1. Welcome to Issue #166 (November 2006) of MIND CHATTER, the e-mail newsletter of Centerpointe Research Institute: http://www.centerpointe.com. Mind Chatter is published once a month, on or about the 16th of each month. Please send Mind Chatter to a friend, and please send us your questions, comments, and suggestions. ................................................................................ 2. If you would like to unsubscribe, you can manage your account via the link at the end of this newsletter. (But please don't. We like you and we want you to stay.) ................................................................................ 3. In This Issue // MindQuotes (scroll to #5) // A few recommendations that may benefit you (scroll to item #6) // Important Announcements // Feature Article How to be Enlightened by Bill Harris, Director (scroll to item #7) // Glowing Testimonials (scroll to #8) // Book Review (scroll to #9) Confessions of an Adrenaline Addict: How to Acheive More with Less Effort by Adoley Odunton and Deborah Deras Review by Kate Sparks ................................................................................ 4. MIND CHATTER contains articles about: // How you create your life--and how you can stop unconsciously creating experiences and outcomes you do not want, and instead begin to create exactly what you do want // Personal and spiritual growth in general // Meditation (high- and low-tech) // Recovery from emotional trauma // Pretty much any other subject I get excited about and want to write about. After all, it's my company and my newsletter, and I can do whatever I want with it. So there. ................................................................................ 5. Mind Quotes The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. -- Albert Einstein The possession of knowledge does not kill the sense of wonder and mystery. There is always more mystery. -- Anais Nin Love the animals, love the plants, love everything. If you love everything, you will perceive the divine mystery in things. Once you perceive it, you will begin to comprehend it better every day. And you will come at last to love the whole world with an all-embracing love. -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky That is happiness; to be dissolved into something completely great. -- Willa Cather ................................................................................ 6. Live long and prosper! Unless you've been living in a cave lately, you must have seen some of the recent news about the health benefits of meditation. It's everywhere... * An article published in the American Heart Association journal, Stroke, recently reported that meditation can reduce cholesterol buildup and the associated risk of heart attack and stroke. * And another study of the elderly found that meditation actually added years to their lives. * The National Institutes of Health reports that regular meditation reduces chronic pain, anxiety, high blood pressure, cholesterol, and cortisol (sometimes called "the stress hormone") production. * A University of Wisconsin-Madison study discovered meditation boosts brain function and the immune system. * A recent issue of the American Journal of Hypertension featured the results of a study showing a significant lowering of blood pressure in a group of meditators compared to a control group of people who didn't meditate. The study also reported a 23% decrease in usage of antihypertensive drugs between the group of meditators and the other group. * A Harvard study also concluded that regular meditation can reduce pain, lower blood pressure, and cut production of the stress hormone, cortisol. * The most recent study by The American Heart Association shows heart and artery health improved 69 percent in test groups practicing meditation. And this is just the beginning. Practically every time you turn around there's another study documenting and supporting fantastic health and wellness benefits of meditation. So, what's the quickest way to actually achieve these amazing benefits? If there's a downside to meditation it's this... Traditional meditation can take years, even decades to master. The Holosync Solution changes all that. Holosync uses advanced scientific technology to induce deep states of meditation virtually at the push of a button. Most regular users of Holosync report fabulous results in weeks rather than years. Try Holosync for yourself-for FREE! Click visit http://www.centerpointe.com/demo/ to get a FREE Holosync demo CD so you can see for yourself how this powerful technology can improve your life. Here's an even better idea. Go ahead and order Awakening Prologue (the first level of The Holosync Solution) and get started with the real thing. With our One-Year 100% Iron-Clad Guarantee, you can do so with no risk whatsoever. Use Holosync for up to a full year and enjoy all the powerful and lasting benefits this kind of meditation brings you. And if you decide that Holosync isn't everything we promise, simply let us know and you can return it for a full refund. It's just that simple. If you have any interest at all in increased health and vigor, increased longevity, lower blood pressure, peace of mind, and all the other great benefits of meditation, at least give Holosync a try. Remember you can get a FREE demo CD by going to +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ http://www.centerpointe.com/demo/ +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ And to learn all about the science behind Holosync, check out our extensive articles section here: ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ http://www.centerpointe.com/about/articles.php ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ** // ** Announcments Centerpointe Returns to Glen Ivy for Spring 2007 Retreat Though spaces filled quickly for Centerpointe's Fall retreat, there are still spots open for the Spring retreat at Glen Ivy Hot Springs and Spa in Corona, California If you have a big issue you'd like to resolve, if you're in a transition period in your life and you just can't seem to complete it, or if you just want to take things to a higher level--one where you understand more completely how you're creating your life--please, do yourself a favor and come spend a week with me at Glen Ivy Hot Springs and Spa. I promise that you'll have an incredible experience you'll never forget. I tell people they'll receive six months of growth in just 5 days at these retreats, but they keep improving every time, and people now tell me they've received much more than that. I tailor each retreat to the needs of the specific people who attend (which means YOU). My goal is to help you see the ways you may be unconsciously and unintentionally creating your internal and external reality, and how easy it actually is to consciously and intentionally create the life you want, both inside and out. This is your chance to make a big change, and to work with me personally. So visit this URL for more information: http://www.centerpointe.com/retreats And, I guarantee results! Here's the guarantee: Attend the entire retreat. If by the end of the retreat you don't think it was the most incredible growth experience you've ever had, just see me before you leave, and I'll refund your tuition. You do not need to be a program participant to attend (though most people who attend are). (And if you're not a program participant, why the heck aren't you? Quit procrastinating and join.) Visit this URL for more information: http://www.centerpointe.com/retreats Or, you can call retreat coordinator Kate Sparks at 503-906-6027 to learn more about Centerpointe's retreats. Here's what recent participants had to say about Centerpointe's retreats: So much more than I expected...Clear, concise, well-planned. Exceptionally qualified leaders and staff. The greatest investment I have ever made. I have attended many retreats and self-help studies. For 30 years I have studied human behavior. I have never received this much information and this amount of personal change in my life. --Kerry ** You can't imagine the growth I've experienced from Saturday through Thursday. More than six months...I met and fell in love with me. There were so many, many things that happened that I'm so grateful for...Bill's talks and explanations brought everything together from the online course and helped me realize I must put the information into practice in order to benefit from it. I'm so glad I came...Thank you all! --Judy ** Every one of you were so present that I felt like the retreat was just for me --Penelope ................................................................................ 7. Feature Article How to Be Enlightened By Bill Harris In the last several articles, I've been describing the difference between what I'm calling "the world of the mind" (a reality you create with your mind, and what most people take to be THE reality) and a more fundamental reality beyond that created by the mind. I have characterized this "other" reality as being the background, with the reality created by the mind being the foreground. I've also described it as being what is termed "non-dual" reality, as contrasted with the reality based on duality, the chopping up of the whole into separate things and events. I've made the point that any division into separate things and events is arbitrary and that all such divisions are conceptual rather than real. As such, the world of the mind is a clever illusion. There are a couple of levels, then, to what I've been talking about. First, there is the world of the mind. In that world, the challenge is to harness the mind in such a way that you learn how to create what you want, rather than just letting your mind run on automatic, creating whatever it's been set up to create by your past experiences. The first of my online courses, The Internal Map of Reality Expander(R), is all about how to do this. If you master that material, you'll get to the point where you have incredible control over your mind and how it creates what happens in your life. Your mind is already creating your life, but if you're like 99% of people, the whole thing is happening automatically, without your conscious intention. It is possible, however, to direct this process--what yogis call the development of siddhis, or powers. And once you can control your mind you do have tremendous power. For instance, you can create whatever internal state you want, when you want it. You can be motivated when you want to be motivated. You can go into problem-solving mode when you want to solve problems. You'll be able to become relaxed when you want to relax, energized when you want to be energized, and so on. And, by