Morning Reflection--Healing: Fence Posts

Healing: Fence Posts.

We drove a lot of miles this weekend on our run to the mountains. Through city and forest, prairie and mountain there was a lot to look at. In a journey of 120 miles, there’s rivers and roads, boulders and bridges.

More trees than you could ever chop down, and more hills and valleys you could ever hike. Yet one constant running through each caught my eye, and made me realize that I’m getting somewhere on this journey.

Fence posts, and lots of fences.

Because boundaries have always been, and continue to be, something that I struggle with. I don’t know why I grew up feeling responsible for the world, but that overwhelming feeling of needing to help everyone has caused me to sacrifice my own interests and desires in an attempt to feel like I was doing what I was born to do.

It also caused me to worry more about the feelings of others more than I should.

So over the last couple of months I’ve been laying down some psychological fences, and a lot of fence-posts. Some of these are to keep others out, and some of them are very definitely to keep parts of myself within.

After so many years learning about myself, I’ve come to understand that there are facets of my mind that still need to mature a little more before I can unleash them on the world.

But setting up fences has not come easy.

It’s caused me to walk away from people who incite me to care too much. It’s forced me to suspend coaching with people who have come to mean so much to me.

I know it’s caused annoyance and frustration in those who took my kindness for granted, and my assistance as an eternal right. And while it’s been really hard to know that some people have been hurt by my process…

I’m learning to be ok with that.

Not that I enjoy causing hurt or discomfort to anyone, quite the opposite. In my day job as a Chiropractor, I often have to adjust people knowing that it’s going to be sore now, so that it will feel better later, and I still hate that part of what I do.

But the further I walk through this process, the deeper in my soul I descend, the more I realize that I have to look first after me, and then my immediate family, the three people who mean more to me than I can ever say.

Everyone else is essentially expendable.

And prior to this process, the part of me that cared for everyone would have overridden that focus, and screamed about how the world needed me, about how people needed me, and how I owed it to them to be there. I would have struggled against an overwhelming guilt and obligation to care more for others than they would ever care about me.

A philosophy that leads to melancholy and madness.

So it’s not that I don’t care about people, because I do, and it’s not that I won’t be available to help, because I will. It’s just that I’m doing it with a greater balance of focus, and stronger understanding of where my energies should be expended.

My focus has to be on healing myself, and caring for the people who have proven that they are here for me, those who reach out not out of need, but out of friendship, out of love, and a desire to help.

Once I thought I could tend to the universe. Now I have only a garden.

But it will grow.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: Balancing the Old with the New

Healing: Balancing the Old with the New.

It’s a strange thing, to reach back into the past of your mind, and try to bring forward those things that should have matured and changed, but didn’t because they were “trauma-locked” by events beyond your control and understanding.

One part of your mind, the part that feels ancient and weary, is trying to control the other side of your brain, wherein lives an angry 15 year-old teenager, or a frustrated 5 year old, desperate to scream in pain and despair.

To tell you the truth, it’s tiring, being on this emotional rollercoaster.

And while I can see that it’s vitally important that the process go forward, I must admit to having days where I’m so weary of trying to find a balance between these two very disparate aspects of my soul.

Because in truth, I need the child inside of me to grow up, and to do so soon, because some of the skills that I need are locked away in there with him.

Which makes functioning as an adult a little tricky sometimes.

The child portions of my soul control some very important parts of growing up, like facing responsibilities, maintaining good boundaries, self discipline and proper self care. Do you ever find yourself struggling with those aspects – I know I do, and I know what a drain it can be on my life and my family. Of the many facets of my soul that I question, these are some of the hardest.

Because these weaknesses, born of wounds from so long ago, create more wounds going forward, making it harder to heal. One of the greatest truths I ever discovered was that it’s really hard to heal on an emotional battlefield.

Healing takes time, peace, kindness, and a significant absence of judgment, especially when that judgment is coming from yourself.

Which means you have to learn to think about yourself outside of your failings.

To some of us, that’s a real challenge. Trained from childhood by the voices that we heard outside us, that eventually became real inside of us, we judge ourselves with a lack of mercy that we would apply to no-one else.

Yet while we hold ourselves in the stricture of shame, and the restriction of hatred, we are never going to be able to stand the pains that growth and progress exacts from our souls.

And so we become unbalanced, as the old and the new conflict in their desire for growth against the fear of change.

Sometimes it feels like I am being torn apart, as I face my weaknesses day after day. Trying to find the balance of forgiveness for that which I am not, against that which I desire to be.

I think all of us have these juxtapositions in our souls to some degree, yet I cannot find rest within my heart, as much as I crave and require it.

For although I feel that there is progress, it is painfully slow, and I don’t have that much time to spare anymore.

Have you ever felt this way, like you are trying to both mature the parts that were held back while meeting the demands of the aged weary soul that hungers for peace and quiet in a time of neither. If so, I’m curious as to how you achieved it, and still managed to live with yourself.

Because it’s even harder than I thought it would be.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: Hearing with Love and Not Fear

Healing: Hearing with Love and Not Fear.

I am constantly amazed that my wife puts up with me. Over the last 23 years, she’s had to deal with so much because of my weaknesses, flaws and idiosyncrasies. There isn’t a day that goes by that in some way I don’t make life harder for her.

It’s never been intentional, and I think she realizes that, but just because something isn’t malicious doesn’t necessarily mean that it isn’t malignant.

And there are days when I think it gets really old.

Maybe it’s my crazy diet, which makes it hard for her to show love through service (if my wife loves you, she cooks/bakes for you), or maybe it’s my incredibly powerful A.D.D. that makes me a nightmare to keep on track in the office, and forces her to have to remind me incessantly about getting things done.

Or maybe it’s the way that I get locked into an idea, where my A.D.D. reverses itself into a pathological hyperfocus that makes me blind to things that I really need to see.

But there’s something far worse about living with me, and I know it drives her crazy.

Because of the fears in my heart about my self-worth, and struggling to understand every day why she would want to be with me, I overanalyze everything.

If that doesn’t sound too bad to you, just imagine that every word, every action and every reaction that you express is being evaluated and slotted into a profile that allows me to understand you probably deeper than you understand yourself.

Sound ok so far – because if it does, I can assure you that it isn’t.

Of course, my ability to read people can really help, even in our day to day interactions, but there are times when my fears drown out the things that she is really trying to say, and that can inhibit closeness in our relationship in a way that is difficult to live with.

In every romantic relationship, every pairing of two souls trying to make it through this crazy universe, there is an element of listening to each other.

It could be about your day, or your frustrations, or your fears, or just the usual struggles we all have of trying to find our way in a world that makes little to no sense.

And for all of my considerable skills, I often struggle to listen to her without hearing the sound of my fears.

Because when she expresses her frustrations, I hear that I am not making her happy. When she is tired, I hear that she is working too hard, because I am not successful enough.

When she stresses about money, I hear that I have not yet provided for my family in the way that I feel I should. When she is weary from the everyday insanity of life, I hear that I have not yet done enough to look after her.

And because of the way I read every gesture, she never has the chance to be herself without knowing how it will resonate within me.

Which has to be exhausting.

So I’m trying to focus more on how I can be a better husband for her, in spite of my fears, my failings and my shortcomings. I try to listen to her, and not react with my usual distancing and quietness.

I try to be there when she needs to vent, and to ask her the questions that will give her the space to talk freely, openly and honestly about the emotions deep in her heart, so that she might be heard over the sound of my fears.

