Category Archives: Education

Creating a Conscious Context Necessary For a Completely Fulfilled & Meaningful Life

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Creating a Conscious Context Necessary
For a Completely Fulfilled & Meaningful Life

Everyone’s life is structured, and often limited by its context. By context, I mean we live with purposes and priorities that in normal life, are often unconscious. Generally, we limit ourselves to external purposes and priorities that are material, tangible, and physical. As a result, we typically pursue lives we hope will be safe, comfortable, pleasant, and somehow, without ever creating a single clear definition, fulfilling.

The primary problem with a normal context for human life is that we have no clear definitions or detailed understanding of a single internal need, potential, purpose, goal, or developmental task. In addition, even our ideas about external fulfillment are built on assumptions, beliefs, and feelings that we unconsciously adopt, rather than consciously explore and clearly understand. In stark contrast, a conscious context for everyday life is built on detailed definitions for both internal and external fulfillment and meaning.

In order to create detailed definitions, we need to learn how to concentrate on one topic at a time, then accurately observe the facts of everyday life, and finally, apply reason and experiment until we can clearly define and thoroughly understand our topic. This is the process necessary to think for understanding, which is the basis for creating the conscious context necessary for a completely fulfilled and meaningful life. Thinking for understanding is also necessary for taking the next step in our internal evolution.

The primary challenge of the 21st century is that the power of our technology has far outstripped the power of our understanding. The tragic consequence is that as a species, we have not developed either the love or the wisdom necessary to use technology to enhance everyone’s individual life, and protect the planet. Instead, we use technology to dominate and exploit both the planet and each other, with the inevitable consequence of destroying the quality of life for both ourselves, and our ailing planet.

To nurture the planet and fulfill ourselves, we must expand the context of human life to include the entire internal world of our mental and emotional needs, potentials, and developmental tasks that we have heretofore allowed to remain unexplored and undefined. We also need to clearly define the physical and material needs and potentials that are pre-requisites to fulfillment in the external world we are more familiar with, but still don’t really understand.

What everyone needs to see is that we normally think and talk relying on generalized conclusions, and never create clear and experiential definitions of our topic. Without clear definitions of every significant word and issue, understanding is impossible.         

Of course, without understanding we can never become loving and wise, or internally competent to create fulfillment, meaning, and lasting happiness.  As a species, we have learned that clear definitions are required to advance science and technology, but we still rely on vague feelings and beliefs, or generalized conclusions and assumptions when it comes to defining our internal development, level of consciousness, and the internal competence required to fulfill ourselves, and nurture other people and Nature.

Awakening a burning desire to master the complex task of thinking for understanding for the innocent purpose of learning how to become a source of love rather than a needy recipient changes the context of our entire life experience.  Now, we commit to becoming conscious, caring, and competent in the internal and external dimensions of human experience. A genuine understanding of the fact that learning how to think for understanding is an evolutionary step in human development is needed to awaken a burning desire, which is a pre-requisite for creating whole-hearted commitment.

Even in this short discussion, is it becoming evident that mental and emotional development is a step-by-step educational experience, not a simplistic one-step conclusion, or quick technique that will magically solve every problem and leave us happy ever after? If so, then your observation is accurate and follows common sense, because just like our advances in science and technology have grown over time fueled by the concentrated effort of many people, so the internal evolution of our species will require the same or even greater degree of concentration, time, and effort.

Time is of the essence. The problems and conflicts that plague every culture on the planet, along with the global changes in climate and ever-increasing demands on ever-decreasing resources means that we live in a world that is becoming ever more fragile and uncertain. At the moment, we just assume that technology will solve our problems. We fail to see that as a species, we lack the consciousness, caring, and internal competence to understand both ourselves and the issues with enough clarity and detail to see what is needed, agree on a plan of action, and then work together to create a conscious world capable of sustaining a quality life for all its inhabitants—human and animal.

We have already proven that technology alone will not save us, simply because fear, greed, and a lack of understanding motivate us to use technology to dominate and exploit rather than nurture and protect. This means our only real hope, individually and as a species, is to master the internal development that is our uniquely human, but heretofore, unfulfilled potential.

The education provided by CMED offers a detailed step-by-step process for first mastering thinking for understanding, and then the internal needs, potentials, and developmental tasks required for the next step in our mental and emotional evolution.

Being The Source of Love Requires Objective Information & Specific Skills

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Being The Source of Love Requires
Objective Information & Specific Skills

After we decide to be the source rather than the recipient of love, we need to acquire the internal development—objective information and specific skills—necessary to pull it off!  In normal life, we assume love is a feeling, and because we have feelings we call love, we also assume we can become a source of love with no training, objective information, or specific skills required.  A hopeful normal sentiment, but quite inaccurate.

