It is the afternoon on a normal school day, not that much different than any other day. The 2nd grade classroom is a bit chaotic. We are all a bit out of control probably from having had to sit so long in our learning process. I am playing some form of tag, which is clearly …
This is a difficult subject to write about because most of us have the inclination to do things in the wrong way. If you have had a dream about a venomous snake in the past, this post is definitely for you. Suppose you have a really great workplace where you are working with a fantastic …
Most of us have been affected emotionally over the past several months from the political ideologies that want to take their countries backwards to an imagined time when everything was so great and glorious. We who work in this field of helping people move forward in our lives just kind of shake our heads and …
So you are finding yourself in an emotional funk. You feel stuck and cannot seem to move forward. Not to worry. I am going to give you some easy steps to get yourself moving again in a positive direction. If you know the principles and can apply them, you can move out of your negative …
Last week I was working with a client who has a tendency to imagine that the worst things are going to happen to his family. The images are not based on concrete reality. It is like his mind goes on walkabout trying to think of dark things. He was having thoughts about his sisters dying, …
During the past couple of months I have been experimenting with various small groups on the ways to create a positive vision. Part of the idea came to me because so many people fail at their New Year’s Resolutions, which are kind of a mini vision to better oneself for the coming year. If you …
I have been called into the director’s office. I know it is going to be bad. No one is called into this director’s office to be congratulated. I try to get into a supremely calm state of being, but the fear is creeping in. He begins his lashing out including telling me that no one …
Before understanding the negative emotion of shame and what it is trying to wake up in us when we feel it, it is important to understand that shame is not guilt, even though people often confuse them in speech and in writing. Guilt, which I wrote about in a previous post, is the feeling you …
There are actually two types of guilt, one is positive, the other negative. Positive guilt evokes a feeling of remorse when you do something that breaks an ethical standard. When you feel it and then take steps to correct your actions, that is an extremely positive thing. When people say someone is God fearing in …
I was hoping to write a post about guilt and then shame as part of the series on the codes of negative emotions, but I wanted to write a bit more connected to the subject of hurt, specifically bullies. I suspect that we have all had to deal with our fair share of bullies in …
For the longest time my presenting negative emotion was grief, especially after the untimely death of my daughter two years ago. Grief is such a challenging emotion to deal with, primarily because when it strikes, it takes your energy down. You feel depressed. It is no wonder that anti-depressants have been so easily prescribed by …
Jealousy is a particularly difficult negative emotion to write about for me, probably because I have mostly been on the victim side of people being jealous of me. I have more experience with trying to cope with jealous people than being jealous myself. It doesn’t come up that often for me. I will do the …
Before we go too far into understanding about envy, we first have to differentiate it from jealousy, because even the dictionary has it wrong (at least in my understanding). It is useful to have a clear distinction. Envy is the emotion you feel when you desire an end state, hope that it will happen, but then do not …
It is a little over a week since New Year’s Day. It is a good time to write about disappointment if you have already given up on the resolutions you might have set. Disappointment is the negative emotion we feel when an expectation has not been met. It has the effect of taking the wind out …
It is rush hour, the traffic is heavy, you are trying to make a left turn into busy traffic. It seems like it will take forever to make the turn. Worse yet, you have been recently cut off by other people in a hurry. OR you are in a meeting giving a proposal or ideas …
In the last post I talked about how anxiety is the negative emotion that is trying to wake up confidence in yourself. Confidence is the ability to embrace the positive abilities that you already have developed so that you can put them into action. It is almost like a feeling of being grounded in yourself. …
Anxiety, for me, is like the emotional pandemic of our times. If we could all find a way to do a better job with anxiety, we could all be so much more productive. What is anxiety, aka, worry, and how does it operate? I like to start talking about anxiety by comparing it to fear. …
In the last post I introduced what having fear means, which, in the simplest terms, means that you are being called to a form of courage. Remember to see my videos on tiktok. They are also very informative. I am “dreamdoctor9”. Fear of Being Constrained. This often occurs when you have been parented by a …
Before I write about fear and where it is trying to take you, I want to let you know that you can watch some of my videos on dream interpretations on tiktok. I am Dreamdoctor9. It is a new medium for me. Fear is by far my favorite negative emotion because I have a huge …
I am sitting at the top of run looking down when my body decides to fill itself up with fear of crashing badly. The longer I stay the worse it gets. The fear goes from mild reluctance to absolute paralysis. I know that I am going to ski down the slope. I am just looking …
The strangest thing happened last night in my dreams. Evidently I was yelling and screaming for help in my dreams so much so that my wife had to leave the bed for awhile because she thought I might be kicking her unconsciously which I have been known to do. What was interesting is that I …
My father lived to be 100. He passed away peacefully in November 2021. He died pretty much in the same manner that he lived. He had very little drama, was cheerful, and found positive in those around him. My mother died in April of 2018. There was much more drama and pain in her passing …
I wrote this story to illustrate some of the challenges that anger as a negative emotion presents us. It is a true story with a few embellishments for the reader’s enjoyment. It is a beautifully calm evening at Trout Lake in East Van, the name locals give to this part of the city of Vancouver. …
Anger is one of the less understood virtues, especially in places like America where the culture is run on how fast you can get to a goal or get something done or delivered. It is even worse in cultures like the Middle East where men think they own their families and have the innate right …
Recently my granddaughter asked me his question. “I have been given the homework assignment to ask several people what they know about, how they would describe/what are characteristics of human nature/ identity?” Here is what I responded to her. True identity is based on one’s virtues. All of who you truly are is in the …
Richard Hastings is an expert in change work and dream work and author of Dreams for Peace. He is a Baha'i and currently lives in Vancouver, BC. Read more...
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