by cstrauss | Jan 1, 2018 | Business, Diversity, Life
As we release 2017 and look back at the year we’ve had,
people are commenting and judging that it was either good or bad.
But knowing that events are neutral and judgment is all in the mind
I invite you to search your memory for the moments of joy you will find
when you look back on the year full of relationships and events,
when you “architect” it all together it begins to make sense.
Remember, as we end another year there’s always a conscious choice
for what we choose to focus on and the opinions that we voice
So let’s commit to looking forward, mining our moments of joy
exploring them and playing with them like a child with a new toy.
And when we take that great energy into the year yet to be
2018 will become filled with endless possibility.
by cstrauss | Nov 11, 2016 | Diversity, Politics, Your Biology
My take on how the election of Donald Trump may be exactly what humanity needs to wake up, resolve our issues and move us to a higher level of consciousness. For the past 3 days, I’ve been in a state of confusion and upset as to the divisiveness and ugliness that is showing up in our country as a result of the presidential election. As for me, I spent most of Wednesday sick to my stomach with despair and unable to comprehend how the people of my country could get it so “wrong”. Our country voted for a man who personifies all of the underlying demons that have plagued our nation, sexism, racism, misogyny, narcissism, fear and hatred. But I think I get it..and hopefully this explanation will help ease some of the tensions that many of us are feeling both personally and culturally.
Anyone who has ever been to therapy knows that to handle and deal with an issue that is plaguing us, we need to bring it into the light, name it and deal with it head on. Therapy makes you aware that when you bury something sooner or later, it is going to emerge in a stronger, more potent, more obvious way to be dealt with. As human beings we have all kinds of levels and layers and attributes as to what makes us us. Some of those layers are buried in the shadows. Concepts and parts of us that we don’t want to look at and deal with as they make us uncomfortable and upset. We spend much of our lives in denial that these aspects exist within us. However once we bring these shadows into the light, we can bring love and understanding to them, and hopefully help them to heal and put them to rest.
The election of Donald Trump is a demonstration of the shadows, the level of consciousness that we as an “embodied” nation are experiencing. For many people this is not the case, however this majority level of consciousness has created this reality. These underlying problems, issues and challenges have been just below the surface of our nation as a whole for decades. Trump’s “persona” brought to the forefront, as the most powerful man in the country, is causing us all to have no choice but to deal with these “hidden aspects” of us as a people. We can now choose to look at them, address them in the light, send positive energy to them as opposed to being sucked into the negativity. We can intentionally deal with them and hopefully resolve them. Then we can rise above, raise our consciousness and live in “The United States”, acknowledging our human connectedness to all things and each other. This can result in leaving conflict, bitterness and upset behind. If we choose it.
It’s funny. I thought that we had processed through most of these issues years ago when I was a young woman growing up in the seventies and eighties. I thought we handled the pro-choice issue, I thought we handled the Equal Pay issue, I thought we handled the racism issue. Clearly I was wrong. And writing “laws” to handle them is not good enough, as those who oppose the laws will take their true beliefs back underground and back into the shadows. The only way to deal with our unwanted issues / demons is to look at them and name them. Donald Trump is the most obvious, blatant, physical manifestation of all of the disowned, dark and disliked attributes of many in our American society. So I want to thank him for showing up. Now we have no choice but to look at our issues proactively and consciously. Maybe then we can live in a country of peace, love, liberty and justice for all. Donald Trump is our collective wake-up call.
