"The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side."
Hunter S. Thompson
I cannot even begin to try to explain how difficult it is for men over the age of 25 years-old to cultivate friendships with fellow men. We live in a wickedly competitive, crazybusy society that most men have learned to play as a zero-sum game, meaning that whatever one man possesses or succeeds in results in something less for everyone else. Gore Vidal famously commented that in America "It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail." This is also known out here in woo-woo land as a "scarcity mentality," the opposite of believing that the universe is abundant and there is enough for everyone.
One would think that psychotherapists and yoga teachers would be above the common fray, but I have witnessed as much sniping, backstabbing, lying, money-grubbing and flakiness in the healing community in Los Angeles as when I worked in Hollyjungle. If Hollywood was infamously dubbed to be "High School with money," then putting two male therapists or yoga teachers together is often akin to putting Chevy Chase and Bill Murray together in an SNL dressing room with a pile of drugs.
On the other hand, in the last few years I have been privileged to meet several upstanding men who have embarrassed me with their generosity and I feel obliged to publicly express my gratitude towards them. If you have already studied with me you know that the final part of my course on cultivating happiness discusses how we must learn how to replace resentment (things our minds tell us should be different or otherwise) with gratitude/acceptance if we wish to be happy. So instead of harping on the small-souled, fear-based egomaniacs who didn't feel it was worth their time to return my emails or phone calls when I reached out to them, let me tell you about some wonderful, old-school gentlemen:
Larry Payne - the co-founder of Yoga Therapy - attended a lecture I gave at a bookstore when I first moved to Santa Monica. Just the fact that such a tremendous scholar, writer, and teacher would come to hear me speak impressed (as well as intimidated) me. From a place of genuine curiosity he asked poignant questions regarding how I thought yoga could be used to treat mood disorders. After that we began to lunch regularly and out of nowhere he called the director at Esalen on my behalf and now I am teaching several sold-out workshops there. "Thanks for making me look good," Larry said with a huge smile when he learned of my successes. Larry Payne is the paradigm of compassionate gentlemen and goes out of his way to help basically everyone who comes into contact with him.
Yariv Lerner - the founder of Udaya - approached me in Lauren Eckstrom's yoga class to tell me how much he enjoyed my writing. He invited me to lunch and then generously gave me an impromptu, three hour crash course on Search Engine Optimization and Google Analytics - showed me exactly who was looking at Optimum Integral Wellness and how they were arriving there. Mindblowing. Besides being a gentleman, I think Yariv is a genius and someone with great integrity. He envisions every phone call and every meeting as a opportunity for a win-win situation.
Edward Ines is widely respected as one of the most talented and compassionate dentists in Los Angeles. When I lived in Berkeley a few years ago, I had a root canal on an upper molar and was experiencing similar pain in the tooth directly beneath it. Instead of thoughtlessly opting for a $3500 root canal and crown, Dr. Ines suggested that he try shaving down one corner of the lower tooth. "A millimeter is a mile," I recall him saying. After years of pain, he graciously shaved down the inner corner of the tooth and my pain was immediately relieved. Over the past eighteen years Dr. Ines has demonstrated time and time again that he only wants what is best for me. As far as dentists go, Edward Ines is some sort of angel.
Before my first time teaching at Esalen I sent an email to all of my teachers entitled "I am standing on shoulders of giants," thanking them for everything that they had taught me and promising to pay it forward. Besides Noah Levine and Larry Payne, only Fred Luskin and Rick Hanson responded with support and well-wishes. I sat with Fred and Rick several times and liberally quote from their masterpieces "Forgive for Good" and "The Buddha's Brain" in my lectures. Besides being cutting-edge scholars and excessively erudite academics, Fred and Rick are two of the most loving, authentic and gracious people I've ever met.
Everyone out here knows that Ron Alexander is one true gem of a human being. When I moved back to LA he kindly invited me to sit in on one of his mindfulness classes and met with me a few times to mentor me starting my private psychotherapy practice. He was frank, direct and supportive and made me sit with my successes and "take them in." Ron's glass is never half-empty; Ron's glass is always overflowing. One Saturday afternoon my phone rang out of nowhere and it was Ron.
"I just wanted to tell you that I read your article in the Huffington Post this morning and I thought it was great!"
