Our Joys

Poetry can often be inspiring, and today this crossed my desk:

Our joys as winged dreams do fly; why then should sorrow last? Since grief but aggravates thy loss, grieve not for what is past.

Thomas Percy, English poet 1729-1811

Grieve not for what is past ... our joys as winged dreams do fly ... doesn't it make sense that we behave the same way with our grief as we do with our joy? As the poet - Thomas Percy - says, are joys tend to leave us very quickly. And yet we dwell on our sorrows.

This is in fact, an unusually interesting statement about the human condition. We have a much greater tendency to stay with those aspects of our lives that are not bright and clear, that do not have sunshine and warmth, and tend to bring on the clouds swollen with rain. Why do we do this? Is it just a wired into us? Wired into our hearts? Wired into our brains?

I don't think so. This may very well be due to what part Eckhart Tolle calls the pain body, and what Chris Griscom calls the emotional body. I've written about this in the past, so I'll just briefly reiterate the basic points:

• the pain body is seductive
• the emotional body has an emotionally sticky quality that we find hard to pull away from
• both pain body and emotional body are familiar to us because they represent pain, difficulties, and hardships that we have been subject to in the past
• this very familiarity based on the amount of time we have spent revisiting those difficult moments, is what causes us to field the seductive pull
• once we give in to the seductive pull into the pain or the negative emotions via our memory needs, we tend to wallow in the pain, much as pigs wallow in mud
• why?
• Because we prefer the familiarity
• if we spent as much time revisiting our joyful moments as we do our painful ones, we might find - ironically - that we experience greater familiarity with our joy than with our pain - and wouldn't that be a wonderful state of mind to be in...

Have you ever considered why the sum total of your life very possibly seems to have an uneven tipping of the scale in favor of the negative? Could it not be simply because of where you spend much of your mental time? And don't you agree that where you spend much of your mental time is a matter of choice? And if it is a matter of choice, why not spend more time with your memories of the joyful moments, as opposed to memories of the painful ones? It really is that easy.

Books by Dr. Gabriella Kortsch:

Rewiring the Soul

Click here to download the first chapter.

To see the Table of Contents click here

Reviews From the Back Cover:

"The masterwork of a profoundly gifted healer of the soul. Dazzling, challenging, wondrously useful." Peggy Rubin, Director, Center for Sacred Theatre, Ashland, Oregon; author: To Be and How To Be, Transforming Your Life Through Sacred Theatre

"Rewiring the Soul is one the best introductions to the spiritual life I've ever read. Not esoteric but real-world & practical. The implications are profound." Peter Shepherd; Founder Trans4mind.com; author: Daring To Be Yourself 

"The human being's directory to the soul. A breakthrough for those seeking practical assistance, those of a more mystical bent & every soul awaiting discovery." Toni Petrinovich, Ph.D.; author: The Call: Awakening the Angelic Human

The Tao of Spiritual Partnership

To download the first chapter, click here
To see the Table of Contents click here

Praise for The Tao of Spiritual Partnership

“All humans seek the illusive touch of another's Soul, which opens us to the sense of belonging to something bigger than the self. Dr. Kortsch has given us the true "tao" of relationship in this brilliant exploration of emotional tapestry. We will be grateful for this illumination of spiritual partnership for generations to come."
Chris Griscom: Spiritual Leader, Author (among others) of: Ecstasy is a New Frequency

“Eloquently and comprehensive, showing how your primary love relationship may be a sacred vessel that transports you and your partner to a place of mutual healing and expansion.” 
Robert Schwartz: Author of Your Soul’s Gift: The Healing Power of the Life You Planned Before You Were Born 


The Power of Your Heart: Loving the Self 

My new book: The Power of Your Heart: Loving the Self, is just out. Here is a brief excerpt from the Introduction:

It is your right to live a life of love. It is your right to understand that loving yourself first is not a selfish way of behavior, but one that allows you to live that life of love. However, it's highly probable that you never got the instruction manual explaining exactly how to accomplish this. Possibly your family - and it may have been a loving family - considered loving the self an act of selfishness. Or perhaps the members of your family simply didn't practice loving the self, and of course, what you didn't see - what was not shown to you - while you were growing up, meant that you just didn't learn how to apply it to yourself. The closer you are able to move towards loving yourself, the closer you will be to living a life of love - quite independently of whether you are in a love relationship or not. A life of love can be lived with or without a partnership, because a life of love implies that you know that it all begins with you by loving the self. The more clearly you understand how to love yourself, the more clearly you will see that it is very hard - if not impossible - to love others in ways that are unrelated to fulfilling any of your needs. Loving yourself first is - for so many of us - one of the hardest things we will ever learn how to do. But know this: the benefits affect you in every particle of your being - body, mind, and soul - and are greater than you will ever be able to imagine.

