I am back, mostly, from moving

Wow, I haven't posted for almost a month. It has been a bit intense moving- it is a challenge to move from a larger space into a smaller space. I had a huge amount of space as well as closet space in my old office-- I had a lot of stuff in there!

Fortunately we have a mostly unused room in the main house- it is now full of  alot of unused electronics and other stuff. A rainy day decluttering project.

Some of the furniture from my old office was moved to my wife's office at the U of M, some is in use around the house, some went to my daughter's house, and some was given away. I gave away 5 old computer monitors using Freecycle. 

The new office is mostly up and running the way I want. After my first week, I found a couple of things that need minor changes, but other than that, it went pretty smoothly.

More people were comfortable parking on the street than I thought. Several who parked on the street commentted that they really do not like backing up. It isn't a long walk to the office from the street at all. 

One person walked to the appointment- she was about 5 minutes late, but now she knows how long it takes to walk to the office from her house. 

I am really glad I made the move. The economic news has been abysmal-- I don't think our culture can be as economically or energetically as mindless as we have been in the past. Credit crunch, recession, resource depletion, peak oil, overpopulation-- wow, moving to a home office makes a lot of sense when you look at all of that stuff.

Next year we'll grow more vegetables more often.

Infrequent Posting due to the move--

I will be busy with the office move the next few weeks, so I will not be posting as much.

Stay tuned to this blog for the latest info on my move.

After things settle down with the new office space, I'll get back to regular posting.

Not in the office today--

It appears to be some sort of virus or something like that-- not enough focus available to go in and do my job today.

Moving in October

This is a Big Announcement-- It is very important to me, at least- I doubt that many of you will find that it that makes a huge difference to you personally.

Here it is-- I am not certain yet of all the specific details, but I am certain that I will not be occupying my current office at 5575 Poplar Avenue after October 1st. I will relocate my private practice to an office at my home.

Why? I am restructuring so that I can bring my life more into line with my values. I want to transition to a personal and professional lifestyle that makes a wiser use of our natural resources. I can do my job just as well without maintaining two separate locations and without using so much energy. To me, given our global energy crunch, reducing our personal and professional consumption is the ethical thing to do whenever possible.

And, given the current nature of the economy, reducing unnecessary overhead just makes good financial sense. I really love working in my current office at 5575 Poplar, but I can be more adaptive to the economic conditions if I reduce my expenses. Financial pragmatism trumps luxury.

Other than my location, most things will not change-- I will maintain my professional status so that I can continue to practice as a licensed psychologist, a health service provider. This means that all of my folks on disability and/or Tenncare can still be seen. I will maintain my relationships with managed care organizations and preferred provider groups. I will continue to have a psychology practice that consists of a mix of biofeedback, marriage counseling, and psychotherapy.

Some things will change-- I will not see as many people as I see now, so I will be even more selective when it comes to seeing any new clients.

The home office is in a remodeled building that was formerly a garage apartment. It is totally separate from the main building, my home, so I can make it my own, a real office that doesn't double as a family space and that will not conflict with my family members' lives. It has a nice tile floor and is quite shady- that's a real plus in the summer time! It has a restroom, and all the comforts of home. One of my daughters lived in it for a couple of years after she graduated from college.

Another way the home office will help is that I can work more flexible hours. Many people cannot get the help they need because of their job or family schedule-- If I am seeing you at my home and I do not have to travel to an office several miles away, I won't mind seeing you now and then during evenings or week-ends. This flexibility should be especially helpful to couples and families that want marriage or relationship counseling -- it is often really hard (or impossible) to coordinate the schedules of family members who are in school or employed full time. Flexible hours should help with that.

What will I do if I am not working as much? Well, you might show up for your appointment and find me working in the garden wearing overalls and work boots. As many of you know, my wife and I are both very interested in living a more local, more self-reliant lifestyle. We are working to gradually convert our modest 1936 farmhouse into a self-reliant urban homestead. We have plans for expanding our gardening efforts, capturing rainwater for irrigation, installing solar panels, removing some more concrete to expand our growing spaces, and improving our composting efforts.

