Wellbeing Health Retreats

Words such as "depressed" and "anxious" don’t exist in some American Indian and Alaska Native languages. Quite a contrast from modern society, where The World Health Organization names depression as the single leading cause of disability globally.

If you were born after 1945, you’re 10 times more likely to experience depression. From 2005-15, cases of depressive illness increased by nearly a fifth. Around 1 in 5 people won’t make it through the year without having a battle with mental illness.

In 1827, during the European colonisation of North America, a doctor met with over 20,000 native Americans to check on their health. He never saw or even heard of a case of insanity among them. His insights don’t appear to be isolated, the consensus is that mental illness was absent in tribal cultures.

Mental collapse seems to be a modern-day predicament.

But it is not just depression & anxiety that have become rife, so has the rise of rage.

In England, road workers now feel that wearing their hi-vis jacket is akin to waving a red flag in front of a bull. Each year thousands of drivers get so irate about having to slow down for road works that they drive straight into traffic cones while effing and jeffing at road workers.

Psychology professor James Averill says “Anger is one of the densest forms of communication. It conveys more information, more quickly, than almost any other type of emotion.”

It seems that many people today are either actively expressing their inner frustration through outward hostility or turning it inwards. Depression has been described like this:

“It starts as sadness, then I feel myself shutting down, becoming less capable of coping. Eventually, I just feel numb and empty.”

Deteriorating mental health occurs due to a complexity of reasons. Consider just one factor, our connection to what we do for a living.

In bygone eras, a person would learn a craft or a trade where there was a direct link between what they did and how it improved the well-being of those around them. A shoemaker could see how the shoes he made or repaired enhanced the lives of those around him.

As jobs have become more information-based, many people have found themselves feeling increasingly disconnected from their work and they question the social value of what they do.

In his book, Iron John, Robert Bly speaks about how difficult it has become to teach children the value of work in the modern-day world:

Fathers in earlier times could often break through their inadequate temperaments by teaching rope-making, fishing, posthole digging, grain cutting, drumming, harness making, animal care, even singing and storytelling. That teaching sweetened the effect of the temperament. But in most families today, the sons and daughters receive only his temperament, which is usually irritable and remote. What the father brings home today is usually a touchy mood, springing from powerlessness and despair mingled with longstanding shame and the numbness peculiar to those who hate their jobs.

A century ago, a native American known as Lame Deer was offered the opportunity to leave his traditional way of life and join our more ‘sophisticated society.’ He reflected on the invitation and said:

“I didn’t want a steady job in an office or a factory. I thought myself too good for that, not because I was stuck up, but because any human being is too good for that kind of no-life, even white people.”

Excessive stress and chronic anxiety around employability are ever-present challenges, but the greater worry people currently voice is feeling that their talents aren’t being valued or utilised.

The columnist Courtney E. Martin captured the stirrings within a society that has tired of simply surviving and disassociating from their lives. As she so eloquently put it:

“Here’s my attempt at synthesizing what I see among my friends, family, colleagues, and co-housing community.

We want to be paid enough to live without the specter of an empty bank account or an empty cupboard hanging over our heads.

We want work that demands something of our minds and our bodies; we want to think and move.

We want to feel like our gifts, whatever weird and wonderful things those might be, are put to good use (which first requires knowing what the hell they are).

We want to work alongside other people who see and celebrate those gifts, people who teach us things, people who want to make cool stuff with us, people who are kind and mostly good and don’t create a lot of unnecessary drama.

We want to be trusted, to know how and when and where we do our best work.

We want to wake up in the morning and feel like there is a place to direct our energy and that place, while it may not define us, dignifies us.”

Research on emotional suppression shows that when emotions are pushed aside or ignored, they get stronger. Psychologists call this principle, amplification.

Instead of denying our feelings of frustration or despair, or trying to suppress them through distraction and addiction, we can heed them as signs that something needs to shift in our lives.

Our wellbeing retreat is designed to help you cultivate a vision for your life and get you thinking about how you might find greater alignment between who you are, what you do and who you spend time with.

Stepping back to hear your inner voice leads to reevaluating your life and consider starting to take values-aligned action.

Imagine how different things could be if Courtney E. Martin’s dignified view of work and how we spend our time, became the norm rather than the exception?

It begins with simply opening to the idea that much greater possibilities abound.

Robert Bly wrote an ode to this concept:

Things to Think

Think in ways you've never thought before


If the phone rings,

think of it as carrying a message


Larger than anything you've ever heard,


Vaster than a hundred lines of Yeats.

Think that someone may bring a bear to your door,


Maybe wounded and deranged: or think that a moose


Has risen out of the lake, and he's carrying on his antlers


A child of your own whom you've never seen.

When someone knocks on the door, think that he's about


To give you something large: tell you you're forgiven,


Or that it's not necessary to work all the time, or that it's


Been decided that if you lie down no one will die.

Our wellbeing retreats may just be that knock on the door for you.

Moving Beyond Trauma

Venturing Beyond the Bounds of our Comfort Zone

“At times you have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover is yourself.” - Alan Alda

Of all the ironies, is there any greater than the fact that we work (or at least labour) extremely hard to build a comfortable life only to then discover that this comfort atrophies into debilitating states of depression or numbness?

It used to only afflict those at midlife, but with the advent of the quarter-life crisis, we are being provoked to get real earlier than ever before.

In stories, we empathise with protagonists such as Frodo. Why on earth would one want to give up the tranquillity of the shire, to enter the dangerous unknown - replete with orcs, wraiths, giant spiders and other deadlies?

Sure, Bilbo Baggins may feel alive while he is reading about dragons and glittering treasure but he is not crazy enough to want to encounter them!

While we secretly urge these heroes-in-waiting on as they vacillate over whether or not to leave their ordinary worlds behind, we typically do so from the comfort of the cinema or our living rooms.

Only ever knowing the Shire, Frodo was intrigued by what lay beyond its boundaries

The fundamental question seems to be whether we merely live vicariously through bold adventurers or use their journeys as an impetus to take our own.

After studying mythology Joseph Campbell maintained that

“The serpent, the rejected one, is representative of the unconscious deep wherein are hoarded all of the rejected, unadmitted, unrecognized, unknown or undeveloped factors.”

Afraid of what our individuating will require, we heartily project our fears until our vision is impaired and all we can see is a dangerous and hostile world.

So perhaps the choice is really no choice at all. Resist doing the extensive excavation work to discover what talents lie dormant within us, or become resigned to the melancholy and lethargy that accompanies denial.

That was the picture painted in the opening scene of Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir, Eat, Pray, Love. I doubt it would have resonated with so many people had her story gone on to show her repressing her wilder intuition and instead, settling down to have a child, fulfil the role others wanted for her and put her crisis moment down to simply being a rough patch.

Daring Greatly

A generation ago we responded to the bravery of Robyn Davidson as she abandoned the blandness of a patriarchal suburban existence to traverse the outback and “place herself in the wilderness of her own accord,” as Suzanne Falkiner puts it.

For a more recent tale of an Australian rewilding her life, take a look at Claire Dunn’s, A Year Without Matches. She encompasses the wisdom of indigenous Australians who took to walkabouts as,

“A fast from all things familiar that is designed to break the habitual patterns of the mind and allow a deeper knowledge to arise.”

Fortunately, she doesn’t have to brave her quest entirely alone. In addition to her mentors, friends and the other courageous souls who join her, she fortuitously happened to pack the ultimate tome on rewilding, Women Who Run With The Wolves.

Whether travelling through the searing heat and dusty wasteland of the outback on a camel, foraging and battling the loneliness of spending a year in the bush, or mixing it up with a year of indulgence, self-discovery and the ordeal of love, rewilding your life is not for the faint-hearted.

But all immature insects must pass through a larval stage before entering the chrysalis state in order to emerge as adults. Metamorphosis requires a caterpillar to liquefy and take on an entirely new form. Rewilding, becoming authentic, taking the hero’s journey, it doesn’t matter which analogy you choose; the process is the most radical one of all.

Claire perfectly captures the purging one must go through. While difficult to read about, it is even harder to experience. I once knew a very lucid and intelligent woman who likened her purging to that of a wild animal taking over her body. We would much rather opt for the more sanitised approach of casting our gaze toward the grace and beauty of a butterfly in motion, rather than endure seeing a caterpillar dissolve their entire bodies to become something grander.

The psychological challenge of 12 months in the bush was as difficult as the physical

Shortcuts... Simply Short-Circuiting

Scott Peck and other thinkers proclaim that for most people suffering is the only teacher they know. It is interesting to think that mental illness was all but absent from tribal societies. Equally curious, is the rise of doof culture.

Having met people who spoke about the high level of connection they find at such festivals I decided to take a peek. The recipe of a natural bush setting, music, dance, alternative thinkers, beautifully designed and creative sets all augured well for something special.

Unfortunately, the drug-fueled haze that characterises these events smacks of people mistaking momentary transcendence for something substantial.

While teaching through the 60‘s era, Joseph Campbell noticed a major drop off in people willing to take their inner journeys. Having found shortcuts through drugs, a number of the students argued that they no longer needed to follow their bliss; they merely had to take it in a pill form. Campbell rued having advised people to, follow your bliss, remarking that he wished he’d said, “follow your blisters.”

“In most of our human relationships, we spend much of our time reassuring one another that our costumes of identity are on straight.” - Ram Dass

Psychiatrist David Hawkins proposed that the reason stimulants are so enticing is that they block out the negative emotional states which pervade weakly developed mindsets, temporarily allowing a person to experience the bliss of the higher states. If that is the case, then it is little wonder that the bulk of people settle for temporarily experiencing elevated states, rather than grow into a more permanent one.

One of the most intriguing responses I encountered came from a young woman who was curious about all this fuss over elevated states. She decided to see how it felt and while she remarked that while it was a wondrous thing, she had no interest in doing it again. Having experienced a higher state artificially, she was determined to spend the rest of her days finding it naturally. Sentiments of a true quester - leaving the herd to find her authentic self.

As Joseph Campbell surmised

“You enter the forest at the darkest point, where there is no path. Where there is a way or path, it is someone else’s path. You are not on your own path. If you follow someone else’s way, you are not going to realize your potential.”

Clare Dunn spoke of solitude as the sledgehammer which restrains the ego long enough to let the soul breathe and be acknowledged. If you are game enough to confront your inner child woundings and the damaging beliefs and behaviours that have stemmed from this, you can be sure that you’re in for a tumultuous time.

Carl Jung once said that:

Only the symbolic life can express the needs of the soul—the daily needs of the soul, mind you! And because people have no such thing, they never step out of this mill—this awful, grinding, banal life, and therefore want sensation.

It could be argued that adventure seeking is a substitute or an evasion of inner exploration.

Our Self-Discovery retreat provides the opportunity to get beyond your persona and discover the deeper, authentic version of yourself.

Our Family Healing retreat helps you work through the imprints from our mothers, fathers and culture, dissolving the limiting and damaging beliefs incurred through upbringing, in order to integrate the healthy masculine and feminine.

In doing so, you become better positioned to sustain high functioning relationships, find and fulfil your vocation, while aligning with your most deeply held values.

Why go through the struggle of metamorphosis?

Try reading the stories of Robyn Davidson, Clare Dunn and Elizabeth Gilbert and you can’t help but feel compelled to. This urging to individuate resides in us all. Suffering and becoming authentic is the ultimate alchemy. Embrace it. Welcome it.

And remember what Janet Fitch said:

“The Phoenix must burn to emerge.”

Couples Counseling Retreat

Of all the myths causing heartache, few compare to the one which says that once we track down our elusory soulmate, everything will fall into place for us.

Anaïs Nin put it succinctly when she said

“Where the myth fails, human love begins.”

Mythologist Joseph Campbell teased this idea out further, saying:

“The whole thing in marriage is the relationship and yielding - knowing the functions, knowing that each is playing a role in an organism. One of the things I have realized - and people who have been married a long time realize - is that marriage is not a love affair.

A love affair has to do with immediate personal satisfaction. But marriage is an ordeal; it means yielding, time and again. That's why it's a sacrament: you give up your personal simplicity to participate in a relationship. And when you're giving, you're not giving to the other person: you're giving to the relationship. And if you realize you are in the relationship just as the other person is, then it becomes life building, a life fostering and enriching experience, not an impoverishment because you're giving to somebody else...