Remember To Laugh!

So much serious stuff all the time. Find a meaning in your life..seek inner growth...watch for your inner freedom...don't wallow in relationship pain...and on and on.

But all the time what is truly so very important is that we remember to laugh. And that doesn't just mean laugh as in hearing a funny joke, or as in watching a comedy, or laugh as in seeing a funny video of your relatives at a party, but laugh as in find the laughter inside of you, even when on the outside it doesn't look so great.

You've probably heard all the same stories the rest of us have, about Patch Adams (played by Robin Williams in the movie by the same name), the doctor who invented laughter therapy, and about Norman Cousins, the man who realized that he was able to temporarily alleviate his pain by watching comedies. These people have shown the world that illness and pain, depression and other ailments can be ameliorated by laughter.

Laugh therapy has begun to become quite prevalent the world over...private practices such as mine, group sessions, weekend retreats, etc., have sprung up ubiquitously in order to show people the benefits of laughter.

Blood flow, immune response, blood sugar levels, all appear to improve with laughter. While the jury is still out on a definitive answer, it does appear that we should not ignore the potential of laughter in our lives, not to mention how good it makes you feel to have a belly laugh.

So back to the inner laughter. The laughter that we should work on finding despite outer worries, concerns, and pain or disappointment. Use your emotions as a barometer (see my article about this subject) in order to raise your energy. Use your emotions to help you realize when you need to find your inner laughter. Begin to practice this on a daily basis in order to bring your life to other levels of joy and satisfaction. Your inner laughter is not only capable of keeping you healthy, but also capable of keeping you in a place of much greater and more constant joy than the way you possibly live now.

Books by Dr. Gabriella Kortsch:

Rewiring the Soul

Click here to download the first chapter.

To see the Table of Contents click here

Reviews From the Back Cover:

"The masterwork of a profoundly gifted healer of the soul. Dazzling, challenging, wondrously useful." Peggy Rubin, Director, Center for Sacred Theatre, Ashland, Oregon; author: To Be and How To Be, Transforming Your Life Through Sacred Theatre

"Rewiring the Soul is one the best introductions to the spiritual life I've ever read. Not esoteric but real-world & practical. The implications are profound." Peter Shepherd; Founder Trans4mind.com; author: Daring To Be Yourself 

"The human being's directory to the soul. A breakthrough for those seeking practical assistance, those of a more mystical bent & every soul awaiting discovery." Toni Petrinovich, Ph.D.; author: The Call: Awakening the Angelic Human

The Tao of Spiritual Partnership

To download the first chapter, click here
To see the Table of Contents click here

Praise for The Tao of Spiritual Partnership

“All humans seek the illusive touch of another's Soul, which opens us to the sense of belonging to something bigger than the self. Dr. Kortsch has given us the true "tao" of relationship in this brilliant exploration of emotional tapestry. We will be grateful for this illumination of spiritual partnership for generations to come."
Chris Griscom: Spiritual Leader, Author (among others) of: Ecstasy is a New Frequency

“Eloquently and comprehensive, showing how your primary love relationship may be a sacred vessel that transports you and your partner to a place of mutual healing and expansion.” 
Robert Schwartz: Author of Your Soul’s Gift: The Healing Power of the Life You Planned Before You Were Born 


The Power of Your Heart: Loving the Self 

My new book: The Power of Your Heart: Loving the Self, is just out. Here is a brief excerpt from the Introduction:

It is your right to live a life of love. It is your right to understand that loving yourself first is not a selfish way of behavior, but one that allows you to live that life of love. However, it's highly probable that you never got the instruction manual explaining exactly how to accomplish this. Possibly your family - and it may have been a loving family - considered loving the self an act of selfishness. Or perhaps the members of your family simply didn't practice loving the self, and of course, what you didn't see - what was not shown to you - while you were growing up, meant that you just didn't learn how to apply it to yourself. The closer you are able to move towards loving yourself, the closer you will be to living a life of love - quite independently of whether you are in a love relationship or not. A life of love can be lived with or without a partnership, because a life of love implies that you know that it all begins with you by loving the self. The more clearly you understand how to love yourself, the more clearly you will see that it is very hard - if not impossible - to love others in ways that are unrelated to fulfilling any of your needs. Loving yourself first is - for so many of us - one of the hardest things we will ever learn how to do. But know this: the benefits affect you in every particle of your being - body, mind, and soul - and are greater than you will ever be able to imagine.

