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From its very beginning as a British colony, the United States has been afflicted with a disease. At its core, the disease is fear. As a response to that fear, greed emerged. The subconscious thought process that fuels greed is something like, “If I can amass enough [money, power, land, etc.], I won’t feel vulnerable, needy, or alone.” Controlled by this greed (fear), our founders acquired wealth by stealing other humans’ lives and putting them to work as slaves. Although overt slavery has ended in the U.S., the underlying disease is still here. If we’re willing to look at it, we all stand to benefit.
I often educate people on what holistic medicine means and how it differs from what could be called “reductive” medicine. The term holistic is derived from the Greek word holos, meaning whole. A holistic medical practitioner (regardless of what form of medicine they use) is one who endeavors to see and treat the whole person. They take into account the “big picture” of this being and the environment they live in. In contrast, someone practicing in a reductive way tends to see a person as a collection of separate parts and addresses themselves to correcting malfunctions of these parts without concern for the influence of, or impact on, the rest of the being.
Sometimes reductive medicine works just fine. You have a headache – who knows why? – so you take an aspirin without concern for balancing your whole being, and a few hours later it’s all better. Score one for reductive medicine.
Other times it fails. You have a headache, you try aspirin, and the headache’s still there. “What’s wrong with my head?” you think. Maybe you consider a stronger painkiller. Without broadening your view, you may never get to the root of it.
In the case of our history of oppression of Blacks, while we’ve taken many big steps in the right direction, our nation’s healing process hasn’t been adequately holistic. There were enough Americans who were sufficiently pained by the existence of slavery to bring about its abolition, but they never got to the root of it.
The prevailing attitude among White people was that despite the fact that Blacks were ripped from their homeland; that their families were torn apart; that they were deprived of rights, recognition, education, good nutrition and healthcare, and a sense of equality and potential – all would be better when the race that perpetrated this invited them to step up and enter society. It wasn’t and it still isn’t.
Greed didn’t fix that underlying fear, and the enslavement and dehumanization of Blacks created its own gaping wound. The recent visibility of police brutality against Blacks shows what can happen when we choose the path of reductive medicine. The problem originated in Whites, well before they saw the enslavement of Black people – and then the freeing of Black people – as their aspirin. But true, deep, holistic healing is often a hard, slow, uncomfortable process. That makes it a hard sell for a population that likes things easy, fast, and comfortable.
Throughout our years of slavery, the following years of segregation, and the most recent generation of supposed equality, it’s simply harder to live to one’s potential as a Black American than a White one. A popular graphic by Tony Ruth does a decent job of explaining the differences between equality, equity, and justice.
In the first panel, we see an apple tree that leans to one side. There’s a man under the low side (where most of the apples are) and another man under the high side (where there are few apples). Neither can reach the branches, but an apple falls into the hands of the man under the bountiful side. The caption is “Inequality: unequal access to opportunities.”
In the next panel, the two men are given equal sized ladders. This allows the man on the low side to reach plenty of apples, but the other man still can’t reach the tree. We may look on such a scenario as being equal for both men – one just happens to be on the better side of the tree – but in our country, the tree of opportunity nearly always leans toward the White person and away from the Black person.
If you’ve never had to worry about being denied a job or loan because of the color of your skin, you’ve benefited from White privilege. If you’ve felt generally safer in the presence of cops, you’ve benefited from White privilege. We could just as well say, “If you’ve ever wondered if you didn’t get the job or loan because of the color of your skin, you’ve been hurt by Black disadvantage.” But Whites have always known about the disadvantages of being Black and done little to rectify it. By framing the disparity as White privilege, it’s clearer for White people to see that the onus is upon them to do something to correct it.
The next panel of the graphic depicts equity – the man on the high side of the tree is given a taller ladder so he, too, can reach the apples. Whereas the previous panel assumes both men are fundamentally equal, with equal resources, they don’t have truly equal chances of succeeding. In an equitable scenario, we attempt to level the playing field by giving the disadvantaged person the resources they need to close the gap between the two. It can be helpful, but it’s an imperfect solution. A real world example is ignoring the systemic racism (the leaning of the tree) that causes the inequality in the first place and attempting to overcome it at the time of college admission or job application by giving extra points to the disadvantaged applicant.
The final panel of the graphic shows the tree being straightened by a set of boards and ropes and is captioned “Justice”. Here there’s no need for affirmative action because the two men finally have equal chances of success. Overall, I like the graphic. However, by depicting unequal opportunity as something as natural as a bent tree, one could say there’s an implication that we got here by chance. We didn’t.