That's a lot of work! Working from home will allow me to invest a lot more time into our urban homestead self-reliance project. So, actually, I think I am restructuring so that I can work more at things that I have to neglect too much now.

I am excited (and a little nervous) about this change.

My phone and e-mail will stay the same. 901-763-0999 and cliff.heegel@gmail.com will be the best ways to reach me. You can text me at 901-763-0999. My website and blogs will remain active for now.

Great Book for those who suffer from trauma, PTSD, etc.

Are you a trauma survivor? Do you suffer from PTSD? I think you might be able to benefit from this book by Claude Thomas, a Vietnam vet who became a Zen monk. Claude has suffered greatly in his life. He was abused as a child, went to Vietnam and entered combat at 17, and lived a long life of anger, fear, violence, drugs, and mistrust. This book tells his story.

More importantly, Claude is really wise. He has a simple but very deep way of talking about the transformation of suffering. On almost every page I see sentences that are zingers- great pieces of wisdom.

I hope you are not scared away from this book because Claude is a Zen monk. There isn't a lot of Buddhist jargon in the book although there are a lot of references to how Claude uses his spiritual practices to deal with his own personal PTSD and other issues.

Check it out, buy it, whatever. Just read it. Claude's Book

Real hope for real freedom from suffering

If you cannot see your mind in operation, you are subject to the vagaries of the causes and conditions of your life and mind. This means that you are operating in a reactive state. Our reactions are created by our past experiences.

If you are stuck in a reactive state, you are not choosing your actions in the present moment. Instead, your past is ‘choosing’ your behaviors—you are acting in reaction to your training or conditioning.

Now, if you are not happy, if your life is filled with suffering, there is a high probability that there are some patterns which were created in your past that are now causing suffering in your present life. Your actions are not creating happiness, they are creating suffering.

Reactions are mindless knee-jerk responses. Reactions are mental, emotional, and physical. We cannot help having our reactions, especially our thoughts—our mental reactions (thoughts) arise naturally when the conditions in the present moment interact with history, which is carried by us in our mind, body, and emotions.

So, if we cannot help having our reactions and our reactions are creating suffering in our lives, what can we do to escape this trap? Is there anything that really helps?

The only thing we can do that has any real hope is to wake up to the nature of our mind, to wake up to the nature of our reactions. We can learn how to act differently despite our reactions.

The key to freedom from the conditioning from your past is to wake up, see clearly how you are reacting, and choose to act differently and hopefully wisely in the present moment.

This means that if you find yourself mired in reactivity, you should first of all, just stop. Sylvia Boorstein phrased it as "Don't Just Do Something, Sit There"

Easier said than done, but it can be done.

After you stop, look calmly at your reactivity—how are the mind, body, and emotions reacting in the present moment? And, how are those reactions influencing your actions?

All of us have moments in which our initial reaction is just not that helpful. We have to calm ourselves and choose a different action than the one which our reaction was leading us toward.

For example, I might encounter someone who seems rude or condescending to me. My initial reaction might be to be rude to them in return. However, I have a lot of life experience which has demonstrated to me that being mean and rude to others is rarely the path to happiness. I would calm myself and make an effort to say something that wasn’t rude or mean. If the relationship was important to me, I might try to go deeper into the other person’s inner world to try to understand where they were coming from. On the other hand, if it was an unimportant relationship to me, like perhaps a rude stranger at a grocery store, I might simply disengage. No need to go to war over something that has no real importance.

No matter what I chose to do, I am probably much better off if I can mindfully choose my actions rather than just blindly reacting.

Practice mindfulness in all of you activities, in every moment. As soon as you notice that you are in a reactive state, stop, calm yourself, and look clearly at your reactivity. Then choose how to handle the moment according to your highest ideals and values.