One of the older homes on our block is undergoing a facelift. They’re having an addition built on and all of the old siding has been removed from the old part of the house. The roof has been re-shingled, new windows installed and new siding has been applied. They’ve done a wonderful job, with one exception – the chimney.

It’s a brick chimney that’s been in place over 30 years. Being the son of a bricklayer, I couldn’t help but notice that the chimney was in need of acid washing so as to match the new look of the house.

The problem for me is I’ve noticed it every day for the last 10 days and had the same conversation with myself. “If you’re going to spend all that money and have your house remodeled, why would you neglect a simple thing like acid washing the chimney to remove old stains and add new luster? Doesn’t the contractor see that? I’ll bet the homeowners never even thought to ask.”

That’s a perfect inquiry – once, maybe twice, but 10 days in a row?

Finally, yesterday, it hit me like a ton of bricks. No one is benefiting by my observation – not the builder, not the homeowner, and especially not me.

I already knew what I knew. Reinforcing it 9 additional times didn’t increase my knowledge or have any effect on the outcome.

A repeated thought without action remains a stuck thought. It takes up our mental real estate blocking any new thought from coming in.

By noticing a repeated thought in action, like I did yesterday, it opens a door to let the thought escape and makes room for some new thoughts – thoughts that have action plans attached. My observation of my stuck thought presented me with three action options:

1. Suggest it to the contractor.
2. Suggest it to the homeowner.
3. Mind my own business.

The stimulus (the stained chimney) only gave me one thought – to be a know-it-all neighbor without an action plan.

By observing my repeated thought, I received new options that had actions attached.

What repeated thought is taking up space in your head that’s benefitting no one? Take time to notice it the next time it comes around. Just by observing the thought, rather than participating in it, again, you receive an action plan.

Thoughts don’t create anything without some behavior attached. The surefire way to keep your behavior stuck in cement, is to let the same thought go on and on without observation.

Your repeated thought may be right, but right has never washed a chimney.

All the best,

John

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The word “Intimacy” has taken on a sexual persona over the years. That’s too bad because it’s so much more.

“Closeness” has been so overshadowed by its sensual sibling that we forget what it’s like to be really intimate.

Intimacy creates a bond and it engenders trust even after the volume has been turned down on lust.

Intimacy has transparency as one of its major ingredients. You trust your secrets to someone you are intimate with, no matter how dark.

I think very few people experience intimacy in this lifetime because they are too caught up on the surface to capture the depth of it.

People fear intimacy. It’s hard for most to let people see into their glass house that they keep nestled in the woods. The fear is being found out. That fear keeps our façade in place so no one else can explore our depth.

You would think you would become intimate with your mate. The evidence points in the other direction.

There’s a reason that 50% of marriages fail. It’s not because people found out too much about one another; they found out too little. They feared going deep with another because of the underlying fear that said, “If you really knew me, you wouldn’t like me.” Therefore that part of you stays clothed.

It’s fascinating to witness a person tell a total stranger their intimate secrets rather than share them with their partner. It happens every day.

There is too much work going on in relationships – work to keep your secrets hidden. When both of you do the same kind of work, you erect your castle on a foundation of sand. It’s only a matter of time before a big wave hits and exposes your relationship’s weakness – the failure to become intimate.

Intimate relationships survive storms; façades fall to the ground.

How hard are you working to keep your secrets? Here’s the arithmetic: The more you keep hidden, the less intimacy you experience.

How open can you be? It’s truly the key to intimacy.

All the best,

John

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Today is Yom Kippur – the holiest day in the Jewish Religion. It’s known as the Day of Atonement. The day is spent by many religious Jews fasting, attending services and atoning for their sins against God and man.

It’s a day of reflection and we can all learn from it.

How do we best atone? I believe it’s when we attune ourselves to the universe – which literally means “One Song.”

When we are attuned, we enter the realm of forgiveness where there is nothing or no one to be at odds with. It’s easy to feel forgiveness when you are attuned, not only for yourself but for others.

This one song the universe is singing is that we are all notes on the same score and that we best harmonize when we are attuned to each other.

In the holy place of forgiveness, we become whole and recognize the melody – the one song that proves the equation: I = You.

We find that we want to do no harm to others because it’s doing harm to us. We realize that it’s like setting fire to the part of the airplane where people we don’t like are sitting. It affects us all. Buddha said it best:

“Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.”

Begrudging is a mental exercise; Forgiveness is a feeling – the feeling of being attuned to all that surrounds you.