One reason it is rare to see a mutually satisfying expression of real love in everyday life and relationships is because of the degree of focused effort, specialized training, objective information and specific skills that love requires.  We all want love to be easier and require less effort than it demands.  Our fantasy is that love and happiness should be like ripe berries growing wild, so without cost or effort, we can just help ourselves!

The reality is that life, love, and lasting happiness are all complex, and to an untrained mind and emotions are as elusive as the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.  Looking at a rainbow it seems at first glance it should be easy to find the end of it, and so, the pot of gold.  If you ever chase a rainbow, however, you will soon discover that the more you pursue it, the more the rainbow recedes into the distance, so the pot of gold (love and happiness), remains forever beyond your grasp.

Choosing to be the source, rather than the needy recipient of love is the first step toward internal development.  The next step is to observe that you need to give effort and get training, information, and skill.  Until you arrive at understanding both realities—one, you need to be a source of love—not a needy recipient—and two, this requires effort, information, and skill, you can never understand and master the full experience and innocent expression of real love.  Now, it is time to get to work, and truly learn.

What do we need to understand?  We need to first understand our own perspectives, and then the perspectives of the people close to us.  We also need to understand and master internal needs—our own first, and then learn how to feed the internal hungers of the people close to us.  These two categories—perspectives and internal needs—require both objective information and specific skills to first understand, and then master.

In normal life, there is no education for defining perspectives, or understanding internal needs, so the information and skill you will learn is new, and may feel difficult, or alien.  Never-mind how it feels; instead, just observe your experience to determine if the information seems to contain a common-sense level of truth, and if the skills actually work to enhance understanding, satisfaction, and meaning in everyday interactions.

Each person’s perspective can be defined in terms of six categories: motivations, purposes, needs, wants, choices and behaviors. To understand ourselves and another person requires that we accurately observe the specific details that define both ourselves and another person in each of the six categories.  Of course, for most people this is an impossible task because they cannot define the six categories of perspective, and have never been taught how to accurately observe life, themselves, and other people.

Instead of learning how to accurately observe, a normal education (cultural and formal), teaches us to draw conclusions and make judgments, which we often use to evaluate our own, or another person’s value.  Understanding for the purpose of nurturing is not something we normally pursue.  Nor is it something we normally have the information, skill, or training to pursue, even if we wanted to.

The most significant and universal internal need everyone experiences is the hunger to be seen, understood, and valued.  To experience and express real love—first for ourselves and life, and then for our mate, children, friends and strangers—requires we learn how to accurately observe for the innocent purpose of understanding and nurturing.

CMED training provides the detailed definitions for understanding perspectives and internal needs, as well as specific instruction in how to concentrate, accurately observe ourselves, life, and other people, and put it all together to understand and nurture.

All the critical information is available in my books and videos, as well as offered thru individual sessions and workshops. Internal development is complex, but CMED training is based on accurate observations and reason-based cause and effect connections that anyone can learn, and then verify through personal experience.

Life’s Most Critical Choice—Whether To be a Recipient—Or the Source of Love

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Life’s Most Critical Choice:
Whether To be a Recipient—Or the Source of Love

A common and invisible tragedy is that our most critical choice is usually unconscious.  This critical and primal choice is whether to be a recipient of love, or the source of love.  Most people never consciously think about love.  Instead, we just assume that love is defined by how we feel, and since we have feelings we call love, in our minds this means we are loving.

The normal process, where we assume we understand love when in fact, we have never actually thought-about it, is one reason that we humans have made little progress in learning how to define, experience, or express love in our daily lives.  Instead, we relentlessly pursue being the recipients of love, without ever clearly defining precisely what it is we are so avidly trying to get from life, animals, and other people.

The problem begins when as children our parents do not understand internal needs.  This means that no matter how well our parents feed our external needs for food, clothing, shelter, etc., our internal needs for acknowledgment and understanding are rarely fed.  We are also rarely taught how to create self-worth and emotional safety, or how to define and master our internal needs, potentials, and developmental tasks, so in normal life, we learn nothing about internal development.

Growing-up without internal education or nurturing, we are mentally and emotionally starved for warmth and acknowledgment, and to be seen, understood and valued—or in other words—to be internally fed and fully loved.  With this hunger driving our choices, most people try to be the recipient of love, and never know there is a choice.

What makes this tragic is that we often spend our lives searching for fulfillments we cannot define, and do not understand.  As a result, we often choose a career for security, financial reward, approval or self-image, and never understand our need for work that provides challenge, internal growth and fulfillment, and permanent meaning.