Wow... from the guy who wrote "Wise Mind, Open Mind" that is quite a complement! Thanks Ron! Anytime something falls outside of my scope I reach out to Ron who is always available as well as very smart, compassionate and funny.
There is no need to mention Gregory Colbert here because I already wrote an entire essay about him last summer entitled "Failure to Lunch." So I'll just round off this post by mentioning bumping into Steve Ross at (of all places!) the laundromat the morning after I had returned from a retreat at Esalen.
"I've never been to Esalen," said Steve with his usual boyish grin.
About a week later I got a crazy idea and emailed the director at Esalen: "How would you like to have Steve Ross from Oprah's network and Dr. Oz and the Today Show teach at Esalen?" When she replied yes, I sent an email to Steve asking him if he would like to teach at Esalen, that I could introduce him either solo or we could do a workshop together. We met, shared our interests in Vedanta, mantras, and different lineages of yoga and came up with a workshop entitled "Yoga, Meditation and Music for Eternal Bliss" that we are teaching together August 10th-15th 2014. So many amazing things can flow together simply and effortlessly when people are open to possibilities!
To summarize, a gentleman is someone who doesn't see other people as competition, clients, or threats. A gentleman is someone who is open and available, someone who sees every fellow human being and every experience as a possibility. It is someone who thinks "How can we make this a win-win situation? What do I have to learn here? What can I share? How can I be of service? How can this relationship make the world a better place? How can I pay forward the generosity that all of my teachers have bestowed upon me? How can I overcome all of the fear-based tendencies that my ego has learned and be the change that I want to see in the world?"
We are all part of the transition team, moving from the dying, white, male, highly-competitive, scarcity-mentality hegemony that has pillaged Gaia for the last few hundred years to the next, more sustainable, equitable, peaceful, compassionate, abundant, loving, win-win society.
Personally, I feel blessed to be surrounded and supported by such awesome and awe-inspiring scholars, leaders and gentlemen.
from Healthy Living - The Huffington Post http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ira-israel/what-it-means-to-be-a-gen_b_4306308.html?utm_hp_ref=healthy-living&ir=Healthy+Living
via IFTTT
Hunter S. Thompson
I cannot even begin to try to explain how difficult it is for men over the age of 25 years-old to cultivate friendships with fellow men. We live in a wickedly competitive, crazybusy society that most men have learned to play as a zero-sum game, meaning that whatever one man possesses or succeeds in results in something less for everyone else. Gore Vidal famously commented that in America "It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail." This is also known out here in woo-woo land as a "scarcity mentality," the opposite of believing that the universe is abundant and there is enough for everyone.
One would think that psychotherapists and yoga teachers would be above the common fray, but I have witnessed as much sniping, backstabbing, lying, money-grubbing and flakiness in the healing community in Los Angeles as when I worked in Hollyjungle. If Hollywood was infamously dubbed to be "High School with money," then putting two male therapists or yoga teachers together is often akin to putting Chevy Chase and Bill Murray together in an SNL dressing room with a pile of drugs.
On the other hand, in the last few years I have been privileged to meet several upstanding men who have embarrassed me with their generosity and I feel obliged to publicly express my gratitude towards them. If you have already studied with me you know that the final part of my course on cultivating happiness discusses how we must learn how to replace resentment (things our minds tell us should be different or otherwise) with gratitude/acceptance if we wish to be happy. So instead of harping on the small-souled, fear-based egomaniacs who didn't feel it was worth their time to return my emails or phone calls when I reached out to them, let me tell you about some wonderful, old-school gentlemen:
Larry Payne - the co-founder of Yoga Therapy - attended a lecture I gave at a bookstore when I first moved to Santa Monica. Just the fact that such a tremendous scholar, writer, and teacher would come to hear me speak impressed (as well as intimidated) me. From a place of genuine curiosity he asked poignant questions regarding how I thought yoga could be used to treat mood disorders. After that we began to lunch regularly and out of nowhere he called the director at Esalen on my behalf and now I am teaching several sold-out workshops there. "Thanks for making me look good," Larry said with a huge smile when he learned of my successes. Larry Payne is the paradigm of compassionate gentlemen and goes out of his way to help basically everyone who comes into contact with him.