And If I WANT To Stay Angry???

So you've been reading these posts and by now you know some techniques to use to keep yourself in a good place, or to bring yourself back up to a good place...and you're sitting in your car, and an idiot almost causes you to have an accident.

And while you're still trying to keep your cool about that, he races down the road behind you, practically kissing your tail end with his front bumper, and you notice you are close to losing it.

I mean, you have a right, right?

So then you think about what you've been reading here...and you tell yourself: "No way am I going to get my mind away from this now to feel better about it - I NEED to feel this anger and frustration; I WANT to feel it. The last thing I want to do right now is get away from this place in my mind, because I LIKE this feeling...at least for a bit".

This is actually simply another type of challenge you get presented with. Life is so great (at this point you may not want to agree). All these challenges bascially all serve the same purpose: your inner growth which leads to your inner freedom.

But, there you are on the road, raging inside, and the last thing you want to do is bring yourself away from the feeling. You are wallowing in it. Eckhart Tolle talks about the pain body as being the place - the painful place we go to, despite the pain, because we are so familiar with it. It's almost comforting in its painful familiarity. Kind of the way kids will cry themselves to sleep to comfort themselves.

So this angry place from which you just don't want to come away, is a version of that. All I'm suggesting is that you give this some consideration next time it happens and think about this. Maybe the pull will be less strong. Maybe you'll want to stay there less time. Maybe you'll decide to leave as soon as you realize what is happening. That's where freedom starts.

Books by Dr. Gabriella Kortsch:

Rewiring the Soul

Click here to download the first chapter.

To see the Table of Contents click here

Reviews From the Back Cover:

"The masterwork of a profoundly gifted healer of the soul. Dazzling, challenging, wondrously useful." Peggy Rubin, Director, Center for Sacred Theatre, Ashland, Oregon; author: To Be and How To Be, Transforming Your Life Through Sacred Theatre

"Rewiring the Soul is one the best introductions to the spiritual life I've ever read. Not esoteric but real-world & practical. The implications are profound." Peter Shepherd; Founder Trans4mind.com; author: Daring To Be Yourself 

"The human being's directory to the soul. A breakthrough for those seeking practical assistance, those of a more mystical bent & every soul awaiting discovery." Toni Petrinovich, Ph.D.; author: The Call: Awakening the Angelic Human

The Tao of Spiritual Partnership

To download the first chapter, click here
To see the Table of Contents click here

Praise for The Tao of Spiritual Partnership

“All humans seek the illusive touch of another's Soul, which opens us to the sense of belonging to something bigger than the self. Dr. Kortsch has given us the true "tao" of relationship in this brilliant exploration of emotional tapestry. We will be grateful for this illumination of spiritual partnership for generations to come."
Chris Griscom: Spiritual Leader, Author (among others) of: Ecstasy is a New Frequency

“Eloquently and comprehensive, showing how your primary love relationship may be a sacred vessel that transports you and your partner to a place of mutual healing and expansion.” 
Robert Schwartz: Author of Your Soul’s Gift: The Healing Power of the Life You Planned Before You Were Born 


The Power of Your Heart: Loving the Self 

My new book: The Power of Your Heart: Loving the Self, is just out. Here is a brief excerpt from the Introduction:

It is your right to live a life of love. It is your right to understand that loving yourself first is not a selfish way of behavior, but one that allows you to live that life of love. However, it's highly probable that you never got the instruction manual explaining exactly how to accomplish this. Possibly your family - and it may have been a loving family - considered loving the self an act of selfishness. Or perhaps the members of your family simply didn't practice loving the self, and of course, what you didn't see - what was not shown to you - while you were growing up, meant that you just didn't learn how to apply it to yourself. The closer you are able to move towards loving yourself, the closer you will be to living a life of love - quite independently of whether you are in a love relationship or not. A life of love can be lived with or without a partnership, because a life of love implies that you know that it all begins with you by loving the self. The more clearly you understand how to love yourself, the more clearly you will see that it is very hard - if not impossible - to love others in ways that are unrelated to fulfilling any of your needs. Loving yourself first is - for so many of us - one of the hardest things we will ever learn how to do. But know this: the benefits affect you in every particle of your being - body, mind, and soul - and are greater than you will ever be able to imagine.