Thursday, August 27, 2009

I'm Presenting in October!

Hi folks,

While it is more on the webby side than the spiritual tools side, I did want to announce I'll be presenting at the 2009 Practice Building Virtual Conference running October 13-17.

It's put on by Casey Truffo's Therapist Leadership Institute. I am a fan of Casey's consciousness about abundance in our profession. But I'll let you check it out and see what you think.

All the best, Peter

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Warning: Tooting of My Own Horn

Hey folks,

This is a self-toot! I am going to be presenting at the Therapist Leadership Institute Virtual Conference this Monday. It's not on the Spiritual Tools part, but it is on growing your business with web marketing.

This is a Casey Truffo thing, and I really respect Casey. She's greatly positive and optimistic and I like working with people like that. 

For me, I am envisioning NEXT year doing a web marketing section AND a Spiritual Tools for Private Practice section! I think that's an exciting vision!

Come in you can - no worries if you don't.

My best to you, Your Ever-Grateful Guy

PS - Am re-energizing my own energies with the help of Spiritual Liberation: Fulfilling Your Soul's Potential - a Michael Beckwith DVD, and in my car with the CDs of the book The Four Spiritual Laws of Prosperity: A Simple Guide to Unlimited Abundance by Edwene Gaines. The CDs are great. She's a got a Southern accent and is a hoot!

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Consider a Media Blackout

Ahhhhh, it's quiet here in my brain. Peaceful. Why? Because I am late in Day 3 of a media blackout.

What's a media blackout? It's a practice of fasting from news. For me, it means not watching the TV news, not reading the newspaper or news-magazines, and especially not reading news websites and blogs.

Having worked a presidential campaign in 2004, I am a bit of a political news junkie. And with the economy doing its tricks, it's been hard to turn my head away from the news. But when you look at it closely, you start to see a few things about "news":

1) It's mostly bad
2) It's mostly things out of my control
3) It's mostly things that don't help me to know
4) It mostly makes me anxious, sad, or depressed

So I am off it. Not sure how long I will do it. But I can tell you my head already feels like a much quieter, more peaceful place to be. And I've suddenly got more time on my hands (added benefit) to do things that I can control, that are good and creative, that make me happy.

I am off to go do them now. All the best, Your Grateful Guy

Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Two Things Remembered on the Raquetball Court

A quickie for you today, two lessons I remembered on the raquetball court today.

One - as my buddy/playing-partner asked "did you lose weight?" I automatically replied "I can't lose weight." I caught it quickly. I can't? Really? Great self-talk there. Thought and belief definitely manifesting into existence around my midline. 

The truth is I have not been losing weight. I haven't. I didn't. And you know what, maybe I won't. Maybe I haven't really tried very hard. But can't????? That's baloney.

If you are self-talking about your private practice this way, STOP! If you say "I can't have 20 clients a week by the end of April" - STOP! It's NOT TRUE!

I mean, maybe you won't have 20 clients then. Perhaps you don't want 20 clients. Heck, maybe you shouldn't have 20 clients then, but I will not sit with you and believe you can't. It's baloney. 

Two - I made some great plays today. I stretched for things I wasn't sure I could get. It reminded me of a lesson I learned playing tennis in college (for the Pace University Setters - yes, Pace Setters, ha ha ha). I learned to train my mind to keep my body moving for a ball, even when I thought it was out of my reach.

By doing this, it was amazing how many shots I got to, and how much more success I had. I definitely got to balls I never would have predicted I could get to. It was also very energizing and esteem-building when I reached them. 

The lesson is you likely underestimate what you are capable of. You can probably go farther than you think. And for most things, even if you don't make it, it won't be fatal (exception including open-ocean swimming, and hiking through snow - though usually not counseling). So keep reaching, keep reaching, keep going.

All the best, Your Grateful Guy


Sunday, March 29, 2009

When You Can't Hold the Vision of What You Want, Intend for What You Need

Hi folks,

Your Grateful Blogger hasn't really been all that grateful lately. I realize that because I've been getting feedback from the universe that has been ungrateful and anxious (that's the energy I've been getting back at me from more people than I care to number). Usually, this is not how it works for me. But I've felt pretty sapped with the baby. As my time and energy have been more divided, my spiritual practice has gotten lax.

A veteran father told me to just ask for, accept, pray for (and be prayed for) Energy. I think that is smart, so I put in a prayer request today at my spiritual center.

It reminded me that sometimes we aren't feeling strong enough, or faithful enough, or ready enough to envision or manifest that big thing we want (The Full Practice! The New Business! The Great Relationship!) and sometimes that means starting by intending, asking for, focusing on the first step towards that vision - the thing we NEED right now.

For me it is Energy. I think I need Energy so I can actually get back on track on the intentions side of things. (I also requested Time, as they seem quite linked for me right now).

For others, it might be Creativity (the ideas for the article/for the business) - or Wisdom (of what to do *right now*) - or Peace (to center myself in Spirit instead of worrying about the storm outside) - or Love (to feel Loved right now, so you don't feel desperate for it in someone else).

So if you don't feel like you can aim big right now, aim for whatever it is you need to aim big :-)

Happy Sunday everyone. So happy to see the sun staying longer in the sky.

Best, Your Grateful Guy

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

So, About That Recession...

So, fellow Spirits, fellow therapists, fellow businessmen and women, fellow Americans (how Presidential it feels to type that) - I want you to know I live in the real world with you. I can see and hear the news. The overall economy is having problems. The average therapist's business is down. But one thing I know is that overall numbers and averages are made up of individual cases, each of these varying WIDELY. You are an individual case.