We also often choose a mate to compensate for our inability to make ourselves happy.  This places a heavy and often impossible burden on a romantic relationship because we expect our mate to nurture us when we have not learned how to nurture ourselves, or our mate.  As a result, we cannot give what we want to receive, and conflict is inevitable.

Have you noticed how rarely couples create and maintain long-term intimacy based on a genuine emotional bond?  Did you ever think about this fact with the purpose of first defining the negative of what is missing—and next, the positive of what is needed, and finally, how to master the skills necessary to feed the needs?

With the normal choice to be a recipient of love, we have no use for understanding.  We simply cannot see the reward for all the work necessary to understand.  Instead, we want simple answers and quick fixes that will create immediate good feelings, and relief from the pain caused by a lifetime of unfed internal needs.

While we all want to feel good, we need the understanding necessary to first nurture and fulfill ourselves, and then our mates, children, and friends.  The critical prerequisite for finally growing-up and wanting internal development is to change our choice—so we want to master the information, skills, and consciousness necessary to become the source of love.

Once we consciously want to be a source of love, then we will immediately see that a genuine experience and expression of real love requires that we understand and master internal and external needs, potentials, and developmental tasks.  For the first time, we experience a whole-hearted desire to be an emotionally independent adult, competent to nurture ourselves and other people—mentally and emotionally (internally)—as well as physically and materially (externally).

Understanding and mastery require the objective information, specific skills, conscious purposes, and mindful awareness that CMED training provides.  With CMED training people learn how to nurture and fulfill themselves, as well as their mates, children and friends.  Internal development is the artesian source for fulfilling our uniquely human potentials, and taking the critically needed next step up our own evolutionary ladder.

Without this evolutionary step, the demands, problems, conflicts, and responsibilities of modern life will remain beyond our developmental capacity to understand or resolve.  This means that to create happiness for ourselves and our loved ones, and to preserve Nature and the integrity of Planet Earth, we must become sources of love, and in the process must master all our internal needs, potentials, and developmental tasks.

Understand Internal Vs. External Life – Then Master Both!

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Understand Internal Vs. External Life – Then Master Both!

As much as we try to ignore, deny, explain or distract away from it, being alive is an unsolvable mystery that is sometimes cruel, sometimes inspiring and joyful, and often frightening.  The mystery that most affects human beings is the fact that unlike other animals we have the potential to develop self-awareness, and with it the ability to understand significant portions of ourselves, other people, life and Nature.

Fulfilling our human potential to be self-aware, and to work toward understanding life’s mysteries, is the beginning of an internal life.  However, if we do not fulfill these potentials, then we either fail to develop an internal life, or we are so superficial that we create more disappointment than inspiration, joy, love and wisdom.

A complete internal life is the result of mastering our mental and emotional, or internal needs and potentials.  Internal needs are defined by our universal need for self-worth, purpose, meaning, intimacy, beauty, wisdom, etc.  Internal potentials are defined by our uniquely human potential to understand, care, master, create and contribute.

By contrast, external life is defined by every need and potential outside our minds and emotions—like our external need for food, clothing, shelter, transportation, etc., or our potential to be physically healthy, professionally successful, financially secure, etc.

In normal life, we merge internal with external needs and wants, as well as potentials, so rather than create clear definitions and a detailed understanding of ourselves, life and other people, we create a confusing chaos of feelings, beliefs, and vague notions.

The lack of clearly defining internal vs. external life is the major reason human beings have failed to evolve mentally and emotionally.  As a result, we still fail to understand internal experiences: like how to create intimacy in long-term romantic relationships, or how to parent children so they grow-up not just able to make a living, but also develop a complete self-worth, can understand themselves, life and other people, and have the skills and awareness necessary to create internal fulfillment and lasting happiness.

Instead of evolving, after almost two hundred thousand years of human existence on planet Earth, we still cannot live in harmony with Nature, or each other.  We are still motivated by fear and greed, resolve conflicts with violence, exploit the weak, and as a species, prefer to distract with drugs, alcohol and mindless entertainments, rather than learn how to create intensely satisfying and truly meaningful internal and external lives.

If we look at the world through the eyes of an all-powerful Creator, we could imagine how He might feel disappointed in homo sapiens and be inclined to wipe the slate clean (eliminate the species), consider it a failed experiment, and then try again learning from His initial mistakes!  Even if the Creator lets us live, we may still drive ourselves extinct from a failure to master our internal needs and potentials.

