Blog Archives | New Dimensions

Shame and Guilt and Grief

June 4, 2018 By Daniel Davis Leave a Comment

Do you avoid talking or thinking about a subject because it is so embarrassing? Have you ever kept a secret from yourself?

Our shame and guilt can have an enormous impact on our lives. We can devise elaborate methods to avoid the pain of toxic shame.

Maya who is gifted in math class pretends to not understand, because she does not want to appear intelligent. Maya would rather not stand out, so she gets a grade of a C instead of an A.

Toxic shame is the feeling and belief that one is worthless. The energy of shame can create walls that keep us from our deepest desires we may not even realize we want.

Our intelligence and our psychological insight cannot prevent toxic shame from robbing us of our joy and fulfillment. Isn’t it a shame when a talented guitarist never plays publicly again because of his need to play perfectly?

Especially in the area of grief and loss, we can be affected by guilt and shame. We may feel responsible for someone’s injury even though it was not our fault.

Please watch this video by Janet Childs about shame and guilt:

What Do You Say When Someone Talks About Taking Their Life?

May 29, 2018 By Daniel Davis 1 Comment

On a warm July night in 1985, I drove to the Capital Drive in Movie Theater to watch “Mad Max Beyond Thunder Dome.”

I was 22 years old and had just graduated from West Valley College with my AA degree in French. My friend Arthur who was 33 years old had suggested that we see the film. I was saddened by my father’s death the year before, but I was hopeful about starting at San Jose State in the Fall as a transfer student.

On this July night, I parked next to the speaker at the drive in theater in my 1984 Toyota Pickup Truck and pulled it into the window of my truck.

Arthur and I chatted about West Valley College and the Oakland Raiders and Sammy Hagar. Arthur suddenly said when I get my check this month, I am going to get my gun out of the pawn shop and kill myself.

I was very angry at Arthur. I was outraged and insisted that he stop talking about it. Arthur kept talking about it, and I drove Arthur home before the movie ever started. I never told anyone what Arthur had said to me. I never spoke to Arthur again.

A month later, Arthur’s brother Bill called me and told me Arthur had killed himself with his shot gun. Bill asked me to be a pall bearer at Arthur’s funeral, and I accepted the honor.

It took me many years to accept what had happened. I felt grief as well as tremendous guilt over many years. My friend Arthur’s suicide was very painful for me.

I wish that I had known to ask someone knowledgeable about Arthur’s intentions to kill himself. I wish I had known what I could do.

Please watch this video by Janet Childs about what to say to someone who talks about taking their life:

Coping with Grief and Loss

May 22, 2018 By Daniel Davis Leave a Comment

Endings are difficult. Divorce, death, and moving to another home seem particularly challenging, when I read research. These research studies use statistics and can sort what events tend to cause people to feel stress.

Individuals are not numbers. What distresses one person can delight another. Bob says divorce is terrible. Jasmine insists divorce is the most incredible event of her life.

Yet again, transitions require us to adjust. It takes some energy to adapt to our new circumstances. Our perception of the change can have a great impact on how we adjust to our new conditions.

Muhammad is devastated, because his wife left. Hafiz was ecstatic, after he left home.

Whether we perceive these events as good or bad, adjustments are required. It is wise to take extra care of ourselves as we go through the passage of change. This doorway can surprise us in its intensity.

Please watch this video by Janet Childs, from the Center for Living with Dying, about coping with loss and grief:

How To Talk to Someone About Cancer

May 15, 2018 By Daniel Davis Leave a Comment

In 1981, my dad had told me that he was diagnosed with lymphatic cancer. After exploratory surgery, the doctors had told my dad that he had six months to live.

I enjoyed my time with my dad after I learned of his cancer. My dad and I went out to eat. We watched the San Francisco 49ers on television and went to Candlestick Park to watch the San Francisco Giants.

In early 1984, my mom told me that Howard Abrams, our family friend, had liver cancer. She told me that liver cancer was particularly deadly. She said that I could go see Howard at University of California, San Francisco, Medical Center (UCSF Medical Center), if I wanted to see him before he died. I now had two people close to me with a cancer diagnosis, and I was just 21 years old.

I drove up to San Francisco in my Datsun station wagon. UCSF Medical Center was about an hour drive to the north from Silicon Valley where I was born and still live.