And heard without someone trying to make suggestions about what could be done to change things.

Which is the ultimate respect I can give her, allowing her to be and to express herself without judgment, without analysis, and without reaction.

Because when I focus on loving her more than on fearing for myself…. Well, I think that is the way she deserves to be treated.

So I’m working on it, even though I fail many, many times.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: The Flow of the River

Healing: The Flow of the River

Sometimes it feels like I’m floating in a river of time and consequence. On occasion, the river is moving slowly; there’s time to admire the scenery, and float quietly and gently through the turns and twists.

In other times, it feels the river is rushing, pounding and driving me towards a waterfall I can barely see, and even less comprehend.

And it feels like I’m being forced into a future I do not want.

But the river is relentless. The current is made of biology and psychology, nature and nurture, wisdom and foolishness, certainty and fear, liberally sprinkled with time, and the ever present elusiveness of questions.

Just when I feel like I’ve gotten my head above water, and am learning to balance in the currents, the flow changes, the river twists, and again I find myself underwater, struggling to breathe in a torrent of doubt, despair and desire.

I know where I want to go, but the river makes it so hard to move sometimes.

So I find myself fighting every day to stay afloat, and to battle against where the default wants to take me, into something ordinary and mundane, trapping me into a life of dullness and drudgery, boredom and banality.

Mistakes made in the past weighing heavily on me, trying to force my future into a futile farce of faked happiness and forced smiles.

For I am scared of where the river wishes to take me, but the only way to change direction, and swim upstream, is to force myself to stand strong against the current.

In standing, each step fighting, forcing my life into a different aspect of the flow, carrying me into different waters, changing the directions at each fork in the river, toward different outcomes, greater possibilities, and a deeper sense of peace.

And while I don’t yet have an exact vision of what it will look like, I cannot help but chase a different future in the present.

Because I know where a failure to change will lead me, and that place fills me full of terror. For I have seen in vision the future that awaits me if I do not become the person who stands against the flow, and that future is full of regret, and bitterness and loss.

The river is an indiscriminate killer of hope, and joy and dreams.

All you can do is stand against the current, and battle it with everything that you’ve got.

Which is why you need to be determined and disciplined in your desires for a different shore to end up on. For each rapid in the river is a chance to improve, each fork a possibility for change, each waterfall a chance to move faster or fall into oblivion, each peaceful waterway a chance to weep or take strength.

Each moment brings the opportunity to fight or to fail.

The longer I spend in this river, allowing it to determine my direction, is to court sadness and loss, hopelessness and fear.

And even though the current is swift, the twists and turns treacherous, and the force of the water strong, I am not without strength, and wisdom, and weapons.

If I wish to heal myself, I have to choose my path in the river, and use everything I have to determine my own path, away from where time and the flow of the world wishes to take me.

For I have seen that trap, and I will not live it.

I choose another way, another path, another mission.

And my choice is my own.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: Are You Enough for Yourself?

Healing: Are You Enough for Yourself?

It’s a strange question isn’t it. I ask it because we seem to spend so much of our time worrying if we are enough for someone or something, and we always seem to give the power of the final judgment on ourselves over to somebody else.

As though they have the ability to tell us something that should be obvious to ourselves, yet for some reason we will not listen.

Is it because we don’t want to answer the question?

We are never really going to find peace in this life unless we ask the question, and then act upon the answer that we receive from ourselves. I think this may be the most important question we can ever ask ourselves, as the answer determines how we carry ourselves in the world, and especially how we act in our relationships with others.

And yet we are never taught how to ask, nor how to answer.

So since we don’t know how to ask ourselves, we trust in the opinions of others, which is how we lose our sense of ourselves.

Over the last 6 weeks or so, as I’ve pulled back from so many things in my life so that I might have the emotional quietude in which to hear, I’ve been struggling with these questions of life.

If I were to die tomorrow, would I feel like I had done enough to be happy? If I could not lose, would I be doing the same things as I am right now? What would I do if I knew I only had a fixed amount of time left? Who would I talk to, and what would I say?

And ultimately, am I really living the life I want to?

If you’re like me in any way, these are not easy questions to answer, for none of the answers bring a sense of peace. Do I feel like I have done enough to be happy – not in the least. I feel like I have only just begun to see a possible happiness in the future.

Of course, there’s a part of me that begs the question about why I can’t just be happy right now, but I know that answer, and it’s a long one.

Because knowing a truth in your mind is not the equivalent of carrying it in your soul.

If I could not lose, would I be doing the same things – absolutely not. If I honestly knew that I couldn’t fail, I’d be coaching full time, day after day.

It brings me the most peace, joy, contentment and understanding, yet right now making that jump would be financial suicide, so I have to find a way to mange where I am at, until the day arrives when I can make the changes to do what I honestly feel is my gift, my calling, my mission and my joy.

I pray that day comes sooner than I can imagine.

And who would I talk to, and what would I say? That’s a hard one for me, because there are constant conversations in my head that are unfinished with people in my life. Some of those would probably bring me joy, and other conversations are not likely to end as well.

Yet I realize that if I am to gain a sense of personal congruency and authenticity, which is really what this whole healing process is about, than I need to either cut those conversations loose, or get down to the business of making them happen.

Which is at the same time exciting and terrifying.

Because this process of healing that I began 6 weeks ago is both of those, in equal measure. It’s about getting real, and realizing that if I were never to progress from where I am now, I would be miserable in my older age.

It’s about finally getting enough quiet in my head, and being able to decode the discord and disquiet that dominate my thoughts, so that I can understand what I need to do next.

And most of all, this process is about pushing myself to face all of the fears and falsehoods that have held me back for so long. It’s amazing how many of the lies we tell ourselves appear as truths, and how far off of our personal course we can find ourselves when we lose the signals from our soul.

Because each wound unhealed is another voice in the multitude that seeks to carry our attention away from the truths of who we want to be.

And I am so very tired of not being happy with who I am.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: That’s Not Truly Who I Am

Healing: That’s Not Truly Who I Am.

In this journey of helping myself to heal, I’m having to dig really deep into the core of one of my biggest faults. It’s something that has affected me deeply, but also those around me have been victims to it as well.

It’s defined part of our lives, and I’ve been afraid that I’ll spend the rest of my days trying to dig myself out of the hole it’s created.

And for the longest time, I feared that it would rule my life forever.

Because although I’ve been able to make a little headway, it’s not been anywhere near enough, and deep in my soul I have had the mistaken belief that this particular fault was a part of me. But this afternoon (Wednesday), I experienced at a deeper level a truth of something that I have written about before.

That the only true part of ‘us’ is our awareness. Everything else is hardware (biology) or software (psychology).

And while the two are often intermingled, neither of them are the true sense of self. In trying to understand this fault, I realized that what seemed to be inevitably joined to my soul was nothing more than an emotional virus that had been uploaded into my psyche by life, by experiences, and by the generations and society into which I was born.

Essentially, I realized that this facet of my soul is not of me, but of something else.

Which means its removal is in fact possible, and desirable. What seems like a simple realization struck me with an incredible amount of force.

I felt a shift in my very core, as though something that was desperately hanging into me lost its grip for a moment, and when it tried to hold onto me again, its strength was a great deal weaker.

And it’s scared, because know I know it is not an essential, irrevocable part of me, but something I can give up, and remove, without changing the core of who I am.

