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Articles from Adele McDowell | Selfgrowth.com
- 50 Ways to Feed Your Soul - by Submitted on May 17, 2009 from Adele McDowellRemember Paul Simon’s song, “50 Ways to Leave Your Lover”? It’s a catchy tune, right? In fact, can you see me humming? I am loosely, very loosely, borrowing the concept. Instead of talking about ditching your lover, I am going for a gentler, happier thought and want to consider: 50 ways to feed ...
Views: 11405(2 votes) - Call back your spirit or die - by Submitted on Jul 07, 2011 from Adele McDowellHave you ever heard a story so powerful that it reverberated loudly through your interior landscape? Or it stopped you cold in your tracks and made you think – hard – about your life? I did in 1994, and it’s still with me today. For weeks and weeks after attending a professional conference ...
Views: 10668(1 vote) - Anatomy of Betrayal - by Submitted on Jul 09, 2011 from Adele McDowellA face reader once told me that I had kind eyes, a strong jaw, a good forehead, in fact, an excellent forehead, an emotional nose, and, more pointedly, that I absolutely could not handle betrayal. Really, though, who can handle betrayal? Its very name conjures up deep hurt and heartache. ...
Views: 9935(2 votes) - Are you suffering from spiritual depression? - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellEvery have one of those seemingly endless stretches of time, when it feels as if all your get-up-and-go has got-up-and-went? You are not sick, per se. You just don’t give a damn anymore. Nothing matters much. After all of your full-speed-ahead decisions, choices and actions, you feel ...
Views: 8759(2 votes) - Five Ways to Deal with an Emotional Hangover - by Submitted on Jul 09, 2011 from Adele McDowellEver have one of those weeks when there is palpable, anger-inciting tension between you and a family member? Or you have had a crushing misunderstanding with one of your dearest friends? Or there is an incident at work that has had you mumbling obscenities under your breath and double-checking ...
Views: 8567(5 votes) - Is Being Sensitive a Blessing or a Curse? - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellThere is the almost eye-roll and rather superior voice that announces to you, as if you were not aware, that you’re so-o-o-o sensitive. The implication is that this is not a good thing. You are somehow defective For years, I felt they were right. I was the one feeling all the bumps in the ...
Views: 8375(2 votes) - The Shaman, mystic and psychotic - by Submitted on Sep 19, 2009 from Adele McDowellIt sounds like the beginning of one of those three person jokes, i.e., the shaman, the mystic and the psychotic walked into a bar. But this isn’t a joke; this is more of a pondering aloud on the line between sanity and insanity, delusion and reason. What prompted these ponderings was that I ...
Views: 8070(4 votes) - How do you make sense of a sudden death? - by Submitted on Aug 25, 2010 from Adele McDowellThe question, itself, must be a Zen koan, because, really, there is no answer to sudden death. There is no making sense of the unreal, surreal, or unbelievable. Yet, it happens, day in and day out. Unfortunately, this week, I have had two poignant reminders of this very fact. In the ...
Views: 8021 - ***A psychologist’s suicide - by Submitted on Sep 22, 2011 from Adele McDowellThe word came last week that a friend and colleague, a clinical psychologist, had committed suicide. She had suffered a hammering of profound losses and fell into a deep hole of depression. She had placed herself in good professional hands, was hospitalized for two weeks, and released with ...
Views: 5443(1 vote) - ***Overworked? Seven strategies to help you cope - by Submitted on May 06, 2011 from Adele McDowellAre you screaming unmentionables in your head all day long? Do you feel like the character in the movie, Network, bellowing out the window for all the world to hear, “I’m mad as hell and I am not going to take it anymore?” Do you fantasize about walking away from your job when you are within ...
Views: 5169(2 votes) - Relationships Are Our Greatest Spiritual Teachers - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellYou cannot escape relationships. They are everywhere. They are the connective tissue of life. Be it friend, spouse, child, sibling, coworker, or neighbor, life is filled with relationships of varying dimensions, connections, and intensities. Each of us is a product of some kind of connection. ...
Views: 4999 - Review: Medical Renaissance Series: The Secret Code (DVD) by C. Norman Shealy, M.D., Ph.D. - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellHarvard-trained neurosurgeon and founder of the American Holistic Medical Association, C. Norman Shealy, M.D., Ph.D. has created a documentary film, “Medical Renaissance Series: The Secret Code.” It is well worth a viewing. Norm Shealy, often called Dr. Wizard by his colleagues given his 10 ...
Views: 4595 - ***Help, I fell off my yoga mat - by Submitted on Jul 07, 2011 from Adele McDowellEver have one of those days? You are brimming with newly found motivation and re-aligned resolution. You haven’t even walked out of the door, yet, and the thought of what you are going to accomplish has you filled with button-bursting pride. You are puffed up with purpose. You are ready to ...
