note that the lower/reptile/limbic brain correlates to the bio-survival circuit of the Leary /Wilson 8 Circuit Model of Consciousness. This is our primal circuit, the base “presence” that we normally associate with consciousness. This is the circuit where we receive our first neurological imprint (the oral imprint), which conditions us to advance toward anything warm, pleasurable and/or protective in the environment. The bio-survival circuit is our most infantile, our most primal way of dealing with reality.

A person obsessed with the pursuit of physical pleasure is probably fixated on this circuit; in fact the Freudians believed an opium addiction was an attempt to return to the womb. We could logically deduce that such addictions occur when higher brain functions are anesthetized and the newly dominant lower brain seeks out pleasure at any cost. Taking this into account, television is like a double edged sword: not only does it cause the endocrine system to release the body’s natural opiates (endorphins), but it also concentrates neurological activity in the lower brain regions where we are motivated by nothing but the pursuit of pleasure. Television produces highly functional, mobile “bio-survival robots.”

Herbert Krugman’s research proved that watching television numbs the left brain and leaves the right brain to perform all cognitive duties. This has some harrowing implications for the effects of television on brain development and health. For one, the left hemisphere is the critical region for organizing, analyzing, and judging incoming data. The right brain treats incoming data uncritically, and it does not decode or divide information into its component parts.

The right brain processes information in wholes, leading to emotional rather than intelligent responses. We cannot rationally attend to the content presented on television because that part of our brain is not in operation. It is therefore unsurprising that people rarely comprehend what they see on television, as was shown by a study conducted by researcher Jacob Jacoby. Jacoby found that, out of 2,700 people tested, 90% misunderstood what they watched on television only minutes before. As yet there is no explanation as to why we switch to the right brain while viewing television, but we do know this phenomenon is immune to content.

For a brain to comprehend and communicate complex meaning, it must be in a state of “chaotic disequilibrium.” This means that there must be a dynamic flow of communication between all of the regions of the brain, which facilitates the comprehension of higher levels of order (breaking conceptual thresholds), and leads to the formation of complex ideas. High levels of chaotic brain activity are present during challenging tasks like reading, writing, and working mathematical equations in your head. They are not present while watching TV.

Levels of brain activity are measured by an electroencenograph (EEG) machine. While watching television, the brain appears to slow to a halt, registering low alpha wave readings on the EEG. This is caused by the radiant light produced by cathode ray technology within the television set. Even if you’re reading text on a television screen the brain registers low levels of activity. Once again, regardless of the content being presented, television essentially turns off your nervous system.

In addition to its devastating neurological effects, television can be harmful to your sense of self-worth, your perception of your environment , and your physical health. Recent surveys have shown that 75% of American women think they are overweight, likely the result of watching chronically thin actresses and models four hours a day.

Television has also spawned a “culture of fear” in the U.S. and beyond, with its focus on the limbic brain-friendly sensationalism of violent programming. Studies have shown that people of all generations greatly overestimate the threat of violence in real life. This is no shock because their brains cannot discern reality from fiction while watching TV.

Television is bad for your body as well. Obesity, sleep deprivation, and stunted sensory development are all common among television addicts.

So I hope we’ve firmly established that television is an addictive drug, one that is no better than opium, heroin, or any other opiate. Television is just as (and possibly even more) harmful to the body-brain as every other drug. But there’s one big difference. All other drugs apparently pose a threat to the established social order. Television, however, is a drug that is actually essential to maintaining the social infrastructure. Why? Because it brainwashes consumers to throw money at the gaping void of their meaningless, terror-filled lives. And by brainwashed, I mean they’ve been hypnotized using very subtle and established techniques which, when coupled with television’s natural effects on brain waves, make for the most ambitious psychological engineering ruse ever concocted.

Psychophysiologist Thomas Mulholland found that after just 30 seconds of watching television the brain begins to produce alpha waves , which indicates torpid (almost comatose) rates of activity. Alpha brain waves are associated with unfocused, overly receptive states of consciousness. A high frequency alpha waves does not occur normally when the eyes are open. In fact, Mulholland’s research implies that watching television is neurologically analogous to staring at a blank wall.

I should note that the goal of hypnotists is to induce slow brain wave states. Alpha waves are present during the “light hypnotic” state used by hypno-therapists for suggestion therapy.

When Mulholland’s research was published it greatly impacted the television industry, at least in the marketing and advertising sector. Realizing viewers automatically enter a trance state while watching television, marketers began designing commercials that produce unconscious emotional states or moods within the viewer. The aim of commercials is not to appeal to the rational or conscious mind (which usually dismisses advertisements) but rather to implant moods that the consumer will associate with the product when it is encountered in real life. When we see product displays at a store, for instance, those positive emotions are triggered . Endorsements from beloved athletes and other celebrities evoke the same associations. If you’ve ever doubted the power of television advertising, bear this in mind: commercials work better if you’re not paying attention to them!

An addictive mind control device . . . what more could a government or profit-driven corporation ask for? But the really sad thing about television is that it turns everyone into a zombie, no one is immune. There is no higher order of super-intelligent, nefarious beings behind this. It’s the product of our very human desire to alter our state of consciousness and escape the hardships of reality .

We’re living in a Brave New World , only it’s not so brave, or even that new. In fact, it’s starting to look more and more like the Dark Ages, with the preliterate zombie masses obeying the authority of the new clergy: Regis Philbin and Jerry Springer .”