When something you thought defined you turns out to be something that impedes you, and demeans you, then you become aware that you can let it go without sustaining a moral injury to your core.

Allowing you the freedom to become the person you were always capable of being.

Because there’s nothing more destructive, more divisive and more demeaning than holding into a pathological way of behaving, believing it to be moral and ‘good’, when in fact it is destroying you and those around you.

When you honestly believe that sacrificing yourself day after day for the good of others is right, you’ll know an intense pain and heartache as you suffer and bleed in the depths of your supposed virtue.

And the conflict of your ‘self’ and your supposed virtue will burn you up inside.

But when you finally see that your supposed ‘good’ is wrong, and that the belief is not a part of you but merely an expression of your consciousness, then you can begin to lay down that behavior, and instead become a completely different person in that facet of your soul.

Because there is nothing good, or noble, or moral, about burning yourself down to keep others warm. Yes, we can serve, and yes we can give.

But to exist in a state of behavior that does not balance the exchange of energy and emotion between you is not moral, it is malignant.

And it’s wrong.

So today, I begin anew the struggle against this fault that has existed within me for so long, but now the battle will be different. For I am not fighting with ‘me’, but merely a malignant psychology that can be discarded. I don’t have to sacrifice my soul to overcome this, I just have to exist outside of it.

Knowing that the true me, the consciousness that is aware of me, is all that I have to be. Everything else is a manifestation, or an expression, and can be changed without damage to the core.

I just take the behavior, and lay it down.

It never was a part of me, it just looked like it for a long while.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: The Definitions of Who I Am (How Do You Walk in the World)

Healing: The Definitions of Who I Am (How Do You Walk in the World)

I think everyone who knows us has a different definition of who we are. To my patients, I am their Doctor; one with a definitely unique bedside manner.

I listen as much as I treat, and they share with me things that they feel safe talking about, hopefully understanding that they will be accepted without judgment, and that I will attempt to answer any questions they bring to me with honesty, respect and kindness.

Yet their definition does not define me.

To my friends, I hope I am someone they think of with fondness. While I am sometimes a difficult friend to have, because I’m not very good at small talk or conversations that have no substance, I hope to them I am someone who is helpful, kind, funny and genuine, and that they know I am here for them in any way I can be.

But again, their definitions do not define me.

To my extended family, I think I am a curiosity, bordering on an enigma. To those who see me closer, I think in some ways I defy definition, especially recently.

Through this process of change, this journey deeper into my soul, I believe they are trying to understand those changes in me so that they might understand the new person within their family.

Yet even their redefinitions do not define me.

And within my immediate family, within the blessing of my wife and my children, I believe I can exist without definition. For the love they extend to me does not require me to act, rather simply to be.

In their love I find the space I need to discover the truths within me, and in their goodness I find the reflections of the person I am becoming.

But even their lack of a definition does not define me.

For that choice, that decision, is ultimately mine alone to make, or to even choose not to make. I find myself accepting an ever increasing desire to exist without a definition of myself, so that I am free to ‘be’ in each experience, without needing a rule to guide me.

Trusting the deeper instincts within the moment, always screening them against the principles that resonate inside of me.

So that I might flow through the world in harmony with that which I believe to be goodness, kindness and sincerity.

For often we cling to a sense of identity, that it might shield us against a supposed onslaught of insult and infamy from the world. Yet it is our attachment to a definition that creates within us turmoil and pain, for only when we believe we are something can we experience a sense of loss when that definition is changed, or taken from us.

If we exist as an awareness in the moment, without definition other than “I am”, we will always be exactly who we need to be in that time and in that place.

So as I work through this change, this movement of my soul, I find myself trying to shed my need to be something, other than an expression of the principles which I feel are important: love, kindness, goodness, benevolence, patience, hope and sincerity.

Although I have roles within the world into which I pour my soul, that of Doctor, of friend, of family, of father and of husband, I hope to carry with me those principles and live according to their precepts.

For in the end, who I am, is really who I chose to be.

And in that, I am trying to chose wisely.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: Hunting the Signal

Healing: Hunting the Signal.

The strange thing about changing who you are, becoming somebody different and new, is that nothing seems quite the same as it did beforehand.

You find yourself grateful for things you took for granted, and at the same time you can see clearer than ever how some things were never going to be good for you, even though you hung on to them for far too long.

And some things you have to give up, even though it hurts so much that you want to scream.

But in the midst of this process, this growth, this regeneration, I’ve been seeking for something that was always ephemeral in the first place; a sense of where I was going. It’s so hard to describe what it feels like, but for the longest time I’ve had this sense of where I wanted to end up.

Not necessarily a geographical location, but more of sense of what I would feel like when I had arrived where I was supposed to be.

And I would get glimpses of it in the strangest of places.

Maybe it was in the bustle of a crowded airport terminal, seeing families united again in joy and happiness. Maybe it was seeing a sunset, and hoping one day to feel a sense of ease and peace at the end of a day well done.

Maybe it was in a piece of music as I drove down the highway, that suggested a sense of completeness and alignment.

Wherever and whenever it would occur, I would get this emotion of synchronicity, and I could see the steps before me, and know that I was going the right way.

But now, forcing myself through this crucible, where every part of my life is being restructured, reconfigured and reinterpreted, I find that I am hunting a different signal.

Strangely, even though my mind is quieter than ever now, I find myself struggling harder to hear that signal, and it’s showing up in the oddest places.

Beckoning me down a path that attracts me, and yet terrifies me at the same time.

For now the signal is hidden in the pain and suffering of others. When I see the cruelties of life, I sense an implacable resolve to bring balance and light. Where I see the anguish, I sense solutions to be implemented.

Where I see sadness, loneliness, longing and tears, I sense the way forward. Balancing both my light and shadow, my dreams and fears.

For I fear the place where the signal is leading, but I know I must go there, and soon.

Because the gifts that I have of communication, understanding and compassion are not ones that can bless me, unless I am using them to bless the lives of others. I don’t claim to ‘know’ everything, far from it, but I know that the time is soon coming when I have to take everything that is in me, and follow the signal wherever it leads.

So I’m trying to hear the signal clearer than ever, blocking out everything from my life that distracts me in any way. Maybe I’ll fall flat on my face, be ridiculed, misunderstood and even hated. Maybe I'll lose whatever sense of self and dignity I have in the process.

So be it.

Because if you truly believe, deep down in your soul, that you have something to offer of good in this world, then I believe that you have to stand up and share that as hard as you can.

Sure it might be scary, and it might demand more of you than you’ve ever known, but in the end, if you never try to make a difference, then you’re no different than the ones who started all the pain in the first place.

At some point in your life, you have to disregard what it’s going to cost you, deep in your soul, and just do the things that you feel are right. Sometimes you have to follow that signal into the middle of the dark, and shine your light so brightly, so that you can be a beacon unto others.

At some point you just have to follow your signal.

Because the signal is there, and I am going to follow it, wherever it leads.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: Are You Alive?

Healing: Are You Alive?

Obviously from a basic physiological viewpoint, if you’re not alive, then I’ve somehow managed to attract attention from the afterlife (and if so, hit me up on Facebook, I’d love to hear from you).

But assuming that you’re one of the still breathing, I’d like to pose that same question with a slightly different context.

Do you feel alive?

Because having a pulse, a heartbeat, a blood pressure and a somewhat functioning nervous system isn’t enough. Feeling alive is a sense of joy, of hope, of optimism, and of happiness.