Yariv Lerner - the founder of Udaya - approached me in Lauren Eckstrom's yoga class to tell me how much he enjoyed my writing. He invited me to lunch and then generously gave me an impromptu, three hour crash course on Search Engine Optimization and Google Analytics - showed me exactly who was looking at Optimum Integral Wellness and how they were arriving there. Mindblowing. Besides being a gentleman, I think Yariv is a genius and someone with great integrity. He envisions every phone call and every meeting as a opportunity for a win-win situation.
Edward Ines is widely respected as one of the most talented and compassionate dentists in Los Angeles. When I lived in Berkeley a few years ago, I had a root canal on an upper molar and was experiencing similar pain in the tooth directly beneath it. Instead of thoughtlessly opting for a $3500 root canal and crown, Dr. Ines suggested that he try shaving down one corner of the lower tooth. "A millimeter is a mile," I recall him saying. After years of pain, he graciously shaved down the inner corner of the tooth and my pain was immediately relieved. Over the past eighteen years Dr. Ines has demonstrated time and time again that he only wants what is best for me. As far as dentists go, Edward Ines is some sort of angel.
Before my first time teaching at Esalen I sent an email to all of my teachers entitled "I am standing on shoulders of giants," thanking them for everything that they had taught me and promising to pay it forward. Besides Noah Levine and Larry Payne, only Fred Luskin and Rick Hanson responded with support and well-wishes. I sat with Fred and Rick several times and liberally quote from their masterpieces "Forgive for Good" and "The Buddha's Brain" in my lectures. Besides being cutting-edge scholars and excessively erudite academics, Fred and Rick are two of the most loving, authentic and gracious people I've ever met.
Everyone out here knows that Ron Alexander is one true gem of a human being. When I moved back to LA he kindly invited me to sit in on one of his mindfulness classes and met with me a few times to mentor me starting my private psychotherapy practice. He was frank, direct and supportive and made me sit with my successes and "take them in." Ron's glass is never half-empty; Ron's glass is always overflowing. One Saturday afternoon my phone rang out of nowhere and it was Ron.
"I just wanted to tell you that I read your article in the Huffington Post this morning and I thought it was great!"
Wow... from the guy who wrote "Wise Mind, Open Mind" that is quite a complement! Thanks Ron! Anytime something falls outside of my scope I reach out to Ron who is always available as well as very smart, compassionate and funny.
There is no need to mention Gregory Colbert here because I already wrote an entire essay about him last summer entitled "Failure to Lunch." So I'll just round off this post by mentioning bumping into Steve Ross at (of all places!) the laundromat the morning after I had returned from a retreat at Esalen.
"I've never been to Esalen," said Steve with his usual boyish grin.
About a week later I got a crazy idea and emailed the director at Esalen: "How would you like to have Steve Ross from Oprah's network and Dr. Oz and the Today Show teach at Esalen?" When she replied yes, I sent an email to Steve asking him if he would like to teach at Esalen, that I could introduce him either solo or we could do a workshop together. We met, shared our interests in Vedanta, mantras, and different lineages of yoga and came up with a workshop entitled "Yoga, Meditation and Music for Eternal Bliss" that we are teaching together August 10th-15th 2014. So many amazing things can flow together simply and effortlessly when people are open to possibilities!
To summarize, a gentleman is someone who doesn't see other people as competition, clients, or threats. A gentleman is someone who is open and available, someone who sees every fellow human being and every experience as a possibility. It is someone who thinks "How can we make this a win-win situation? What do I have to learn here? What can I share? How can I be of service? How can this relationship make the world a better place? How can I pay forward the generosity that all of my teachers have bestowed upon me? How can I overcome all of the fear-based tendencies that my ego has learned and be the change that I want to see in the world?"
We are all part of the transition team, moving from the dying, white, male, highly-competitive, scarcity-mentality hegemony that has pillaged Gaia for the last few hundred years to the next, more sustainable, equitable, peaceful, compassionate, abundant, loving, win-win society.
Personally, I feel blessed to be surrounded and supported by such awesome and awe-inspiring scholars, leaders and gentlemen.
from Healthy Living - The Huffington Post http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ira-israel/what-it-means-to-be-a-gen_b_4306308.html?utm_hp_ref=healthy-living&ir=Healthy+Living
via IFTTT
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