As Scott Woods writes, “Racism is a complex system of social and political levers and pulleys set up generations ago to continue working on the behalf of Whites at other people’s expense, whether Whites know/like it or not. It is so insidious that it doesn’t care if you are a White person who likes Black people; it’s still going to find a way to infect how you deal with people who don’t look like you.”
Another questionable implication of the graphic is that the tree can be bent to fix the problem. As we all know, an old tree can only bend so far before it snaps. Can we really keep the old structure and simply rectify it to correct centuries of damage? We must dive deep into the holistic path of healing to find out, but my hunch is that tree-bending is reductive.
So, what do we do? The old fear remains and as White people come to terms with the persistent consequences of treating humans as property, it takes new forms: the fear that healing this will be painful; the fear that fixing the system will mean a loss for those currently in a position of privilege; the fear that Blacks are cooler, stronger, faster, or more powerful than Whites and that their rise to equality will threaten White dominance; the fear that truly desegregating ourselves will amount to a dilution of Whiteness, etc. Thus we encounter many attempts to derail the conversation, like, “Don’t all lives matter?” and “If I’m so privileged because I’m White, how come I’m [poor, sick, disabled, struggling, etc.]?”
I don’t think I need to point this out, but acknowledging the advantages of being White doesn’t mean blaming White people for their whiteness. White privilege shouldn’t be conflated with White guilt. And whiteness alone doesn’t guarantee someone a good life. Life is, after all, what we make it.
I’m not an expert on racism, so I’m sharing this amazing list of resources (mostly for White people) – books, podcasts, videos, and articles by people who have made this their life’s work. Learn what they have to teach and amplify their voices.
What I do know is holistic healing and by applying these principles to our disease, I believe we truly shall overcome.
- Be humble. Resist the impulse to believe you already know, and listen to others’ experiences.
- Dedicate yourself to learning the truth. Go to multiple sources – not just the first one that confirms what you already believed.
- Broaden your perspective. Let your vision include as many factors as you can hold space for. This means also acknowledging what’s been kept hidden in the shadows, and the parts of yourself that you’ve denied.
- Forgive. Forgiveness is healing. I’m not saying your feelings are wrong. I’m not saying you aren’t entitled to feel angry, sad, victimized or anything else. I’m not putting a timeline on it. I’m only saying that at some point, a complete healing process – and true freedom – entails releasing our grievances.
- Keep your heart open. It’s natural – but not helpful – to close our hearts in the presence of pain. Open it, open it, and open it some more. Be willing to feel what’s arising. Feel without resistance. Notice what happens.
- See the connections. As Yogi Bhajan said, “Remember, the other person is you.” The great divisiveness and brutality of this chapter in human history is made possible through the illusion of separation. We are one. And as long as one person is oppressed, none of us can be completely free.
- Be willing to get uncomfortable. You simply can’t heal if you aren’t willing to be uncomfortable in the process. Trust that the discomfort will give way to greater freedom.
- Don’t settle for less than the ROOT. We’ve band-aided the hell out of this thing. Go deep. Ask for clarity and guidance and they’ll be given to you.
Please share about your experience. We all learn from this conversation.
Much love,
Peter
[post_title] => Holistic Medicine for Racism
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Do you know what finna, on fleek, stan, and W mean? If I didn’t have a teenager I probably wouldn’t either. (I’ll provide definitions below.) The older (and possibly lamer) I get, the more picky I am with my words, and the less attracted I am to jargon and slang.
But I’m guilty of overusing certain words in my work and putting my own spin on them – mostly because they describe a significant aspect of what I do and I haven’t found anything better. Case in point: the words expand and expansion.
I use the word expand all the time to describe the process of transcending your ego, getting outside your comfort zone, and going beyond your human conditioning. Expansion means recognizing that these limitations aren’t real, and even discovering that who you really are goes beyond your personality and even beyond your body.
I use the term often because I think this is generally a really good thing and I believe it represents a form of personal evolution.
Sign up now for Sacred Expansion – an 8 week course devoted to your healing and evolution!
When we don’t challenge our conditioning, we operate according to deep mental programs that define who we can be, what we think, the range of emotions available to us, etc. This “unexpanded” state restricts our freedom and tends to limit our depth of engagement with life – our body awareness, how deep we’re willing to go in relationships with others (and ourselves), our connection to the natural world, our openness to spiritual experiences, etc.
Expanded versus unexpanded isn’t a black-and-white situation. Expansion is relative, always changing, and there’s no end to it. To be open to expanding beyond our limitations wherever, whenever, and however we can is a way of life.