I was shocked when I saw Howard. His hair was patchy. His skin had a yellow color from bile from his liver I think. Howard’s watch dangled loosely around his wrist, because he had lost so much weight.

Howard and I chatted for about an hour or so. He seemed to accept his coming death, even though he had a wife and two small children.

In April 1984, one day my mom told me that Howard had died.

In June 1984, I was driving to the Oregon Coast for a vacation as I was on summer break from West Valley College. I left work at 10:00pm and drove up highway 101 all night until I reached Crescent City, a few miles from the California and Oregon border, where I ate breakfast. After eating, I called my mom to let her know I was safe. My mom said, “Your dad died last night. His heart stopped in the middle of the night.”

Why do bad things happen? I do not know! Cancer seems to be a terrible disease for patients as well as families and friends to endure.

Please watch this video by Janet Childs about what to say to someone who has cancer:

Talking to Kids about Death

May 9, 2018 By Daniel Davis Leave a Comment

Children are precious. They are our greatest resource – our future. How we treat them shapes our future. How we talk to children influences who they become.

When we talk to children about death, we carry great weight with our words. They form their beliefs about death through their experiences and our conversations with them.

Take care to attend to their needs. They will be influenced greatly by your willingness to suffer for their betterment.

Please watch this video by Janet Childs, co-founder of the Centre for Living with Dying, about talking with children about death:

What Is the Matrix?

January 2, 2018 By Daniel Davis 1 Comment

What is possible? Do I really know? I have assumptions that help me navigate each day. I assume there is day and night. I get up each weekday morning with the morning sunlight and go to work. In the evening, I return home after work and I have leisure time. I go to sleep after the sun sets. The next weekday I get up and do the same.

There are somethings that we assume will never change. Yet all things do change. Leap year reminds us that our calendar and the universe are out of sync. We add a day every four years, because our way of measuring time is not a perfect fit with the movement of the planet earth around the star we call the sun. There are trillions and trillions of stars in the universe.

If we just consider human life on planet earth, light is quite varied. If I travel to Alaska, USA, in July, the sun sets at 10:30pm. In winter, the sun only briefly reveals itself.

The speed of light changes as does gravity. Our world changes in ways we may not realize.

As much as I may deny it, I must acknowledge that I live in an unpredictable universe. Death can stop me in my tracks. Suddenly the rhythm of my life can be thrown into chaos.

Yet there is nothing so bad that something good cannot come of it. Even Jesus’ crucifixion, enabled others to see and understand new possibilities that changed our world forever.

Learning to withhold our judgments can be very powerful. Once we make assumptions, we exclude options. There is a place of total possibility, some name the Quantum Field or the Matrix. This reality identified in quantum physics is a very powerful concept. Physics is the most validated science today.

It is modern physics and the study of electromagnetic fields that enables my iPhone to post this blog on my website which allows you to read it from almost anywhere in the world. Modern communication is remarkable thanks to modern physics. Quantum physics reveals a universe that is ripe with possibilities.

When we can approach life with an open mind, many constructive things can emerge. If I can set my assumptions aside, I can see the world in a new way.

My assumptions can act like blinders which limit my vision. It is like looking at the world standing in a valley. If I can set my assumptions aside, I can see the world from a larger perspective. It is like moving from the ground level of the valley to the top of a hill.

This is a mindful position of awareness. When I can observe others, events, and myself from a wider vantage point, I can see more choices. Our two basic powers as humans are to observe reality and make choices. Seeing more possibilities is empowering for each of us.

Please watch this video on a whole brain state which opens up our perception enabling us to see the world more clearly and to see more options:

Genius and Intelligence

November 21, 2017 By Daniel Davis Leave a Comment

What is your gift? What can you do that no other human being can do just like you?”

“There is nothing special about me!” said the character, Jack, in the film, The Fisher King. “I control my own destiny.”

Life is mysterious. Yet I believe that we all have a certain genius. The word genius comes from the root of gignere which was to ‘beget.’ We bring forth or give birth to something, according to this definition of genius.

In the late 16th century, the word genius had evolved to mean natural ability. By the mid 17th century, genius came to mean ‘exceptional natural ability.”