And while I feel like I’ve experienced those at some points in my life, I have to admit that there have been a lot of times when the majority of those have been in short supply.

Because I’ve been living with a lot of negative feelings.

As part of my journey into wherever I’m going, I’ve been trying to understand the genesis of many of these emotions, and I’ve started to recognize that there are some things I’ve felt that began as a result of things that happened to me, and other feelings that are a result of how I was ‘programmed’ to feel about me.

And I want to explain the difference, because I hope it can help you.

As a result of some events that occurred in my formative years, I have a terrible ‘perfection complex’, where I feel like I have to do things really, really well (if not perfectly) in order to have any worth.

While this sounds like a recipe for always becoming better, it’s actually the perfect recipe for creating avoidance, fear and anxiety, and a pretty bad case of ‘analysis paralysis’.

But then those emotions (the result of the events) cause more events, and more emotions.

Because there have been times in my life when I could have just ‘gone for it’ on something, and didn’t, and lived with the regret.

There have been many times when I have started or tried something, and ended up stopping early, not seeing it through, because the fear of not doing it perfectly was so bad that I just ignored it when I could have made it work.

So as a result of actions (inactions really) that were driven by originating emotions, I then felt a second set of emotions, based on anger, self hatred, and disgust.

All of which kind of fill up your emotional radar, until there’s really no space left for a sense of joy, or optimism, or hope. There’s just a sense of dying a little more each day, realizing that every moment going by was another one lost to a sense of sadness, to futility and to failure.

You feel bad about yourself, and feel worse because of what you think that means about yourself.

It’s a vicious cycle that keeps going around and around, until you figure out a way to stop it.

Which is what I’m working on right now. I didn’t expect it to be easy, but wow, I didn’t realize it was going to be this hard. I am making progress, but there are days when I wonder if I’m ever going to get to where I want to be, and find this thing that I’m searching for, this wonderful sense of amazement, of laughter, of hope, of gratitude, and of joy.

I want to feel what it feels to feel alive again.

Because I have people in my life who I stand in awe of, in the way that they express their joy of life. I hate to admit this, but when I see someone who is truly alive in happiness, there’s a big part of me that struggles against a very strong feeling of jealousy. I know that’s not a great response, but hey, I’m trying to be truly honest here.

Because honesty, especially self honesty, is needed now more than ever.

Along with large helpings of forgiveness, of acceptance, of love, and of change.

You see, the people who seem to be the happiest, the most alive and the most vibrant, all seem to be people who have mastered the art of forgiving themselves, of accepting themselves, of loving themselves, and of changing themselves.

So on my journey towards a feeling of being alive, I’m trying to give myself the gift of all of those.

Because I really want to feel joy again. I really, really do.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: The Right to Be

Healing: The Right to Be.

What do you hear in the silence of your soul? I ask, because a significant part of the journey I am now on involves learning to listen to myself at a much deeper level than ever before.

So much of my life up until now has been spent in avoidance, which has looked a lot like caring so much for other people. Yes, I have truly cared (sometimes too much) but if I’m honest, which I’m trying to be, I can realize that part of my ‘caring’ has been a way to avoid listening to what my soul has been screaming at me for so long.

Trying to tell me that something has been missing in the core of me.

Once I realized that I needed to dedicate myself to this journey, I scaled back a lot of things in my life. I wrote the ‘Sabbatical’ post, telling you what was happening to me, and why I was going to be stopping or decreasing the frequency of my posts.

I told coaching clients that I could not support them at the current time, and I have deliberately distanced myself from some people who incite me to care in ways that are sometimes painful for me.

And after removing a lot of distractions, I’m getting down the task at hand, which is listening to the screaming in my soul.

Which sounds a lot easier than it really is, because most of the time, our soul just speaks in emotions that don’t have a lot of explanation behind them. We simply feel things, but don’t necessarily have a great understanding of why, and so we struggle to tease out the meaning.

After all, sadness is an indication of loss, but is that of purpose, of significance, of connection? Anger is the same – it is a secondary emotion that rarely explains itself.

So in all of my listening and writing over the past couple of weeks, I’ve begun to create a shape, or a form, as an explanation for what my soul has been trying to tell me, and it’s been a startling realization to understand that what is missing is something very profound, and considerably problematic.

Because the part I’m missing is “The Right to Be”.

I know that sounds crazy, but please bear with me while I try to explain it. As I’ve made no secret of, I grew up in a home where there was a lot of chaos, and a significant lack of emotional support.

One of the downsides of that type of a home life is that you never have a safe platform to explore who you are, and people can come out of those types of upbringings feeling like the problems were some fault of theirs.

That probably makes no sense unless you’ve been there, but I’ve spoken to so many people who came from a dysfunctional or broken home, who at some point in their childhood created the understanding that the problems were somehow related to who they were.

Maybe if they got better grades, their parents wouldn’t fight so much, or if they were just a better son or daughter, their emotionally unavailable parent would love them more.

So you grow up believing that you are the cause of a lot of the problems in the world, and that you need to become somebody else in order to make that right.

And you lose the right to just be the person who you really were born to be.

Which for me manifests as a constant sense that I can’t live my life for myself, that I always have to be serving someone else. In practice, I struggle to charge for what I do, because I have this deep underlying sense that I should be serving them for free to make up for who I am.

If I find myself with free time, I wrestle with the concept that it’s ok to just do something for myself. Even now, as I write this in the privacy of my office at home, there’s a desire to phrase the words just the right way, so that I might touch the heart of someone who reads this, and help them feel less pain, more peace, and a greater sense of joy.

Because doing something just for me is wrong.

Which sounds very noble, but it’s really incredibly destructive. A child who for whatever reason (and there are many) never gets the emotional and psychological freedom to find out the truths of who they are can live a life that rings hollow, never fully finding a sense of completeness or peace.

It’s like no matter what you do, or who you become in your attempt to right the scales of your life, you’re never going to find that sense of authenticity, or emotional congruency, until you find the answers to your own questions, and become the person who is right for you.

Which means you have to accept that you have a right to become that person, that despite the opinions of others or yourself…. you simply have a Right to Be.

Which can feel incredibly wrong, selfish and terrifying.

But I’m trying to find a sense of peace through this journey, and to do so, I realize that I have to have a right to be me, and to find the sense of who that really is. Not bound by Dogma, or of the opinions of others.

Not even bound by this incessant desire to care so hard that I might balance the scales in opposition to my supposed inadequacies.

But to discover the person who I really am, in the absence of everything and everyone else.

Which for me is such a hard thing to do. I stare with jealousy at those who have a confident congruency in their soul, and I struggle to not care too much for those who are so very important to me.

Withdrawing from the world to walk alone for a while is my way of trying to find the person inside of me, without falling prey to the weaknesses of the thoughts and feelings I carry within.

So I ask you patience while I seem to be gone for a while, because I’m trying to find the right to Be, and the right Me.

The pathway I am walking is a lonely one, but the journey is more necessary that you can possibly imagine.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: The Foundation Run

Healing: The Foundation Run.

If you want to understand a person, try to discover what their personality is built on. For some, it’s a bedrock of feeling of being loved, accepted, cherished and wanted. This generally produces people who are happy, successful, and at peace with themselves.

For others, it’s precariously perched on an unstable tripod of longing, loathing and loss, and produces a person who struggles to feel happiness, thinks poorly of themselves, and has a hard time finding their place or some peace in this world.

