Mindfulness

Our organism is a structured and interactive collection of variously patterned energy flows, such as the individual cells and their interconnections, the hormonal and organ systems, and the different aspects of the mind including awareness, cognition/thoughts, emotions, and somatic sensations. These energy flows are in a constant process of self-regulation for survival and thriving, which unfolds through self-monitoring and appraising how fluid and adaptive the different energy flows and their intricate interactions are at any one moment. Once a determination is made that these energies flow sub-optimally, the organism proceeds to modify them by creating, tapping into, and using resources in such a way as to achieve maximal integration towards health and wellbeing. […]

The oceanographer Francois Serano recounts an experience with a young male sperm whale, who approached the researchers with curiosity and communicated the way sperm whales usually only communicate when they intimately interact among themselves. It was a highly unusual encounter, as if the whale wanted to tame the researchers and invite them to become part of their own. […]

What the mindfulness journey is really about Was it not for a recent dream one of my patients brought into a session, in which a two-faced person appeared, I would likely not have started this blog with Janus. Consciously, my patient knew nothing about this Roman god. I concluded, that the collective unconscious Carl Jung described is alive and well even in this technological day and age of science and computers, where studying Roman mythology is hardly the main menu in our school curriculums anymore. […]

Beginner’s mind is an attitude of openness Beginner’s mind is a notion that originated in the Buddhist Zen tradition, referring to an attitude of openness, eagerness, and lack of preconceptions when examining one’s mind. Maintaining beginner’s mind is what’s most difficult in mindfulness because we are customarily imprisoned by our mind’s incessant chatter. […]

The mirror neuron A mirror reflects back to us what we cannot see directly. We cannot directly see the inner subjective experience of someone else, and yet the capacity to ‘put ourselves into someone else’s shoes’ is essential for human survival, good relationships, and health in general. What does it mean to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes, and how do we do that? […]

The Mindsight Intensive course begins soon, and during the preparation, the notion of a beginning intrigued me. Not only are we at the beginning of an academic year, but to me, the fall is also the beginning of a descent into the unconscious realms of our psyche, in which we roam during the winter, and hopefully derive great benefit from the creative potential to be unleashed for the upcoming spring and summer. […]

Group Psychotherapy provides exactly the kind of safe, but intense transformative environment some of us need to heal deeply. On June 14, 2020, Dr. John Salvendy, co-founder and first president of the Canadian Group Psychotherapy Association sadly passed away. In 1984 he became my group psychotherapy supervisor during my psychiatric residency at the University of Toronto. Within 3 years he taught me everything I needed to know to begin my own 35 years of group psychotherapy practice. […]

When we train our minds to expand consciousness In my two blogs ‘Initiation Renaissance In Our Pandemic Times’ and ‘Wu Wei’, I wrote about a subjective, yet universally accessible dimension of reality that opens up like wakefulness emerging from a dream, when we train our minds to expand consciousness through successive stages of depth and integration, all the way to the realization of the transcendental emptiness of Being. […]