The Big Picture

It’s been about seven weeks since we woke up to our new reality. Distancing. Isolation. Self-quarantine. Thoughts of contagion. Thoughts of worry, anger, fear, rage, desperation, and loneliness. Impatience with our particular circumstances – whatever they might be. Cabin fever. Masks, gloves, sanitizing lotion, Lysol, and bleach. Distress, pain, and despair. And back we go to fear and anger.

We connect via Zoom, Skype, Facetime, Google Hangouts, Whatsapp, and so many more. We remember people we have not spoken to in years. We feel warmth in our hearts for those whose calls we may have just recently ignored for lack of time in order – or so we told ourselves - to do something more important. And back some go to fear and anger.

Global inequality is at an extreme, transnational corporations, Silicon Valley, and the world of hedge funds and investment banking all hold the citizens of our world prisoners in their tiny drudge-filled slots with no hope of making better lives for themselves. Materialism reigns supreme, the fashion industry, influencers, and social media keep superficiality at extreme, god-like levels, climate change runs rampant through our entire earth and atmosphere, and so few are paying attention. But now, I believe, many are sitting up in ways that go far beyond what they did before, and are doing more than simply paying lip service to the recognition that there is a need for deep and profound change.

And so – despite all of the above, and despite our distancing and isolation and quarantining, there is hope in so many of us. And not only hope, but for many there is a sense of recognition. We’re all in this together. All of humanity. We see how we are all connected, and have been connected, although just recently we might have easily denied it. This – the pandemic - is a collective issue. All the other ills I listed are collective issues as well. And the pandemic has created a pause. Therefore, many are thinking in new ways. So the pandemic is also a collective potential.

Countless organizations, groups, and individuals are talking about it. The potential lies in what we make of this so that we are able to come out the other side not only contemplating, but already having begun the process of putting in place necessary and urgent changes in the state of our world.

You may be reading this with derision sketched on your face. Changes, you ask? Really? And how do you think those changes will come about?

I don’t know. All I know is that since the beginning of the realization that this was a different problem than just about anyone alive had ever experienced before, I began asking myself what the big picture is; what the big picture was going to become, how the big picture could be understood and made sense of.

And now, after observing for more than seven weeks much of what can be observed, or that I have access to, I have seen two things, repeated over and over, that give me great hope.

The first is logistical: this is not going to be over any time soon. Oh yes, some things will go towards what people might call the old normal, and yet not truly be the old normal, because we can’t go all the way back there. We all know that until there is a solution, a vaccine, a cure, the old normal is simply not possible. Crowded offices, bars, restaurants, hotels, shopping malls, stores, public events of any kind that imply a gathering of many people, are simply not feasible for now, and not feasible for the foreseeable future. Any kind of work that involves agglomerations of staff as opposed to remote work, faces the same issue. As do business and leisure travel, group sports activities, and so much more. Thus, logistically, until a solution, a vaccine, a deterrent for continued contagion, is found, none of the above is going to happen any time soon.

That implies that we continue to distance, isolate (even if to a lesser degree than for the past couple of months), potentially self-quarantine if the situation warrants it, and simply not go back to business as usual.

The second element I have observed that gives me great hope is inextricably linked to the first, because this second element requires, I believe, more time to marinate in the human mind, heart, and spirit. Many of you will have seen the same as I have: an emerging awareness of our connectedness on levels that reach far beyond simply being members of the human global community. You will have seen how in so many ways the world has come together virtually, to connect on that human level, via events on our digital screens that have united us with so many others. Events that might be concerts, speakers with ideas that move us, spiritual leaders, singers, actors, health professionals, politicians, and so many others coming together to present us – virtually – with so much that unites us. To speak of love, gratitude, compassion. To remind us of connection. And to remind us that we simply can’t go back to business as usual.

On some of these occasions, and when I contemplate the big picture concept that has so fascinated me since the outbreak of this pause in our lives, I have caught myself thinking: it can’t end yet. It’s too soon. We haven’t had enough time yet to see where we should be … where we could be going, and so, of course, when I read the cautionary statements that we need more time to resolve the virus, and that things will not be as before for quite some months, perhaps even years, a part of me almost rejoices.   

