The best way to deal with long-term symptoms of post-traumatic stress is to prevent it from happening in the first place. Obviously, one never knows when something traumatic might occur or where, however, there are ways of handling the situation once it has happened that can significantly reduce a person’s susceptibility to long-term feelings of hopelessness and alienation.

If you or someone you know has just been through a traumatic event, the best time to take steps to prevent PTSD is as soon as possible.

1. Combine encouragement with time to process the event.

The importance of combining positive input while realistically processing what has happened is an interesting balance. The key here is to “talk about it, but don’t dwell on it.” That way the patterns of shock, fear and hopelessness are dispelled before they get a chance to become habitual.

Formula # 2 in Soul Oriented Solutions offers one way to help those who have been overwhelmed by recent events by going through a process that will help to calm them down and focus in on what would genuinely help them.

This e-book is free of charge and can be downloaded right now by going to:

http://www.intuitivelearningcircle.com/soul-oriented-solutions/

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The purpose of Soul Oriented Solutions is to give you additional resources to turn to when you are going through difficult times. Please feel free to share this information with others whom you feel might benefit from it.

Consider it a gift from someone that has been there and wants to share the little wisdom she has gained from her own experiences. Each formula has the potential to give some hope, inner guidance and clarity of mind if you are willing to try something new and different.

The Intuitive Learning Circles and Graphs used in this e-book have been extensively tested in clinical and educational settings.

If you would like to know more about them, go to http://www.intuitivelearningcircle.com/

Share your experiences. We want to hear from you about your stories of hope and inspiration.

In recent weeks we have witnessed many examples of what happens when we expect anger and rage to solve our problems. Hatred of this kind is an acting out of ancient patterns that are crying out to be healed. You may say, “those incidents are just an anomoly, Cho was sick, most people don’t have that problem.”

Say that to the people in Iraq.

“But that’s way over there,” you may say. “The Sunni’s and Shiites all hate eachother.”

I recently went to a meeting to promote an economy built on peace and the hatred, resentment, superiority and indignation was palpable. I drove home and watched several people be cut off and flipped off. I walked into the house to find my husband watching the TV. His eyes were practically bugging out, he was so outraged by the lies of the pundits shouting at eachother and the politicians making their excuses. Within moments, I found myself completely buying into it.

Sorry, folks. It’s not just “out there.” It’s here in our hearts - a nasty old weed that feeds this Sacred Cow:

“The only way to solve a problem is by fighting with it.”

As Sacred Cows go, this one is primed to be tipped and if enough of us release our ancestral and collective agreement with it, we have a much better chance for seeking out a new way.

Play our Sacred Cow Tipping Game and pay extra attention to your answer to the question “What would you do instead?’

http://www.intuitivelearningcircle.com/sacred-cow-tipping/

The Status Quo contends that the purpose of agreements is to enforce their power and control. However the real purpose of agreements is so that we may all live together in greater harmony and peace. Another inherent quality of agreements is that they can be re-negotiated if they aren’t creating the desired effect.

However, what if the person(s) involved will not allow the compromise? This does happen, and we are witnessing it in our Leaders right now. They might be merely stubborn and inflexible, because dammit they MUST stay the course or they will be guilty of weakness. Another possibility is that they could be willfully ignoring other important agreements just so that they can remain in control. Either way, the results are the same. They cannot bring themselves to let go of the original agreement, so even though they say they are changing directions, they are still just staying the course. In addition, every time they make a new agreement, they compound the problems, confusion and social unrest that already exist.

What is the Sacred Cow controlling this unholy stalemate? Well, after all, we do have a pretty significant cultural agreement that:

“Any deviation from the pre-agreed agenda is a sign of weakness and can only be construed as failure.”

This inflexible, unmerciful Sacred Cow is standing behind the scenes keeping everyone stuck in the mud, not just our leaders. Play our tipping game. By releasing your personal, familial, social and collective agreement with it, we may be able to let ourselves off the hook, so that we can re-negotiate and move forward again.

Access the game at: http://www.intuitivelearningcircle.com/sacred-cow-tipping/
Rheanni Lightwater © 2007

Sign up for our e-zine to receive monthly consciousness raising games: http://www.intuitivelearningcircle.com/e-zine/

The Status Quo is now behaving like an old Puritanical schoolmaster from the days of yore who has lost control of the classroom. Indignant and motivated by revenge, the powers that be spend their time vilifying the standouts and threatening everyone with dire, apocalyptic punishments.

Luckily, we have gotten past the point where we would be deterred from our convictions by being set in the corner with a dunce cap on our heads.  Unfortunately, we still have a little charge on the idea that we might just be blown to bits if we fail to do as we’re told.

That’s why today’s Sacred Cow is about another key survival motivation that is being used against us:

“Use revenge to motivate people to stay in line.”

If you are as tired as I am of the Status Quo using pain, punishment and threats as the way to maintain their agenda, play our tipping game and release any and all agreements to buy into it.

Rheanni Lightwater © 2007

Sign up for our e-zine to receive monthly consciousness raising games: http://www.intuitivelearningcircle.com/e-zine/

The Sacred Cows for January have to do with our survival motivations and the either/or syndrome, i.e. “either you’re for us or against us,” “either you win or you lose,” and the infamous “either you’re right or you’re wrong.”
Thinking in absolutes is the basis of most survival issues and provides the fodder for war - “Either we stay in Iraq until we win or we cut and run.” This kind of polarized thinking is collective and filters down into our families and businesses to pollute our motivations and decision-making processes. In the end, either/or thinking makes it very difficult for us to cooperate with each other and build positive consensus in our projects.

I hope you will join me in playing our tipping game, where we consciously release any unconscious agreement we may have with this dangerous Sacred Cow:
 

“Limit the choices people make by speaking and thinking only in terms of black and white.”

Nature is our teacher as she adapts, recombines and evolves. She is filled with variables, creative combinations and surprising options. Maybe it’s time we followed her lead by letting go of our personal, business, national and collective agreements to limit ourselves in this way.As usual, I will post the others as they come up throughout the month on our Intuitive Learning Circle blog and selected forums.