Introduction to Total Training

 

 

I           Welcome and Preface

 

Hello, I would like to welcome everyone and hope you are having a good day.

 

This seminar is an introduction to a set of workshops that are geared to help us get a better idea about who we are and how we can improve our lives.

 

Most of us want to have more happiness and fulfillment.  We want to feel a purpose in our lives.  If we don’t already have one, these workshops can help us find one, or give it a boost if we do have but have lost our motivation.  Most importantly, we emphasize our relationship with ourselves, our self-image, subconscious mind and our higher self.

 

 

II           How the Subconscious is Related to Our Lives

 

The subconscious mind is mystifying to many.  Emotions reside there.  Our value system resides there.  Habits reside there.  Some of those habits were created by intentional training; others were allowed to develop by default.  Some of those habits were copied from other people who may or may not have known what they were doing. 

 

When it does develop by default, especially when due to primal or emotional urges, it can be the source of much trouble.  Primal instincts tend to use fear and anger to protect us from harm.  While we are children, those instincts may be necessary if others do not protect us, but once we become adults, they are more of a hindrance than a help.  And with emotional desires, while they are there to make life more exciting, they can lead us astray into distraction.

 

The combination can produce insecurities and irrational, even neurotic behavior.  We then act compulsively to eat, to shrink in fear, to rage, to anesthatize ourselves, to have lots of sex or seek other excitements in order to avoid unpleasant feelings that my lay deep inside us.

 

How Our Childhood Shapes Our Subconscious

When we are born, it is the responsibility of our parents or other caretakers to not only nurture our bodies, ie food, clothing and shelter.  But in addition, they need also to nurture our emotions and train our subconscious with a value system that is healthy.  Unfortunately, many have themselves not received a lot of good training, as in our society, animal instincts are still the default manner of behavior.  Drama in our lives is the result.  To get an idea of what I mean, watch a couple of the daytime drama shows.  There you will see lots of animal behavior, otherwise known as dysfunction.

 

 

III          Need for Conscious Development

 

Many Feel Stuck, Confused or Lost

We want to have a better life.  But for many, life has a way of grinding us down or simply boring us.  Hassles exist at home or work.  We try this or that to keep us going.  But at times, unhappiness seems to be our perpetual companion.  When we don’t seem to be getting anywhere, we feel stuck and frustrated.  We don’t know where to turn.  Our family and friends might be of no help because they don’t know either or they give contradictory advice.

 

What is Expected of Us

Life is in the process of moving creation forward.  It is our part of the urge of life, to rise above the level where we find ourselves.  Life prods us with both discomfort and pleasure, sometimes in appearingly contradictory ways.  We may find food to be pleasurable but then if we indulge too much, we gain too much weight.  On the other hand, some foods that are good for us, may not taste so pleasant.

 

If however, we consciously apply our efforts to what we know is a better way of thinking and behavior, we then can retrain the subconscious to be healthier.

 

 

IV         Process of Personal Development

 

Most of our training has been rather lopsided.  In regular schools we have lots of mental exercise.  We also have some physical exercise through sports and play.  But what about emotional exercises?  And what about higher values that help us to get along with one another?

 

The body gets trained through sports, dance and exercise.

 

The mind gets trained through reading and school studies.

 

But the emotions also need training through emotional exercises that release the unpleasant feelings such as pain, fear and frustration, and nurture the pleasant ones like joy, camaraderie and creativity.

 

In addition, spiritual training is needed through establishing and maintaining a higher value system and a deeper connection with our core self.

 

We Need Total Training

There are some people touting that they have the one answer to all your problems.  But in reality, no one-trick pony can really resolve all issues.  Different people have different lives.  Issues that come up in one person’s life may not apply to someone else.  Certain things work better than others.  And for some maybe and not for other people. 

 

There are some commonalities among us.  That is a good place for us to start.  But in the long run, it is best to have a comprehensive approach to recovering from dysfunctional environments.  There are many methods and tools available to help us develop the lifeskills and state of mind we would like to have.  Some are better than others but no one is the all encompassing panacea.

 

Please, click here to follow along with the courses.

 

 

V         Tools and Lifeskills to Progress Our Life

 

Taking a Look at Our Life

How DO we deal with our every day lives and issues?...........

 

Before we can really take control of our lives, we need to get a good view of what our life is really like, without denial, by rigorously digging into our past history and analyzing our present value system.  That is the purpose of our first series of workshops.  They are under the heading “Taking a Look at Our Lives”.

 

These workshops help us to get clarity on what is functional and dysfunctional in our lives.  We take a look at our own harmful behaviors and how we got that way.  We reach into our deeper selves and begin to get down to our core issues.

 

 

Tools Plus Practice Creates Lifeskills

Generally, lifeskills are something taught to us during childhood.  Mostly we learn them from our parents.  But there are also others that become role models such as other family members, school teachers and even our friends and peers.  Television and video games also have a major impact on our view of life.