Express your atonement and then practice attunement. It’s a one-two combination that cleanses your mind and body and allows you to feel the unifying power of forgiveness.

All the best,

John

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We’ve all attended funerals, told stories about the deceased and listened to a heartfelt eulogy by a family member or dear friend. But the most revealing things said probably came when some people went out back for a smoke.

That’s when things surface that would never be said inside.

It would be a great use of our imagination and a working compass for our lives if we could listen in now to what will be said about us outside.

We meet too few people who will share their real feelings about our behaviors, and what a pity that is. It gives us a false sense of acceptance and insulates us from finding a more workable way.

It seems that some authentic thoughts about us sneak out when another unleashes a moment of pent-up upset. That rarely works because it’s usually filled with accusatory vomit.

We tend not to listen when being attacked.

The real truth has no words, but our relative truths do point to this place of authenticity. Your feeling about someone and their behaviors is your relative truth. When we sugar coat or withhold it, we gulp down another dose of a universal drug called “mediocre relationships.” Life becomes your sugar coating interacting with their sugar coating and it has the sickenly sweet taste of saccharin.

WARNING: Please don’t confuse this with “speaking your mind.” That is just us telling the world how it should be. That’s a head trip that just feeds our sense of being right.

Telling the truth isn’t about right or wrong; it’s just communicating what is. It seems when we have all the information, we make better decisions. Hidden agendas bury the truth and keep us from truly connecting in this lifetime.

Any conversation that starts off with “you did” will mask the truth in anger. When you talk about another’s behaviors and how you feel when you encounter them, you’re communicating a personal truth and not a judgement.

The truth is about you, not them. Your verifiable truths are your feelings. If you don’t tell another about them, you are living a lie.

Deep connection can seem scary at first because we feel our vulnerability surface. If you’re not willing to show your underbelly to another, your relationship will stay mired in mediocrity. Vulnerability is the price of admission to see if we can make a true connection. If you’re not willing to ante up, all bets are off. Nobody wins.

You really decide how you relate to another. The only question is: “Will you offer another sugar cube or an authentic serving of you?”

All the best,

John

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There’s a Bill of Goods we’ve been sold that doesn’t match up with the way things really work.

There is an ebb and flow quality to life and when we ignore that fact we get smacked down by an oncoming wave. This false Bill of Goods would encourage us to go out when the tide is coming in and vice-versa. That always has predictable consequences that we continually ignore.

When we force things in life, we go against the tide.

Nowhere is this truer than with our feelings. Everyone would intellectually agree that we cannot force feelings, yet we do it all the time.

How many times have you said, “I shouldn’t feel this way”? Then you make monumental efforts to feel some other way than you do. This is ignoring the tide of life known as reality. The unpainted truth is you DO feel this way.

Feelings, like tides, are meant to flow. One false bill of goods is that we can keep the tide we like in place for as long as we want. The oil that’s being sold with that philosophy has a little hiss to it.

The corollary is we can force the tide that we don’t like to go away. What’s that hiss I hear over in the dune grass?

The approach that we ignore is the one that works best – dig for clams when the tide is out and wax up the surfboard when it’s coming in.

You cannot legislate or negotiate tides or emotions. They are what they are and they crush all resistance.

Trying to force your feelings to be other than what they are is the largest cause of self-induced pain. The radiating pain you cause for others when you continue to entertain emotional denial is equally destructive.

Feelings are meant to be felt. That’s one of life’s truths occluded by society’s lie which is: You don’t have to feel your feelings. That’s like claiming there is no such thing as low tide.

If you are attempting to force or deny your feelings, you are drowning in your own fairy tale. It’s time for a re-write.

The new chapter of your life has you feel the feelings you have. Fully experience any feeling that shows up. Don’t have conversation with it, just sit in silence with it and allow it to flow where it naturally wants to go and keep your attention on it. Here’s the result: When you stop trying to force the tides, you get to calmer seas quicker.

I never got the logic that hiding under a thin bed sheet protected you from lightning, but that didn’t keep me from doing it.

No one yet has talked their way out of a feeling, but we continue the practice. It’s time to feel the storms that roil our emotional seas.

Take a dip into your emotions and feel them to the fullest. There are two benefits:

1. You know what it feels like to be human.
2. You can never again be sold a false Bill of Goods.

All the best,

John

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We’ve all seen enough “Cops & Culprits” shows to have witnessed this plot line: A race against the clock to save some poor innocent soul who’s buried alive with only so much air left to breathe.