What a beautiful thing is a life together as growing personalities, each helping the other to flower, rather than just moving into the standard archetype. It's a wonderful moment when people can make the decision to be something quite astonishing and unexpected, rather than cookie-mold products.”

Joseph Campbell with his wife, Jean Erdman

So how did that play out in concrete terms in his own life?

Joseph Campbell inspired his partner Jean Erdman to incorporate myth into her work as a dancer and choreographer.

Conversely, Jean helped Joseph climb down from the towers of intellectual abstraction he lived in, to teach students about relationships and other areas of life in practical, meaningful terms.

Sometimes I forget completely

What companionship is.

Unconscious and insane,

I spill sad energy everywhere.

- Rumi

The Mystical Marriage

Compatibility within our Soul Blueprints

Unfortunately, high functioning relationships are often the exception rather than the norm. Unless we commit to our self-development and endeavour to gain greater self-awareness, relationships inevitably languish. As psychologist James Hollis put it:

“The more we wish another person to repair our wounds, meet our needs, and protect us from having to grow up, really grow up, the more dissatisfying the relationship will prove over the long haul. It will swamp in stagnation. If, however, we can see that the relationship is a summons to growth, in part by encountering the otherness of our partner, the relationship will support each person risking, stretching, and growing beyond the point where they entered.”

Many Eastern cultures draw on the insights of astrology to help understand the compatibility of a couple.

Numerology uses the form of sacred geometry to express the growth process.

The number 1 is symbolised by a dot. This captures the single-mindedness and intensity of individual will. A circle can be formed by making a line that begins and ends with itself. Individuality can be thought of as a bubble, or isolating principle.

The number 2 is represented by the intersection of two individuals. This pairing of opposites unites to create a Vesica Piscis. The centre of this is the Mandorla, an Italian word for almond-shaped.

In numerology, the number 2 symbolises co-operation, partnership and harmony. It is the polarity of the number 1.

One of our foundational challenges in life is balancing our authenticity to become individuals while maintaining relationships and effective boundaries.

Carl Jung said,

“The unrelated human being lacks wholeness, for he can achieve wholeness only through the soul, and the soul cannot exist without its other side, which is always found in a ‘You.”’

Only after we spend sufficient time working on ourselves and expressing what’s important to us can we create the container where we can effectively love and receive the love, which can give further impetus to our development.

James Hollis points out that, “Whether in a relationship or not, each of us has a profound need to feel the resonant support of the soul, to feel that we are participants in a divinely generated story.”

In the case of couples like Joseph Campbell and Jean Erdman, they each felt they had their own vocation in life and through coming together in a conscious relationship, they were better placed to express their individuation while supporting one another’s expression.

When 3 dots join with one another we create a triangle, the first 3D object, which symbolises an outwards expression. Consider the birth of a child. Two partners who may have focused their energy on each other, now devote themselves to a third being.

In numerology, 3 represents expression, be it communication, creative or other.

Jung believed that wholeness comes through relationship with another. Only in such fashion can the third appear. If we have only a conversation with ourselves, as a hermit might, we can easily get caught in the looping tape of our own madness, or our own stagnant, self-confirming neurosis. James Hollis offers this:

“A more mature relationship is based on “otherness” itself, on the dialectical principle that demonstrates that my one and your one together create the third. The “third” is the developmental process that results as we influence each other in turn; we grow by incorporating that influence into our private sensibilities. We do not learn and grow by all subscribing to the same school of thought, copying the same values, or voting the same way. We grow from the experience of our differences, although in insecure moments we quickly forget this. The capacity to include those differences, even incorporate them into an ever broader, more sophisticated range of choices, is the chief task, and gift, of an evolving relationship.”

Our retreat for couples is designed to balance relaxation, reconnection and deepening of your relationship with self and each other. In an era where we are collectively reevaluating what relationships represent, this program helps you clarify the challenges and opportunities within your connection.

When was the last time you invested in tuning up and tuning into your relationship?

With so much of our emotional energy tied to our primary partnership, cultivating the best version of it may be one of the best things you can do to enhance your wellbeing.

One of the optional activities during this retreat is to have a compatibility reading done for your astrology and numerology charts as a couple.

Shedding Our Old Selves

The moment you understand your value, you become valuable.

Prometheus and the Gift of Fire

Here in Australia, forest fires are synonymous with wanton destruction, invoking tremendous fear in people. We imagine what it would be like to lose our houses, our possessions and possibly life itself.

The early European settlers were equally perplexed by how comfortable the indigenous Australians were with fire and how it was present throughout the seasons. As a result, large intense bushfires were uncommon.

The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is the fear of the unknown.

- H.P Lovecraft

Danger of Too Little Fire

Trees have always been at greater risk of death from insect infestation and disease than from fire, which kills diseases and the insects that prey on trees. Fires very rarely occur anymore in Sydney’s exclusive North Shore. One consequence of this is that the tick population has flourished leading to an outbreak of red meat allergies in people who have had tick bites. Then, of course, there has been the scourge of Lyme disease around the world which is associated with growing tick numbers.

A five-year study in America compared regularly burned areas with unburned woodlands. They found annual fire reduced the abundance ticks by 70-80%. The greater our knowledge the more we learn how wise ancient cultures were in living in harmony with the natural environment.

In the past, forests had fewer but larger, healthier trees. With fewer fires, trees have to compete with undergrowth for nutrients and space. Fire takes away weaker trees and debris, which brings greater health to a forest.

Friedrich Nietzsche wrote, “The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die.”

Change is essential to maintain a healthy forest. There are species of trees, which are entirely fire-dependent. Others have fire resistant cones that require heat to open and release seeds for regeneration. They actually encourage fire by having leaves that are covered with flammable resins. Without fire, many trees would succumb to old age with no new generations to carry on their legacy.

It could be argued that human life is the same. Abraham Maslow used the analogy of people being like trees in that they instinctly want to grow straight and tall. He argued that it is only unhealthy environments (eg ones culture) that inhibits our growth. But perhaps positive psychology takes things a step too far, underestimating the importance of the occasional roaring fire to rip through our lives and open us up.

“In any given moment we have two options: to step forward into growth or step back into safety.” - Abraham Maslow

Erik Erikson suggested we view life as a series of crises or development opportunities, rather than focus on the most singularly recognised one, the midlife crisis.

Evolution or Devolution

By heeding the lessons that are offered throughout the development cycle we essentially carry out hazard reduction in our psyches, lessening the chance of a major wildfire sweeping through our lives.

The BBC series, Doctor Foster, is a great example of someone reaching midlife with a strong ego identity but an absence of soul development. Doctor Gemma Foster has a seemingly happy marriage to a property developer, a happy young son and a job that gives her good standing in the local community. But everything changes after she discovers a blonde hair on her husbands’ scarf, causing her to suspect her husband of having an affair. In short order, her life unravels in dramatic fashion.

A pivotal moment occurs when in the depths of despondency she swims out to sea to drown. Away from safety and deep into the raging, icy ocean she surrenders. Her surrender, however, isn’t into the arms of death but rather to that of victimhood. Swimming back to shore she is a changed woman who comes into her power in spectacular fashion.

Robert Walter, director of the Joseph Campbell Foundation, said we each choose one of three attitudes to life:

“You can either surrender to victimhood – and a lot of people do – or you can surrender to a fundamentalism – you can basically give your responsibility to someone else and say, ‘Tell me what to do and I’ll do it’ – or you can say, ‘I have a choice here and I’m responsible’. What does it mean to be the hero of your own life? It means to be responsible for your own adventure.”

Seizing Our Invitations

Each of the archetypes reflects themselves in our lives in different ways and at different times, but there tends to be one that is most dominant. In the case of Miguel Piñero, it was the Magician, for Abraham Lincoln, the Ruler. Determining and then accentuating your prime archetype goes a long way in assisting you in being able to create a joyous and fulfilling life.

Being responsible for our own adventure means saying yes to opportunities and facing the unknown, be it attending a workshop or some other form of courage and openness.

As part of our Midlife Crisis or Renewal retreat you will explore the Destroyer archetype and the necessity of letting go to embrace the chaos that life throws at us. So too will you look at the midlife opportunity for rebirth, in line with the impulse of the Creator archetype.

In mythology, the Phoenix was a fabulous golden-red feathered bird whose body emitted rays of pure sunlight. It became reborn through rising from its ashes, a fitting metaphor for how we learn from life’s trials and become far more than we were. French philosopher Voltaire described the Phoenix in this manner:

It was of the size of an eagle, but its eyes were as mild and tender as those of the eagle are fierce and threatening. Its beak was the color of a rose, and seemed to resemble, in some measure, the beautiful mouth of Formosante. Its neck resembled all the colors of the rainbow, but more brilliant and lively. A thousand shades of gold glistened on its plumage. Its feet seemed a mixture of purple and silver; and the tail of those beautiful birds which were afterwards fixed to the car of Juno, did not come near the beauty of its tail.

Cornelis Troost’s ‘A Phoenix’

As you contemplate your own Phoenix Rising, I’ll leave you with a poem which encourages taking a bigger perspective on your life and illustrates how being alive is itself an ongoing act of transformation; of annihilating and creating again from ashes.

The Fire

Listen, I’ve light


in my eyes


and on my skin


the warmth of a star, so strange


is this


that I


can barely comprehend it:


I think


I’ll lift my face to it, and then


I lift my face,


and don’t even know how


this is done. And


everything alive


(and everything’s


alive) is turning


into something else


as at the heart

of some annihilating


or is it creating


fire


that’s burning, unseeably, always


burning at such speeds


as eyes cannot


detect, just try


to observe your own face


growing old


in the mirror, or


is it beginning to be born?

~ Franz Wright

The Secret to Thriving Relationships

Frustrated desires, the theme in René Magritte's, The Lovers

How many relationships do you know of that you would regard as high functioning and responsible for bringing out the best in each person?

Neuroscientist Bianca Acevedo and her colleagues took brain scans of people in long-term relationships and discovered that only 10% were fulfilling and happy.

Most people struggle to nurture the conditions necessary for a flourishing relationship and maintain interactions that result in passionate coupledom, which the researchers dubbed as ‘swans’.

As with so many other areas of life, our childhoods set the framework for our attachment style, schemas, anusayas and other blindspots which sabotage our chances for optimal connection and leave us in the ugly duckling stage of development.

The poet Rafiq Kathwari captured the common experience many of us felt as children in his one-line poem, On Receiving Father at JFK After His Long Flight From Kashmir:

“As I open my arms wide, he extends his hand.”

We could speculate on the reasons why the father opted for a handshake but suffice to say it takes maturity to realise most parents did the best they could and it takes a lifetime to realise that feeling loved and complete is ultimately an inside job.

Phil Stutz grew up with a violent father who up and left him as a child. After so many years of being battered his mother concluded that all men were worthless. From a young age, Stutz was repeatedly told he would be worthless unless he became a doctor.

He gained a medical degree and then trained as a psychiatrist blending science with intuition to develop his own theories.

Stutz claims that there are some unavoidable aspects of reality we must accept before we can move forward in life. The first step he offers patients is to accept the Aspects of Reality - being pain, uncertainty and constant work.

From the perspective of Carl Jung, within our psyche our ego identity is far more developed than our self is.

Constant work, pain and uncertainty are all anathemas to the ego.

Is it any wonder the Disney, or fairytale picture of love is so appealing to us?

Being primed to think the right relationship will be smooth sailing and constant magic has become the mirage of our times.

In his fictional work, The Course of Love, philosopher Alain de Botton captures our infantile tendencies when it comes to relationships:

…though so much about Rabih will alter and mature over the years – his understanding of love will for decades retain precisely the structure it first assumed in the summer of his sixteenth year. He will continue to trust in the possibility of rapid, wholehearted understanding and empathy between two human beings and in the chance of a definitive end to loneliness. He will experience similarly bittersweet longings for other lost soulmates spotted on buses, in the aisles of supermarkets and in the reading rooms of libraries. He will have precisely the same feeling at the age of twenty, during a semester of study in Manhattan, about a woman seated to his left on the northbound C train, and at twenty-five in the architectural office in Berlin where he is doing work experience... He will need to learn that love is a skill rather than an enthusiasm.

