Perseverance
To succeed, any transformation process must comprise roughly 20% insights and 80% practice. For this reason, the thrust of the PQ Programme is practice. Full commitment from the outset is required. Wisely accommodating ourselves (surrendering) to what is beyond our control, is the prerequisite for progress. Perseverance is the fuel that keeps us going. Resilience, – ever faster recovery from setbacks, – is the reward. Happiness, in the sense of the fulfilment of our full potential in alignment with our purpose, our passions, and deeply held values, is the outcome…
New Boots
The Inner Critic (Judge) is never satisfied, always chanting the mantra: `I will be happy, when…..´ and that `when´ never comes, of course. The Controller never gives up on trying to dictate the winds rather than allowing us to develop the capacity to surf, and trust, the waves. The Victim keeps telling us that..
Return
The third possibility is to try to find some subset of the domain into which you have come that can receive even a little portion of what you have to give. This is the pedagogical attitude of helping them to realize the need; what you needed, received, and have now got to give. Those are the only possibilities…
Innovate!
Even though we made our first connection a mere month ago, the not-so-suprising fact, considering the parallels in our life experience, was that we got on so well, as if we had been friends all our lives. This is reflected in our wonderful conversation about The Great Spirit, the Universe, Life’s Challenges, Adversity, Courage, Recovery, PQ Mental Fitness, Transformation, and Paying Forward to the next generation..
Sage Perspective
My life then took a dark turn. Many years were to follow in limbo, spent in the no-man’s-land of clubs and pubs; numbing and self-medication, whereby my feeling got stuffed ever deeper, until the anaesthesia was almost complete. “Lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely; a story with a middle only,” wrote the contemporary Irish poet, Paul Durcan at around that time…
Foundations
As this has been the major theme of my own experience, it appeared that the time had now arrived to `pass forward´ the guidance and support which has so generously been given me during my life. One of my main qualifications could be described as `having made almost every mistake that can be made´ along the way and `turning the respective experiences into gifts´…
Sweat Lodge
I sat in complete blackness, except for the glow of the red-hot stones and the firefly effects of the herbal offerings placed upon them before the dousing with water began. When the water did hit the stones, there was a loud sizzle, both audible and tangible. This moment was cathartic. I found myself sweating profusely in what seemed both the `Womb on Mother Earth´ and the actual womb in which I was gestated so many years ago. The former gave me great comfort and solace, while the later came close to inducing panic…
The Rest Test
It has been demonstrated that any person who practices PQ Mental Fitness daily for 40 days or more, experiences palpable benefits. The metric for PQ is that, for every negative thought or feeling we experience over a day, we have at least three positive ones. This is as true for our self talk as it is for our communication with others…
Waste
Transformation processes can be mandated from the top. This never works. Alternatively the team can be engaged to come up with the ideas and then execute. This is a much better approach. If the Saboteurs remain invisible, however, true transformation will never be achieved. Sustained transformation requires the `Coaching from the Inside Out´ provided by the PQ approach. Only by identifying the Saboteurs, and applying the on-going practice of PQ Mental Fitness to keep returning to Sage, will the desired transformation begin to shape new ways of interacting in high-performance teamwork…
Fasting
In hindsight, I see that all me daemons (Saboteurs) had come out to play, preying upon my existential fears (future) and criticising me for not better preparing my new business venture, which had not been unfolding as my optimism had declared it should have (past). This is a classic example of a stance of resistance to `what is´, the main source of suffering for all of humankind…