Views: 4588(5 votes) - Joan Pancoe: Portrait of a NYC Psychic - by Submitted on Aug 07, 2009 from Adele McDowellAre you a curious type? Do you ever wonder how someone becomes an intuitive, and what their life has been like? Allow me to introduce you to Joan Pancoe, a psychic, trance channel, and karmic astrologer in New York City since 1976. Recently, Joan gifted me a good portion of her afternoon ...
Views: 4498(3 votes) - Messages from the Other Side - by Submitted on Aug 25, 2010 from Adele McDowellOnce upon a time, a woman, let’s call her Shirley, lost her husband to the ravages of cancer. It had been a long and arduous battle. Shirley was completely depleted on every level. After the funeral service, everyone returned to the house. The coffee pot was plugged in; neighbors brought in ...
Views: 4495(2 votes) - Soul Survivor: The Reincarnation of a World War II Fighter Pilot - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellDo you believe in reincarnation? Past lives? A regular, hard-working, church-going couple, Andrea and Bruce Leininger were faced with these very questions when their two-year-old son, James, began have unremitting nightmares and shouting the words, “Plane on fire! Little man can’t get ...
Views: 4178(2 votes) - Pay It Forward - by Submitted on Apr 28, 2011 from Adele McDowellSomeone wise once said, “If you have much, give your wealth; if you have little, give your heart.” And here is the perfect occasion: Thursday, April 28 is international Pay It Forward Day. Based on the 2000 movie of the same name, Pay It Forward is the concept of doing a good deed for ...
Views: 4016(1 vote) - Thank You, God, for My Fears - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellDo you know those moments when you are driving in the car and you find yourself knee-deep in reverie? These are moments when, out of nowhere, you find yourself long in thought; it’s as if you have made a U-turn into the underground waters of your psyche. Maybe it’s the constancy of the ...
Views: 3988(3 votes) - ***Ernest Hemingway, Oprah, and my new spiritual discipline - by Submitted on Jan 30, 2012 from Adele McDowell“For Sale: Baby shoes, never worn.” That’s how it started. Those six words, we are told, are the shortest of Hemingway’s short stories. And those provocative words inspired Smith Magazine writer and editor, Larry Smith to challenge his Smith Magazine web readers to describe their lives in a ...
Views: 3986(2 votes) - ***Five ways to be happier, steadier, and more balanced in today’s upside-down world - by Submitted on Aug 17, 2011 from Adele McDowellCan you remember when you last felt happy, really happy? Would you like to feel steadier in a healthy, mind-body way that does not involve pharmaceuticals? Is straddling a teeter-totter the last time you consciously considered balance in your life? Today’s topsy-turvy world has us all ...
Views: 3978(3 votes) - Help, it's Dark in Here - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellDo you ever have one of those days, weeks, or, even, years when it feels nothing is going your way? There is no break from the gods. In a word, you would say that your life stinks, and it stinks out loud. I have recently had a number of conversations with folks who are finding themselves, ...
Views: 3958(4 votes) - Are you Jesus? - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellI didn’t realize it at first, but they happened on the same day. On Saturday morning I am taking a walk with a friend. We cover our familiar route, knowing the circuit automatically in our steps. We are on the home stretch of the walk, moving down a country lane, all green and leafy. Out of ...
Views: 3938(1 vote) - Were you Cleopatra? - by Submitted on Mar 11, 2011 from Adele McDowellOr, maybe, Julius Caesar or William Shakespeare or Marie Antoinette? Discussions of past lives are often met with a bit of a smirk. Do you really believe? And the answer is, “Yes, I do.” I look at past life information in a number of different ways. It serves as a teacher; it explains ...
Views: 3841(2 votes) - You lost hope - by Submitted on Jul 06, 2011 from Adele McDowellYears ago, a shaman looked at me and said, “You lost hope. You should never lose hope.” He was right -- and, boy, did I hate that. I have a long history of unflappable optimism. I’m able to make copious amounts of lemonade. I pride myself on my out-of-the-box thinking. But the shaman ...
Views: 3781(1 vote) - The Tao of 007 - by Submitted on Jul 07, 2011 from Adele McDowellI like James Bond. I like him for all the obvious reasons. He is dashing, witty, intelligent, sexy, fun, etc., but it's his less obvious qualities that make me a hard-core admirer. This man is present. He is 100 percent focused on the here and now. A mystic couldn't do it any better; he is ...
Views: 3778 - Welcome, Class, to Advanced Uncertainty - by Submitted on Jul 06, 2011 from Adele McDowellIs your world more down than up? Has sideways become your new vertical? Have your health, sanity, relationships, future plans, money, housing and/or employment concerns been in bucking-bronco states of flux? Have global warming, political warring, economic forecasting, ecological nightmares ...