Television:Opiate Of The Masses By: Wes Moore May 5, 2001

http://www.disinfo.com/2010/01/television-opiate-of-the-masses/

Hypnosis, Float Tanks, and Sensory Deprivation

Posted on November 19, 2015 by rick_ranum

Being in a trance is physically like being in a floatation tank. Most of our day we are closely connected to our body as our mind constantly monitors and evaluates many many inputs of stimulus data. In trance there is a very different relationship to the body as the mind is freed from dealing with so much data. The body is forgotten, it is allowed to rest, completely stimulus free. If there is a body feeling it often ranges from feeling relaxed and heavy, relaxed and light, or no “feeling” at all. The mind is simply free.

Being in a trance is like being in a floatation tank where you are assisted to create a happier reality. Everyone coming to see me is really wanting to be happier no matter what the issue may be. Learning to float in a trance is learning to experience the pleasure of full relaxation both body and mind.

Here is some new research found on wikipedia about float tank sessions. (the tank on the left retails online for $49,999.00)

“New research undertaken at the Human Performance Laboratory at Karlstad University Sven-Åke Bood[11] concludes that regular floatation tank sessions can provide significant relief for chronic stress-related ailments. Studies involving 140 people with long-term conditions such as anxiety, stress, depression and fibromyalgia found that more than three quarters experienced noticeable improvements. Dr. Bood commented: “Through relaxing in floating tanks, people with long-term fibromyalgia, for instance, or depression and anxiety felt substantially better after only 12 treatments”. Research targeted the effectiveness of floatation treatment with regard to stress related pain and anxiety over the period of seven weeks. 22 percent of the participants became entirely free of pain and 56 percent experienced clear improvement. Broken down to various symptoms, the results were as follows: 23 percent slept better, 31 percent experienced reduced stress, 27 percent felt less agony and 24 percent became less depressed or got rid of their depression altogether. The research also confirms the findings of an earlier thesis that floatation, after only twelve sessions, substantially improves sleep patterns leaving users more optimistic and with reduced nervousness, tension and pain. Relaxing in a weightless state in the silent warmth of a flotation tank activates the body’s own system for recuperation and healing, said Sven-Åke Bood. What researchers find particularly gratifying is that the positive effects were still in evidence 4 months after the floating treatment ended.”

Here in Olympia, we have Olyfloats http://www.olyfloat.com/floathome/

Hypnosis is this state of weightlessness, or a state of heaviness, or a state of not feeling the body at all. It is a state that is most easily experienced in hypnosis or in a sensory deprivation tank.

This study included 12 sessions in the tank.

“I just love you, I don’t care what happens to you”

Posted on November 19, 2015 by rick_ranum

It was suggested I read and consider an article in Oprah Magazine. The article was titled How to Love More by Caring Less by Martha Beck. I read it, I pondered it, and ultimately shared it. The following are excerpts from the article.

” It was in the midst of processing all this that I suddenly heard myself say, ‘Well, Loretta, I just love you. I don’t care what happens to you.‘ The statement shocked me as it left my lips. But even as I mentally smacked myself upside the head, a funny thing happened: Loretta visibly relaxed. I could feel my own anxiety vanishing, too, leaving a quiet space in which I could treat Loretta kindly. It was true—I really didn’t care what happened to her. No matter what she did, I wouldn’t love her one bit less. Since then I’ve found that loving without caring is a useful approach—I’d venture to say the best approach—in most relationships, especially families. If you think that’s coldhearted, think again. It may be time you let yourself love more by caring less…. on an emotional level, our brains are designed to mirror one another. As a result, when we’re anxious and controlling, other people don’t respond with compliance; they reflect us by becoming—press the button when you get the right answer—anxious and controlling. Anger elicits anger, fear elicits fear, no matter how well meaning we may be…

[Having] your loved one’s cooperation would be lovely, but you don’t absolutely need it to experience any given emotional state… For now, the goal is just to try believing, or merely hoping, that even if all your loved ones remain toxically insane forever, it’s still possible you’ll find opportunities to thrive and joys to embrace.

I always focus on creating my own happiness… sanity begins the moment you admit you’re powerless over other people…. This is the moment you become mentally free to start trying new ideas, building new relationships, experimenting to see what situations feel better than the hopeless deadlock of depending on change from someone you can’t control…. You have the freedom to live and let live, to love and let love. Granting yourself that freedom is one of the healthiest, most constructive things you can do for yourself and the people who matter to you. And if you disagree, I truly, respectfully, lovingly do not care.”

If you wish to read the whole article here is the link >

T T Liang

Posted on November 19, 2015 by rick_ranum

I first studied Tai Chi extensively in the 1970’s while living in Cincinnati. Later I studied with another teacher in St. Paul Minnesota (I cannot remember his name). At one point in the early 1980’s the company I worked for asked me to open a new territory in St. Cloud Minnesota. There I met T.T. Liang. He was 86 years old at the time and in St. Cloud with his wife because his daughter was a graduate student at St. Cloud State University. I loved TT! I studied with him and Stuart (his number one), for quite some time. I learned his 150 movement long form, Tai Chi Sword and Push hands. The best learning was that of wisdom from TT. I currently teach Tai Chi to a couple of students. I do not charge for lessons. I am still learning about Tai Chi and always will be. It is a long term, life time, study. If you think about it, it took most of us a couple of years to really begin to master walking and running and skipping and hopping.

Tai Chi has been shown to help with many things: reduced stress, anxiety and depression, enhanced mood, balance, arthritis, pain control, cognitive effects of chemotherapy, depression in the elderly, bone health and inflammation in postmenopausal women. If you like to read articles here is a link to my links page with many articles on the benefits of learning and doing Tai Chi.

Join the class if you so desire.