If we were able to resolve it all today or in a few weeks, we would go back to business as usual. Nothing would really have changed beyond the hundreds of thousands of dead (or millions), the lost jobs, businesses, and ruined finances of so many, the health of yet others who survived, but whose physical well-being has suffered a great decline due to the fact that they were infected. Those changes are monumental, life-changing, harrowing, and heart-breaking. But if we go back to business as usual, and simply try to move on from there, then I have to ask: but what was it all for? To create such devastation and to not learn from it; to not begin to fashion a new tomorrow precisely because of it?

So I welcome the time we are asked to be patient. I welcome the fact that we cannot – yet - get our lives back on track. I welcome the fact that we will continue to have time to contemplate what this might all mean. Because by continuing to come together as connected humanity, as intermingled molecules, and by realizing that we are indeed all one, we may find, by the time a solution for the virus is created, that there is a new way forward, and that we do not, after all, have to go back to business as usual, but that we will find ourselves co-creating a very new and better world. I hope to see you there.

NOTE: This is my May 2020 Newsletter. If you wish to subscribe in order to receive the monthly articles, please sign up at the top left of this page

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VIDEO COURSES IN ENGLISH


See the preview (click the title below) to my online video course:

Now Available

"Fatherless Women & Motherless Men"


***************

See the preview (click on the title below) to my online video course:

Now Available

"Freedom From the Torture of Your Thoughts"

**************************************************

See the preview (click on the title below) to my online video course  

  NOW available

"Emotional Unavailability & Neediness: Two Sides of the Same Coin"

  *****************************

CHARLAS EN ESPAÑOL EN YOUTUBE

Los enlaces a continuacion no sirven, dado que el canal de YouTube de Mindalia ha sido eliminado. Por tanto, las conferencia mias se pueden ver en mi propio canal de Youtube pinchando en este enlace


Vampiros energéticos: Su efecto destructivo en tu vida

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"Límites malsanos y autoestima: Tu felicidad y el amor hacia ti mismo"

****************************

"Basta con la tortura de tus pensamientos"

****************************

"Soluciones para personas emocionalmente inaccesibles 
y con dependencia emocional"

****************************

Narcisismo y Psicopatía: Vivir sin Empatía

****************************
Relación espiritual y sexo en pareja

****************************
Elige hábitos para llevar una vida de bienestar

****************************
Morir: Un enfoque espiritual

****************************

Amor sano o disfuncional: ¿Cuál es la diferencia?

*****************************

BOOKS - LIBROS - BÜCHER

Also visit my book website: www.gabriellakortsch.com where you may download excerpts or read quotations from any of my books (also in Spanish & German). My latest book Emotional Unavailability & Neediness: Two Sides of the Same Coin is available globally on Amazon in print & Kindle. You can also obtain it (or any of my other books) via Barnes & Noble.

Books by Dr. Gabriella Kortsch (English). Available globally in paperback or Kindle e-book versions

Bücher von Dr. Gabriella Kortsch (Deutsch) ... JETZT bei Amazon (Taschenbuch oder E-Book) erhältlich 

DEINE SEELE UND DU

  

Angefangen mit Rewiring the Soul - auf Deutsch: Deine Seele und Du, jetzt weltweit erhältlich als Taschenbuch oder Kindle E-Book (Blog hier), werden auch meine anderen Bücher in Zukunft auf Deutsch bei Amazon erhältlich sein.

Libros por Gabriella Kortsch (español) ... ahora en todo el mundo en Amazon en versión bolsillo y Kindle

Note: Also see my other other blog The Tao of Spiritual Partnership, so named for another one of my books. Click here to visit the blog and/or to sign up for the feed. 

My blog posts are also featured on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Pinterest & you can find me on Instagram 

Rediscovering a Sense of Adventure in Your Life

As a young pre-teen living in Switzerland and Canada, I remember vividly feeling a sense of almost unbearable excitement thinking about how my life would unfold. Now mind you, I had no specific thought about the exact things that would happen – this was not an exercise in goal planning – rather, it was a sense of unadulterated joy about that which could be, but which was still veiled; not yet clear to me at all. There was an incredible sense of adventure in it. I felt a literal and physical vibration in my solar plexus when it happened. The fact that I did not know what it would be – this unfolding of my life - made absolutely no difference to those truly sublime feelings that resounded in me like a clarion call to be awake and aware about that which could be.