To be clear, “expanded” isn’t the same as happy. There are plenty of people who are happy the way they are, even if there isn’t much (or any) Spirit or growth in their lives. If you’re happy, you’re happy, and I don’t want to try to convince you otherwise!
But once you have an inkling of recognition that there’s more to life than what’s on the surface, it awakens your inner seeker, which has an insatiable appetite for the truth and perpetual inclination toward expansion.
Where do we start? There are countless ways to promote your expansion. In my opinion, two of the most vital and powerful are these:
- Cultivate an inner YES. When life is uncomfortable, we’re pressing against our limitations. When we resist and say “no” to what’s arising, we stay small and confined. When we say yes, the experience changes. When we say, “I’m open to this,” or, “How can I make this an opportunity?” or “How can I grow through this?” or “What is this showing me?” or “How does this support my highest good?” these are all ways of saying YES and promoting expansion.
- Be innocent and curious. One of the biggest hindrances to expansion is all of the shoulds we’re imposing on ourselves and the rest of the world. Some examples: People should let me into the lane when I have my turn signal on! I should be more successful at this point in my life. He should appreciate everything I do around the house! I shouldn’t be sick. Taxes shouldn’t be so high! We all do it. Just watch your mind and you’ll see. There’s a certain arrogance to “should,” as it implies that you know how the world is supposed to be and it’s wrong. Instead, what happens when you release your “shoulds” and your grievances? What happens when you just become innocent and curious?
The third way that I recommend you support your expansion is through our upcoming course, Sacred Expansion. It starts April 1st.
It’s an 8 week journey led by my wife, Briana. She’ll guide you through a nature-based framework for recognizing where you’re limited and discovering who you could be without those limitations; releasing baggage; deepening your connection to Spirit; and building the resilience and courage to continue the process on your own.
Initially, Sacred Expansion was the preliminary phase of our Dragontree Life Coaching training program. We felt this process of “cleaning house” and opening oneself to growth and change was an essential prerequisite before guiding others.
But the response in the first couple years was that the Sacred Expansion portion of the training was, for many students, the most transformative part. So, we decided to make it available to people as a stand-alone course.
Here’s what one of our graduates had to say about it:
Sacred expansion is like a crash course in being a better human. So often, we stop examining what we do and what we say in a meaningful way – we get so steeped in assumptions and learned behaviors, and patterned thinking, that we forget there are other ways to look at things. This is challenging self-work, but at the same time, Sacred Expansion is so gentle, so loving, it’s almost as though the lessons and questions are hugged into you, they are absorbed so sweetly, so completely without judgment or blame or shame. – Heather Wells
I highly encourage you to sign up!
Click here to learn more about it.
Be well,
Dr. Peter Borten
P.S. for those who are out of the Gen Z slang loop. . .
Finna: like a contraction of “fixing to,” as in “going to” – “I’m finna go to the store”
Fleek / On Fleek: flawlessly styled, groomed, perfect, etc. “That outfit is on fleek! That song is fleek!”
Stan: a very zealous or enthusiastic fan
W: abbreviation for “win.” Used to congratulate someone or express a victory or success.
[post_title] => Are you ready to expand?
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If you’re anything like me you’ve been reflecting on 2019 and nestling into your goals for 2020. I’ve been using my Dreambook to dive deep into what matters most to me in all aspects of my life, so that as I move forward my actions are inspired toward the bigger vision. It’s been an amazing experience. The goals I’ve set this year feel really connected, and spacious, and incredibly ambitious.
I can’t wait!
For some, setting goals and making plans is fun, exciting, and even nourishing. For others, it’s more stressful. It feels like a lot of pressure, or just really uncomfortable. We see this a lot in our Facebook community. People start the new year with big dreams, but when it comes time to turn those dreams into an actionable plan, they get scared and second guess themselves. The right next step becomes fuzzy, and some people stop moving forward.
But it doesn’t have to happen that way!
Here are three reasons we fail to achieve our goals, and what you can do to prevent these common setbacks from slowing you down.
1) We put a huge amount of pressure on this one random day to be the end-all-be-all of fresh starts. But the truth is, we have a great opportunity every day to make a fresh start. So if you fail January 15th, who’s to say you can’t start fresh January 16th? You don’t have to wait until the next New Year comes around.
If you commit to any one thing this year, maybe it should be to let each day be a fresh start.
2) We do it half-ass. I don’t mean to be rude, but let’s be honest, sometimes we set goals or resolutions and then act as if it’s an annoyance to even consider giving it our attention.
Give it 100%. Because the life you desire deserves your 100%, after all, this is your life! Whether the goal is to have more connection with your family, to marry your soul mate, to make a million dollars, to feed hungry children, or to invent the best earplugs this world has ever seen – commit to your best. Every. Day.
3) We often don’t have a system in place to help us achieve these goals. If we set a goal or resolution, but we don’t create the structure to ensure it’s fulfillment, then we have set ourselves up to fail.
Get clear about your intentions. If you really want it, get it. Find a proven system, and work the steps. Your results depend on whether or not you continually take action and have a positive mindset for optimal success. You have to have both, and having a structure that supports both is ideal. It’s why we created the Dreambook and and why I’m so passionate about sharing the next step to a vibrant, centered and peaceful life: Dreaming+Planning:Create Your Well Life (currently 50% off through January 7th)
I’m not saying it’s the only system that will get you there, but it’s one I know definitely works.
So, to celebrate you, and all the amazing things you’re going to do in 2020, we're offering 50% off enrollment in Dreaming and Planning, and all of our online courses*, through January 7th!
If you've been thinking about taking the next steps and creating a life that feels balanced, successful, and meaningful, there will never be a better time than now!
If you have a dream that isn’t realized - Join Us.
If you feel like your potential isn’t totally tapped - Join Us.
If you keep trying the same thing, and it isn’t working – Join Us.
If you want more of the beauty and richness life has to offer - Join Us.
Dragontree online courses have helped thousands of people live a more vibrant, centered, and peaceful life, and now it’s your time!
I know you can make 2020 your best year ever!
Love,
Briana
[post_title] => What if you tried this instead?
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From its very beginning as a British colony, the United States has been afflicted with a disease. At its core, the disease is fear. As a response to that fear, greed emerged. The subconscious thought process that fuels greed is something like, “If I can amass enough [money, power, land, etc.], I won’t feel vulnerable, needy, or alone.” Controlled by this greed (fear), our founders acquired wealth by stealing other humans’ lives and putting them to work as slaves. Although overt slavery has ended in the U.S., the underlying disease is still here. If we’re willing to look at it, we all stand to benefit.
I often educate people on what holistic medicine means and how it differs from what could be called “reductive” medicine. The term holistic is derived from the Greek word holos, meaning whole. A holistic medical practitioner (regardless of what form of medicine they use) is one who endeavors to see and treat the whole person. They take into account the “big picture” of this being and the environment they live in. In contrast, someone practicing in a reductive way tends to see a person as a collection of separate parts and addresses themselves to correcting malfunctions of these parts without concern for the influence of, or impact on, the rest of the being.
Sometimes reductive medicine works just fine. You have a headache – who knows why? – so you take an aspirin without concern for balancing your whole being, and a few hours later it’s all better. Score one for reductive medicine.
Other times it fails. You have a headache, you try aspirin, and the headache’s still there. “What’s wrong with my head?” you think. Maybe you consider a stronger painkiller. Without broadening your view, you may never get to the root of it.
In the case of our history of oppression of Blacks, while we’ve taken many big steps in the right direction, our nation’s healing process hasn’t been adequately holistic. There were enough Americans who were sufficiently pained by the existence of slavery to bring about its abolition, but they never got to the root of it.
The prevailing attitude among White people was that despite the fact that Blacks were ripped from their homeland; that their families were torn apart; that they were deprived of rights, recognition, education, good nutrition and healthcare, and a sense of equality and potential – all would be better when the race that perpetrated this invited them to step up and enter society. It wasn’t and it still isn’t.
Greed didn’t fix that underlying fear, and the enslavement and dehumanization of Blacks created its own gaping wound. The recent visibility of police brutality against Blacks shows what can happen when we choose the path of reductive medicine. The problem originated in Whites, well before they saw the enslavement of Black people – and then the freeing of Black people – as their aspirin. But true, deep, holistic healing is often a hard, slow, uncomfortable process. That makes it a hard sell for a population that likes things easy, fast, and comfortable.
Throughout our years of slavery, the following years of segregation, and the most recent generation of supposed equality, it’s simply harder to live to one’s potential as a Black American than a White one. A popular graphic by Tony Ruth does a decent job of explaining the differences between equality, equity, and justice.
In the first panel, we see an apple tree that leans to one side. There’s a man under the low side (where most of the apples are) and another man under the high side (where there are few apples). Neither can reach the branches, but an apple falls into the hands of the man under the bountiful side. The caption is “Inequality: unequal access to opportunities.”
In the next panel, the two men are given equal sized ladders. This allows the man on the low side to reach plenty of apples, but the other man still can’t reach the tree. We may look on such a scenario as being equal for both men – one just happens to be on the better side of the tree – but in our country, the tree of opportunity nearly always leans toward the White person and away from the Black person.
If you’ve never had to worry about being denied a job or loan because of the color of your skin, you’ve benefited from White privilege. If you’ve felt generally safer in the presence of cops, you’ve benefited from White privilege. We could just as well say, “If you’ve ever wondered if you didn’t get the job or loan because of the color of your skin, you’ve been hurt by Black disadvantage.” But Whites have always known about the disadvantages of being Black and done little to rectify it. By framing the disparity as White privilege, it’s clearer for White people to see that the onus is upon them to do something to correct it.
The next panel of the graphic depicts equity – the man on the high side of the tree is given a taller ladder so he, too, can reach the apples. Whereas the previous panel assumes both men are fundamentally equal, with equal resources, they don’t have truly equal chances of succeeding. In an equitable scenario, we attempt to level the playing field by giving the disadvantaged person the resources they need to close the gap between the two. It can be helpful, but it’s an imperfect solution. A real world example is ignoring the systemic racism (the leaning of the tree) that causes the inequality in the first place and attempting to overcome it at the time of college admission or job application by giving extra points to the disadvantaged applicant.
The final panel of the graphic shows the tree being straightened by a set of boards and ropes and is captioned “Justice”. Here there’s no need for affirmative action because the two men finally have equal chances of success. Overall, I like the graphic. However, by depicting unequal opportunity as something as natural as a bent tree, one could say there’s an implication that we got here by chance. We didn’t.
As Scott Woods writes, “Racism is a complex system of social and political levers and pulleys set up generations ago to continue working on the behalf of Whites at other people’s expense, whether Whites know/like it or not. It is so insidious that it doesn’t care if you are a White person who likes Black people; it’s still going to find a way to infect how you deal with people who don’t look like you.”
Another questionable implication of the graphic is that the tree can be bent to fix the problem. As we all know, an old tree can only bend so far before it snaps. Can we really keep the old structure and simply rectify it to correct centuries of damage? We must dive deep into the holistic path of healing to find out, but my hunch is that tree-bending is reductive.
So, what do we do? The old fear remains and as White people come to terms with the persistent consequences of treating humans as property, it takes new forms: the fear that healing this will be painful; the fear that fixing the system will mean a loss for those currently in a position of privilege; the fear that Blacks are cooler, stronger, faster, or more powerful than Whites and that their rise to equality will threaten White dominance; the fear that truly desegregating ourselves will amount to a dilution of Whiteness, etc. Thus we encounter many attempts to derail the conversation, like, “Don’t all lives matter?” and “If I’m so privileged because I’m White, how come I’m [poor, sick, disabled, struggling, etc.]?”
I don’t think I need to point this out, but acknowledging the advantages of being White doesn’t mean blaming White people for their whiteness. White privilege shouldn’t be conflated with White guilt. And whiteness alone doesn’t guarantee someone a good life. Life is, after all, what we make it.
I’m not an expert on racism, so I’m sharing this amazing list of resources (mostly for White people) – books, podcasts, videos, and articles by people who have made this their life’s work. Learn what they have to teach and amplify their voices.
What I do know is holistic healing and by applying these principles to our disease, I believe we truly shall overcome.
- Be humble. Resist the impulse to believe you already know, and listen to others’ experiences.
- Dedicate yourself to learning the truth. Go to multiple sources – not just the first one that confirms what you already believed.
- Broaden your perspective. Let your vision include as many factors as you can hold space for. This means also acknowledging what’s been kept hidden in the shadows, and the parts of yourself that you’ve denied.
- Forgive. Forgiveness is healing. I’m not saying your feelings are wrong. I’m not saying you aren’t entitled to feel angry, sad, victimized or anything else. I’m not putting a timeline on it. I’m only saying that at some point, a complete healing process – and true freedom – entails releasing our grievances.
- Keep your heart open. It’s natural – but not helpful – to close our hearts in the presence of pain. Open it, open it, and open it some more. Be willing to feel what’s arising. Feel without resistance. Notice what happens.
- See the connections. As Yogi Bhajan said, “Remember, the other person is you.” The great divisiveness and brutality of this chapter in human history is made possible through the illusion of separation. We are one. And as long as one person is oppressed, none of us can be completely free.
- Be willing to get uncomfortable. You simply can’t heal if you aren’t willing to be uncomfortable in the process. Trust that the discomfort will give way to greater freedom.
- Don’t settle for less than the ROOT. We’ve band-aided the hell out of this thing. Go deep. Ask for clarity and guidance and they’ll be given to you.
Please share about your experience. We all learn from this conversation.
Much love,
Peter
[post_title] => Holistic Medicine for Racism
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