 

Unfortunately, in a world full of dysfunction, it is seldom that we get all we need in positive role modeling to become a fully mature and rational adult that can handle pretty much anything that comes along in life and do so with confidence, integrity, and have good positive results most of the time.

 

Once we have taken a look at ourselves and our lives, in our follow on series, we learn what we missed in growing up.   We learn to reparent ourselves by using the tools to practice new lifeskills we may be lacking.  We work with ourselves, with other people, with our bodies, with our finances and with our connection to our creator.  The next two groups “Relationship with Myself” and “Getting Along With Others” cover the processing of old issues and replacing them with new feelings, thinking and behavior.

 

 

Skills:

Here are some of the skills that we cover in our workshops, with some descriptions:

 

Three Wild Horses - gaining control over body, mind and emotion

Our bodies, minds and emotions have a will of their own at times.  Let’s do a short meditation to demonstrate how most of us do not have control over our mind and body...

 

Sit or stand quietly and close your eyes.  Try to be aware of just existing.  Don’t think any thoughts of people, places or things.  Don’t move, scratch or twitch.  Do this for 3-5 full minutes....

 

As most of us probably have experienced, the mind wants to jump from this to that to the other thing.  Our body itches and twitches.  Our emotions sway up and down like the ocean.  There are ways and practices to gain control over these, as we will see here and in the Tools below.

 

Mindfulness – the value of paying attention

Feeling our Feelings – unblocking our emotional stagnation

Attitude Adjustments - how we approach life makes a big difference

Balance – moderation in all things including moderation itself

Learning to Behave – where the rubber meets the road

Prosperity – poverty is a way of thinking, so is prosperity

Physical Fitness – makes life more enjoyable

Energy Flows – become aware pleasure & pain are forms of energy flow

Life Force Control – regulate energy circulation

 

 

Tools:

There are tools all over the place.  But if we use them in a helter-skelter, scattershot approach, they are not going to be as effective as when we apply them in a comprehensive, logical and consistent manner.  The courses are laid out as such and include:

 

With ourselves:

Breath Exercises – to regulate our life force

Here we will demonstrate a Relaxation Breath exercise...

Again, sit or stand quietly and close your eyes.  Slowly take a deep breath in through your nostrils.  When full, hold for a few seconds while relaxing your body.  Then slowly let out the air through your mouth and, along with it, any tension you may have.  Do this several times and notice what you feel.

 

Let’s take another but opposite example...

This time stand quietly or sit at the edge of your chair, back straight, and close your eyes.  While breathing deeply, rub your hands together in a circular motion like you are making balls out of clay.   Do this vigorously.  Push your hands together.  Notice your energy rise.  You may also start noticing a heat, first in your hands and then throughout your body.  Your mind may clear and your whole being begins to come alive.  This exercise is great in the morning, instead of coffee, for aerobic metabolism and mental clarity.

 

Focus Exercises – develop mindfulness

Meditation – getting in touch with our superconscious

Hypnosis – getting in touch with our subconscious

Hatha Yoga – stretch and limber the body

Aerobic Exercise – get the blood circulating and develop stamina

 

With other people:

Emotional Exercises – clearing out our bad feelings and nurturing our good feelings

Tailored Social Environment – taking a look at the friends we keep

Personal Boundaries – setting appropriate space

Words We Use – clear communication for healthy interaction

Trust Building Exercises – leads to camaraderie

 

With our daily lives:

Getting My Butt In Gear – ways to get past our procrastination

Bookkeeping and Budgeting – gaining control over our finances

 

 

VI         Where Do I Go From Here –

 

Self-Help Meetings, Workshops and Therapy – go hand in hand

These workshops, while very helpful, should not be taken in isolation.  There are many self-help meetings available in many locations.  As well, professional counseling is helpful for those really difficult issues that are better not done alone.  Each of these avenues has their benefits and drawbacks.  Using them all together, however, provides the most benefit for the time, effort and money that need to be applied to get us to the kind of life we want to have.

 

The table helps one see the advantages and disadvantages. 

 

	Self-Help Mtgs	Workshops	Therapy
Level of encouragement	good	good	good
Level of opportunity	frequent	monthly	weekly
Level of specificity	general	targeted	very targeted
Personal direction given	low	medium	high
Level of expense	low	medium	high

 

 

These workshops, together with Self-Help meetings and private therapy, get us the insights and practice that help us to transform our life to be more what we really want it to be.  As you probably have already come to the conclusion with previous efforts, it will not be as easy as falling off a log.  Nor will it be overnight.  But without question, if you apply yourself honestly, you will get results.

 

Please take a look at the Course Descriptions and avail yourself of the Schedule.  The first three workshops are recommended to be taken in order.  Thereafter, they can be mixed as you please.

 

May your future be brighter than your past...