controlling your internal state you'll be able to control your behavior. What's more, this control allows you to attract, and be attracted to, the exact people and situations that will facilitate the creation of what you've focused your mind on. As I've said many times, the secret to this first level, the level of the mind, is what you focus on, and the whole Internal Map of Reality Expander was about the details of all the ways you focus your mind and how to take charge of the creative process generated by what you focus on. The second level is one where you remove your focus from the mind and what it creates. For those of you who are eager to be enlightened, let me just let you in on the secret of how that's done. All you have to do is take your attention off of the creations of the mind, off of the world created by the mind. (Yes, I know that this isn't easy to do.) When you do this, however, you perceive a different reality--the reality spoken of by those who are enlightened. As long as your attention is on what the mind creates, however, you miss this other reality. Now it's not really accurate to call it "another reality," because it's actually THE reality. It's the mind-created reality that is illusory, ephemeral, flimsy, and constantly changing. What we think of as "reality" in fact exists only in your mind. We're just so used to it, and there is such strong social convention confirming for us that this is the only reality, that we buy into the idea that it is THE reality. Desire creates the world In the East they have a saying: "Desire creates the world," or "Desire creates the universe." What they mean is that your desires cause you to focus on the creations of the mind, and as long as this is where you direct your attention, you stay in that reality, and the no-mind or non-dual world, the world seen by the enlightened, is hidden. In Eastern meditation schools they would say that each seeker has what are called samskars, "unburned seeds of desire." These seeds of desire pull your attention back to the world created by the mind--the world of suffering and change. When you say to yourself, "Wow. I want to be enlightened," and you start off to meditate or do some other spiritual practice so as to become enlightened, these samskars continually pull you off-track and keep you from seeing and experiencing the Oneness experienced by those who are enlightened. For instance, you want to make money, so your attention goes to money. You want to be respected, so your attention goes to being respected. You want the love of other people, so your attention goes to that. You want pleasures, such as food, sex, excitement, and so on. Or, on the other side of the ledger, you want to avoid pain, or something else. These desires grab your attention, and that keeps you in the world where all these things are created. It's as if your attention was so riveted to the movie you were watching that you totally forgot about the world outside that created by the movie. Only when these seeds of desire have been burned away, they would say, will you be able to take your focus off of the world of the mind, off of what I have called the foreground, and allow you to pay attention to the background, the non-dual world beyond the mind. Another analogy used in the East is that of a mirror. The mirror of your awareness, it is said, will reflect reality (non-dual reality, that is). Unfortunately, if your mirror is covered with dust, you won't be able to see this reflection. The dust represents all the desires (and aversions, the other side of the desire coin) created by your mind. To see reality directly, you must wipe the dust from the mirror--in other words, you must stop focusing your attention on the creations of the mind. This is what they mean when they say "Desire creates the universe." The creations of the mind aren't real, you'll remember, because they are representations of reality, conceptualizations of reality, a map of reality. Non-dual reality contains no conceptualizations, no maps, no representations. It is, instead, the thing itself. If non-dual reality is the meal, the world of the mind is the menu. The desire to get rid of desires There is an intermediate position, however, between these two worlds. You'll remember that I told you last month about Buddha's Four Noble Truths. When Buddha, as the story goes, sat under the Bodhi Tree and had his awakening, he went to teach the Four Noble Truths to the other ascetics in the Deer Park near Beneres, in India. These ascetics were super-serious seekers. Their method was to withdraw from the world of the mind in every way they could. They did everything they could to not engage the mind and its desires, thinking that this would allow them to see the real world behind it. They ate very little, they did not seek pleasure or try to avoid pain, they did everything they could to stop or quiet the mind. They tried to take their mind off their desires and keep their mind one-pointed on whatever their object of meditation was, whether it was their breath, a mantra, an image of God, or whatever they were focusing on when they meditated. The problem with this approach was that it rarely worked. Part of the problem was that pushing away desires was just as much a desire as having the desires in the first place. The entire existence of these ascetics was about