The soil doesn’t determine the type of tree, but it sure makes a difference to how it grows.

But accessing the foundation of a person is not easy. Sure, there are fast ways to do it, with sleep deprivation and a focused encounter, a careful cocktail of chemicals or an incredibly powerful feeling of fear, but none of those are kind, respectful or easy to manage the fallout from.

If you really want to get to the depths of someone’s soul in a way that helps rather than hurts, then your best chance is a little process I like to call ‘The Foundation Run’.

But buckle up buttercup– because this one gets real, really fast.

There’s just a few things you need, and like any good meal, your outcome is only going to be as good as your ingredients. You start with a huge spoonful of desire, because unless the person wants to do this, and really understands a deep personal need to get this done, they’re never going to give you access to the core.

But if they really want to change, then you’re ready for your second ingredient.

A guide you can trust.

Because running the core of a broken foundation is tricky, and it’s sure as hell going to hurt someone, if not both of you. If you don’t have a guide who knows how to fly this particular brand of trouble, the chances are that you’ll crash and burn.

But in the hands of someone who drives compassion with wisdom, and kindness with knowledge, you can start the run into someone’s very own heart of darkness.

Which means all you need now is time, and a safe place to scream.

The questions start the process, lightly touching the exterior, gently probing to see the reactions, focusing on the breathing, the tone, the wording of the answers, and the micro-expressions of the body and face.

Modulating intensity with intrigue, you enter the soul, the questions coming faster now, from odd angles, tangential shifts designed to confront from strange angles, succeeding in stealth where strength could never get through.

And the closer you get to the core, the greater the resistance, and the harder and more painful the answers become.

This is where you turn up the wisdom, melding intuition with intention, guiding the person past the wasteland of unknowing, and running right into the defenses of fear, pain and rejection, as their inbuilt desire to avoid the agony of all that is buried inside of them tries to shut them down, and shut you out.

And in that moment, when they’re hurting and lost, feeling their past rather than understanding it, struggling against the tears, the heartache, the loss and the cruel reality of all they have suffered, you execute the final dance of the run.

You challenge the meaning of all that is holding them in pain, help them to see it differently, and in doing so, let it go.

If you’ve done it right, then they’ll likely feel an intense pain that rocks them to their core. It’s like you’re pulling out a splinter that has been lodged in their heart for as long as they can remember.

They may cry, they may scream, and they might even throw up. This is the real pain that they have been suppressing for so long that they feel like a part of their soul is being torn away. This is primal, terrifying and horrific.

This is the soul naked to the universe; broken, bleeding and screaming for the pain to go away.

Which is when you need some pretty powerful people skills, and the ability to hold them in compassion with the absolute and complete absence of any kind of judgment.

People heal when they are accepted, and do not have to alter who they are or what they feel for fear of the opinions or emotions of others. When you can accept another in their entirety of their soul, you can be a light helping to guide them out of the darkness.

And it can be a long journey back.

Because even when you’ve opened the wound in their soul, and hopefully cleaned it with love and acceptance, it still takes a long time for them to heal, learning new patterns of behavior and understanding.

This is when you are needed to most, to hold them in the times when they still struggle to grow and become the person they always wanted to be.

But if the run was done correctly, the rest is just a matter of time and tears.

What are you hiding in your foundation?

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: Balancing the Sword.

Healing: Balancing the Sword.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been fascinated with the sight and sounds of the forging of metal.

Something deep within me is moved by the red hot light from the piece being worked, the sparks and sounds of each hammer blow, and the incredible creations that can come from the repeated heating and pressure applied to a single piece of metal, creating form and function where once there was none.

And I am not unmindful of the way that this mirrors our lives.

Because I kind of feel like I’m in a forge right now. As I move through this healing process, I feel like I am taking new hits from the hammer every day, and every time I feel like things are cooling down for a moment, someone somewhere turns up the heat again, albeit in a different way.

I am trying to keep my focus on the benefits from the process, not on the feelings and struggles I experience along the way.

So I try to imagine myself as the sword in the furnace.

Because the purpose of heating steel in the furnace is to bring to the surface the impurities inherent in the metal. Then, with repeated strikes over and over again, those impurities are struck from the metal, leaving the remaining core purer, stronger, more flexible, and more prepared for the purpose for which the sword is being made.

And this is hardest part of the work.

For no matter how skilled the craftsman, even the greatest cannot produce a work of art with steel that contains too many impurities. So the time is spent, hour after hour, heating until those impurities are revealed, very much like the truths I am facing now as I travel further into my past, deeper into my soul.

As the pressure on me increases, the weaknesses and damaged portions of my foundation rise to the surface, so that I may examine them, understand them, and finally dispose of them.

And although this process is far from easy, or painless, I am beginning to find a sense of gratitude for the lessons along the way.

Because once the steel is refined, then the master craftsman begins to shape the sword, finding within each blade the point of balance and weight, so that the sword can be held and wielded in perfect alignment.

Then, after a process that has stressed the metal in the blade, and strengthened it, shaped it and prepared it, the final part of the process is revealed.

The sharpening of the blade.

For although the blade may be strong, balanced and aligned, the sword is nothing without its edge. In some ways, my very soul is being sharpened, focused and brought into symmetry. I see this as a providence, for the desires I have to go beyond where I am cannot come to pass without a significant change of who I am.

And so I choose to accept this process, and pass within the forge, that I regenerate into the person I most desire to be.
But there is one extra lesson through this journey, and while I sense its necessity, I am saddened by its reality.

I am mindful that the sword is an instrument to cut, and that sometimes, progress means deciding to cut away that which no longer serves you.

For the Latin origin of the word ‘decide’ is de (off) and caedere (cut) to decide is literally to cut off any other way.

To heal from the wounds that beset me, I have to not only cut off the behaviors, fears, false self beliefs and childish notions of how the universe should be, but I also have to cut away some of the relationships in my life that do not uplift me, support me, or that no longer bring joy to me.

And while the loss of these things will hurt me, I have to believe that my future will be brighter through my time and my decisions in the forge that I am currently in.

For now, I am focusing on finding a balance in the sword of my soul.

That I might come through this process more perfectly, and find on the other side a better me .

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: Open

Healing: Open

As I’ve moved into this new phase of my life, trying to go as deep as I can to heal the wounds from my past, I’ve come to the realization that part of the acceptance of healing is to allow yourself to be more open with the people around you.

Not that you have to suddenly start telling your life story to strangers, but that you will deepen your relationships with the significant people in your life if you share the truth of how you are really feeling.

Which isn’t something that comes naturally or easily to me.

Growing up in a home where chaos was a constant, and certainty was in short supply, you get really good at hiding how you feel.

Because somewhere in your early growing years, you come to the realization that not everyone understands or experiences these feelings, and the last thing you want to do as a kid is stand out for being different, because as you know, children aren’t necessarily the most understanding.

So you learn to blend in by lying about who you are, and how you feel.

And like any skill, if you do it long enough, you get really good at it. The more you hide away, the further away from others you feel, even though you’re in the same room, the same family, the same lives.

If you practice this long enough, you even start becoming a stranger to yourself, lost in a sea of suppression, shutting out the feelings, becoming numb, nobody, no-one.

But eventually it catches up with you.

Because we need those real, honest and deep human relationships to allow us to buffer the cruel reality of the world in which we live, and honesty is the key to authenticity and depth in a relationship.