Constant work, pain & uncertainty.

Despite his devotion to self-awareness, Stutz speaks of his inability to find lasting love.

Unfortunately, the imprints from his childhood have won out, although he acknowledges he makes for a far better partner now than during his younger years.

At 74, during the filming of a documentary about himself, he accepts the challenge of engaging fully in a relationship opportunity which he was half invested in.

Barry Michels is a fellow psychotherapist who has co-authored books with Stutz. Michels holds that the defining factor in whether a relationship is strong or not is how competent a couple is at creating an emotional environment where they feel close, trust each other, and here’s the big one: where each person wants the other to get the most out of life.

Whereas our ego identity is self-serving by nature, our self, or soul is other-oriented.

As we dedicate ourselves to our individuation or self-actualisation, we move away from an over-dependency on a relationship to fill the void that only our higher purpose can meet.

There are a plethora of impactful tools and theories that can improve our relationships but without tending to the soul aspect as well as the ego it is unlikely couples therapy will be successful.

Rainer Maria Rilke’s poem, Love Song, illustrates how becoming whole acts as a bridge.

Self-actualisation takes us from the ego’s loneliness and into the connectedness that arises from developing the self and coming on stream with the collective consciousness.

When my soul touches yours a great chord sings!


How shall I tune it then to other things?


O! That some spot in darkness could be found


That does not vibrate when’er your depth sound.


But everything that touches you and me


Welds us as played strings sound one melody.


Where is the instrument whence the sounds flow?


And whose the master-hand that holds the bow?


O! Sweet song

The poet begins by sharing his worries about being in love.

If pain is one of the core aspects of reality then to experience love, we have to open ourselves to potential loss and heartache.

Uncertainty is another aspect of reality. Who knows how we will cope when we become vulnerable and allow our wounds and frailties to be exposed?

There is a burgeoning tendency towards avoidance in relationships where people seek to shelter their soul “O! That some spot in darkness could be found, That does not vibrate when’er your depth sound” far away from their partner.

Overcoming these challenges and doing the constant work has a profound effect, facilitating the union of souls Rilke speaks of in the second part of his poem.

We may bemoan the Disney image of soul mates appearing to be a modern idea, but it stretches back to Plato’s Symposium, where the philosopher Aristophanes discusses the concept of mirror souls.

In Greek mythology, Zeus, split androgynous human beings into two separate parts, male and female, and they spend their whole lives in pursuit of their other halves so that they could become whole again.

Two human beings in love can come together to create one whole relationship and still maintain their distinct individuality and not lose sight of their own unique purpose in life.

If we wish to fully experience the sweet song of union then we are tasked with refining our egoic nature, confronting our shadow selves and moving into a greater soul orientation.

The musician Steve Winwood expressed the yearning we each have to experience higher love in his song of the same name, saying:

Bring me higher love

Think about it, there must be a higher love

Down in the heart or hidden in the stars above

Without it, life is wasted time

We might all want it but very few of us grow into readiness for it.

As T.S Eliot remarked:

Between the potency,

And the existence…

Falls the Shadow.

The Birthday, by Marc Chagall

Alain de Botton affirms 3 essential qualities for cultivating high-functioning relationships:

1) Kindness: seeking (and being) a partner who is gentle with our imperfections and can good-humouredly tolerate us as we are.

2) Shared vulnerability: someone with whom we can be open about our anxieties, worries and the problems that throw us off balance: someone we don’t have to put on a good front for; someone around whom we can be weak, vulnerable and honest – and who will be the same around us. 

3) Understanding: someone who is interested in, and can make sense of, certain obscure features of our minds: our obsessions, preoccupations and ways of seeing the world. And whom we are excited to understand in turn.

Our couples counselling retreat draws on conventional approaches to improving relationships while exploring the larger themes of shadow aspects, core wounds and individuation.

Midlife Crisis

“In the middle of life's journey, I found myself in a dark wood, the right way entirely lost.”

- Dante’s opening line in the Divine Comedy

Navigating Midlife

The midlife passage (ages 35-55) is the most treacherous of our lives according to life phases expert, Gail Sheehy.

Midlife calm is not a phrase in the lexicon but midlife crisis certainly is.

Dictionaries define it as: a loss of self-confidence and feeling of anxiety or disappointment that can occur in early middle age.

Midlife cycles involve major mood shifts and physiological changes. Menopause for women and men. Most men notice a steep decline in sex drive while many woman experience a letting go of identities forged on appearances. Roles based on people pleasing and gaining societal approval wear thin. A crises of authenticity is just one of many that emerge.

The middle years of middle age have been dubbed middlescence. It’s the adult equivalent of the mayhem we experience in adolescence.

An example of this can be seen in the recent film, The Professor, starring Johnny Depp.

He plays a responsible university professor named Richard who has a wife and family.

Struggling with her slumping career and midlife malaise, Richard’s wife has an affair with his boss.

Upon learning he has 6 months to live, Richard casts aside every social norm that feels stifling. In his opinion, “maturity is really just another word for how much misery you'd swallow.” And so he begins doing away with pretence to live boldly and freely.

In one conversation his wife says, “What happened to us?”

He replies, “What happened to us? Life.”

If you’re navigating this stage of life and like Richard and the rest of us, don’t feel like you’ve got it all together, take heart.

Native American Medicine Wheel Ceremony

Some native Americans used the concept of the medicine wheel to explain the seasons of our lives.

Based on moon cycles they regarded our first 27 years as working through childhood development.

From 27-54 the developmental phase was adolescence. Gail Sheehy’s called it provisional adulthood.

In the indigenous model, adulthood only commences at around age 55.

Quite a contrast to the view of our culture that makes us feel we should have our life path and career direction sorted by the time we leave school at 18.

Fast forward thirty years and we end up thoroughly disengaged with our lives. As journalist Bill Moyers recounted:

“A man said to me once after years of standing on the platform of the subway, ‘I die a little bit down there every day, but I know I am doing so for my family.’”

The mythologist Joseph Campbell captured the other extreme, where a person had devoted themselves to a life of striving for what seemed critical only to discover it was at the expense of developing their psyches:

“There is perhaps nothing worse than reaching the top of the ladder and discovering that you’re on the wrong wall.”

Just as the moon has a waxing phase and a waning phase so do our lives.

If we are to flourish during what Carl Jung called the afternoon of our life, we have to have a radical change of focus.

Midlife demands that we shed what we’ve outgrown and insists we relegate our egos from being lead role to supporting cast.

Should we embrace the changing cycle and grow more introspective rather than mindlessly striving, our second half of life can be both rewarding and one where we leave a legacy of substance.

The poet David Whyte wrote a piece which expresses the letting go aspect of midlife where we sit with uncertainty and discomfort, akin to the caterpillar dissolving during chrysalis before rebirthing into something far greater.

Sometimes

if you move carefully

through the forest

breathing

like the ones

in the old stories

who could cross

a shimmering bed of dry leaves

without a sound,

you come

to a place

whose only task

is to trouble you

with tiny

but frightening requests

conceived out of nowhere

but in this place

beginning to lead everywhere.

Requests to stop what

you are doing right now,

and

to stop what you

are becoming

while you do it,

questions

that can make

or unmake

a life,

questions

that have patiently

waited for you,

questions

that have no right

to go away.

What is that thing in you that you will sow and cultivate in midlife so that your harvest years bring about your bloom?

You can read more about what is a midlife crisis, signs of midlife crisis and the effect of mid life crises for men & women.

Men’s Retreat

Our Blue Mountains centre offers a personal development space nestled in nature

“Our feeblest contemplations of the cosmos stir us, there is a tingling in the spine, a catch in the voice, a faint sensation, as if a distant memory, of falling from a height. We know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries.” - Carl Sagan.

If the celestial beauty of the universe evokes such a response in rationally minded scientists, consider what it awakens in those with an openness to the transpersonal.

In the language of astrology, the zodiac represents archetypal themes. Astrological ages change every 2150 years when the Earth's rotation moves into a new sign. There has been debate as to when the last shift occurred with many proclaiming 2012 as the time we left the Piscean age and moved into the Age of Aquarius. There might be conjecture as to the official year of change but this archetype has come to the fore.

Aquarius is considered the most progressive and forward-thinking of the zodiac archetypes. Consider how much change there has been in terms of gender identity and acceptance of diversity around sexuality. It promotes a “we” mentality rather than an “I“ one.

The shadow qualities of Pisces includes enmeshment, codependency and subjugating our core values to fit in or gain approval. Clare Dakin asserts that “The repression of the feminine has led to a planet on the edge of collapse. The re-emergence is going to be a dance to behold.”

The Dalai Lama has often remarked that he inherited his compassion from his mother. At the Vancouver Peace Summit in September 2009, he was surrounded by a number of women who have devoted their lives to helping the downtrodden. There were Nobel peace laureates: Mairead Maguire, Jody Williams and Betty Williams. He also met with Irish president and activist Mary Robinson, Susan Davis and Abigail Disney. The effect of spending time with such powerful women caused him to declare, “The world will be saved by the Western woman.”

Nicholas Roerich: "Mother of the World"

Beyond the outward expression of the feminine such as compassion and activism, there are signs that more soulcentric inner expression is helping us move beyond empty materialism to connect with something greater. Religion wanes but shamanism and esoteric modes of connection continue to grow.

The Egyptian deity, Ma’at was the goddess of measure and balance. The traits of balance and harmony are qualities we associate with the zodiac sign of Libra. Like Aquarius, it is powerfully motivated by equality. As women step into their full power, men are being asked to leave behind all the patriarchal qualities that have seen toxic masculinity cause so much harm.

Films like “The Hangover” showcase the man-child concept. The 2020 film, “Another Round,” explores where this leads come midlife. Four Danish men have become dead-eyed, jaded in their work and live either alone or in the midst of crumbling relationships. And so they experiment with the idea that instead of numbing themselves with alcohol during evenings or weekends, they should drink during the daytime too, while at work. Beyond the social commentary of alcohol dependency and the masculine tendency towards anaesthetising the feminine, there is a great level of tenderness as the men allow their feminine side to surface in the way that they open up and care for one another.

Hunter Johnson was mocked as a child for being so connected with his feminine essence. In retaining his sensitive and self-awareness, he models the kind of masculinity that the world so desperately needs today.

In 2004, he created “The Man Cave” which offers young men a rite of passage that isn’t about rejecting the masculine altogether but acknowledging wholeness — that the feminine and the masculine exists within each one of us — and how certain traits can become destructive when they’re not in balance with others, or given their full expression.

Hunter could have climbed the corporate ladder to find conventional success but has used his talents to create change as a social entrepreneur. His not for profit enterprise has helped change the paradigm for over 25,000 young men across Australia, giving them opportunities to confront their social conditioning and connect with a deeper part of themselves.

Jeff Brown followed the conventional script to do all the things he was supposed to do to become successful in the eyes of the world. He was on the Dean's Honour List as an undergraduate. He won the Law and Medicine prize in law school and apprenticed with a top criminal lawyer.

But then, on the verge of opening a law practice, he heard a voice inside telling him to stop. With great difficulty, he honoured this voice and began a heartfelt quest for the truth that lived within him. Although he didn't realise it at the time, Brown was actually questing for his innate image, the essential being that he came into this lifetime to embody. He was searching for his authentic face.

He integrated his feminine aspect by going inside and connecting his spirituality with his emotional life, distilling his true calling from the distractions of modern life. 

Recognising the impulse in the collective to heal the gender wars and help people integrate their masculine and feminine, I’ve created a program called: Sacred Union: Integrating the Divine Feminine & Divine Masculine. It outlines how men can leave behind toxic masculinity and embrace healthy masculinity as well as how women can step into the divine feminine and not settle for anything less than the divine masculine in themselves and a partner.

It can be done as a retreat program at my Blue Mountains retreat centre or online. You can find out more about it here:

Writers Centre

Our Blue Mountains centre offers a tranquil writing retreat space nestled in nature

An outlier is defined as ‘Something that lies outside the main body or group that it is a part of, such as a distant island belonging to a cluster of islands.’ The term was popularised recently when Malcolm Gladwell wrote a book on the subject of what leads to success. In researching successful people he found that “the biggest misconception about success is that we do it solely on our smarts, ambition, hustle and hard work.”