desiring to get rid of desire. Buddha was, in part, trying to say that there was another way to be free of suffering, and that you didn't have to be an ascetic to do it. Pushing away the mind and its creations and desires wasn't the answer, because pushing away the world of the mind was really just the flip side of seeking it. This brings me back to what I've been advocating, which is being in the world of the mind, but realizing that it's just something you're creating. I've used the metaphor of a movie or a play numerous times, because this third approach is a lot like the posture you adopt when you watch a movie, where you become absorbed in the story, feel the feelings, and identify with the actors as if the whole thing was real--while at the same time, in the back of your mind, you know it's just a movie. That isn't Brad Pitt up there You know that Brad Pitt isn't really there, that what looks like Brad Pitt is just light images reflecting off a screen. How those images move and what they seem to do is determined by the film, the light source, and a number of other things. In the same way, the world of the mind is a function of the way your mind processes what comes in through your senses (which, if you've read what I've written about your Internal Map of Reality, could happen in an infinite number of ways). What's more, your senses, as we discussed last month, only perceive a tiny amount of what's really there. Because of the sensory equipment we have, and the way our Internal Map of Reality has been constructed, we create our own particular kind of movie, but it's not the ultimate reality any more than Brad Pitt is actually there in the movie theater with you. As you become consciously aware of how your mind creates the reality you're experiencing and, as a result, see what your mind does that causes this self-created reality to seem to be THE reality, you begin to see the relativity of it all. You begin to realize that it's the relationship between what's really there and what happens in your mind that makes whatever happens, or seems to happen, unfold in the way it does. Imagine someone so immersed in a movie that they really think the movie is real. This is the way most people are with the "reality" created by their mind. But if you can change your perspective to one in which you say to yourself, "Ah, it's a movie, my mind's creating this, and I can watch it and enjoy it, but it isn't real," then everything changes. Such a person plays along with the world of the mind, but knows there's more. They're aware of the foreground AND the background. Now you might be wondering why anyone would care about any of this, and if there's any practical application to all of this. Here's why you should care: as long as you're caught in the idea that the world of the mind is THE reality, as long as you're caught up in the world in which things come into being and pass away--where you sometimes don't get what you want, and where you sometimes get what you don't want--you suffer. You're subject to the Four Noble Truths--or at least the first two. But once you're experientially aware of the background, the nothingness out of which everything comes, you can relax. Then, the movie of your life becomes fun--or whatever you want it to be. I've gone a long way around to get to my point, which is that there is a price to pay to live this way, and it involves being willing to see the world of the mind in a different way. You don't have to totally withdraw your attention from the world of the mind, but you do have to take a new perspective. You have to look at the movie screen and remind yourself that that isn't Brad Pitt--it's a projector and light and a screen creating an image that looks like Russell Crowe. In fact, all evolution, all growth, is a process of learning to see things from an expanding and increasing number of perspectives, instead of the one you're currently immersed in. Focusing on what you want versus witnessing Let me take a short detour here and answer a concern that often comes up when people try to integrate living in the world of the mind and trying to reach the non-dual world beyond the mind. In the world of the mind, the key to everything is what you focus on, and since your mind will create whatever you focus on, I encourage people to focus on what they want. On the other hand, I also encourage people to adopt what I call the witness posture, to step back and watch themselves with awareness, and with no agenda other than to watch. Sometimes people become confused between the two. This usually happens when someone is feeling bad or experiencing an outcome they don't want, and is looking for a remedy. Many people have interpreted focusing on what you want and witnessing as being two different remedies for those times when life goes sideways, and then they wonder which one to use. I'm going to go into the topic of witnessing in great detail in a later article, but I'll just say for now that these two topics are not mutually exclusive. The question isn't one of focusing versus witnessing. However, this is a great example of what I've just been discussing: the idea of operating in the world created by the mind, but at the same time knowing that you, through your mind, are making the whole thing up. Since so many people are struggling with bad feelings and outcomes they don't want, let's