Most often they get found in time; sometimes they don’t.

Are you running out of air?

You are if you’ve buried your aliveness by smothering on superficiality.

How many of your highs lack depth?

Have you ever noticed that superficiality lacks an afterglow?

That causes us to seek another hit of it again, never noticing that the effects of it are so short-lived. This leads us to string together back-to-back moments like these and call it a life. It’s called being buried alive.

It’s searching for your aliveness through superficiality, which is a choking agent.

Every time you add another layer of it, it’s harder to breathe.

There comes a time when it’s time to get out your shovel and dig deeper. When you dig past superficiality, you find an escape tunnel filled with fresh air that gives you an opportunity to breathe deep – an action that provides an ongoing glow.

Notice that superficiality is a lousy bedfellow. It’s tossing and turning keeps you restless and searching for a breather.

The fear of those hooked on superficiality is that depth is dull. It’s anything but. Depth is rich with choice and not subject to the one destination that superficiality leads to – a magic carpet ride to nowhere that eventually runs out of air.

If you’re hooked on the idea that it’s the “next” thing that will rescue you, you’re buried alive and slowly smothering on superficiality.

You have to rescue yourself. It seems counter-intuitive but the way to dig out is to dig in.

When you get past the surface layer, you’ll find the air.

This search operation is called “Finding You.”

All the best,

John

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I like the TV Show HOUSE. Last night was its season premier. The theme of the episode, for lack of a better term, was introspection – taking a visit inside.

I loved the episode because it demonstrated no matter how smart we are; we can’t figure it all out.

My observation is that we spend too much of our lifetime trying to figure it all out and we always come up short. Our goal seems to be on the end game and not the game itself.

It seldom occurs to us that we can’t get to the next moment without experiencing the moment we’re in.

Think of each moment as having its own little windstorm kicking up a bit of dust. We become covered in dust before too long because we carry it from one moment to the next, never taking time to dust ourselves off.

Dusting ourselves off is dealing with the debris that any current moment may bring. We hardly ever take time to process the moment. It becomes baggage we carry into each succeeding frame of our life’s movie.

We become covered in outside crud and rarely take the time to cleanse ourselves. Just like outside health begins from the inside so, too, does cleaning up your life.

It may be time to take a look inside.

It’s a quiet place filled with solvents of all sorts. Inside works its magic by first emptying the trash from our mind, and then it gently nudges us to apply elbow grease on the outside in places where we never did before. Before too long, we’re clean as a whistle.

If you haven’t already done so, find a mind quieting practice that takes you inside. There are so many to choose from and they’re all effective.

A note to the busy beavers: It’s not a one-time proposition. It takes regular visits inside to cleanse our accumulated rubbish.

We all get caught up in life’s dramas. This is just a reminder that from time to time we have to go inside and clean house.

All the best,

John

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Skeptic: Cynic, disbeliever, doubter, Doubting Thomas. That’s the dictionary definition.

I find skepticism to be a unique, doubled edged sword. One side quickly cuts through the BS and the other side is butter knife dull and can’t cut into to what’s possible.

The difficulty is that we generally only see ourselves as only using the sharp side of skepticism. We deem ourselves the ever present authority of what others miss.

Having been a world class skeptic myself, I can tell you that skeptics have a penchant for judging things in their head. That means they get in the habit of being right without sufficient evidence to back up their belief.

Skeptics miss a lot. We are so busy being right, that we often miss out on something that’s cutting edge.

Such was the case for me and vitamins. I was so sure that I could get everything I needed from the foods I ate that I didn’t need anything else. That may be true if I lived on a diet of plants, grains, water, nuts and seeds. That’s just not the case.

Then there was my evidence. I had tried high doses of Vitamin C about 30 years ago and got a kidney stone. Then I took more than the recommended daily requirement for Vitamin E and my hair began to fall out. I now had stories to back up my skepticism.

Skeptics not only anoint themselves as being right, they metaphorically put on a collar and begin to preach. I would tell my stories to anyone that would listen and would haughtily dismiss those that had other stories about vitamins as having the most expensive urine in town.

Older is also a double edged sword. It can mean wiser OR more set in your ways. It’s a choice we get to make. Set in your ways usually keeps skepticism in place keeping you from learning something new.

I got my skeptic’s cage rattled when I met Dr. David Lee. I had heard about Dr. Lee from our seminar coordinator, Hali. She would tell me lots of stories about Dr. Lee over the years that I thought were interesting but it was a comment she made in passing that caught my attention. She said that 80% of the patients that Dr. Lee sees have been told to get their affair in order by their physicians and are sent home to die. A number of these patients have gone on to live vibrant lives after experiencing Dr. Lee.