Gladwell argued that all successful people experienced various strokes of luck. Carl Jung and others would prefer replacing the word luck with synchronicity, the idea that when you go after something in life; the universe tends to meet you half way. Gladwell also spoke of timing. Bill Gates was a young man when the first do-it-yourself computer kit arose. Were he a little older, it is likely he would have been too settled in his life to take a leap of faith and launch Microsoft. Shakespeare argued that each of us encounters a particular threshold moment in life, where we must choose to boldly take a risk or remain safe. He maintained that the decision shapes the course of our life:

There is a tide in the affairs of men. Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune; Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea are we now afloat, and we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures.

Interconnectedness

Most importantly, Gladwell spoke of the fundamental need for support. While there is a time to take on the persona of the rugged individualist, we have over-mythologised it and moved too far from the poet John Donne’s refrain that, No man is an island entire of itself. Ask any extraordinaire about their success and provided their ego hasn’t gotten out of control, they will tell you about the integral support of spouses, family, friends, mentors, role models and elders.

When asked what message he wanted people to take away from reading Outliers, Gladwell responded, “What we do as a community, as a society, for each other, matters as much as what we do for ourselves.” His message mimics the archetypal hero’s journey, which often begins as a self-serving vision of attaining fame, wealth or glory, only to refine the pilgrim and bring out their best self. Our retreat centre shares this intention.

From Creative to Cultural Clusters

Over a decade ago Richard Florida spoke about the possibilities of creative clusters. His premise was that a burgeoning creative class was the key to thriving cities. Sadly, his prediction has been failing. He now laments, “On close inspection, talent clustering provides little in the way of trickle-down benefits for low-income workers.” Meanwhile, the chasm between creative-class bastions and other cities is “not just a vicious cycle but an unsustainable one—economically, politically and morally.”

Rather than focusing purely on building creative clusters, perhaps we should give equal regard to building a hub for cultural creatives where the focus is on nurturing socially flourishing communities. A couple of decades back, sociologist Paul H. Ray coined the term Cultural Creatives in response to over a decade of research on values, lifestyles, surveys and focus groups that showed an important and new subculture was emerging. He surmised that growing numbers of people are literally creating a new culture based on similar ideals in terms of living more sustainably, creating equality for women, emphasising children's well-being, developing and maintaining relationships, focusing on personal development and helping other people bring out their unique gifts. Ray went on to say:

While Cultural Creatives are a subculture, they lack one critical ingredient in their lives: awareness of themselves as a whole people. We call them the Cultural Creatives precisely because they are already creating a new culture. If they could see how promising this creativity is for all of us, if they could know how large their numbers are, many things might follow. These optimistic, altruistic millions might be willing to speak more frankly in public settings and act more directly in shaping a new way of life for our time and the time ahead. They might lead the way toward an Integral Culture.

The map of verbal description does not fully represent the territory of lived experience, including the richness of visual symbolic processes, feelings, emotions, and sensations.

-Jennifer Freeman

In the Blue Mountains, on the fringes of Sydney, we have twice as many people employed in the creative industries as the state and national averages. While there isn’t any stats on what proportion of the Blue Mountains would ascribe to being Cultural Creatives, I dare say that it too is much higher than the national average. In their newsletter showcasing local artists and innovators, an initiative knowns as MTNS MADE spoke about how unique an area the Mountains are:

"Here, community & networks are in abundance, allowing us to all feel connected, not remote. Collaboration is welcomed & encouraged, not forced or contracted. We respect one another’s integrity & craft, and recognise our singular talents & unique voices...We are authentic and we are bold."

Retreat Centres

They are a place to get involved. Somewhere authenticity and boldness can blend. The perfect combination to creating outliers, extraordinaires and cultural creatives. Woody Allen once said that of all the life lessons he has encountered, the one that really worked for him was the idea that 80% of life is simply showing up. I’d go a step further and say that beyond showing up, it is following through with action that what makes all the difference. Since our inaugural workshop, here are a few examples I’ve learned of participants making changes and pursuing more authenticity.

One lady has started laying the groundwork to create a charity, which would facilitate fair trade for women in her homeland of Pakistan. Later this year she is flying over to organise final preparations.

A guy with a particular fascination for mysticism and self-actualising has just launched a Facebook page that is “A place for people to share their experiences of, and efforts towards, self-transcendence.”

Then there has been Elvia’s unveiling of Bottlebrush Photography, an outlet for her to pursue her passion for photography and capture the joy created by family:

Your workshop actually had A LOT to do with me starting this up! I think it gave me a bit of extra boost that I needed.

Mitch has taken a new direction by opening an espresso bar holding a vision to make it a hub for community events and cultural gatherings.

Tina liberated herself from her long-term career to pursue her writing and interest in adult education. How often do we hear some great ideas or go to an event and be moved in the moment, but then watch our good intentions fade as we fail to make any changes to our life? Tina is an example of someone bucking this self-defeating trend.

From Insights to Taking Initiative

In terms of redesigning her life and getting back to her most raw and essential self, she returned home from the workshop to write about what she uncovered - a blind spot to do with self-esteem and feeling innately defective. With her permission, I’ve included is an extract from her blog:

Basically, I learned that I wasn’t very valuable except for what I could offer others. Doing for others provided me with a sense of my value in the world. I would never be the beautiful one. I would be the giver, the nurturer, the do-er. As a result, I wasn’t giving to myself, I wasn’t nurturing my own life. And so I lived my life as an ugly person, who needed to serve others because they were more valuable and important than myself. I think I am shy because of this. I am fine with kids but in front of adults, it still impacts. I am worried that people will hate listening to or hearing from the ugly one. At least, this is the inner voice, and I fight her quite aggressively.

Obviously, for the most part at 44, I realise that what she says is utter bull but it did frame the reality of probably my first thirty-five years of life. Tragic waste of time. And so, as I said, I fight her. Like today, as much as I hate speaking in front of others, I forced myself to do it. As much as I hate initiating conversation (unless I am travelling), today I initiated. And when I received a series of compliments on two fronts, after initially cringing, I fought the inner voice and accepted that these lovely perceptions of me were as valid as the nasty ones, in fact probably more valid, so I stopped cringing and embraced the moment, both times. I have more work to do on this. And more reading to complete on the schemas so that I can thoroughly unpack them and map a path forward.

So what happens when one takes the time to reflect, be brutally honest and makes a commitment to delve deeper? It would seem that as mentioned earlier, the universe meets you halfway. Within a matter of weeks of reading that blog entry, Tina followed up with this one:

“I have decided to grab my life by the horns and really start to live it again like I did when I was young. I’m shaking my snow globe and daring the flakes to settle in new patterns. Today was my initial business consultation. It went exceptionally well. I looked up Post Graduate courses. They offer a Doctor of Philosophy (Creative Arts) and a Doctor of Creative Arts. I have read the requirements; I am not sure that I meet them. But, twenty seconds of courage, and I have enquired. I am going to apply. It doesn’t cost anything except courage. I am going to focus on the therapeutic value of creative writing/life writing. This connects to the first phase of my business plan. The first phase of my business plan also then provides research participants for my research. Synchronicity or what. Boom. Add to that my foster care application. And I am making dreams come true in every direction. Self-empowerment. That’s the way to go … Following my bliss. Life is gonna change.”

For those who have attended our retreats and workshops, you would have realised that we celebrate people of action. Up until I turned 30, I simply loved ideas as well as my bunch of ‘dreams on the shelf,’ to cite a previous post. But living in that safe bubble did little for my happiness levels. It is actually quite dispiriting to be inspired and contemplate what is possible, but then see nothing change in your life as you stay stuck by inaction and inertia. Since entering my thirties I made a vow to take initiative and actual action. In doing so this last decade of my life has transformed in every single respect.

Writes of Passage Retreats is a forum for working through core beliefs and barriers to self-actualisation, we resonate strongly with Albert Ellis’s comment that, “The trouble with most therapy is that it helps you to feel better, but you don’t get better. You have to back it up with action, action, action.” So therein lies the challenge. The decision to attend one of our retreats may be your Shakespearean, threshold moment. Change is rarely an earthshaking affair. It starts slowly. Simply turning up may be the catalyst that launches you on the path to your most authentic life and leading on to fortune. As William Hutchinson Murray pointed out:

“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth that ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.”

Narrative Therapy

In countering the effects of a problem-saturated story, it is important to develop as rich, detailed, and meaningful a counter-story as possible. – Freedman and Combs

The philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer tended to be a rather grim and stoic character. With the benefit of age and having lived quite a self-reflect life, he was able to eventually find a sense of interconnection with the cosmos.

Schopenhauer had this to see about how empowering it can be to see yourself as the hero of your own story:

“When you reach a certain age and look back over your life, it seems to have had an order. It seems to have had been composed by someone. And those events that when they occurred seemed merely accidental and occasional and just something that happened, turn out to be the main elements in a consistent plot. Who composed this plot?

Just as your dreams are composed by an aspect of yourself, of which your consciousness is unaware, so your whole life has been composed by the will within you. Just as those people whom you met by chance became effective agents in the structuring of your life, so you have been an agent in the structuring of other lives, and the whole thing gears together like one big symphony, everything influencing and structuring everything else.”

Narrative Therapy was born as a personal development tool to help people identify themselves as being distinct from their problems in order to employ their own strengths to move toward change.

Your Writes of Passage Journey is designed to help you take the reins of your life through recognising the life passage crossroads and applying a mythic understanding to them.

Albert Einstein was asked for advice on how to make kids smarter. He responded by saying “Read them fairytales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairytales.”

The childhood tendency to entertain possibilities, be open to learning and experience the richness of imagination are qualities that often become lost in adult-erated life.

By drawing on an archetypal model to write our life stories we can view our journey as we would any other great narrative with settings, themes, characters and plots – just like in any movie, book, historical account or legendary fable.

Although most of us don’t formally explore the concept of archetypes, the novels, television and films we soak in all centre around archetypal patterns, which speak to us at a deep level.

Gaining an understanding of the archetypes and what they have to teach us about the stages of life development, unearths rich material to write about our own journey.

Author Caroline Myss captured the value of understanding archetypes when she said:

Archetypal patterns are about what makes us who we are and what drives us. They hold the key to our inner mysteries, power symbols, dreams as well as our cravings, fashion sense, and spending patterns. Everything about us is connected to one or more of our archetypal patterns.

Through our writing courses, you will explore archetypal pairings that reflect a time period of your life.

For example, the strongest archetypes during the period of youth involve the Innocent archetype (childhood and predominately the light aspect) and the Orphan archetype (adolescence and predominately the shadow aspect).

Gaining an understanding of the archetype and its role can help clarify and colour the stories you write about this period of your life.

Seeing aspects of your life story in this new light helps with reframing - a narrative therapy technique designed to help facilitate a shift in your thinking and how you embrace the future.

After a writing session, I work with you to polish and edit your pieces while helping to draw out the larger narrative your life reveals.

As we become aware of ourselves as storytellers we realize we can use our stories to heal and make ourselves whole. – Susan Wittig Albert

Exploring Consciousness

‘There’s a dangerous message that psychedelics will solve all your mental health problems’ - Michael Pollan

In order to understand the popularity of plant medicine, shamanism and alternative approaches to health and self-improvement a great resource one can explore is the 2020 documentary “AWARE – Glimpses of Consciousness.”

It looks at the science behind consciousness. A brain scientist, a plant behaviourist, a healer, a philosophy professor, a psychedelics scientist, and a Buddhist monk each offer their perspectives on the big questions such as:

What is consciousness? Is it in all living beings? Why are we predisposed for mystical experience? And what happens when we die?

Michael Pollan is a journalist who explores the socio-cultural impacts of food.

His books focus on the places where nature and culture intersect: on our plates, in our farms and gardens, and in the built environment.

More recently, his investigations have led him to research psychedelics and human consciousness, culminating in his book, How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence. He has also released a television series based on his book.

Krishnamurti once said, “It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”

Having peered between the veil of our relationship with food, Michael went further to say:

“Normal waking consciousness feels perfectly transparent, and yet it is less a window on reality than the product of our imaginations - a kind of controlled hallucination.