review for a moment why you might be feeling bad, and why you might be getting an outcome you don't want. Actually, this is an easy question to answer, because there's really only one way to feel bad or to have some part of life not work, and that is to focus on what you don't want. When you do that, you get a kind of "two for the price of one" deal. First, you get what you don't want, since when you focus your mind on something, your mind does everything it can to create it or attract it to you, and your mind is very good at creating whatever you focus on. Second, as a bonus, when you focus on what you don't want, you instantly feel bad. In fact, there is no way you can feel bad except to focus on what you don't want. So changing your focus to what you do want is definitely a remedy for feeling bad or for experiencing outcomes you don't want, because you can't get what you don't want without focusing on it, and you can't feel bad without focusing on what you don't want. Witnessing, however, is on a different level. When you're witnessing, you're in that space I've been talking about where your mind isn't any more real than the moving light on the movie screen. If you step right out of the world of the mind and just watch, you don't really care what happens, in the same way that what happens in a movie doesn't really matter (as long as it's entertaining, of course). So what if a moving image dies, or breaks up with his girlfriend, or is captured by pirates? So, on a more ultimate level, witnessing is just stepping out of the whole drama and looking at it from outside, with no agenda for wanting it to be any certain way, because from that perspective it doesn't matter. The witness is who you are The other point I want to make is that witnessing isn't really something you do, which is the perspective many of you have taken. The witness is who you are. In the world of the mind, we experience doers and their deeds--or at least it looks that way. In the world of the witness, there is no doer, any more than there is a doer in a movie. In a movie, there's really no one there. It looks like a doer, but what looks like a doer is just changing shapes of light projected onto a screen. In the world of the witness, it's all one, and the only doer is the universe as a whole. So when I talk about witnessing, it does seem as if I'm talking about a technique, something you do, but it's really just a shift in your attention away from being taken in by the creations of the mind. It's seeing the movie as a movie instead of as reality, it's noticing the background instead of the foreground, it's just watching the mind do its thing, but without any agenda for wanting it to be a certain way. It's the ultimate "Let Whatever Happens Be Okay" perspective, because from that perspective everything IS okay. So when you feel bad, or you're getting an outcome you don't want, the solution, on the level of the mind, is to change your focus to what you want. On the level of Reality, it's just shifting your perspective to that of the witness. Once you do that, the feelings and the outcomes have no more impact than do those in a movie you're watching. At that point, you may see other people who think the movie is real, and you may have compassion for them in that they're suffering because they're asleep to the fact that the world of the mind isn't real, but you don't have to suffer with them. When you adopt the witness posture, many times whatever was going "wrong" straightens itself out, because you can't keep doing something that isn't resourceful and do it consciously. When you adopt the witness perspective, any unresourceful ways of thinking or acting become obvious, and when this happens you lose the motivation to keep doing them. In this sense, witnessing could be seen as a method of ending bad feelings and bad outcomes. It should be clear, however, that you can focus on what you want, and be the witness. The two aren't mutually exclusive. You should do both, all the time, though this takes some practice to achieve. What do I do about my ego? Another question comes up a lot when I suggest being in the world of the mind while at the same time knowing that the real world is the world of non-duality: what about the ego? What do I do about my darned ego? Many people have the idea that in enlightenment the ego disappears, and that if you're on a spiritual path you want to get rid of the ego. First, let's get clear about what the ego actually is. The ego is your concept of yourself. Your ego is your Internal Map of Reality I have written so much about. Your ego is the activity of your mind as it creates concepts and chops the world into separate things and separate events. The ego is your mind, filtering what comes in through your senses, making internal representations of what is left over after the filtering process, using tens of thousands of varieties of submodalites to make these internal representations, making unlimited numbers of distinctions between these supposedly separate things and separate events, and then stringing these internal representations into strategies. These in turn create the internal states and the external behaviors and results you experience. So this ego, this map of reality, is your concept of yourself and how you fit in to the rest of the universe. Now stop for a moment and think about