borderline

[PATRICIA DESERT]

Dear Bud--I have experienced this role lock over and over again with clients 
stuck in their negative self perceptions.  And one of the most powerful 
practices I have taught my clients and use as the foundation of my work is 
mindful awareness.  I feel the powerful and loving presence of a universal 
energy when I sit with clients and see the healing that comes when they can 
sit quietly and mindfully connect with self, noticing everything that comes 
up without judgement or criticism.  This I believe is connecting in a deeply 
spiritual level with self and when my clients, including those diagnosed 
with BPD!,  can do this the most remarkable calmness, peace, and problem 
solving capabilities emerge.  I erupt in goose bumps each time this happens.

And I too wish when my children were growing up that I knew about the 
soulful expanding experiences you describe.  Prechtel's program is new to me 
and I plan to find out more about it to pass on to my colleagues who work 
with adolescent and teen addicts struggling to find their way.   Thanks.  
Patti


>From: BARNETT WEISS <budweiss at verizon.net>
>Reply-To: list at grouptalkweb.org
>To: list at grouptalkweb.org
>Subject: Re: client or trainee
>Date: Tue, 5 Sep 2006 07:01:36 -0700 (PDT)
>
>Yes Yes and Yes again I say YES !!
>
>   Educational models along the lines of mentoring when you really look at 
>it.
>
>   Mentoring in terms of expanding the role capabilities of all who come to 
>learn. Understanding and reworking poorly formed roles that keep people 
>stuck in certain situations and expanding their capability in so many 
>others.
>
>   We live in societies where much of the most profound aspects of who we 
>are have been crushed leaving a great vacuum within even in the most devout 
>religious communities, the conserves have taken over, memorized and obeyed 
>with so little relatonship to what indigenous people have known for milenia 
>in terms of spirituality.   This serves the ethic of scarcity as a basis 
>for all we operate within.  The most powerful and wealthy must maintain 
>that sense of scarcity and fear so that they can remain in charge of the 
>wealth they have gathered. To that end, nearly all education is presently 
>bent while the soul is left out of the classroom. That soul or true time 
>tested indigenous spirituality is the source of abundance.  So many seek it 
>with mentors who have not been adequately mentored themselves and have 
>agendas that continue to serve the sense of scarcity.
>
>   One of the wonderful programs that I only wish I had known about when my 
>children were younger is that begun by the great Guatamalan trained shaman 
>Martin Prechtel 
>http://www.lightworks.com/MonthlyAspectarian/1997/October/1097-06.html
>   In the process begun by him which is now carried on by groups trained by 
>him, a group of nearly 10 adolescent or older up to nearly 30 years of age 
>boys/young men one year and 10 girls/young women the next are given one 
>hundred tasks to perform prior to thier being formally graduated as 
>initiates.  These tasks require mentors who the committee that supports 
>them assists in finding. THe tasks are all about building a more profound 
>relationship with Nature and their spiritual development as well as 
>performing service tasks in the community. At the end of the year, well 
>over 100 persons gather to honor the inititates at a beautiful ceremony. At 
>that time, everyone who comes to the initiation is asked to present 
>themselves in front of the initiates who will offer the supporters some 
>insight into the supporters life and purpose and anything that occurs to 
>the initiates that may assist the supporter in maintaining their life's 
>purpose. It is overwhelming to say the least for
>  everyone and as spiritually renewing as anything I have ever known. Those 
>I know who participate in this process as supporters are some of the most 
>wonderful, deeply spiritual, resourceful and dependable people I know.
>
>   This is in fact the direction of my life and all of the methods and 
>techniques that I have gathered during my 67 years. All are pointed toward 
>supporting more of this kind of thing happening for more young and older 
>people. My work in creating the Dagara Village up state New York under the 
>tutelage of Malidoma Some is about that. As well, my association with the 
>Plant Spirit Medicine work of Eliot Cowan whose shamanic training comes 
>through the Huichol People as well as Prechtel's work and those of other 
>Indigenous people of the land we call the Americas are other models with 
>which I am working.  I often laugh at the fact that we call this land the 
>Americas named after a ne'er do well drunkard and womanizer whose false 
>perverse fantasies about this land were used to sell the newspapers of his 
>times, and so the land was named after him. A cruel joke untaught in our 
>schools and a perfect example coming out of the scarcity model of life 
>about which I write here.
>
>   Milton H. Erickson, MD, another mentor of mine,  was also quite enamored 
>with these types of indigenous cultures and supported them more than people 
>suspect. It is highly probable that Erickson was in fact the model for Don 
>Juan in Casteneda's work as Casteneda spent a great deal of time working 
>with Erickson before and after he began to write his powerful pieces.
>
>   Indigenous people are not interested in categorizing people and in fact 
>rebel against it as an insult to the spiritual ground that is essential to 
>their way of life.  Rather  they are seeing what the individuals gifts are 
>and working to have those gifts be available to the people. The Shamanic 
>work is greatly occupied with dealing with the blocks that prevent the 
>access to those gifts and the polution of the spirit consequent to the 
>abandonment of their ancient rights and traditions or the violation of 
>contracts clearly spoken either in this life or another and subsequently 
>forgotten.
>
>   Blessings all, Bud
>
>
>Peter Howie <peterhowie at macquariehouse.com.au> wrote:
>   Dear Adam,
>
>Sorry Adam but I can't help myself.
>
>"So there's a cultural lag-- a need to recognize this sub-field, but still 
>the main field of psychodrama is based on the conventional model of 
>psychotherapy-- and training certification is also geared to this, albeit 
>loosely. "
>
>I came across this quote as I was perusing some early ANZPA thesis.
>
>"I have always tried to show that my approach was meant as much more than a 
>psychotherapeutic method--my ideas have emphasized that creativity and 
>spontaneity affect the very roots of vitality and spiritual development, 
>and thus affect our involvements in every sphere of our lives. Furthermore, 
>I have always wanted to have people attend to the processes of health, as 
>well as to the problems of illness; thus I am glad that Dr Blatenr has 
>noted the applications of psychodrama in the home, school and world of 
>business" J L Moreno, M.D., 1973 in Forward to "Acting In" by Adam Blatner.
>
>Part of our discussion involves, at an underlying level, how the conserves 
>of the psychotherapeutic communities/world (Psychology, Psychoiatry, 
>Counselling etc) have dominated some of this discussion. It may not be so 
>much about the dilemmas that arise from boundary issues with 
>clients/patients/trainees but more about how this work is conceptualised. 
>Personally and professionally I think viewing most of our work as that of 
>education or adult education works for me. Deep learning is deep therapy. 
>Still working on this idea.
>
>Cheers
>
>Peter Howie
>Brisbanew, Australia
>
>
>
>
>
>
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