You go deep enough or far out enough in consciousness and you will bump into the sacred. It’s not something we generate; it’s something out there waiting to be discovered. And this reliably happens to nonbelievers as well as believers.

The usual antonym for the word “spiritual” is “material.” That at least is what I believed when I began this inquiry—that the whole issue with spirituality turned on a question of metaphysics. Now I’m inclined to think a much better and certainly more useful antonym for “spiritual” might be “egotistical.” Self and Spirit define the opposite ends of a spectrum, but that spectrum needn’t reach clear to the heavens to have meaning for us. It can stay right here on earth. When the ego dissolves, so does a bounded conception not only of our self but of our self-interest. What emerges in its place is invariably a broader, more openhearted and altruistic—that is, more spiritual—idea of what matters in life. One in which a new sense of connection, or love, however defined, seems to figure prominently.”

Australian musician & spiritual seeker Ben Lee released his 2013 album Ayahuasca: Welcome to the Work.

That same year author Graham Hancock shared a talk at a TEDx conference called The War on Consciousness, which ironically got banned.

He spoke about how slow the evolution of consciousness has been, with 6 million years amounting to very little awareness until the emergence less than 40,000 years ago, when we became fully symbolic creatures.

Hancock went on to say that research led by professor David Lewis-Williams in South Africa, and many others, have suggested an intriguing and radical possibility, which is that this emergence into consciousness was triggered by our ancestors’ encounters with visionary plants and the beginning of shamanism.

He offered the idea that mother ayahuasca has evoked a more mainstream use of plant medicine to help people with their individual addictions and blindnesses as well as society on a collective level.

Dr. Gabor Maté, famous for his work around the area of trauma, incorporated plant medicine into his healing work until the Canadian Government intervened and stopped his healing practice on the grounds that ayahuasca itself was an illegal drug.

Ayahuasca is currently illegal in Australia also, partly due to a number of bad reactions from people with underlying mental health issues.

A number of people choose to undergo an ayahuasca ceremony in places like Peru where the pilgrimage is part of the preparation. They also tend to be more effective when conducted by dedicated shamans rather than mere enthusiasts.

One reason that psychedelics and plant medicine are increasingly explored is that while the ego sleeps, the mind plays, proposing unexpected patterns of thought and new rays of relation.

In addition to an array of experiential methods, Jungian approaches can be equally powerful, drawing on archetypes and a symbolic imagination to take us beyond the rational mind and into the soul life.

Our Life Purpose, Healing or Spiritual Retreats allow you to have a transformative encounter in a safe and supportive environment.

Explore Your Life Story

We all engage with archetypes, be it consciously or unconsciously

The dancer and musician Gabrielle Roth shared some potent wisdom when she said

“In many shamanic societies, if you came to a medicine person complaining of being disheartened, dispirited, or depressed, they would ask one of four questions: When did you stop dancing? When did you stop singing? When did you stop being enchanted by stories? Especially the stories of your own life?”

As industry slows, nature grows more vibrant.

And as our industriousness wanes, so can our soul-sickness dissipate.

This morning I connected with an online group where we each spoke about what has changed in our lives since Covid. Many people shared the same responses.

‘I’ve had to stop and sit with myself rather than be distracted with busyness.’

‘For the first time in ages, I’ve gotten to do things I want to do rather than just fulfil obligations.’

‘It has allowed me to connect with my neighbours reminding me of what it was like 20 years ago before we all became strangers.’

People spoke of how clear the air was, how connected they felt and how peaceful life had become.

Collectively, we hoped that the gains we’ve made would stay once normality returned.

Beauty making was another theme. We were asked what creative work was rising within us and how we could help create a better world.

It reminded me of the glorious phrase Maggie Smith’s closed off with in “Good Bones”, a poem encouraging people not to be overwhelmed by the immensity of the issues we are facing:

“This place could be beautiful, right?

You could make this place beautiful.”

Having been bogged down doing things that don’t particularly speak to me, I’ve noticed a shift in the last couple of weeks as I’ve returned to doing life story writing.

Events in my past which seemed arbitrary took on a great deal of meaning as I looked at them with awakened eyes.

The combination of introspection and writing helps us to view life as a great adventure and privilege. It infuses soul back into our lives. And as the Philosopher, Heraclitus so sagely pointed out “You could not discover the limits of soul, even if you travelled every road to do so, such is the depth of its meaning.”

A facilitator in this mornings group shared a most exquisite poem. It was written recently to capture the zeitgeist.

Keeping the Smoke Hole Open

Seek Vigil Not Isolation

In Siberian myth, when you want to hurt someone, you crawl into their tent and close the smoke hole.

That way God can’t see them.

Close the smoke hole and you break connection to the divine world. Mountains, rivers, trees.

Close the smoke hole and we become mad.

Close the smoke hole and we are possessed by ourselves and only ourselves.

Close the smoke hole and you have only your neurosis for company.

Well, enough of that. Really, c’mon. We’re grown-ups. Let’s take a breath.

We may have to seek some solitude, but let’s not isolate from the marvellous.

High alert is the nature of the moment, and rightly so, but I do not intend to lose the reality that as a culture we are entering deeply mythic ground.

I am forgetting business as usual. No great story begins like that.

What needs to change? Deepen? What kindness in me have I so abandoned that I could seek relationship with again?

It is useful to inspect my ruin.

Could I strike up an old relationship with my soul again?

You don’t need me to tell you how to keep the smoke hole open. You have a myriad of ways.

We are awash with the power of words—virus, isolate, pandemic—and they point toward very real things. To some degree we need the organisational harassment of them.

But do they grow corn on your tongue when you speak them?

Where is the beauty-making in all of this?

That is part—part—of the correct response. The absolute heft of grief may well be the weave to such a prayer mat.

Before we burn the whole world down in the wider rage of Climate Emergency, of which this current moment is just a hint, could we collectively seek vigil in this moment?

Cry for a vision?

It’s what we’ve always done.

We need to do it now.

- Martin Shaw

Recognising the Archetypes at Play in your Life

I suggest that writing our stories allows us to connect with the transcendent and clear our minds of the day to day concerns and worries that can sap our spirit.

Indigenous cultures had carefully mapped out rites of passage to help them awaken a vision for their lives. Today we have this opportunity through writes of passage, which combines depth psychology and reflection to help keep the smoke hole open.

A Mythic Imagination

We all engage with archetypes, be it consciously or unconsciously

Seeing Your Life Through a Mythic Imagination

What makes us so interested in reading stories? Is it simply to escape into pleasant diversions from our routine lives? Some argue they help us make sense of the human condition. Then there are those who suggest that our fascination has to do with stories being able to speak to that part of us which yearns to live a heroic or significant life.The psychologist Carl Jung argued that stories provide a system for archetypal impulses to be made known.

Perhaps the purpose of stories and the archetypes they reveal is to help us feel rooted in history and eternity, transcending the rootless and emptier elements of contemporary life. They help us avoid what Jung called the participation mystique, where our individuality is dissolved by our need for group approval and belonging. Mythologist Joseph Campbell reflected on the enduring power of story to stir the human spirit, labelling it as the song of the universe. Laurence Boldt suggested that the key to tapping into the power of story is being able to identify with the characters we read about:

The heroic life lives in dormancy in all and in active expression in the great men and women. What does it take to transfer that beauty into an active force in our own lives? IDENTIFICATION. We must be able to identify with the hero as being fundamentally like ourselves.

The Emperor card represents a powerful leader who demands respect and authority

Inspired to Self-Actualise

It was this realisation that transformed Abraham Lincoln’s life.

Abraham Lincoln could easily have fallen into despondency or victimhood. Growing up poor and uneducated, his upbringing was marked by family tragedy, losing his mother and siblings at an early age. With his father failing to be much of a role model, he resolved to live a wholly different life and devoured books about people of greatness.

Something within him responded to the archetype of the Ruler, symbolised in the tarot by the Emperor. As an idealistic youth, he cultivated principles to live by and emerged as a wise leader and elder who rejuvenated the community around him and put forward a better societal order. In an age where most politicians embody the shadow or self-serving side of the Ruler archetype, Lincoln is regarded by people of all political persuasions as one of the noblest statesmen to have ever lived.

Lincoln demonstrated what could be called narrative mindfulness, in that he was able to notice and critique the stories others told him about himself. Throughout his life, he was derided for being poor, overly tall, homely, gawky, deficient in schooling, social grace and poise. But in reading about people who became great, he realised that character counted far more than circumstance. He placed authenticity above acceptance saying “I desire so to live that if at the end, I have lost every other friend on earth, I shall at least have one friend left, and that friend shall be down inside of me.”

Being inspired by examples of the Ruler and determined to embody the archetype in his own life, he overcame the loss of his family, his first love, long stretches of failure in business and politics, as well as the depression that accompanied them. Lincoln defied impossible odds to become president and lay the groundwork for the abolishing of slavery.

Just like Laurence Boldt suggests, he was able to identify with the heroic or higher self in others and in doing so, awakened his own.

Recognising the Archetypes at Play in your Life

Which of these archetypes are most relevant in your life right now? The Fool, the Magician, the Caregiver, the Ruler, the Mystic, the Sage or the Lover. Which would you like to accentuate and which of their shadow aspects do you need to grow beyond in order to live a more balanced, fulfilling life?

Our Tarot/Archetypal Development Retreat looks at the developmental lesson of the first four major arcana cards as well as the lives of mythical and real people who express the qualities of the archetypes. The heroic life may live in dormancy for you at the moment, but it is there just waiting for your desire to transcend your circumstances and pursue a more extraordinary existence.

Miguel Piñero was a poet and performer who encapsulated the Magician archetype using words to enchant and provoke. Although addiction (one of the shadow sides to the Magician) resulted in his premature death, he shared a great reflection about the importance of having the courage to get off the couch, leave our comfort zone and throw ourselves into life:

Every player is a poet, an actor, a statesman & a priest. But most of all he’s a player. You go out there on the street and you meet the world of suckers. The world of greed and whatever other names have been defined for those who seek something outside of the acceptance of their society and you stand with your balls exposed in the jungle of fear and you battle. And you fight the hardest fight of your life. Each day out there in those streets that demands blood to nourish its own energies. Today and all the todays and tomorrows that are left inside your soul. And when it’s over & the streets are soaking up in the blood. You smile and you know you just won another day with yourself.

Each of the archetypes reflect themselves in our lives in different ways and at different times, but there tends to be one that is most dominant. In the case of Piñero, it was the Magician, for Lincoln, The Ruler. Determining and then accentuating your prime archetype goes a long way in assisting you in being able to create a joyous and fulfilling life.

The Wealth Retreat

A radical rethink of our relationship to money is needed if we are to readdress the imbalances behind climate change, poverty, unhappiness and so many other social issues.

Some years ago Ken Robinson made waves in the realm of education by arguing that we need to move away from the archaic manufacturing model of education to take an approach more like organic farming. Instead of squeezing people into narrow moulds and creating compliant consumers, Robinson suggested we cultivate the uniqueness of individuals and help them find a fit in a society where they can best offer their gifts.

Any sustainable solution has to bring external impact in concert with inner transformation, in a very real way. - Nipun Mehta

Nipun Mehta was a software engineer who found himself climbing the corporate ladder along with everyone else.

Mythologist Joseph Campbell once said, “There is perhaps nothing worse than reaching the top of the ladder and discovering that you're on the wrong wall.” Midlife crisis often stems from following the scripted path of success.

The corporate ladder - a modern day tower of Babel

Nipun felt uneasy about his place in corporate life. Instead of chatting to a financial life coach, he spoke to monks and nuns who lived on very little money. He contrasted their happiness levels to his Silicon Valley counterparts with their big bank balances. He concluded that happiness is not proportional to how much money you accumulate.

At 25, he abandoned the ladder to nowhere and spent his time volunteering before creating the not for profit, Service Space. His journey has led him to the following philosophy about finances:

“Money has some design flaws. If you look at the mechanics of money, money is issued as debt in the world. And when you have debt, you need to have growth to pay off that debt. We assume an infinite capacity for growth, and when we inevitably hit limits, we become extractive. I’m not so sure that that’s really how we want be engaging with each other. We extract not just from nature but from each other. Not only that, we start to be extractive with our own self! That’s why so many people are so burned out. I think we need to shift from extractive systems to more regenerative systems. Some of that will have do with a redesign of money. With that, though, we also need to upgrade the way in which we relate to money. I don’t think it’s just an external systems issue.”