concepts and what they can and cannot do. Take the number three, for instance. The number three is a very useful concept. But can it do anything? No, it can't. And, you can't put it in your pocket, or hand a pile of it to someone else. Take another concept, that of the equator. The equator is a very handy concept, but it can't do anything. You also can't wrap up a package with it, or tie your dog to a tree with it. Concepts are maps, and maps can't do anything. They represent something, but they aren't the thing they represent. As I've said before, you can't swim in the blue oceans on a map, and you can't camp on the little triangles that represent mountains. Thinking that a map is what it represents is like climbing up the street sign to get to the street, or eating the menu instead of the meal. "So what?" you say. "What does this mean to me in real life?" Well, here are a couple of things it means. First, everyone in the spiritual growth community seems to want to get rid of the ego. But I've just demonstrated that there's nothing to get rid of. That would be like getting rid of the equator, or the border between the United States and Canada! What good would it do to get rid of an imaginary line? So you can all relax about the problem of the ego, because it's a bogus problem. There's nothing to get rid of. This would be like getting rid of Brad Pitt--the Brad Pitt on the movie screen. It makes no sense, because he's not really there. The map is not the territory The only thing to do, then, is to stop confusing the ego as being who you are, to stop thinking that your idea of who you are is who you are--to stop confusing the map for the territory. And this is just a shift in perception. You can continue to have an idea of who you are, but you need to be aware of the fact that it is just that--an idea. Useful, but not who you really are. When you do this, you are free to play in the world of the mind, where the ego seems to be real, while at the same time knowing, behind it all, that you really are the entire going on of it all. Second, you can't get rid of the ego because who would do it? The "you" you think you are, the you that would get rid of the ego is the ego, and how can something that's just a concept get rid of itself? This confusion of the ego with the real self is why some of you are so tied up in knots over a lot of what I've been sharing with you. You think there's something you need to do to get to somewhere other than where you are now, and that there's something that needs to be changed. But the truth is that what you think needs changing is like the equator, and how would you change the equator? You can't, because other than being a concept, the equator doesn't exist. So if you are trying to change yourself spiritually in this way, you're like a dog chasing its tail, or someone trying to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. What you want to do is realize that the ego, your Internal Map of Reality, and the separate self you think you are, is just a concept, an idea. Once you see it for what it is, everything changes. This is why they call enlightenment self-realization. I know this is baffling to many of you. If it's any consolation, it's been baffling to seekers for several millennia. At the same time, making the shift in perception is actually very easy. For now, I'll just leave you with the big clue that you can't kill the ego with the ego, because the ego doesn't really exist. It's just a concept, and as such cannot do anything. You can, however, see the ego for what it is. This is no different from seeing a movie for what it really is, and you do that, don't you? It's important, as you read these articles, to actually do something with the information. This information can change your life, but only if you put it into practice. This means beginning to notice the difference between concepts and what they represent. It means noticing how you divide the whole into bits and pieces, considering how arbitrary these divisions are, and how they exist mentally but not in reality. It means noticing what you are focusing on, and noticing how your results change as you change your focus. It's noticing the background instead of unconsciously placing all your attention on the foreground. If you will play around with these ideas and principles, and notice how they work inside to create your reality, a whole new world will open up to you. And, if you want to go more deeply into these ideas, and their practical application, please take my Life Principles Integration Process(R) online courses. You can listen to a free preview lesson at http://www.centerpointe.com/life/preview. Please don't miss next month's issue of Mind Chatter, where I'll discuss the concept of threshold, and let you in on the real cause of all dysfunctional emotions and behaviors. Be Well. ................................................................................ 