The evolution of the word genius seems to reflect our cultural perception that we are not all gifted as individuals. There are special people who are different than average humans, like you and me.

It is my experience that everyone has unique gifts. School can be confusing, because of its emphasis on language and mathematical ability. Often we see a person’s I.Q. (Intelligence Quotient) as a number which defines whether she or he has genius or not. Further, our I.Q. is too often seen as fixed and never changing.

Alfred Binet originally developed the intelligence test to identify which French students would have difficulty in school to assist them. It is ironic that we now use the concept of IQ to label and shame others. IQ scores have a long history of gender and cultural bias.

Fortunately, Howard Gardner developed the ideas of Multiple Intelligence. He asserted that there are nine different types of intelligence:

1. language (Verbal-Linguistic)
2. mathematics (and logic)
3. science (Naturalist)
4. artistic (Visual-Spatial)
5. athletic (Bodily/Kinesthetic)
6. musical
7. interpersonal (social)
8. intrapersonal (self-awareness)
9. existential (meaning of life)

Your IQ score will not reveal your creativity, your common sense, or your social skills. The singer, Lady Gaga has high Musical Intelligence. The tennis player, Serena Williams has great physical abilities. The teacher, Thich Nhat Hahn has high intrapersonal Intelligence.

Yet one does not need to be famous to have genius. I think each of us has unique gifts with which we are born. It is our opportunity and privilege to develop these talents. The saddest thing is when families and schools fail to recognize the uniqueness of each child, leaving one to feel insignificant, powerless, or unlovable.

If we work hard at developing our natural gifts, then we are able to experience the joy of expressing our gifts in sophisticated ways. Richard Bolles writes, “where your great passion meets the great need of the world, that is where your work lies.”

May each of us have the courage to take the heroic journey of individuation. May we work and struggle to develop the natural gifts with which we are born.

Charles Baudelaire writes that “genius is childhood recaptured.” A healthy relationship with our inner child may assist us in developing our unique talents in love and work. Please watch this video by Judith Peterson,M.A., on the Inner Child:

Self- Love and Narcissism

November 7, 2017 By Daniel Davis Leave a Comment

Is selfishness always a bad thing? What is narcissism? The word narcissistic is in the news a lot recently. What does it mean?

Narcissism is an exaggerated view of your own abilities and wanting praise from others.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines narcissism as “extreme selfishness, with a grandiose view of one’s own talents and a craving for admiration.”

While most of us would recognize the problem with narcissism, I do need to be self-centered in healthy ways. My body needs adequate sleep, healthful food, and frequent exercise.

When I neglect myself when I get too hungry, lonely, angry, or tired, and I am more likely to be self-centered. I may try to love others, but I am too needy. If I do not get 8 hours sleep at night, I may be so tired that my concentration is poor. I may not listen well. I may not be aware of myself and talk too much, too loudly, or insensitively.

Moreover, when I do not see myself and my story clearly, I relate to others from a cloudy point of view. This is called a projection.

I need to see others as they are – no more or less. I need to be see myself as I am. This is an authentic relationship. I am human which means I need real relationships. It is important to be noticed by others. I need to matter to myself as well as others. I need to be treated with respect. Others need to be treated with respect.

The golden rule is “to love thy neighbor as thy self…”. When I treat myself well, I have the patience and resilience to nurture others. This is being selfish in a wise way.

Psychotherapy, pastoral counseling, meditation, 12 step work, or coaching with energy psychology techniques enable me to learn to see my story more clearly. Seeing my narrative clearly enables me to see myself as well as others with more objective eyes.

For example, if I get angry or afraid when someone mentions money, then I am unable to listen objectively on the subject of money. When someone talks about money, I am distracted by my anger or fear, and do not hear their story. It is like driving with a dirty windshield; it is hard to see the road ahead. This lack of clear vision affects me when relating to others, like in marriage or raising children.

Our modern society is dominated with narcissistic and nihilistic ideas, Ken Wilber writes. In the Oxford English Dictionary, nihilism is defined as “the belief that nothing in the world has a real existence.” I may assume that we live in a 3 dimensional world made up of atoms. I may assume that nothing matters, therefore, I may as well do whatever seems to feel good and avoid obvious pain. So I may cheat to pass the exam or win the election. I lie to destroy someone’s reputation, because I want to hurt them.