Holistic financial planning integrates our values, vocation and social contribution

Nipun argues we need to adopt a metaphorical shift in the way we view money, shifting from a manufacturing mindset to a gardening one. As he describes it:

In manufacturing you can say, “Here’s the recipe, I’m going to apply it N times, and scale.” Cookie cutter approach, right? But when you’re a gardener, you know that there are all these other inputs. You can’t control the sun. You can’t control the rain. But you can control so many other factors. So you are in concert with all of these factors. You are just supporting the emergence. You cannot look at a sapling and say, “I need a tomato by tuesday.” That’s manufacturing, which is predicated on control and knowing the recipes. Our business schools today are set up precisely to leaders who can take over manufacturing plants. That’s good, and certainly has its place in the world. But everything can’t be manufacturing. Compassion, for example, cannot be manufactured. It has to grow. Now, there are people who try to apply the manufacturing mindset to compassion too.

The television series Brave New World illustrates this idea.

A gardening mindset towards money is a holistic approach where we integrate our values and those things that express our passion or joy, in a way that enriches the lives of others.

The manufacturing model leads us to over consume to assuage the disconnection we feel doing jobs we dislike simply to accumulate money.

Elizabeth Williard Thames noticed this when she was climbing the corporate ladder, saying:

“My days felt like a Styrofoam of emotion: devoid of color and flavor, imprinted with the day that’d come before, promising me I’d be left disappointed. I longed for something vibrant to jolt me into consciousness…We were spending more and more money in increasingly desperate attempts to mitigate the frustration and discontent we felt over our jobs. We were working for the weekends and spending the money we’d worked so hard to earn in an effort to make ourselves feel better about how hard we worked. It was a vicious cycle.”

Living more modestly, or simply is both the cornerstone of financial freedom and the best way forward collectively for our culture.

When José Mujica was the president of Uruguay he gave away 90% of his wage. Speaking about his value system he said:

I stand out because my values and way of life reflect those of the society to which I am honored to belong. And I cling to them! I spent almost ten years in solitary, in a hole. Plenty of time to think... I spent seven years without one book!

That left me time to think. And this is what I discovered: either you're happy with very little, free of all that extra luggage, because you have happiness inside, or you don't get anywhere! I am not advocating poverty. I am advocating sobriety.

We have invented a mountain of superfluous needs. Shopping for new, discarding the old... That's a waste of our lives! When I buy something, when you buy something, you're not paying money for it. You're paying with the hours of your life you had to spend earning that money. The difference is that life is one thing money can't buy. Life only gets shorter. And it is pitiful to waste one's life and freedom that way.

The following interview of José Mujica comes from Yann Arthus-Bertrand's masterpiece, Humans.

Financial Literacy Course

My inspiration in creating a 2 day program, which I’ve called the Wealth Retreat, is to help people deconstruct social and family conditioning around what real wealth is, advocating greater simplicity and greater individual integration. It balances areas like clarifying values and belief systems with the practical steps to achieving financial independence.

Life Review Therapy

Our End of Year Exploration program is an opportunity to reflect on the year, integrate the developments and learnings while preparing for next years focus. Here’s a sample of areas I journaled about in relation to 2018.

Career Movements

Can you remember who you were, before the world told you who you should be? - Charles Bukowski

What were the developments and highlights from your career life this year? Did you manage to sustain your place in the career satisfaction stakes, drop down a notch or break into that 20% minority who love what they do for work?

As a kid, I wanted to be a writer. During the process of schooling, however, I got shunted towards more formal writing, which saw my desire to be a writer wane and seem unrealistic.

During adolescence, I met a slew of teachers who had a positive impact on me and one, in particular, became larger than life. Doc McClellan became my first mentor figure. I secretly grew interested in becoming a teacher in the hopes of nurturing young fledgelings as he did. With my sensitive disposition though I worried I would get eaten alive by hormonal and hard to please teenagers.

We’ve all been taught that the crux of being an adult is to be responsible, practical and realistic. That we should defer passion till retirement. Resignation then retirement. Something is amiss there.

I’m not sure about you but I’m yet to meet anyone who has endured decades of a 9-5 job they felt ambivalent about and then suddenly blossomed like a century plant upon retiring.

The Danger of Wisdom

We learn to live without passion.
To be reasonable. We go hungry
amid the giant granaries
this world is. We store up plenty
for when we are old and mild.
It is our strength that deprives us.
Like Keats listening to the doctor
who said the best thing for
tuberculosis was to eat only one
slice of bread and a fragment
of fish each day. Keats starved
himself to death because he yearned
so desperately to feast on Fanny Brawne.
Emerson and his wife decided to make
love sparingly in order to accumulate
his passion. We are taught to be
moderate. To live intelligently.

 ~ Jack Gilbert

2018 saw me splitting my time evenly between writing and teaching. Best of all, there were times where they coalesced during life story writing classes and workshops that incorporated life story work.

It has been an unexpected delight to fall back in love with writing once more. Being a rather solitary and lonely pursuit, it has felt healthier to be able to blend it with more social elements such as group work.

An enormous feeling of gratitude rises up when I think about all the individuals I have gotten to work with one-on-one this year. Their courage and desire to design their lives has sustained my motivation and humbled me.

Shifts and Movements

The art of life is a constant readjustment to our surroundings. – Kakuzo Okakaura

The dreaded dinner party setting.

Us introverts are not ones to feel anticipation for large and unfamiliar social settings. Saying yes to every invitation this year, I agreed to accompany the person who asked me along despite knowing everyone would be complete strangers. “Who knows,” I thought, “perhaps it will be as eventful as that recent Italian film about a dinner party, Perfect Strangers.”

I made some small talk, had a few strained conversations and thought I was in for a long evening until I got talking to a fellow quester I’ll call Sam. Gail Sheehy dubbed the midlife phase The Flourishing Forties, a period both Sam and I had entered.

She had always been trying to find her place in the world and this year saw her really throw herself into life. Sam tackled the Camino track, launched a business she felt passionately about and tried many things that thrust her out of her comfort zone. Along the way she was exposed to a new concept called Human Design, which she found intriguing.

Philosophy-wise, I have always been something of a bower bird and have had a particular fascination for models of human consciousness. This year I took a gander at Integral Theory but figured the last thing I need is more cerebral engagement with the world. A character I met at a yoga class invited me to a Gurdjieff group. While the prospect of meeting a bunch of eccentric mystics held some appeal I couldn’t lend any support to it having learned this year that the Armenian teacher was something of a scoundrel.

18 months earlier I met someone who waxed lyrically about the Human Design model but it didn’t really land with me. Giving it another go, I kept an open mind as Sam described me as being a Projector.

According to the model, Projectors are one of five different types. It’s claimed that the gift of this type is being able to manage, guide and direct others, particularly in terms of career and life direction. I could identify with that.

As for the challenge of this type, Sam informed me that it required waiting for an invitation for opportunities. Quite a countercultural idea when you live in a society that is gung-ho about taking initiative and making things happen.

The advice given to Projector types is to follow your passion while you wait for things to present themselves.

Hearing this, I found it interesting to reflect on the opportunities that presented this year…

After running a writing class in January a participant approached me with an offer to do a workshop at her local writer’s group.

Another participant asked me if I’d be interested in doing some editing work. I expressed my enthusiasm and waited to hear back from her after she had completed her book. When she contacted me in the spring to say her book was finished we worked together on it. It turned out to be the most stirring and enlivening experience of 2018.

More and more I realise what a gift it is to hear the entirety of a persons life story. Being able to help someone enhance their telling of it through editing and offering insights into their narrative was equally thrilling.

If one of the years big shifts was waiting for invitations, the other involved clearing out the old in order to make way for the new. The one career element that felt really out of alignment for me this year was working with forced audiences in heavy environments.

One day I’d teach in a drug and alcohol rehabilitation centre, the next in a prison. I would head to these classes feeling in a good space and leave depleted and washed out. While some of the participants valued what was being offered most were heavily victimised, extremely negative or just lost in a drug-induced haze.

I’ve always worked hard to be free from “having-to-work-jobs” to “wanting-to-work-jobs.”

When I wasn’t working for an employer this year I was teaching classes with willing participants on areas of keen personal interest. The contrast between these two environments was monumental. Despite the security and financial rewards of those challenging teaching roles, I left them aside in order to lead a more integrated and peaceful life.

New Shoots

We must always change, renew, rejuvenate ourselves, otherwise we harden. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

What new things did you discover a fondness for, or at least try this year?

My fondest new connection this year was meeting a master pianist. I played a few notes on her piano from the one and only tune I remember being taught as a kid. She then sat down and elegantly played a song from one of this year’s movie highlights, A Star Is Born.

Is there anything more electrifying than seeing someone in their element?

During her rendition, I was fully taken by the beauty of the music. When it was over I marvelled at the devotion involved in reaching such a high watermark of ability.

Afterwards, she invited me to try some improv with her. “Who me? I’m not at all musical. And I don’t even know what improv involves” I said. She coaxed me to give it a try, nominating I take on the black keys while she worked her magic on the white.

Except for the time of dissonance when I blundered off the black and onto the white keys the experience was a joy.

In keeping with my “Say Yes” attitude I took a trip to the city in order to hear an artist by the name of Robyn Wilson talk about her journey. She had always felt like a misfit but battled away to find her place as a creative, combining art and legacy work as a career. I admired her courage. She didn’t speak to us from an ivory tower of great success but as someone still finding their way through life’s great maze hoping to reach the centre, being an authentic life.

She had created an art product which empowers people to create the ink blot style paintings she focuses on. After her talk, I fumbled around with her art kit and wondered where to start. Noticing my apprehension she came over and guided me through the process. I gladly accepted her assistance and produced a piece which helped dispel my inner critic who was saying “Who you? You’re not a tactile artist.”

This year I made use of that Facebook feature which tells you about interesting events your friends are going to. Lyttleton, a local co-op attempting to form, was hosting a celebration and some talks. I’d not heard of the venture before and felt grateful to be living in not just a spectacularly scenic part of the world but in such a civic-minded one too.

While reconnecting with David he talked about his growing interest in permaculture and introduced me to a lady at the event who helped people design permaculture spaces on their property. I put myself down on her waiting list and marvelled at the new world beckoning.

A week or so later I noticed a poster advertising a gardening course. I had tried to get a garden off the ground a couple of years earlier with mixed results. Adopting the beginners’ mind I eagerly signed up.

The teachers had such intricate knowledge of all things green and it was a delight to be around other would be gardeners. Buoyed by the course I began my first attempt at raising seedlings indoors. As the days and weeks passed with nothing germinating it felt like a flop. Just when all appeared lost, a tiny shoot appeared. Then another. Any many more after that. My garden which contained only a couple of hardy offerings in Spring is now growing rampant as Summer begins.

Over the last couple of years, I’ve started harvesting spring water, harnessing rainwater, utilising the leaves, kindling and logs of fallen trees to keep warm and design my living quarters to be more ecologically sound. Composting and producing food has also played a role in helping me connect more with the slower, enduring rhythms of the natural world.

Learning this year that we share 99% of our DNA with lettuce makes it a little bit harder to hold onto the separation myth. As Maria Popova put it, “If the creaturely difference between us and a species as dissimilar as a salad plant is so negligible, what of the differences among us humans?”

Lucille Clifton expressed this interconnection in poetic form with her piece Cutting Greens:

curling them around


i hold their bodies in obscene embrace


thinking of everything but kinship.


collards and kale


strain against each strange other


away from my kissmaking hand and


the iron bedpot.


the pot is black,


the cutting board is black,


my hand,


and just for a minute


the greens roll black under the knife,


and the kitchen twists dark on its spine


and I taste in my natural appetite


the bond of live things everywhere.

2018 has seen me spending more time with babies and young ones. Noticing the rejuvenating effects of being around young souls brings to mind something I heard Clarissa Pinkola Estés, once say. Something about the importance of always having little people in one’s life.

Swinging from life to death, I accepted an invite to what was billed as an interactive theatre performance. I was unsure what it involved but said yes anyway. Turned out that it captured the experience of what it would feel like to die. After being whisked away in a hospital bed and gown, an eye mask made things dark while audio snippets played with questions and comments that young kids might say when their grandparents have passed. It was most interesting to contemplate death in a more visceral way rather than abstract thought.