These thoughts, feelings, and sensations continued – on occasion - nearly to adulthood, and then – curiously, as I discovered in the aftermath - they seemed to disappear from my conscious mind. I didn’t miss them, because I had apparently simply forgotten about them.

Life went on, much joy, but also great pain ensued, and finally, when I was in my mid-thirties, I suddenly remembered those feelings. Where did you go? I asked myself. And how do I get you back?

Let me tell you right here and now that I don’t have a fail-proof plan for getting those feelings back, but as I look retrospectively over my life since the time I realized I had lost the feelings, I can see clearly how mine did come back. Perhaps it can help you shed light on how you might get yours back – or, if you have never experienced such feelings, perhaps it might help you discover them.

What I write now comes from having given the process much thought over the ensuing 30 plus years, and remembering – again in retrospect – exactly when I would, occasionally, experience the feelings again. What I believe now is that the feelings are intertwined with the connection we all have (but do not all sense) with our inner self. Perhaps, in those pre-teen and teen years, despite my apparent early onset maturity in thought, I was, in some fashion, still a child with a child-like connection to the numinous, the divine within. And somewhere, somehow, in that mix, those feelings arose initially.

Understanding this, or perhaps it is better to say believing this, later, in adulthood, I could see that the feelings re-emerged whenever I went back on my path. What is my path? I certainly didn’t know it then (I may not fully know it now), but I could sense that it was when I was on that “path”, that those feelings came back. They would never stay long enough for me to become fully acquainted with them, but they became more and more familiar as time went by. They would again energize me, fill me with that sense of adventure I remembered from my teens, although I remember some dark years in my late forties where it appeared that they had again all but vanished, and my heart cried out in vain wondering how I could get them back once again.

After that, however, as I stayed more and more on a given road in my life, I was greeted more and more often again with those feelings of adventure, of excitement, and of joy. I cannot reiterate enough that it was never connected to outer honours, successes, or financial rewards, but to a knowing that I was walking my path.

One part of the rediscovery of these feelings was to try different things and test out how I felt as I did them. As time went by, I could sense quite clearly which were the ones that connected me to that feeling and which were not. The adventure I refer to is, of course, not an outer adventure such as white-water rafting or trekking through the foothills of the Himalayas, but an adventure of the soul. This creates the connection and this creates the joy and the sense of adventure and excitement, almost as if you are able to re-connect with a long-lost and very beloved friend.

In order to sense what I have written about, you need some quiet space in your life. Without it, how do you expect to even notice what is going on inside? Without it, how do you expect to recognize when you are coming closer to yourself with what you are doing and thinking? Without it, how do you expect to reconnect to the you that you may have forgotten, or barely even realize is there?

Giving yourself time to contemplate this process – and putting it into action - may lead you to a joy you may have never experienced.

***************

VIDEO COURSES IN ENGLISH


See the preview (click the title below) to my online video course:

"Fatherless Women & Motherless Men"


***************

See the preview (click on the title below) to my online video course:

"Freedom From the Torture of Your Thoughts"

**************************************************

See the preview (click on the title below) to my online video course  

"Emotional Unavailability & Neediness: Two Sides of the Same Coin"

  *****************************

CONFERENCIAS EN ESPAÑOL EN YOUTUBE

Estas conferencias que ofrecí entre el 2017 y el 2019 se 
pueden ver en mi propio canal de Youtube 
pinchando en este enlace




Vampiros energéticos: Su efecto destructivo en tu vida

*******************************

"Límites malsanos y autoestima: Tu felicidad y el amor hacia ti mismo"

****************************

"Basta con la tortura de tus pensamientos"

****************************

"Soluciones para personas emocionalmente inaccesibles 
y con dependencia emocional"

****************************

Narcisismo y Psicopatía: Vivir sin Empatía

****************************
Relación espiritual y sexo en pareja

****************************
Elige hábitos para llevar una vida de bienestar

****************************
Morir: Un enfoque espiritual

****************************

Amor sano o disfuncional: ¿Cuál es la diferencia?