Should we want to not just survive, but also fulfill our potentials motivated by a desire to flourish on a planet we are internally competent to make healthy and beautiful—or perhaps, just want to live out our lives internally fulfilled, then we need to concretely define internal vs. external life, needs and wants, feelings and facts, reality and fantasy, and every human potential.

Evolution in science has come about because we have systematically defined layer upon layer of observable facts and experiences in our everyday lives.  Prior to the scientific method, however, our progress in understanding Nature was glacially slow.

After the scientific method was adopted, our external progress has been phenomenal—but our internal development has not kept pace.  Now, we need to adopt the scientific method to study not just Nature, but ourselves, so we can first learn how to learn, and then master every internal and external need, potential, and developmental task. 

It has been my life’s work to lay the foundation necessary to understand ourselves, life, and each other for the innocent purpose of creating satisfying and meaningful lives, internally bonded relationships, and an evolving world where everyone learns to express love, pursue truth, experience and create beauty, and develop wisdom.

Contrasting Licensed Psychotherapy & Unlicensed Coaching With Education In Mental & Emotional Development

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Contrasting Licensed Psychotherapy &
Unlicensed Coaching With Education In
Mental & Emotional Development

Since the middle of the twentieth century “therapy” has become a staple of normal American life.  It may be a surprise to people outside the field that in fact there is no agreed upon definition for what constitutes “psychotherapy.”  In fact, once a person has a state issued license—whether as a Marriage & Family therapist, Clinical Psychologist, Licensed Clinical Social Worker, or Psychiatrist (MD licensed in Psychiatry)—whatever he or she decides to do, is now legally “psychotherapy”.

This means there is no agreed-upon protocol for treatment, and no objective criteria for measuring effectiveness.  As a result, in this highly-regulated profession pretending to be scientific, in real-life practice it is in effect the wild-west where almost anything goes.

So if a therapist believes in reincarnation, and that we carry inside ourselves memories of past lives, then he can offer “past life regressions” where the client is induced into a hypnotic state to help her remember who she was in the past.  The theory is that our experience in past lives affects our mental/emotional states in the present, and that connecting the two will help us understand ourselves and make needed changes.

Less fanciful but no more substantiated are more traditional forms of therapy that range from Behavior to Reality therapy, from Psychoanalysis and Ego-psychology to Neuro-linguistic programming and Positive Psychology, to advice giving and problem solving that we could get from an insightful friend.  To date, there is no therapy style that can experientially define and objectively measure precisely what it offers, or even define specifically what is gained if the therapy is successful. 

The consequence is that as a healing profession, “psychotherapy” is strictly a faith-based enterprise—just like religion.  Of course, in our feeling-based world, for most people, this is not a problem.  Often, all we want is a therapist who makes us feel good, so real-life effectiveness is not a consciously defined criteria.

Mostly, we are hungry for energy and attention offered in a context of real or feigned interest by someone who at least pretends to know more about life, living and intimate relationships than we do, and mostly that is exactly what we get!  Feigned interest, and the pretense our therapist knows more than we do.

Coaching, in a sense is more honest.  It is un-regulated, and anyone who has the balls to pretend they know more than other people, or who simply offers some level of warm interest and undivided attention, or perhaps is a charismatic “know-it-all” who makes people feel special just because they know him/her—much like Jim Jones who got nine hundred people to “drink the Kool-Aid” based solely on his personality and say-so—can virtually, literally, or figuratively “hang-out his shingle” and be a coach.

The problem is that as individuals, and as a species, we need objective training in all the “internal” dimensions of real-life human experience so we can fulfill our potential to become consciously content ourselves, and developmentally competent to first understand, and then effectively respond to the complex problems of modern human existence.

Anyone can review the major issues of modern life—whether the personal happiness of each individual, or the well-being and even survival of our species—and see that the global problems of resource depletion, climate change, economic inequality, political strife, religious conflict, species extinction, etc. etc., are far beyond our developmental capacity to either understand, or resolve.

Clearly, as individuals and as a species, we need the mental and emotional development necessary to think through complex problems until we understand what is both true and needed—for ourselves, mates and children, as well as the global healing of Nature, and the well-being of all people.

We need an objective and measurable level of training that clearly defines our own and everyone else’s universal internal needs and potentials, as well as developmental tasks, so we can embark on an educational process to acquire the skills and awareness necessary to think for understanding, build emotional bonds, and master the ability to express love, pursue truth, experience beauty and develop wisdom.

Neither therapy or coaching can offer a single step toward objective internal development, and while each may feel good emotionally, like a body massage can feel good physically, if we observe the objective results there is no real change in our ability to think for understanding, or master internal needs, potentials, and developmental tasks that occurs because of a mental and emotional massage, i.e., psychotherapy or coaching.