8. Glowing Testimonials I don't have a question--I just wanted to say thank you for all the extra stuff that has appeared in my mailbox in the last few days! I am one of those people who has had a really rough, traumatic life. (Four days after my 8th birthday I was removed from my father's home and taken to OHSU so the damage that had been done to me could be documented. In and out of foster care for the rest of my childhood. Hard core domestic violence as an adult.) To say that my threshold was extremely low would be pretty accurate. In June of 2000 I had to get on a Greyhound bus--leaving my children and everything else that I loved behind--to come to Arizona because if I didn't I was going to die at the hands of a man who constantly told me that he loved me. In climbing on that bus and coming to a city where I did not know a soul (I spent my first night in Phoenix in the bus station), I made a huge shift in how I looked at and experienced my life. I was 35 years old and I had no idea who I really was. I only knew that I was afraid of absolutely everything... Now, six years later, I am living a whole new and completely different kind of life. I am president of a non-profit corporation called SwanRider (www.swanrider.org). I ride my Harley to shelters around Arizona and I share the tools that I used to break my own patterns of victimhood with other Survivors of dv. I also go into the prisons all over the state and talk to the inmates about it. I feel so blessed that I have found a positive way to use a really ugly history to help other people to maybe not have the same kind of history. In this cd series that you sent me (The Inside Secrets of how to be Happy, Etc.) you talk about the Vietnam Vet who speaks about his experiences and he feels like that stuff happened to somebody else. I am now coming to the point of being able to see my own stuff that way. My life is so awesome now I can't even imagine focusing on the negatives any more, which was how I lived every day of my life when I was still in Portland. Anyway, I just wanted to say thanks. I am thoroughly enjoying ALL of your material. I'm listening to the cds and am in the middle of your book and I can tell that these programs, both the Holosync Solution and this course, are the next steps for me to take. I'm ready to go to another level in myself and I'm grateful that I came across Centerpointe and actually took steps to get involved in your programs. I have actually had your introductory materials for several months and I wasn't going to do anything with it. Then I saw you in "The Secret" and I heard Cheryl Richardson recommend Holosync all in the same week, so I figured it was time to step up and jump in with both feet. Also, I got my first support letter yesterday and I thought it was wonderful to see that you recommend the Sedona Method. I have been using that for about a year now and I find myself automatically using it when stuff comes up that I know is a result of listening to the Holosync material. So thanks for that, too. I wasn't sure if I should be doing that or not. So now that this simple "thank you" note has turned into my life story, I'll shut up. Thanks so much for sending the bonus material, and for not letting me know before-hand that I would be receiving it. It's fun to look in my mailbox and find things like that, that I wasn't expecting! I'm looking forward to what's coming in my involvement with Holosync and my expansion of my Map of Reality. Life is good! -- Sandi *** Hello. I just returned from my mailbox with more new CD's clutched in my hand. I am overwhelmed by your generosity in continuing to add more and more listening material to my original purchase. I finished your book today at lunchtime, sitting in the last of the summer sun, on my front terrace. I am so excited about beginning your program and even relish the fact that my meditation sessions are 'itchy' at this point, knowing that things are happening. I am very involved with T. Harv Eker's work and am participating in an advanced group...and have 'personal growthed' myself heavily for the last 30 years. Despite all that work I have constantly battled with depression and anxiety and a lot of physical pain. I have endured two spinal fusions and brain surgery. I decided a year ago that none of that can matter anymore, I set my intention to have a great and prosperous life and your program feels like the very next logical step. I truly believe that science can help with all of this and am so excited about what you have accomplished with your work. I am delighted that I get to reap the rewards! So, thank-you, thank-you. Your retreats look like a dream and I will do my best to attend one in the future! -- Maureen ................................................................................ 9. Book Review By Kate Sparks Confessions of an Adrenaline Addict: How to Achieve More With Less Effort By Adoley Odunton and Deborah Deras ***If you would like to read more about or order this book click here: http://www.adrenalineaddictbook.com/ *** "Adrenaline is like a drug. It pushes our body to work faster and harder with the energy reserves we have. The end result can be a crash of blood sugar, of energy and a depletion of our nutritional reserves. Adrenaline junkies are looking for the boost that their fight-or-flight responses gives them, but like other junkies, that boost gets less and less satisfying, even as it hooks them. High adrenaline levels over time can lead to heart disease, diabetes and chronic fatigue states. They can also lead to chronic insomnia, suppressed immunity and to anxiety and depression." -Glen Rothfeld, M.D., M.Ac., from the book Confessions of an Adrenaline Addict *** We seem to live in a society where more is always better and the person who can accomplish