We could ponder what the overall decline in counseling sessions will be in 2009 vs. 2008.  10%? 20%? More? We could imagine we will experience that same decline, or worse. But I tell you with full faith there will be people who have less of a drop in business than the average. There will be people who will have no drop in business. And there will be people who will actually build their business during this time.

You can believe in the Law of Averages, and it will deliver for you accordingly. Or you can focus on faith, delivering value, communicating value, helping people, gratitude, and finding creative ways to do all of it. We call it the Law of Grace. I'll pick the latter, thank you.

I was going to tackle the issues of fees in a separate post, but why not just do it here - as it seems relevant. Someone asked me my opinion about lowering fees in this economy. I said I thought it depended on the intention behind it. My opinion is that helping people is what we do. And if you want to offer lower-fee or pro-bono services for people who are out-of-work, or underemployed, or in foreclosure, so that they receive the help they need - I think it's a good thing. Fill the more fallow daytime slots with these clients. Run groups. Offer your help and your value to the people around you. Keep the faith that times will get better overall. Do it from an attitude of service, and compassion, and growth, and the future, and Abundance. Know that your referral engine will be running strong when your client's personal economies bounce back.

So yes, I think you truly can offer lower-fee services from an attitude of Abundance. Or, you may not feel moved to do so. That's OK too.

This is my two cents. Opinions may vary. I certainly wish you all the best in your individual journey.

Sincerely, from late-night babyland, your always Grateful Guy



Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Coming Back & Finding Strength

Hi folks,

It has been a while. The life of parenting a newborn is as all-encompassing as they say, and as tiring. That it is also happening while the overall economy is in turmoil, and the country's consciousness about what could happen is so shaky, well, that's an added stressor. Because a lack of sleep definitely impacts my psyche, and the lack of time has definitely impacted my spiritual practices.

But I can happily reporting that things are slowly returning to a new normal as my son gets over the 3-month-old mark and starts to sleep more at night - a new homeostasis.

And I had a month or two where I let all the worries and fears, especially about scarcity and separation (that there isn't enough, and that you and I and Spirit and I are disconnected) get to me a bit. Not good times. And when it got bad enough, I reached out to friends to help. And they reminded me of all the good, and they reminded me to turn into what I already knew. And holy moly, has that made the difference.

So, I guess the moral of the story for this post is that when you get scared, get worried, lose faith, or lose your way - turn to a friend. Turn to someone who can remind you of the good. Who will dust you off, and turn you around. I know you have them, I just do. And I bet you've done it for friends and colleagues in your life.

Finally, I have two posts I am working on - one about lowering fees during this time, and the other about scarcity and separation and fear (versus Abundance, Unity, and Faith). But those are for another night.

Until then, I wish you the best. Keep doing all the good you do - it is needed now more than ever.

Best, Your Grateful Guy

PS - and sleep is always the best thing to check when anyone's head is messed up. I was gifted with a full night's sleep on Sunday and I was a new man the next day.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Checking In & DVD Recommendations


Hello dear readers,

Well time is fleeting these days. A newborn baby is an amazing thing, a spiritual journey in itself. There is a long post I am working on about energy, "matter", and the connectedness of things, but I want to formulate that a little more.

In the meantime, I've been exploring DVD's way past The Secret - wanted to let you in on them:

1) What the Bleep Do We Know - Down the Rabbit Hole edition: with all the extended interviews in it, and the ability to have it show you stuff randomly, this is a fun one to watch over and over again. Interesting to watch the movie that really presaged The Secret, which borrowed greatly from WtB in many, many ways.

2) Introducing Abraham - The Secret Behind the Secret: for many folks, the idea of this (channeling) will cause a dead-stop. That's OK, it did for me for many years. But I've decided to stow away my disbelief and see what I thought. There is interesting stuff here.

3) You Can Heal Your Life (Louise Hay) - Extended edition: what I loved about this was Louise (and the other people featured, especially in the extra interviews on the extended edition), and the learnings they were drawn to, almost as if they couldn't escape them. The learning comes from pain and passion, but in some ways these are ordinary people who just ask "why"? That's how I feel about metaphysics. What about you?

4) Consciousness: this is a multi-disc set of one-on-one interviews, apparently done during a conference on consciousness. The production values are minimal, and some of the interviews (I think there are like 25 or so) annoyed me (some poet blathering on in ryhme, etc.). But others fed me new knowledge, and stoked the fires of curiosity. This stuff is good for therapists in their work too - it touches on existential issues and mental health issues too.

That's all from baby-central. I wish you the best, Your Grateful Guy


Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Intentions Get Answered - In Big Ways

Folks, this is a personal one today.

Last night, as my wife got 5 hours sleep, I sat with our newly adopted infant son in my arms. He was fairly fussy but I got him to sleep finally lying on me (he likes warmth).

You may have heard the adoption process can be long. Overall, it was, but our wait once "in the queue" (that's after all the trainings, background checks, interviews, etc etc etc) was really only 4 months.

We were at our spiritual community on Sunday and the talk was about intentions, and setting them. This has been a very intentional process all the way through (basically, each hurldle makes your re-affirm your intention.....hmmmm, sorta like being a private practice therapist). When I got home from service, I listed my intentions for 2009. One of them was about fatherhood. And the call that we were to be parents came the next day.

Back to last night - I had Louis Hay's "You Can Heal Your Life" DVD playing (for me) in the dark while the boy tried to sleep (highly recommended, by the way, especially for those with medical issues - much deeper advice than The Secret, etc) - and I cried as I told him that he was an answer to our prayers, and that I'd always remember that, and that he should always know that.

I know there will be struggles, and times when he is less lovely to be around (2, 13, etc), but I figure we set the firmament now.

I feel quite warm and open and just want to share that love with you all. I truly wish you all the experience of having your intentions manifest wonderfully in your life.

Namaste, Your Grateful Papa