*****************************

BOOKS - LIBROS - BÜCHER

Also visit my book website: www.gabriellakortsch.com where you may download excerpts or read quotations from any of my books (also in Spanish & German). My latest book Emotional Unavailability & Neediness: Two Sides of the Same Coin is available globally on Amazon in print & Kindle. You can also obtain it (or any of my other books) via Barnes & Noble.

Books by Dr. Gabriella Kortsch (English). Available globally in paperback or Kindle e-book versions

Bücher von Dr. Gabriella Kortsch (Deutsch) ... JETZT bei Amazon (Taschenbuch oder E-Book) erhältlich 

DEINE SEELE UND DU

  

Angefangen mit Rewiring the Soul - auf Deutsch: Deine Seele und Du, jetzt weltweit erhältlich als Taschenbuch oder Kindle E-Book (Blog hier), werden auch meine anderen Bücher in Zukunft auf Deutsch bei Amazon erhältlich sein.

Libros por Gabriella Kortsch (español) ... ahora en todo el mundo en Amazon en versión bolsillo y Kindle

Note: Also see my other other blog The Tao of Spiritual Partnership, so named for another one of my books. Click here to visit the blog and/or to sign up for the feed. 

My blog posts are also featured on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Pinterest & you can find me on Instagram 

Why Love Isn’t Always Love

Almost everyone knows the marvel of falling in love. Similarly, most of us have experienced the pain of love ending. What many of us don’t know is why love is not always love, even when the emotions of falling in love, or the pain of losing love are clearly very strong.

Let’s examine some of the ways in which we fall in love:

• The chemistry between you and other person is so unusually strong that you (or both of you) believe it means you are in love
• The adrenaline and excitement that surges when you are with the other is so strong that you are convinced it means you are in love
• The need you feel for the other person is so strong that you believe it is a clear indication that this is love … else why would you feel such need?
• The desire you feel to spend all your free time with the other, and not with friends and family, signifies – or so you believe – that this is love
• The fact that you are unable to stop thinking about the other most of your waking hours, is a strong indication – or so you believe - that this is love
• The near instant connection … almost on a soul level … that you feel with the other person very soon after meeting is so strong that you believe it signifies that this is love
• The fact that the love the other shows you, and that you see reflected in their eyes, makes you feel so good, that you are convinced this is love, especially because you don’t feel that way when you are not together.
• The fact that you are able to clearly see the qualities of your new partner – that he/she is not yet capable of seeing – qualities that you are convinced will surface, once your partner has realized how much you love him/her, and this love outpouring from you is so strong, that he/she will be able to change in order to allow said qualities to surface … makes you believe that this is true love

Now let’s examine how we might define an ideal state of love:

• Ideally, loving another means you don’t love the other because you need him/her, because you have already learned to fulfill your own needs
• Ideally, loving another means you are able to complement each other, not need each other, because you both bring full and rich lives to the table at the beginning of the relationship
• Ideally, loving another means you love within the parameters of a rich and full life that you had before you met the other, and that you continue to nurture, despite the relationship with the one you love
• Ideally, loving another means you love yourself first – not in a selfish way – but in the way you would take care of yourself first on board an aircraft should the air pressure drop, and thus you put your own oxygen mask on first in order to be able to be there for others. Clearly, this is not egotism, but an understanding that if you are taking good care of yourself, you are capable of offering so much to others
• Similarly, loving yourself first, means a trespassing of boundaries is not tolerated
• Ideally, loving another means you have learned how to love yourself, and thus do not need the other’s love to make you feel good about yourself. Rather, you give each other love freely, and revel in it, but feel good about yourself either way.