The creators of the performance have worked in theatre for decades. I wondered how many hours of flow and memorable moments they racked up over the years. I suspect it has been as equally challenging a path as it has been rewarding.

Summiting what is known as Cloud Mountain, near Uki in the northern rivers was another unique affair. I had taken in sweat lodges before but didn’t realise there were varying degrees of intensity. Having built a fire and heated up some volcanic rocks I joined a mixed gender group to enter a womblike yurt. It was pitch black, muddy to sit in and sweaty to smell. Pouring water on the rocks led to scalding waves of steam. As the heat grew more acute I found myself dropping lower and lower to the ground in order to breathe more comfortably.

Later that day we returned for a men’s session. The facilitator spoke of purposefully keeping the previous session tame, rating it a 4 out of 10 on the spectrum of scorch. Now he was really going to ramp it up. I thought I could handle a 5 out of 10 but baulked at the 7 or 8 he was aspiring to. It got so unbearable that I put my face an inch away from the bare earth and hyperventilated through the ordeal. There was tremendous relief and a feeling of exhilaration upon returning to the cool night air.

Cloud Mountain in Uki

With the Sydney Writers Festival extending its fringes to the Blue Mountains I took in a session held by Tara Westover who was there to discuss her memoir Educated. The year before I had relished reading The Glass Castle and Tara’s story was equally startling.

While our culture has arguably veered too far towards individualism it was valuable to be reminded how stifling tribal acceptance can be. Tara’s story brings to mind a point Brene Brown raised this year which was reiterated by many voices. Janet Fitch put it most eloquently in her novel, White Oleander:

“Loneliness is the human condition. Cultivate it. The way it tunnels into you allows your soul room to grow. Never expect to outgrow loneliness. Never hope to find people who will understand you, someone to fill that space. An intelligent, sensitive person is the exception, the very great exception. If you expect to find people who will understand you, you will grow murderous with disappointment. The best you'll ever do is to understand yourself, know what it is that you want, and not let the cattle stand in your way.”

Some years ago I stumbled upon what is known as The Moth, a live storytelling event. I had gobbled up dozens of their stories, read their books but never got around to attending one of their monthly events. The night I finally booked in for turned out to be their grand slam event. Each of the year’s monthly winners was invited back to compete in their annual competition. The speakers were diverse and the calibre of the talks exceptional. It’s destined to be an annual highlight I suspect. Being accompanied by someone of Mediterranean background revealed to me just how restrained Australian culture is in comparison to those who laugh richly and easily.

Culture Vulture

Is it just me or has there been a host of riveting documentaries this year? I found the pick of them to have a focus on the shadow side of following one’s bliss.

Come Inside My Mind looked at the life of comedian Robin Williams, capturing the destructive tendency of the Creator archetype, which can have us so addicted to creating and tasting transcendence that we become unable to navigate the plateau periods of life.

Another who experienced major fallout from following her life’s purpose is Jane Goodall. Studying chimps, living in a faraway country, having to constantly find sponsorship, raising a son and trying to maintain a relationship…something had to give. Jane, a documentary about her revealed what it was.

Whitney complimented last years documentary Whitney: Can I Be Me, while Generation Wealth and Three Identical Strangers further demonstrated the venality of defining success purely in narcissistic terms.

Surveying the cinematic front, 2018 was a standout for smaller, more independent fare.

Lean on Pete had me appreciating the stability of my upbringing as it portrayed the awfulness of growing up displaced and in poverty.

Adolescence may be trying but early adulthood is no picnic either. The Rider was another horse-related story but this one was based on a true story. Deeply affecting.

Finding one’s place in the world is no mean feat. Neither is the quest for companionship and love.

The Hungarian film, On Body And Soul, was the one I found to be the most tender of the year, sublimely revealing the beauty in our fragility.

Norwegian offering, The Guilty, was among the most poignant redemption stories of the year while Russia reliably produced its antidote to American fairy floss with Loveless.

Woody Allen even made a return to form this year. Or was it simply the brilliance of Kate Winslet that made Wonder Wheel so beguiling?

Lastly, there was Puzzle, a remake of an Argentinian film, which looked at how challenging it can be to break out of the midlife tombs we can find ourselves in. I recommend it be watched alongside The Visitor.

From the screen to the shelves, James Hollis’ Living an Examined Life: Wisdom for the Second Half of the Journey was the book I found most pleasingly provocative.

Darryl Cunningham’s, The Age of Selfishness: Ayn Rand, Morality, and the Financial Crisis might have been packaged in the lighter format of a graphic novel but it was no less confronting.

Tara Westover’s Educated got my vote for the memoir of the year.

Mari Andrew’s, Am I There Yet?, blended her illustrating and writing skills superbly.

Everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is.

Shadow Work

The woods are lovely dark and deep, but I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go before I sleep. - Robert Frost

 There may be great value in claiming our victories or reminiscing over what brought us joy throughout the year but pleasantries are only ever half the equation. The more real we become with ourselves the more we have to face those unhealthy patterns and tendencies we keep playing out.

Our innate Smeagols’ constantly jostle with our corruptible counterpart in Gollum.

Dejection has always been one of my bugbears and it reared its head again this year. My internal wiring causes new ideas to forever bubble up. This year I had to let go of a vocational venture that brought a lot of satisfaction to my life but always remained somewhat stunted. I learned the necessity of grieving one’s stillborn creations.

I read some searingly honest facebook posts from friends this year who had the courage to share the pain they felt having put their all into their passion and found little yield from doing so.

Whether someone is a traditional artist, a social one, or a mix of the two, the artists’ way may be transcendent when it flows but it can be devastating when it doesn’t.

Many years ago I was leading a Rotary weekend for youth and felt some self-doubt about how effective my contribution was. Then I heard someone share a sentiment along the lines of success not being about how we are received as much as whether we’ve had the resolve to give something our best shot. It helped me tweak my attitude and is something I have to keep revisiting.

Thankfully now, it has been some months since I’ve put this endeavour to pasture. As the dust settles, I’m finding much more time and energy for new initiatives which have since sprung up.

The other major bugbear I continually battle is a sense of being on the outer. Men tend to struggle more with loneliness than women and the risks grow the older one gets. A statistic I came across this year said that chronic loneliness cuts one’s life shorter than if they are a smoker!

Over the years I’ve explored personality models and other tools for self-understanding, which have helped me move through these feelings of isolation.

Mainstream models such as Myers Briggs have me clearly identifying as an introvert.

Susan Cain made a great case for how modern culture has regarded introversion as a deficiency, disregarding the strengths it can offer.

This year has seen me work hard to fight the temptation to become too solitary.

Extroverts do better from integrating and making sense of all the experiences they drink in. Conversely, introverts become more balanced by pushing themselves into the thick of life. Saying yes to opportunities as well as actively seeking them out has done wonders to keep my hermit tendencies at bay this year.

Finding further gold from the shadow, a book idea birthed itself this year. It involves exploring the similarities I find with my mentor and how I am endeavouring to grow beyond the places I feel he has got lost in. The notion of eldership becomes more fascinating the longer I live. As it should I guess.

The last area in which shadow work has revealed itself this year has involved reciprocity and equality in friendships. Perhaps those of us with introverted tendencies are naturally more loyal to people because friendships seem harder to make.

In a culture where connection has become increasingly fraught, good listeners can find themselves highly sought out. And in an increasingly noisy world, their silence becomes ever more golden.

Psychiatrist, Paul Goodman nominated 9 kinds of silence in his book, Speaking and Language:

“Not speaking and speaking are both human ways of being in the world, and there are kinds and grades of each. There is the dumb silence of slumber or apathy; the sober silence that goes with a solemn animal face; the fertile silence of awareness, pasturing the soul, whence emerge new thoughts; the alive silence of alert perception, ready to say, “This… this…”; the musical silence that accompanies absorbed activity; the silence of listening to another speak, catching the drift and helping him be clear; the noisy silence of resentment and self-recrimination, loud and subvocal speech but sullen to say it; baffled silence; the silence of peaceful accord with other persons or communion with the cosmos.”

We give someone a tremendous gift when we listen deeply to another.

Courage

It is a sign of great inner insecurity to be hostile to the unfamiliar. - Anaïs Nin

How have you shown courage this year? Eleanor Roosevelt famously advised to “Do one thing each day that scares you.”

Over the years I have visited a particular swimming spot in New Zealand and watched people swim out to a rock in the ocean, battle the tide to approach it and the crashing waves to climb it before then diving off it. I watched some people do it this year while telling myself there is no way I would. “But why not?” I asked myself. When the impulse came to tackle this fear I seized it and swam out (all the while wishing I had watched far fewer Jaws-themed movies this year).

It was exhilarating.

Another external act of bravery (or was it stupidity?) involved climbing Mt Warning. While exploring the Northern Rivers I asked a local shopkeeper for recommendations of things to do. He said that Mt Warning was popular and took around half an hour to climb. I did a few other things and arrived at the car park at 4:30. Being winter I aimed to catch a bit of sunset at the top and be back down by dusk.

A sign at the start of the track advised that the walk not be attempted after midday during the winter months. Curious how the shopkeeper could have got it so wrong I decided to start the track, hoping to find a lookout and then return. But I didn’t manage to find a decent lookout. At some point, I had a Rocky Balboa moment and decided I would summit the mountain despite the high likelihood of running out of light. I surmised that there was always the torch facility on my phone to fall back on. Undeterred by the faces being pulled by those people passing me on their descent I pressed on to realise just how long a walk an 8.8 km mountain climb is. After thinking I had reached the top I encountered what seemed like the 12th labour of Heracles, a final boulder scramble that involved having to pull yourself up a steep section with a chain. As it got darker it felt more and more sketchy. Was there really any great reason I had to reach the pinnacle? Not particularly. And so I descended the mountain.

It was alive with nocturnal activity. Glowing eyes stared out of the trees, creatures hopped or scurried about while glow worms littered the track on the walk back down. Driving out of the national park I noticed groups of people who must have been on some kind of camp or retreat, wandering the forest with fire lit torches. Every now and then it’s good to revisit our primal origins, push our limits and explore remote places.

The School of Life is an organisation I’ve treasured for a while. This year I took in a couple of their one-day workshops. Typically I keep to myself but this year I approached a participant who made interesting observations in class and I asked them whether they wanted company over lunch. They did and it was a connecting experience.

Some months later I returned for another course and struck up a conversation with the class facilitator. It turned out we were both interested in rites of passage work and had even been involved with the same organisation. He was a similar age and like myself, had been on quite a journey moving away from 9-5 employee work to find a more deeply authentic career path. Emboldened by my previous lunchtime canvassing I reached out to another participant who just happened to be doing work in corrections like myself.

I’d never been inside a jail until this year. It was a daunting as well as dispiriting experience. Rarely would I run a class with inmates where there wasn’t at least one alpha male challenging everything I said or disrupting things for the people who did want to learn. Initially, I remained diplomatic but it didn’t often solve the problem. Over time I summoned the guts to confront troublesome folk and found to my surprise they respected me more for doing so.

Internally, my toughest time this year involved returning to an event I worked at many years ago running a week-long class. Back then, one of the participants completed the course and said it changed her life. Another remarked on how much she got out of the workbook I designed and asked if she could buy copies of it to give to friends. Then there was someone who said she was hoping for a magic bullet and didn’t find it. Later on, she made contact to say that she realised it was up to her to take more responsibility for designing the life she wanted. But rather than focus on the successes, however, I fixated on the disappointed one, becoming hypercritical of myself and deciding I wouldn’t run further courses at the event.

So it was with a lot of trepidation that I made my way back there this year. I was nervous, to say the least. I’ve always been blessed with good health but just before the course started I had this strange illness which made it painful to talk due to a blocked ear. How was I going to run a course when I struggled to speak as well as hear? Fascinating how the body can manifest things out of emotional blockages.

As fate would have it, one of the participants was a doctor and his advice helped immensely. The course was hugely satisfying and just today I received an email from the organisers asking if I would be willing to squeeze in another participant now that the cap of 15 has been reached. It would have been so easy to avoid returning this year but how much more anaemic 2018 would have been if I did stay safe in my shell.