Being truthful about how we feel, rather than acting like everything is ok, is one of the ways you make those bonds stronger, although it feels so foreign, so alien and so unnatural to me.

Opening up is hard, because you fear the reactions of those to whom you lay yourself bare.

Which isn’t a reflection on them – far from it. But the lessons you learn as a child, and carry with you as an adult, are really hard to overcome. In a home where you don’t feel safe to share how you really feel, for fear of the repercussions, you just keep it all inside.

But if home is the place where you’re supposed to be able to be yourself without fear yet you can’t, and you don’t show the world outside because of the ridicule you expect….

You never get a chance to be yourself anywhere.

So now I’m trying to learn how to open up and share the truth of how I feel. Not that I exactly lied previously, but I would have shaded my answers, avoiding extremes to avoid attention. I’m struggling to open up about fears, dreams, doubts and failings.

Thankfully, Holly is patient, and understanding, and is probably well on her way to a degree in dysfunctional psychology. She’s even started using some of my coaching techniques on me…

And you can imagine just how much I’m enjoying that :)

But I’m finding that the more open I am with her, the more authentic and honest our relationship feels, which is amazing given that we are pretty close to each other anyway.

I think it’s been eye opening to her, and yet has clicked some puzzle pieces into place so that she understands me emotionally in a way where previously she could understand logically, but had no emotional frame of reference.

She has held me when I’ve need it, listened when I’ve talked and covered me in compassion. I don’t deserve her, but here she is, and I’m so grateful for her.

So today, I invite you to try to find a deeper connection with the important people in your life by being truly honest about how you feel. The harder it is to share the real you, the more worthwhile you’ll find the process.

Because the deeper your foundations of friendship and love, the greater the peace and happiness you’ll find.

Which is what we’re all here for in the end.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: Acceptance

Healing: Acceptance

As I try to take my first faltering steps on this new pathway, I’m realizing that there are many things that I need to change about the way I live. Which, if you could see what feels like a train wreck of a life, is probably a good thing.

There are so many fundamental things misaligned in my soul that need to be corrected that ‘change’ should really be my best friend right now.

But when you come from a place of chaos, change is usually last thing you want to happen.

Because for me, in my emotional linkages, change usually heralds in chaos, which is then closely followed by pain. Change for me represents something uncertain, which I immediately think is going to end up in something bad or negative, because as a child that was usually the case.

So I fight against change way more than I should. But there’s one thing I’ve fought even harder.

The acceptance that there are things wrong with me, and that I need to be honest about that.

Because it’s one thing to understand logically that you have areas of your soul that aren’t fully formed or working properly, but it’s another thing entirely to actually accept and be open about it.

Coming from the background that I did, I’ve tried for so long to fight against the reality of the scars that it left upon me, trying to convince myself and everyone around me that I was ok.

When in reality, I wasn’t and I’m not.

Which is really hard to admit. We live in a world that is so obsessed with perfection as a way to find worthiness (significance) that we have a hard time admitting to ourselves that sometimes it’s the very people who have walked in the dark who can become the strongest carriers of the light.

If I have any skill in working with people, it’s because I’ve experienced things that allow me to see them without judgment, without condemnation, and without disdain or disrespect.

And yet it’s the acceptance which I give freely unto others that I struggle to apply to myself.

But I realize I am not alone in that. I have people in my life who are wonderful people, yet they only see themselves as flawed. They struggle with their sense of worth as well, because we as a society do a terrible job of being open about our struggles.

From our social media highlight reel to our movies and television, we lie, distort and deceive, portraying perfection as the pinnacle, and failure as the fall.

Making it hard for people to accept themselves, and be open enough to accept the love and friendship of others.

Because when we are not open about our failings, and instead hide them deep inside of us, we remove ourselves from being able to be sure that we are loved.

If we hide our flaws deep within, we become convinced that people only love us for that which they see, and that they would not love us if we only revealed the truth of who we are.

We believe their love is conditional, when it may not be.

So as I work through this new journey deeper into my soul, I find that I need to be honest about who I am, and the struggles and fears that I face.

If I have been able to do any good in this work so far, I think it has come from being able to help people realize that we are all imperfect, we all struggle, we all fall, and sometimes we all need help.

And when you find someone who is ready to be honest about that, it helps us be a little more accepting of ourselves.

So I’m trying to be more honest about the way that I think and feel, knowing that it’s not always going to be pretty, or feel good. But I’m hoping in the honesty that I can be not only a light unto others, but a beacon unto myself.

So that I can finally accept all that is inside of me, and make progress on my journey towards making myself better, and finding peace.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection--Healing: Deciding Who You Grow Up to Be

Healing: Deciding Who You Grow Up to Be.

It sounds crazy to say that at 49 years old, I’m still trying to decide who I want to be when I grow up, but I think there’s more truth to that than even I want to admit to.

I’ve been doing an incredible amount of soul searching over the last few days since my previous post, and what I have to share will probably take a while to sort out, but all of my ponderings have led me to this one vital truth.

I need to heal the child inside of me, and finally become the person I want to be.

We all seem to operate within a preconception that taking another trip around the sun, riding this planet through the void of space, should give us another year of wisdom and maturity, but it doesn’t always happen that way.

I’m sure you’ve met some people who struggle year in and year out to finally feel like a functioning adult, bound to the past by something they have been unable to break through. While they look and sound like fully functional adults, there’s something missing in their soul that aches them to the core.

If you haven’t met someone like that before, well… you have now.

Since I last wrote for you, I’ve done something that hasn’t happened in a long time. I reached out on email to my sister, who still lives in England. Through some very heartfelt and honest communication, we’ve opened us some old wounds, sharing memories of the things that we experienced during our childhood, and how those things made us feel.

While it has been good to reconnect with her, the recollections haven’t been ones that I’ve enjoyed.

Because despite popular opinion, reaching emotional maturity isn’t something that’s guaranteed. The evolution of a child into an adult happens much more reliably in biology than it does in psychology.

For a young boy to grow into a man, the physical body needs nutrition, hydration and rest. For a child to grow into an fully emotional adult he requires safety, compassion, guidance and love.

And if any of those are missing, some rather difficult emotions can occur.

As I’ve gone deeper into myself than ever before, facing sadness and loneliness, grief and loss, I’ve come to a greater realization of all that is broken inside of me, and of the parts of me that are still like a child, crying in the corner, desperately trying to find a way out of the nightmare that he feels like he’s stuck in.

Trauma, it seems, is a very effective deterrent to progressing.

As I sat here tonight (Sunday evening) I finally, for the first time, felt a movement in my soul unlike anything I have felt before. After a week marked by sadness, tears, frustrations and a powerful desire to scream, I experienced a sensation that feels like a small step forward.

I began to see the possibility of the person I could become, and I realized that I could come to like being him.

The idea of liking myself is not one I have a lot of experience with.

Which is how I find myself trying to decide who I want to be as I try to evolve into a mature responsible adult. It’s a very strange thing to realize that you are in essence parenting yourself, but the more I look back, the more I understand that there was no one available to do it right the first time.

Both of my parents were too busy trying to survive the emotional train wreck of their lives be able to provide much of what I needed.

So it’s up to me, and I’m grateful to have Holly by my side as I try to make this happen.

Because after all the emotional personas that I feel like I’ve been wearing all these years, the one thing I want to make sure that happens is that I become as authentically me as I can, and hopefully growing in kindness, compassion and love.

Because without those, what would be the point.