more in less time always wins. Rather than experiencing stress occasionally, many people today spend their entire lives in a state of stress. It's been well-documented that stress is the ultimate cause of many modern diseases, such as heart disease, diabetes, and chronic fatigue. Adrenal fatigue--caused by the habitual overuse of adrenaline--is said to be experienced by an estimated 80% of adult Americans at some point in their lives. For some, the term 'adrenaline addiction' may bring about images of sky divers, bungee jumpers or extreme sports enthusiasts. But there is another type of adrenaline addict. They are people who can't seem to slow down, and are rewarded by those around them for the incredible amount they can accomplish in a day. They are the ones who get a thrill out of waiting to the last minute to pull off an important task, and feel guilty if they take time off from work. Adoley Odunton and Deborah Deras, life coaches and authors of Confessions of an Adrenaline Addict: How to Achieve More With Less Effort, may surprise you with what they have to say about stress, time, and your health. Their candid confessions and simple, sound methods to take back your time will help you more easily achieve what you want in your life. The authors define an adrenaline addict as "someone who has a compulsion to be constantly in action and is addicted to the rush of energy that adrenaline provides. When we are in a crisis situation, under a perceived threat, the body produces adrenaline to give us extra energy to deal more effectively with the crisis. This burst of energy is what we commonly refer to as an "adrenaline rush." Unconsciously we begin to recreate the circumstances that produce the adrenaline until it becomes a habit. While adrenaline is a great resource for us, when it is used as our primary source of energy, it has some serious side effects and can lead to total adrenal burnout." Like all addictions, the beliefs and feelings that hold adrenaline addiction in place may be unconscious until we make them conscious. Taking responsibility and recognizing that we always have a choice in any situation is the first step in the program presented in Confessions of an Adrenaline Addict. Others in the book's seven steps to healing include surrender, living in the now, and slowing down. "As adrenaline addicts, the tendency is to focus on either the future or the past," they write. "To achieve more, with less effort, we need to shift our focus into the Now, since this is our point of power." Adrenaline addicts tend to be achievement-oriented and when they have their minds set on a goal, they simply barrel through, regardless of the circumstances. Much of the time they are disconnected from their feelings. The writers recommend planning and partnership to help adrenaline addicts minimize the stress that comes from throwing themselves into chaos and trying to do everything on their own. Odunton and Deras point out that many adrenaline addicts don't like planning because it seems boring compared to the dramatic results they can produce at the last minute under challenging circumstances. Planning also involves sitting down and getting into the details of a particular project, which may be uninteresting to an adrenaline addict. The book is intended to be used as a resource over a period of seven weeks (though the authors admit this may be a frustrating task for an adrenaline addict, who wants to get it all done now). Odunton and Deras have included coaching steps, declarations, assignments and resources at the end of each chapter. They candidly share their personal stories as well as the stories of their clients to illustrate the power of letting go and slowing down. To put into perspective how adrenaline addicts function in the world, Odunton and Deras use this metaphor: "Imagine you are driving a stick shift in beautiful San Francisco, with the gorgeous hilly backdrop and beautiful ocean view. You can't continue to drive in one gear. You'll eventually need to shift gears up or down, depending on the road, terrain, traffic, etc. If you don't change gears in response to changing conditions, you'll burn out your transmission, and be forced to stop driving altogether. The same is true with our bodies. Many of us are running on empty and if we are not careful the engine is going to burn out." Overall, Confessions of an Adrenaline Addict offers powerful activities and suggestions for someone who is looking to survive in a world that seems to tell us we have to keep going faster and faster to achieve our goals. Dr. Michael Bernard Beckwith, Founder of the Agape International Church, had this to say about the book, "The wisdom in Confessions of an Adrenaline Addict cuts the cords of bondage that tie one to a false sense of self-importance found in the addictive high of everyday 'busyness.' Its pithy instructions will liberate many people and bring them home to themselves." Adoley Odunton and Deborah Deras own the company, Synergy Unlimited. They give seminars to groups on time expansion, peak performance, work/life balance, and diversity. At their website, www.synergyunlimited.net, you can buy the book, download free resources, or sign up for their monthly teleconference on adrenaline addiction. ***If you would like to read more about or order this book click here: http://www.synergyunlimited.net/ =//=