Over the last few months, I have been expanded on the material for that Life Story Writing course which begins with a module that explores one’s childhood and the accompanying archetype for this period of life, The Innocent.

Relationship Lessons

Lieben und arbeiten - love and work are what Freud regarded as giving meaning to life.

If job satisfaction marries up with a bell curve, then it holds that only a minuscule percentage of people find themselves in a rarified position. Analyst Richard St John concluded that even those who do love their jobs, whom he dubbed workafrolics, spend around 20% of their time on mundane tasks.

I wonder if the proportion of people in a relationship who feel passionate about their partnership is 20% or less also. Love may give meaning to life but it can also be regarded as one of the thorniest aspects to master.

It can take an expert watchmaker like George Daniels 3 years to make a finely crafted watch. He works with tolerances of 4000th of a millimetre to ensure his pieces are reliable and will outlast its owner. Ironically, it seems like we are all transferring our expectations of a supremely built watch onto our relationship hopes while becoming less willing or capable of contributing excellence in return.

I guess that when it comes to love few of us can, or should, approach it with the objectivity of a Swiss watchmaker understanding their machinery. Emotions are nothing if not messy.

In his most recent work, The Course of Love, Alain de Botton suggests dispensing far greater compassion on ourselves and our partners:

“It’s not just children who are childlike. Adults, too, are – beneath the bluster – intermittently playful, silly, fanciful, vulnerable, hysterical, terrified, and pitiful and in search of consolation and forgiveness.

We’re well versed at seeing the sweet and the fragile in children and offering them help and comfort accordingly. Around them, we know how to put aside the worst of our compulsions, vindictiveness and fury. We can recalibrate our expectations and demand a little less than we normally do; we’re slower to anger and a bit more aware of unrealised potential. We readily treat children with a degree of kindness that we are oddly and woefully reluctant to show to our peers.

It is a wonderful thing to live in a world where so many people are nice to children. It would be even better if we lived in one where we were a little nicer to the childlike sides of one another.”

 Even when the complexity of all our working parts lines up with another’s, simple timing can dash the most promising of connections.

If there was a lesson for me on the relationship front in 2018 it was realising it is better to enjoy a connection for a brief season than have either party attempt to contort themselves at the expense of some core value.

With a predilection to avoiding conflict, I’d like to think that perhaps my time in the sweat lodge purged some of this tendency. This year I was far better at asserting myself while looking at surfacing tensions through a more compassionate lens. That said, it can be damn hard to discern where unconditional love ends and acquiescence begins.

Whilst in a relationship earlier this year I accompanied my then partner to an event that she had previously attended and spoke highly of. I soon discovered it was not for me. My choice was to politely endure a week of it, withdraw from it altogether or find a balance between attending some activities and opting out of others in order to devote time to things I found enriching.

I went with the last option but she took it as reflecting poorly on her image. She also felt aggrieved that we didn’t end up sharing this deeply held passion of hers, saying that in her ideal world her partner would love ceremonial work as much as she did.

My intuition told me going into the event that it would be the making or breaking of us and it was right. An interesting dynamic that unfolded with the relationship demise was finding myself become the pariah of the group. Fortunately, I had begun Tara Westover’s memoir and recognised the strength she showed in remaining true to herself.

Desiring greater reciprocity in friendships this year has also had me seeking out more asymmetry in a relationship while being just as elusive.

That brilliant Bulgarian blogger from Brooklyn, Maria Popova, captured how heart-rending this can be for the one who feels more. In her example she spoke about Emily Dickinson feeling greater intensity than that of the target of her affection, Susan Gilbert:

“Emily’s feelings for her were not of a different hue but of a wholly different color — one that Susan was constitutionally unable to match. Or perhaps Emily had always misdivined the contents of Susan’s heart, inferring an illusory symmetry of feeling on the basis not of evidence but of willfully blind hope.

Few things are more wounding than the confounding moment of discovering an asymmetry of affections where mutuality had been presumed. It is hard to imagine how Dickinson took the withdrawal — here was a woman who experienced the world with a euphoria of emotion atmospheres above the ordinary person’s and who therefore likely plummeted to the opposite extreme in equal magnitude. But she seems to have feared it all along — feared that her immense feelings would never be wholly met, as is the curse of those who love with unguarded abandon.”

This year I’ve found myself on both sides of the asymmetry equation.

Ahhh love, what divine madness you unleash!

Me, my brothers and dad on the Otago Rail Trail

Connections

Interaction it turns out is the high road from merely human to full humane. - Rebecca Abrams

The year began with meeting a fellow writer who has become something of a mentor figure and whose life has inspired a new book project in me.

Another cherished soul I met was a lady in her 80’s who reminded me of an Echidna. She appeared prickly on the surface but I quickly discovered that was merely a protective mechanism to safeguard her very tender side.

Elders, elders, everywhere.

Midway through the year, I met another lady in late bloom. Her professional life was spent as a dutiful psychologist but in post-retirement, she had become a free-spirited traveller and in many respects, a child again. How radiant are individuated beings twinkling through their twilight years.

In keeping with my “Just do it!” mantra I took up an invitation to accompany a fellow chess enthusiast in his 80’s who was heading a bush walk to a place called Bungleboori. It was a remarkable spot. The highlight, however, was witnessing a pack of wild brumbies dance in what appeared to be a choreographed celebration of their freedom.

Another writing connection grew as the year went on. Initially, we had something of a more formal connection but in writing and sharing more of our life stories an endearing friendship grew.

Being replete with wisdom and engaging stories is evident in those mature in years but what I’m finding most enviable is their equanimity.

Midway through the year, I pushed through my reluctance to attend a friends 40th birthday party. I didn’t know anyone who would be going aside from the host. I spoke to a handful of people and noticed various cliques forming. One guy seemed on the outer sitting by himself so I struck up a conversation. He’d had a hard year battling a health condition. Coupled with his inherent shyness it didn’t seem like he was too at ease. Finding some commonality I asked a bunch of questions and got a broader picture of his life. He made a concerted effort to enquire about me and my life too. A couple of hours later I said farewell to the birthday girl who remarked on how great it was to watch her friend open up with someone. It was equally rewarding for me too.

Spending a lot of time this year researching the Midlife Passage it was serendipitous to attend a social event and meet someone who was just coming out the other side of a midlife crisis (or was it a midlife opportunity?).

On paper, she had attained the ideal life as held by society. She had a husband, son, daughter, high profile job, wealth, house in an exclusive area and fulfilling social life. What more could she have asked for?

Reminiscent of the TV series Doctor Foster, she was blindsided by a betrayal that saw everything stripped from her life in short order. Rather than collapse into despondency or victimhood, she managed to completely reinvent her life. New passions were birthed, spirituality discovered and a whole new vocational chapter opened up.

Navigating my own midlife transition, I found it heartening to reflect on her journey and embrace, rather than fear, the changes that have and continue to occur in my life.

My daughter often expresses how much she would like more friendship with kindred spirits. I encourage her to attend more events and try new activities. Moving into fatherly advice mode I said, “Often you’ll meet dozens of people you have little in common with but every now and then you’ll find someone you really gel with and the discomfort will have been worth it. The only thing for certain is that if you don’t make any effort things won’t change.”

Had I not taken my own advice I wouldn’t have made the connection that led to me learning about Human Design and enjoying being able to hear about another seeker’s questing.

This year, like so many others, I’ve met some fascinating people with whom I had hoped friendships would grow. Being too far removed geographically from them or finding they have enough friends already, most connections I make are temporal but that just makes the enduring ones more appreciated.

There we both sat and rested for a while, facing the rising sun the way we’d climbed, for looking back can sometimes help you on. - Dante

When I was younger I didn’t see my grandfather on my father’s side very often as he lived in New Zealand. He was cantankerous and closed off, the polar opposite to my exceedingly warm and loving grandmother. It wasn’t until after his passing that I found out he was a writer and a poet. At 28 his life must have felt full of promise. Taking a sabbatical from working on his parent’s farm he undertook a 6-month cycling trip around the North Island.

The roads were rough and his bike was nowhere near as flash as our modern ones. At times he found it so cold sleeping by the side of the road that in desperation he would knick a paling or two from a farmers fence so he could make a fire. Perhaps he also did it to provide some light so he could journal about his trip.

As I take up gardening, which was his vocation in life, I wonder what other traits I might have inherited from this man who felt like such a stranger growing up. Hearing that he was plucked from his peaceful life and drafted into WWII I suspect the horror of that period must have contributed to him hardening as a person. Things couldn’t have been helped by him having a stern father who never offered so much as a skerrick of encouragement.

My father broke that cycle. He chose to follow the example of his mother who lavished goodwill on everyone she met. Although she was bullied as a child for being poor she never became bitter and went out of her way to accept everyone, offer positivity and a kind smile. With my father turning 70 this year, my two brothers and I celebrated the occasion by taking him on the Otago Rail Trail, a 150+ km ride on the South Island. Sustained by wild apples and hearty pub meals we wound our way through spectacular scenery, rugged drought lands and through pounding rain and winds.

Roadtripping the North Island with my son and daughter has been a great way to see the year out. In a year that began surrounded by the glow of elders, it fittingly ends with the presence of wide-eyed and appreciative youth.

In NZ, the tiki symbolises the connection between people, their ancestors & the natural world.

Shedding Old Skin

We must die as egos and be born again in the swarm, not separated and self-hypnotized, but individual and related. - Henry Miller

Over-extending myself is a continual challenge, particular with a creative nature which forever dreams up new projects. Focusing on one thing at a time and learning to tick something off the list before moving down to another has been life-altering.

Listening to my body when it comes to finding better balance has been equally transformative. So has it been to live healthier, grow more of my own food and learn from health-conscious people. Discovering watermelon slushes has been among the finds of the year (simply freeze chunks of watermelon then blend with some freshly squeezed lime juice and mint from the garden).

Becoming diligent about being more unplugged has helped counter my habit of pushing myself till exhaustion. This year has seen me confining the mental, or creative work I do on the computer to the morning when I’m clearest and most refreshed. Then the remainder of the day has been devoted to gardening, reading, cooking, bush walks, connection and all manner of things.

Living in greater harmony with the seasons this year has led to me noticing which flowers appear at different times and has had me anticipating the seasonal produce at my local co-op such as lemonades, tamarillos, feijoas and other things not readily found on the supermarket shelves.

Joseph Campbell was an advocate of people finding a sacred space - a place to regularly inhabit where one could forget about their day to day concerns and reconnect with deeper meaning and larger feelings. This year I’ve found such a place at a particular waterfall on an almost uninhabited rainforest walk not far from where I live.

Having always had a penchant for dour drama it has been nice to lighten things up by looking for more laughs. Carl Barron and Chris Rock produced some of 2018’s finest stand up performances while series such as The Good Place and The Marvellous Mrs Maisel brought plenty of amusement.

With my grandmother living to 96, I have always thought my father would follow her footsteps, particularly being so fit and healthy. But only a month after he completed the 150km bike ride he became unwell while travelling through Europe. What I thought was just a blip in his impeccable health record has proven otherwise. While he may yet bounce back the likelihood is that he will remain in the heavily subdued state that he is now in. 2018 has really rocked the idea that my parents will live forever.

The Story Which Best Captures the Year

A gift of narrative therapy is being able to consciously look for meaning in day to day events rather than feeling we are living in a psychic washing machine getting battered and thrown around by pure chaos.

I loved reading something this year from the extraordinary storyteller Tanya Batt:

“Humans live a double life: in the world that we can manipulate/interact with directly and then the world we mediate through language.”

This year my outer world has seen major events take place which has helped to fulfil my dream of creating a retreat centre for people to explore writing, reconnect with nature and utilise numerous personal development tools to help them grow and individuate.

If I was to write one story about this year it would involve the shower of synchronicities that took place which has made this vision many steps closer.

What better way to see out the year and welcome in the new than undertaking an End Of Year Exploration.

As T.S Eliot pointed out:

For last year’s words belong to last year’s language. And next year’s words await another voice. And to make an end is to make a beginning.

Consider all the remarkable events and fascinating happenings from this year. Do you find a bountiful assortment to trawl through or are there slim pickings? How much do your outer circumstances reflect your inner life?