Thank you all so much for your kind comments and messages after my last post. You really mean the world to me ❤️❤️❤️

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Sabbatical

Sabbatical

I’ve been writing this work for almost 2 years now. Other than holidays, I’ve missed one day due to sickness. I’ve tried to be as consistent as I know how to be, both in the writing, and in replying to your kind comments and questions.

It’s been a joy, a privilege, a blessing and a very humbling experience to try and bring you something of value each day, welding together words for you to ponder, and hopefully making your journey through this vale of tears just a little bit easier.

And I’ve loved every minute of it.

Writing this work has changed my life, in some very literal and powerful ways. I’ve come to understand so much more about who I am, where I am in my personal journey, and in some aspects, just how very far I have to go.

It’s challenged every belief, every preconception and every way of seeing the world that I had. I think it’s helped me grow into a better person, kinder and more compassionate than I used to be.

And I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

But I’m at a point in my life where I need to take a break for a time. I’ve been hit with a few emotional bombs over the last little while, and their combined effect has been to do something that I have been trying to make happen for a very long time, but was unable to accomplish because of the pain and trauma it would cause.

The bombs have ripped the band aid of willpower off of my deepest emotional wounds.

Which, if you’ve ever been there, is one of the most painful things you can go through. I’ve cried for the first time since my son was born 21 years ago, and diagnosed with a condition that nearly killed him in his first few hours.

He required an open-heart procedure at 6 days old to give him back a normal life, and unless you’ve been there, you can’t imagine how traumatic that experience was.

I’ve held so much together since then, carrying the earlier and deeper wounds from my childhood through that experience, and carrying those plus others picked up along the intervening years.

And I’m at a point where I need lay down my burdens, and work on healing me.

Over the last little while, I‘ve had some nights of very little sleep. I’ve walked the floor, crying while I thought, and allowed myself to feel things that I’ve kept suppressed for such a long time.

If you know me, and have seen the insane levels of willpower that I can manifest, you’ll understand how scary it is for me to say that I can’t hold it together anymore.

So I need to spend a little while going through some things that are really going to hurt, and I don’t want to drag you through it.

There’s probably going to be some pretty dark and painful days ahead, and I don’t want to put that energy out into the world.

Of course, I wouldn’t be me if I wasn’t learning the lessons, finding the truths and storing up things to share through this work, (I even stopped in the middle of crying last night to note down a new concept I realized), but I need to make sure that when I share those lessons, I’m in a place that allows me to do it properly.

And right now, I’m nowhere near there, wherever that is.

I’m not abandoning this work, far from it. I hope to return in a little while and write about the deeper truths I’ve discovered through this process. I will admit that I’m a little scared about what I’m going through, but I’m hopeful that this is what I’ve needed to prepare me for the next evolution of my life, and to become the person I’m trying to be.

Because I’m either falling apart, or putting together Alan 2.0.

I think I have an idea as to how this is going to end up, but when you’re stripping away so much of a person and getting down into their foundations, you never quite know how it’s going to turn out.

I’m going to be dancing with demons that have plagued me for as long as I can remember, and the journey to salvage my soul could take me many thousands of miles into the past.

And I’ve been avoiding that for the last 23 years.

So I’m going to ask for your patience and understanding as I work through the next period of my life. I may post infrequently, or I may not post at all.

I promise you that anything I do share will be thought out, and the result of some deep introspection and understanding, shared with the intention of hopefully helping someone who may benefit from the truths that I am learning, which has been my hope and my desire all along.

But for now, this is me, signing off.

We’re all travelers through this journey called life, and right now, I need to walk alone for a while.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: “You’re Gonna Die”

“You’re Gonna Die”.

A mentor of mine shared this truth when a woman on the street came up to him and asked him for three words of motivation.

He thought about it for a couple of seconds, and looked into the cell phone she was holding, and stopped her cold. The simple phrase, 3 words long, was the ultimate truth anyone can ever understand.

And the look on her face was priceless.

What instinctively sounded like something depressing was in fact the most honest, powerful and liberating truth that anyone can ever share with you. Because this life, right now, is all you can be sure of.

Despite a million different claims of what happens next, you have to worry about what is directly in front of you, what you are experiencing right now.

And the only way to enjoy it, and feel like you gave it your best shot, is to be Yourself.

Because authenticity is kind of in short supply right now. From social media to the news media and everyone else in between, there’s so much positioning, spin and outright falsehoods that when you come across someone who is authentic, it resonates with your soul in a way that seems too good to be true.

That’s why I try hard to be real in this work, because I don’t want to give people the impression that I’m more than I am.

So that you can understand that it’s ok to be 100% you,

If we were to talk, you’d find that I struggle, I fear, and I have times of feeling lonely. I have my strengths, and many, many weaknesses. For every kernel of wisdom I have attained, there have been mistakes, failures and defeats.

Every moment of success has had many more of loss. The truth to learn from this is that struggle, loss, defeat, sadness, fear and loneliness are part of being human.

And they are the only stepping stones to I know to reaching this thing we call success, which is really just a state in which we hope to experience joy.

But even those who have arrived at ‘success’ can find themselves feeling the opposite of joy if they forgot to bring authenticity along with them.

If you spend your life being someone who you aren’t, you’ll also spend your entire life wondering if they’d like you if they really knew you. Nothing will seem real, and everything will seem fake.

And you’ll have wasted your life trying to make everyone else happy, instead of yourself.

So today, I want you to focus more on being you. If you don’t have a clear idea who that really is, well that’s a sign that you need to get busy getting to know yourself. Too many of us have lived with the opinions and ideas of others as our North Star, instead of listening to that voice inside of us whispering the truths of our souls.

Listen to that voice, and learn to recognize it when it speaks to you.

Because as the title of this piece says, one day you’re gonna die, and every day you spent living your life listening to someone else’s conscience is a day you blew a chance to listen to your own.

You’ll never find true happiness trying to be someone else, because the only person you can get right is you.

So find the truth of you, and live that as kindly, nobly, honestly and compassionately as possible.

Just be you, every day you can...

and that will be enough.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Picture It Real

Picture It Real.

How good is your imagination? As someone who got busted time and time again as a young child for daydreaming, I have to confess that my imagination is pretty powerful.

That’s a great thing for applying intention into the future, as it allows me to see incredible possibilities, and to explore and experience a sense of gratitude for the things that could be in the now that is next.

But there’s a dark side to allowing your imagination free reign over your soul.

Take this weekend for example. As we drove around the place where we would love to buy land and build our dream house, my imagination was in overdrive. I could picture the house, and feel the interior as we walked through the door.

The warm lighting, maybe at Christmas, with a wreath on the door, the smell of Christmas dinner cooking. Family, friends and fun, all wrapped up in a perfect singular vision, and all of which seemed amazing.

But in all of my imaginings, there’s always one thing missing.

Maybe it’s still the child in me that loves to dream, or maybe it’s a way to deny some of the harsher realities of life, but whenever my mind goes freely in the future, creating desires and possibilities, I never remember to keep it truly real. Instead, I only see the best of what could be, and forget to factor in the truth of our existence.

That “with every wish, there comes a curse”.

Because real life is never that ideal, that easy, or that textbook perfect. Real life is messy, with broken dreams, broken hearts and the ever present possibilities of failure and loss.

It’s never fun to imagine those things, but keeping your dreams centered in reality can help you avoid getting to where you want to be, and finding yourself unfulfilled or disappointed with what you find when you get there.