Views: 3762(2 votes) - In a spiritual funk, untethered and free falling? - by Submitted on Jul 07, 2011 from Adele McDowellEver felt like you were falling through space? Everything that held you and tethered you has disappeared and evaporated. You are simply bobbing in the cosmos awaiting your next signal. You look to the right; you look to the left. Up, down, over and around, yet, there is no sign indicating your ...
Views: 3673(1 vote) - ***The stuckness of spiritual depression - by Submitted on Jul 07, 2011 from Adele McDowellEvery have one of those seemingly endless stretches of time, when it feels as if all your get-up-and-go has got-up-and-went? You are not sick, per se. You just don’t give a damn anymore. Nothing matters much. After all of your full-speed-ahead decisions, choices and actions, you feel ...
Views: 3650(4 votes) - ***The stuckness of spiritual depression - by Submitted on Jul 07, 2011 from Adele McDowellEvery have one of those seemingly endless stretches of time, when it feels as if all your get-up-and-go has got-up-and-went? You are not sick, per se. You just don’t give a damn anymore. Nothing matters much. After all of your full-speed-ahead decisions, choices and actions, you feel ...
Views: 3650(4 votes) - Have I Missed the Boat to Enlightenment? - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellI was at a workshop recently where a spiritual teacher made a statement that has been rattling around my cranium for a number of days. Now, mind you, this is not the first time I have heard this statement, but, perhaps, I had reached the tipping point vis-à-vis this information and could no ...
Views: 3573(1 vote) - ***Five ways to deal with today’s chaotic energies - by Submitted on Sep 22, 2011 from Adele McDowellCan you feel the energies bumping up against you? One minute, you feel pushed; the next minute, pulled. One minute, you’re ok, and the next minute, you’re not. It’s chaotic out there. Our world is in flux; nothing feels normal anymore. Disasters are becoming way too familiar, and terra ...
Views: 3549(2 votes) - ***The wandering brain finds happiness - by Submitted on Apr 22, 2011 from Adele McDowellThose trusty researchers at Harvard University -- and elsewhere -- have been busily exploring what makes us happy. It is called the neurobiology of happiness and speaks to what lights up our brains. The researchers are also examining the plasticity of our brains – how we can re-pattern our ...
Views: 3522 - The weight of wait - by Submitted on Aug 26, 2010 from Adele McDowellLike Oprah, I have spent my life dealing with weight and have recently regained once-lost avoirdupois. I hate that. I end up hating myself and then it’s that all-too-familiar battle of up and down, Monday is a new start, last hoorah Sundays and so forth in a addictive cycle that has its roots in ...
Views: 3409(2 votes) - Have you read The Shack? - by Submitted on Aug 26, 2010 from Adele McDowellThis is a book that has generated a great deal of conversation. Some love it; some hate it. For over a year, The Shack by Wm. Paul Young has been on The New York Times bestseller list. Young wrote this book as a Christmas gift for his six children. He also shared a few copies with friends and ...
Views: 3347(3 votes) - What Happened to My Epiphany? - by Submitted on Aug 25, 2010 from Adele McDowellWhat happened to my epiphany? I just had it. I know it was here. It had lit up my mind and thumped my heart with excitement. It has been with me a mere few days, and, now, it is gone. It has vamoosed and high-tailed it out of my life. I am heart sick. I want my epiphany back. It felt so right. ...
Views: 3321 - Tired and cranky? Time for a vacation? - by Submitted on Aug 14, 2008 from Adele McDowellHave you met anyone recently who isn’t tired? It seems to be a national, if not international, pandemic. Most everyone is a bleary-eyed, caffeinated automaton who is putting one cranky foot down after the other. Even the kids with their over-scheduled days and burgeoning back-packs can ...
Views: 3282(1 vote) - Tired and cranky? Time for a vacation? - by Submitted on Aug 14, 2008 from Adele McDowellHave you met anyone recently who isn’t tired? It seems to be a national, if not international, pandemic. Most everyone is a bleary-eyed, caffeinated automaton who is putting one cranky foot down after the other. Even the kids with their over-scheduled days and burgeoning back-packs can ...
Views: 3282(1 vote) - Hey, it's scary out there - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellEating tranquilizers, pounding Jack, inhaling carbs? Do you need to be sedated before you watch the evening news? Do you come home from work black, blue and bedraggled, feeling as if you have done a few rounds with the great Muhammad Ali? Has your relentless job hunting evolved into ...
Views: 3199 - But What About the God in Me? - by Submitted on Aug 24, 2010 from Adele McDowellIt’s late at night. All around me is quiet and dark. I strike a match; the friction is amplified by the stillness. The match sparks with the wick in a bubble of flame, and shadows dance on the ceiling. The room fills with soft, yellow light. My eyes adjust, and I can make out the edges and ...