You will have seen the differences between the examples of ways in which we fall in love and the comments about an ideal state of love. Of course we fall in love in other ways as well, but the examples I have cited, rarely, if ever, give the end result we might hope for. In those situations, eventually what you thought was love often devolves into something dysfunctional and even toxic. There are a number of reasons for this. When we fall in love (or believe we are in love) due to needs that we believe the other will fulfill, a red flag is unfurling about what we have not yet learned how to do ourselves. This will create issues very quickly, when – for whatever reasons - the other balks at filling your needs. When we fall in love due to a strong desire to spend all our time with the other, another red flag unfurls regarding such a desire, such an obsession. A life that we have not filled with meaning, purpose, and content, and that we wish to fill with meaning and content through another, telling ourselves this means it is love, will surely cause the other to feel suffocated in short shrift, and sooner or later causes them to leave us to our own devices. The profound void caused by this abandonment by the beloved – fueled by your own lack of having learned to give your life meaning and purpose – is one of the most painful situations to be experienced in this kind of love. Another case in point is falling in love and having a vision of the other through rose-colored glasses. Such a vision typically has little to do with reality, and much more to do with our own as yet undeveloped inner qualities. Thus yet another red flag makes its appearance and shows us – if we have eyes to see it – that rather than yearning for said qualities in the other, we need to develop them ourselves.

So – what can be done? First, recognize the differences between real love – ideal love – and the love you think you feel due to some kind of need of lack of self-fulfilment. Second, and this is the more important part of the solution – begin to work on yourself. Begin to grow into that person that could attract the more ideal kind of love into your life. Begin to evolve, and grow into what we could call an emotionally mature person. This involves learning how to love the self and becoming conscious and aware at all times.

Also see:

• How Your Degree of Emotional Maturity Influences Your Partner Choices
• A Portrait of A Healthy Relationship
• The Nature of True Intimacy

***************

VIDEO COURSES IN ENGLISH


See the preview (click the title below) to my online video course:

Now Available

"Fatherless Women & Motherless Men"

Click HERE


***************

See the preview (click on the title below) to my online video course:

Now Available

"Freedom From the Torture of Your Thoughts"

Click HERE

**************************************************

See the preview (click on the title below) to my online video course  

  NOW available

"Emotional Unavailability & Neediness: Two Sides of the Same Coin"

Click HERE

  *****************************

CHARLAS EN ESPAÑOL EN YOUTUBE


Vampiros energéticos: Su efecto destructivo en tu vida

En YouTube aquí

*******************************
"Límites malsanos y autoestima: Tu felicidad y el amor hacia ti mismo"

En YouTube aquí

****************************

"Basta con la tortura de tus pensamientos"

en YouTube aquí

****************************

"Soluciones para personas emocionalmente inaccesibles 
y con dependencia emocional"

en Youtube aquí

****************************

Narcisismo y Psicopatía: Vivir sin Empatía

en YouTube aquí

****************************
Relación espiritual y sexo en pareja

en YouTube aquí

****************************
Elige hábitos para llevar una vida de bienestar

en YouTube aquí

****************************
Morir: Un enfoque espiritual

en YouTube aquí

****************************

Amor sano o disfuncional: ¿Cuál es la diferencia?

en YouTube aqui

*****************************

BOOKS - LIBROS - BÜCHER

Also visit my book website: www.gabriellakortsch.com where you may download excerpts or read quotations from any of my books (also in Spanish & German). My latest book Emotional Unavailability & Neediness: Two Sides of the Same Coin is available globally on Amazon in print & Kindle. You can also obtain it (or any of my other books) via Barnes & Noble.

Books by Dr. Gabriella Kortsch (English). Available globally in paperback or Kindle e-book versions

Bücher von Dr. Gabriella Kortsch (Deutsch) ... JETZT bei Amazon (Taschenbuch oder E-Book) erhältlich 

DEINE SEELE UND DU

  

Angefangen mit Rewiring the Soul - auf Deutsch: Deine Seele und Du, jetzt weltweit erhältlich als Taschenbuch oder Kindle E-Book (Blog hier), werden auch meine anderen Bücher in Zukunft auf Deutsch bei Amazon erhältlich sein.

Libros por Gabriella Kortsch (español) ... ahora en todo el mundo en Amazon en versión bolsillo y Kindle

Note: Also see my other other blog The Tao of Spiritual Partnership, so named for another one of my books. Click here to visit the blog and/or to sign up for the feed. 

My blog posts are also featured on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Pinterest & you can find me on Instagram