Being a skeptic, I had to go see for myself. I had to meet this person, in person, and look them in the eye. I also charged up the batteries of my BS detector for the trip.

I was blown away. Dr. Lee was the real deal and a real person. He was a Navy medic in the Vietnam War and afterward, came home and began his studies. During our time together, he told me that he never treats disease. He only treats the patient. He uses a multi-pronged approach – one of those prongs being a nutrient regiment that he’s been using successfully for years – both personally and professionally. I liked him already because he practiced what he preached.

My skepticism melted even more when Dr. Lee prescribed to take nothing he said on faith. He invited me to take home his daily vitamin packet and use it for 30 days. He said, “Let your body judge the results, not your head.”

The first thing I noticed after about a week was an increase in energy. Then I noticed that my nails were growing back more quickly. Then I noticed being more alert, especially during the parts of the day where I became somewhat drowsy in the past. These new found feelings and occurrences snuck up on me and I feel absolutely great!

Like Dr. Lee, I recommend that you don’t take what I say on faith. Investigate for yourself. I encourage you to read more about my experience with Dr. Lee and the great opportunity that came out of that meeting for all who visit my website. I request that you log on now to find out how healthy you can be with the assistance of Dr. Lee.

Click on the link below or copy it into your browser and find out what I did – that with the right formula even a skeptic can become healthier.

http://johnmorganseminars.com/ddl

All the best,

John

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Here are 3 attitudes to take into the weekend with you.

Remember, “Attitude” is an aeronautical term which means “Angle of Approach.”

• Approach forgiveness with the attitude of a dog.
• Share laughter as though it was as plentiful as autumn acorns.
• Be kind to your body. It truly is your best friend.

All the best,

John

P.S. I have been waiting for 2 months to make the exciting announcement I will make here on Monday. Be sure to come back and find out the answer to the question, “How Healthy Can You Really Be?”

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Did you expect to be doing better at this stage in life? Me too.

There’s an old song by Creedence Clearwater Revival that addresses the topic of expectation so well. It’s called “Lodi.”

Just about a year ago,
I set out on the road,
Seeking my fame and fortune,
Looking for a pot of gold.
Things got bad, and things got worse,
I guess you will know the tune.
Oh ! Lord, Stuck in Lodi again.

If I only had a dollar, for ev’ry song I’ve sung.
And ev’ry time I’ve had to play
While people sat there drunk.
You know, I’d catch the next train back to where I live.
Oh ! Lord, I’m stuck in Lodi again.
Oh ! Lord, I’m stuck in Lodi again.

We all get stuck somewhere. Some of us learn to like it, or at least claim we do because we fear there is no alternative. Our main problem is our expectation.

“Shoot for the moon” is the carrot and stick philosophy we seem to follow. I’m sure that approach has worked for some to reach their expectations but most of us have come up short.

“She had such great potential” is what we often hear when we witness her fall on her rear. Not living up to expectations is a mental game that we play and it is one that’s played for us by others.

Expectation starts out as foresight but its sting is mainly felt in hindsight.

Expectation ignores the moment. It suggests that we should be somewhere where we’re not, whether looking forward or looking back.

No one ever taught us to expect to be where we are at any given moment. It’s the strategy that pulls out the stinger of expectation.

This by no means suggests that you give up on your dreams, just don’t attempt to live them by expectation. Expectation is entitlement by a different name. The only thing we are entitled to is the moment we’re in.

Making the most of the current moment is the real dream builder, not the diversion of expectation.

My wife from another life had this observation: “Fathers tend to tell their children what they can be and mothers accept them for who they are.” I’m sure the roles are reversed in some families but the premise of expectation, high or low, starts at home. We seem to all play the role of “Stage Mother” somewhere in our parenting – projecting onto them what was projected onto us – expectation.

When we don’t live up to that expectation, something seems to be missing. What’s missing is the life and opportunities the present moment brings. They’re sacrificed for expectations.

The building blocks for anyone’s future can only be found right here and right now. The only place you can start from is right now. When you slip into the world of expectation, you slip out of the only time you can accomplish something – right now.

Expecting and doing run on different tracks. One is a path to nowhere and the other is a pathway to your dreams.

Here is my suggestion: Go for your dreams, just don’t let expectation get in the way.

All the best,

John

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