Views: 2976 - Understanding Attention - by Submitted on Aug 01, 2009 from Adele McDowellIn my gym, there are promo pieces that are played over the loud speaker. One such tag line is, “What gets measured gets improved.” The message is designed to encourage the clientele to get body fat levels measured and, ultimately, be inspired – or, more likely, shocked – and, as a result, hire a ...
Views: 2916(2 votes) - Got Stress? - by Submitted on Jul 09, 2008 from Adele McDowellDo you have a monkey mind that has run amok? Is there lots of chatter ricocheting around your cranium? Is there so much clamor and internal conversation that it’s standing room only in your head? Like the deli counter, do you need to take a number to discern which inner voice has taken over ...
Views: 2914 - Take god care - by Submitted on Feb 16, 2011 from Adele McDowellIt started simply enough, a run of the mill typo. Instead of signing off with my usual “Take good care,” I had missed an “o” and written “Take god care.” I noticed right away, but opted not to correct my mistake. This was fun and, besides, I look for messages and meanings in almost everything ...
Views: 2909(2 votes) - Got Prayer? - by Submitted on Jul 19, 2009 from Adele McDowellRecently, I have been thinking about prayer and, more specifically, the human aspects of prayer. I am of the opinion that there is no right or wrong way to pray. I find prayer to be unique and idiosyncratic because prayer is predicated on our very human, one-to-one relationship with the ...
Views: 2853(1 vote) - ***Crazed by the holidays? Six steps to avoid overwhelm - by Submitted on Dec 14, 2011 from Adele McDowellOMG! The holidays are here. Are you ready? Good God, I’m not -- even though I swore up and down that I would be all wrapped and carded by Thanksgiving. Well, such is the way of my good intentions when life does life. I am guessing you can relate. It’s not too late to find help. Here are six ...
Views: 2844(3 votes) - ***Mental health needs a booster shot - by Submitted on Dec 14, 2011 from Adele McDowellThe majority of mental health practices are deeply rooted in the medical model, knee-deep in the latest edition of the DSM to provide diagnostic labels and entrenched with pharmaceutical solutions. And much of this is aided and abetted by the insurance companies who look to quantify and contain ...
Views: 2791(1 vote) - Everyday peace - by Submitted on Mar 10, 2009 from Adele McDowellI’m of the Viet Nam and Kent State generation and can remember the feel of singing “All we are saying is give peace a chance.” The swaying bodies, the deep resonance, the fervent belief that if peace were found – because, oh so, certainly, it had been lost – then the world would be right. I was ...
Views: 2772(1 vote) - ***A lesson in grief - by Submitted on Sep 26, 2012 from Adele McDowellThis summer, I had the opportunity to visit sunny, palm-treed southern California, where it kisses the blue, blue of the Pacific Ocean. It is a beautiful part of the world. I had the great honor and privilege of presenting my new work -- and still in-process book – Making Peace with Suicide at ...
Views: 2748(1 vote) - Are you ready for a life review? - by Submitted on Jan 10, 2011 from Adele McDowellWhen we pass over, we are welcomed by loved ones. We are also given the opportunity -- in the presence of a guardian angel type -- to review our life. I imagine the the angel says something like, "Let's roll the videotape" and every frame of our life unfolds before us. We each get to see ...
Views: 2682(1 vote) - ***This year, I choose surrender - by Submitted on Aug 09, 2011 from Adele McDowellMy dear pal, Debbie, passed along this birthday ritual. On your birthday, you choose one word to be your focus for the coming year. Once, I chose the word “sparkle” – just the thought of it made me happy. This year, my word arrived unbidden with cat-like stealth and sure-footed certainty. It ...
Views: 2654(2 votes) - ***Chocolate, tantrums and salvation - by Submitted on Mar 31, 2011 from Adele McDowellMy inner child has run amok. She wants nothing to do with restriction, rules and can’t-have’s. She wants chocolate and French fries and a loaf of toast. She is acting out big-time. On the outside I still look like the grown-up I am, doing my daily adult thing, but on the inside, ...
Views: 2651(2 votes) - And the signs say, "Don't Push" - by Submitted on Feb 25, 2011 from Adele McDowellI am a woman who believes that there are messages in everything. In other words, everything is symbolic to me. So, what am I to think when 10 days before I head to my long-awaited, greatly-anticipated trip to the UK, I fall into a small well on uneven pavement – a hole, if you will – after ...
Views: 2651(2 votes) - The Three Toms - by Submitted on Apr 09, 2009 from Adele McDowellRecently, a very dear friend of mine lost three relatives -- her 30 year old nephew, 96 year old uncle, and 62 year old brother, in that order. They died within a mere six weeks of one another. All were named Tom. The causes of death: murder, the complications of old age, and a sudden heart ...
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