As I once told a friend “make reality your dream”.

Because anytime you drift off into the land of fantasy, you’re missing a chance to appreciate reality as it here and now. It’s taken me a long time, but I’ve finally come to realize that in fantasy, or dreaming, we take with us not only our desires, but also our difficulties. Insecurities and fears can be dragged into that which we imagine, feeding our terrors and worries.

That’s the flip-side of ‘dreaming it real’ – reality is often quite different than our hopes and our fears.

And while we can and should dream about what could be, we also need to keep firmly rooted in the good things that are now, and working on the things that bring us sadness and pain.

For as much as dreaming is good for the soul, if your dreaming is nothing more than a way to escape a difficult now, then we run the risk of becoming addicted to the good feelings of the future that may never come to pass.

And that way, well that way leads to disappointment and sadness if we don’t do the things that we need to do now.

Today I implore you to dream, but make sure it’s rooted in reality, and backed up by a lot of hard work. Have dreams that take into account the truth of the real world, and a knowledge of yourself and all the strengths and weaknesses that you carry into the dream world that you create.

The power of dreams to move you is incredible, so make sure you’re dreaming in a way that moves you and excites you.

But keep it real, so you won’t be disappointed when you get there.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: Why Did I Even Ask the Question?

Why Did I Even Ask the Question?

Looking back, it’s not like I didn’t know the answer. As we sat in the hotel room on our anniversary get away, we were going over some of our goals for the year. We try to do this every year, and it’s been helpful to make sure we’re on the same page about things.

It’s kind of understood that during these sessions nothing is off the table for discussion, knowing that we have space and quiet to explore whatever comes up.

So I felt the question was worth asking, to see if she could see something I didn’t.

“What is the biggest thing the I struggle with, that I need to overcome”? I asked, realizing that there are several different candidates for the top answer.

My creative ADD brain makes staying on task difficult, so follow through can be a nightmare. Attention to detail is another possibility, because if it’s not something I’m passionate about, I need someone to keep my feet to the fire in order to make sure I’m doing it exactly right, and not losing it in the specifics.

But my wife, being the wonderful woman that she is, went straight to the heart of the matter.

“You get paralyzed by fear” she said, “and you talk yourself out of things before you start”. Then she just calmly, lovingly, looked at me. She wasn’t being judgmental, or saying it to make me feel bad. She was just honestly answering my question, full of belief that I would respect her answer, and not react to it childishly.

Thankfully, I was able to do that, although I’ll admit that I had a hard time looking her in the eyes for a minute or so afterwards.

I had nothing to say to refute her, because her answer was correct. When you combine a creative mind with a difficult childhood, things like anxiety and avoidant behavior are a pretty common outcome.

A book I’ve been reading recently explains how the brains and bodies of people who experience traumatic situations, (especially kids), wire themselves differently to be more alert to problems, and avoid them whenever possible.

Which explains a lot about me.

Because there are things in my life that I could have done, but haven’t yet because my brain focuses more on the potential problems than possible success outcomes, and I get caught up in that paradigm, seeing only the bad, and not believing the good.

My brain that is wired to see trouble often manages to convince me that I will fail, and that it’s better not to start something.

So I miss a lot of opportunities that I could have taken but didn’t.

I recently discovered that a friend who I did a 1 hour coaching intensive with wanted to hire me as her coach, because in a one hour session I helped her as much as being at a retreat for a week.

She didn’t see anywhere on my website where I offered long term coaching programs (because I don’t advertise it), so she found a different coach to work with, and almost felt like I was rejecting her by not giving her the opportunity to work with me (she’s awesome, it wasn’t her fault).

When the truth is, I don’t advertise what I do, out of a fear that I would let people down, which is kind of sad because I honestly love helping people, and from what they tell me I’m pretty good at it.

So as my wife sat there, telling me the truth, I could feel the kindness in her answer. My inability to push through and be all that I could be has affected her and our children, and yet she has never once made an unkind comment, or blamed me for the things that I have not done.

For some reason, in the 23 years of marriage we were celebrating, she has been able to focus on the good parts of my personality, and not on the ones that cause her grief.

And that’s what this reflection is really about.

Both of us could have spent those 23 years looking at each other’s faults, because we both have them. We could have spent that time arguing, fighting, and tearing each other down, instead of building each other up.

Her patience with me, and mine with her, have given us a relationship that allows us to trust each other to be kind, and most of all to be honest with each other.

Even when that truth may be hard to hear.

So today, I invite you to try to find the balance in your relationships to focus on the good, and to try to let go of the bad.

I know that can be hard, and not every relationship is going to work out, but I truly believe that if you spend your time looking at all that is good in your relationship, at some point you’ll have the emotional space to ask the truly difficult questions.

And then have someone to help you work on the answers you receive.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings

Morning Reflection: The Dark Night of The Soul

The Dark Night of The Soul.

Have you ever been to your own personal hell? I ask because I think most of us at some point in our lives have experienced a night where it seemed like the world was coming to an end.

Not literally, although those can happen as well, but one of those nights where it just feels like you’re going to lose everything that means anything, and that the world will never be the same again.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, hang in there, it will find you.

But I’m guessing if you read this work, then you’ve had at least one time where the light seemed to fade from your world, and darkness seemed to be the only avenue left on your journey.

Somehow, someway, you seem to survive, but for that night, sleep was probably never going to happen and hope was running faster than you could keep up.

In personal development, this is known as the dark night of the soul.

Hopefully these are few and far between for you, as they have been for me. I had one recently, and I spent most of the night trying to think my way through a situation that was incredibly painful, and which felt hopeless.

At 3am, I sat in front of my computer, trying to write out my feelings as a way to process them in the hope that I might find a way to move beyond how I felt right then.

Even though it hurt, writing helped me to find a light out of the darkness.

That’s not so say that what I had to do after that was easy; far from it. What it did do was help me to get clear on the fact that there WAS a way forwards. It certainly wasn’t going to be painless, and neither was it going to be fun, but the way was open, as long as I was prepared to walk it.

And so I did. One painful step in front of the other, until I found myself on the other side of the problem.

Realizing that I had survived another trip into the darkness, and had come out still in one piece.

And in hindsight, going through that difficult experience had actually made me stronger. I was reminded that the Japanese art of making a Katana, a sword for the Samurai, involved heating the metal and beating it over and over and over again.

Time after time in the flame. Time after time under the hammer. Heat and pressure, pressure and heat. Until the sword is forged into perfection, ready to go out into the world.

While I can’t say I’m ready yet, I can say with some confidence that I have grown through my trials, and often at the time that has seemed the darkest, I have found within me the strength and the courage to grow and become more. It’s never easy, and during the process it is never fun, but the outcome is often something far better than it seemed when everything was going wrong.

And there are times when I need to remind others of this, and times when I need to be reminded of it myself.

Because as I sit here at my keyboard, tonight has already slipped into tomorrow, and once again I am facing a night and a morning that seem rather uncertain.

Life, in its infinite capabilities, picked the day right before our vacation weekend, to throw us a curve ball of epic proportions. One that has the potential to change everything in our lives all over again, and not necessarily for the better.
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And so my role tonight is to seek the light, and forge the pathway forwards, knowing that the pressure can be used for my benefit, and the heat is there move me forwards when otherwise I would want to quit.

For in the darkest night is where the winners are forged.

Next time you go through one, I pray you will remember these words, and find the light that is there for you.

— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings