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[post_content] => When Briana and I decided to leave Oregon, I had lived in Portland for 15 years and she’d been there for 12. As we prepared for our move to Boulder, Colorado – where we knew no one – Briana was concerned that we’d have a hard time making friends. I assured her it would be a breeze. Maybe I was a little overconfident.
Until then, I’d never had to put much work into establishing a friendship; they just happened. I hadn’t considered that during my tenure as an Oregonian I spent seven years in grad school, I held several jobs, and I lived with many housemates – situations that caused me to be around the same people day in and day out, which made connections easy.
We found it more challenging to get a friendship started through “single exposure” events. When you’re limited to short, infrequent meetings – like a dinner party or an event at your kid’s school – there’s a greater dependency on “chemistry.” We noticed that even after hanging out with people who were friendly and cool, if we didn’t feel a spark of connection, there wouldn’t be a strong drive to keep the ball rolling. Also, if the connection process started but lacked timely follow-through, it could sometimes get a little weird, as if there were a question hanging there: “Why didn’t we take this deeper? (Was it Murray’s gas?)”
Eventually we found a tribe of dear souls who feel like family, but along the way, it became clear that chemistry isn’t everything. Sometimes it’s not there at the outset – it doesn’t develop until you “learn” each other and discover how to harmonize together. Other times, the chemistry never really happens, yet the connection can still be fruitful. For instance, while we might not share meals together, I know I can count on my neighbors to keep an eye on my house or feed my pets – and I’d happily do the same for them.
Through this process, we felt moved to learn more about community building. We recognized the value in having multiple circles that served different functions. And we saw just how much the people can make the place. Until we made connections, we weren’t sure we wanted to stay; once we found our people, we could easily see ourselves living out our lives here.
We go into this (and much more) in our book, The Well Life. Here’s an excerpt of some guiding questions we came up with to help people build community consciously. Feel free to share your insights in the comments section below.
- Describe the kind of community that would make you feel excited to participate.
- If you could shape your community, what values would it have? Some ideas: mutual respect, creative expression, healthy living, education, helping, active participation, safety, tolerance of differences, honesty, integrity, fun, equality, inclusiveness, etc.
- Write down the names of five people you value having in your life (they don’t need to be local).
- What skills and gifts could you share with your community?
- What sorts of people would you like to invite into your community to make it more diverse?
- What forums can you utilize to make these connections? While the internet can sometimes promote physical disconnection, it also provides lots of tools (evite, Facebook events, Meetup, etc.) for organizing real-life get-togethers.
I encourage you to get a piece of paper (or use your journal) and write freely on these questions, even if you already have a healthy community.
Wishing you an environment that supports you to be your best,
Dr. Peter Borten
[post_title] => Six Questions for Connection
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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.
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[post_content] => I have written so much about what and how to eat, so I thought I’d say a few words about what we might do before and after a meal to enhance the experience.
First, the before-meals recommendations:
1) Set an intention. This applies to food, medicine, and supplements, though I think it especially makes sense for medicine and supplements because you had a specific outcome in mind when you bought them.
I believe there’s some value in stating to yourself what you want to happen whenever you put something into your body. Even if you’re doubtful about your ability to influence your body’s inner workings, perhaps you’ll find it worthwhile to just get clear for a moment on why exactly you’re swallowing something. But if we consider how powerful the placebo effect is – it’s not a matter of being fooled into believing we feel better, but a very real ability to cause our bodies and minds to change – isn’t this worth taking full advantage of?
When I say “set an intention,” I don’t mean you have to have an elaborate ritual (although if you want to light a candle and take your time with it, that’s great). I really just mean taking about 10 to 30 seconds to close your eyes, recognize that you’re about to introduce a new influence into your system, state clearly what you intend to get out of it, and feel grateful.
What do you want this new influence to do? Please you with its flavor, texture, and a satisfying feeling in your stomach? Make you feel grounded? Give you energy? Nourish you in the deepest places? Calm your mind? Repair something that is out of balance? Help you feel connected to the world? Build your muscles? Expressing your choice may make a difference.
2) Make sure you’re hungry. I should have said this first, but I wanted to make sure you saw the part about intention. It should be at least two hours since you last ate, and in my opinion, it’s best to avoid snacking between meals (though four or five small meals per day is fine). If it has been several hours since you last ate and you know you should be hungry, but you have a poor appetite, you can try taking some bitters before the meal, such as 15 drops of gentian tincture in a little water. Others prefer blends of bitters with aromatic herbs, such as citrus peel, cardamom, and ginger. Luckily, there is a wide selection of great bitters these days.
3) Make sure you’re not starving. If you skipped breakfast and now it’s lunch time, it’s quite possible that you’re going to eat faster than your body would like and more than your body would like. If meal skipping is a common thing for you, it’s also possible that your metabolism has slowed down, and it will be easy to eat more than your body can readily burn. I recommend not going more than about four hours between meals. If you’re already starving, of course you need to eat, but try doing it slowly. Next time, eat sooner.
4) Let everything go. Stop moving, sit down, and to the best of your ability, set aside anything you’re worrying about. Now it’s time to feed yourself and that deserves your full attention and enjoyment.
After you eat:
1) Set an intention again. You can spare 10 seconds to do this. You just filled yourself up and maybe forgot about that starting intention until now. So, once again, consider what you would like to happen with what you just consumed and state it clearly to yourself. For example: “Thank you for this meal. I intend that all the nutrients will be well absorbed and will go exactly where they’re needed in my body.” Or, “I’m grateful for this meal and intend to be thoroughly nourished and energized by it.”
Once, when I was doing a lot of qigong, I went out to eat with a friend. After finishing my food, while continuing to converse with her, I imagined I was sucking all the energy from the food through my digestive tract into all my cells. It was something I was practicing at the time, it only took a minute, and I thought I wasn’t giving any outward appearance of doing anything. But my friend’s eyes bulged out and she yelled, “What the hell did you just do?!” I explained what I had been up to and was very curious as to what she perceived. She said she couldn’t really explain it, but that it looked like my whole body came alive (I’m assuming she meant more alive). Regardless of what it looked like to her, I was just struck by the fact that my internal visualization had an outwardly noticeable effect. So, try it!
2) Relax. If possible, don’t get right back to your work or something that stresses you out. Give your body at least a few minutes to assimilate what you just consumed.
3) Take a walk. Vigorous exercise right after eating isn’t a great idea, but a walk is fine (after a brief rest), and will assist with digestion, especially after a big meal.
Give these easy practices a try. I believe that even if your food choices aren’t always excellent, you’ll be much better off if you observe these simple acts. Let me know what happens.
Be well ,
Dr. Peter Borten
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[post_content] => When Briana and I decided to leave Oregon, I had lived in Portland for 15 years and she’d been there for 12. As we prepared for our move to Boulder, Colorado – where we knew no one – Briana was concerned that we’d have a hard time making friends. I assured her it would be a breeze. Maybe I was a little overconfident.
Until then, I’d never had to put much work into establishing a friendship; they just happened. I hadn’t considered that during my tenure as an Oregonian I spent seven years in grad school, I held several jobs, and I lived with many housemates – situations that caused me to be around the same people day in and day out, which made connections easy.
We found it more challenging to get a friendship started through “single exposure” events. When you’re limited to short, infrequent meetings – like a dinner party or an event at your kid’s school – there’s a greater dependency on “chemistry.” We noticed that even after hanging out with people who were friendly and cool, if we didn’t feel a spark of connection, there wouldn’t be a strong drive to keep the ball rolling. Also, if the connection process started but lacked timely follow-through, it could sometimes get a little weird, as if there were a question hanging there: “Why didn’t we take this deeper? (Was it Murray’s gas?)”
Eventually we found a tribe of dear souls who feel like family, but along the way, it became clear that chemistry isn’t everything. Sometimes it’s not there at the outset – it doesn’t develop until you “learn” each other and discover how to harmonize together. Other times, the chemistry never really happens, yet the connection can still be fruitful. For instance, while we might not share meals together, I know I can count on my neighbors to keep an eye on my house or feed my pets – and I’d happily do the same for them.
Through this process, we felt moved to learn more about community building. We recognized the value in having multiple circles that served different functions. And we saw just how much the people can make the place. Until we made connections, we weren’t sure we wanted to stay; once we found our people, we could easily see ourselves living out our lives here.
We go into this (and much more) in our book, The Well Life. Here’s an excerpt of some guiding questions we came up with to help people build community consciously. Feel free to share your insights in the comments section below.
- Describe the kind of community that would make you feel excited to participate.
- If you could shape your community, what values would it have? Some ideas: mutual respect, creative expression, healthy living, education, helping, active participation, safety, tolerance of differences, honesty, integrity, fun, equality, inclusiveness, etc.
- Write down the names of five people you value having in your life (they don’t need to be local).
- What skills and gifts could you share with your community?
- What sorts of people would you like to invite into your community to make it more diverse?
- What forums can you utilize to make these connections? While the internet can sometimes promote physical disconnection, it also provides lots of tools (evite, Facebook events, Meetup, etc.) for organizing real-life get-togethers.
I encourage you to get a piece of paper (or use your journal) and write freely on these questions, even if you already have a healthy community.
Wishing you an environment that supports you to be your best,
Dr. Peter Borten
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