It is ironic that those who neglects their own needs are the most self-centered. When I have a poor sense of self, I am the most narcissistic. My neglect of my own needs creates my own obsession with myself.

When I was born, I was self-centered. I perceived my mother and myself as one; each one of us does. As I developed, I began to distinguish between my mother and myself. When I cried, my mother did not always come to hold me and calm me. I learned that the world and I are separate.

Over the course of my life, I am learning to see myself as different from others. This learning continues until I die, if I choose to actively participate in the process of learning or not.

In addition to the normal human development of seeing myself as separate and unique, I can be wounded. I can experience being shamed – treated like I am worthless. I may feel unworthy of love. This self-hatred can be an additional block to seeing myself and the world clearly. The self-hatred can keep me frozen in self-centeredness.

The antidote to narcissism is authentic love of oneself. The feeling of self-love is healing for us humans. To consciously experience the sensation of self-love in my body enables me to heal physically as well as emotionally. Please watch this video from Michelle Minero, M.A., author of “The Self Love Diet,” on learning to love yourself:

Do You See What I See?

February 7, 2017 By Daniel Davis Leave a Comment

We assume we are so evolved in our modern world. We have amazing technology – iPhones, Tesla cars, trains that speed at 200 miles per hour. Yet as humans, we remain fragile. We are vulnerable to over-reaction and self-deception. “When I fall in love, it will be forever. And I’ll never fall in love again,” sings Nat King Cole.

Falling in love can feel like having my feet swept out from under me. I may see my beloved as flawless. All I want to talk about are the astonishing qualities of my beloved. As I talk about my beloved, I feel high – like I am on cocaine. Such is the power of projection.

Our self-deception can enable us to take on worthy challenges, like education, marriage, or parenting. Yet our ambitious decisions can also lead to chaos, disease, and even death.

We may believe in modern life that we are free of the superstitions of our ancestors, yet this 2 million year old archaic mind is present in each of us. It will operate unconsciously in our lives. If we fail to honor our archaic mind, the cost is very high. Yet if we do integrate the wisdom of our unconscious mind, our lives are enriched beyond measure.

Please watch this video by Manuel Costa on projection:

NFL Football

January 31, 2017 By Daniel Davis Leave a Comment

I remember watching NFL football as a young kid. I loved watching quarterback Len Dawson play with the Kansas City Chiefs. I loved playing football in the grass and the mud with my friends. When I was able to play on a team, all the better. In the seventh grade, I played flag football and started at the center position, hiking the ball to the quarterback. The next year I was cut from the eighth grade team.

When I started Cupertino High School in the ninth grade, I was determined to make the team. I often played as hard as I could. I started the freshman football team on defense at Defensive Tackle. In the second game against Mountain View High School, I had a quarterback sack. I was defensive captain for the next week’s game. I was honored as one of the best Defensive Tackles, first team All-League player at my position. I was injured in later years and never played football another year on a high school team. Yet my experience was priceless. I learned a great deal about hard work, focus, discipline, motivation, and teamwork.

I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area in Northern California, USA, watching the Oakland Raiders win three World Championships and the San Francisco 49ers win five Super Bowls. I watched coaches like Bill Walsh and John Madden lead their teams with brilliance and class. I loved watching players like Ronnie Lott, because of his values. He would talk about how he loved his fellow players. I learned a great deal about life and success watching the NFL.

For many years, I have been learning about the brain and repetitive brain trauma. A very high percentage of players at the high school, college, and professional levels are effected. According to research cited by Dr. Daniel Amen, ninety-six percent of NFL players have brain damage and seventy-nine percent have CTE (Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy). Former NFL superstars such as Frank Gifford and Ken Stabler suffered from CTE. This condition of CTE causes memory loss, confusion as well as aggression, depression, suicidality, and later in life, dementia.

NFL players have been in the news for allegedly committing domestic violence and sexual assault. I have mixed feelings about football. It has taught me many great lessons. Yet, I can see that it is a violent and dangerous game in many ways. I feel fortunate to have played the game. I respect those men who play the game well, who live with integrity and honor.

Please watch this video by Manuel Costa about the life of an NFL Player: