The Many Doorways To The Force

My former mentor, psychiatrist Martin G. Groder, M.D., was a brilliant man. A bit arrogant, a bit grandiose, he was, nonetheless, a man with an exceptional capacity to see life, in general, and the people within it with a vast comprehension.

Out of this astute understanding, Marty was able to interweave complex, interlocking elements into a working system for personal and societal well-being and transformation.

The Groder-Rosen Addiction Development (and Transformation) Theory (GRAD) upon which this blog site is set represents this capacity of Marty’s, augmented by my own contributions to his original thinking and my expansions of it.

Among the intricacies he identified, Marty recognized an array of portals through which contact with the Force could be reached and transformed from the Dark into the Light.

In an article he wrote, published in Transactional Analysis After Eric Berne* (see resource below), Marty identified these doorways as –

• Emotions/feelings;
• Behaviors/doing;
• Body/physicality;
• Thinking/intellect;
• Social Systems, and
• Spirituality.

In a manner of thinking not readily grasped these days, Marty also cultivated the perspective I have passed on to hundreds, if not thousands, that the central playing field for the integration of these elemental, gateway energies for well-being is the community.

Later, when my years of training with Marty had passed, Murat Yagan,** who then became my spiritual guide and New Horizons’ community development mentor, presented the almost identical template for human transformation. Again, community was spotlighted as the essential learning laboratory.

The major difference, for me, between these two, somewhat different in terms of fundamental principles, yet markedly identical perspectives was that Marty’s approach offered a map out of survival-driven living (i.e. the life of the survivor/addict) and Murat’s showed the way to grow and develop beyond that mere subsistence baseline, ascendancy to the highest realms of human life and consciousness.

When, as a result of massive changes in my own life, I came to combine these two ideologies into an integrative whole for myself, especially professionally, I came to view Marty’s methodology as being one of focusing on the “what not to do in life” and Murat’s as the “what to do.”

In other words, one might say that Marty’s work was about wrestling with the Dark Side while Murat’s was with reaching for the Light. Simply, yet not simple at all, two sides of the same coin – the workings of humanity; operations that are far more about process than product, ongoing experiential learning not mere achievements.

Learning by living is how the Inner Warrior gives birth to itself in its highest regard; the potential for the Dark lifted into the Light; the Force being the working ingredient of human alchemy.

This is not an adventure that can be laid out for you in a simple formula. It is an adventure that calls up every facet of your being and doing; body-mind-emotions-spirit, interpersonal interactions, economics, politics, education and more – in the service of the higher good.

Activated these can become the Force for good and better in you and all of humanity. Used in negative, self and life-destructive ways they are the doorway to the Dark.

Visit New Horizons Small “Zones of Peace” Project blogs for stories,  philosophies and hints on reaching for the side of the Light.  And, further stories of a more personal narration on Anastasia The Storyteller.

Today's assignment 

Check yourself out –

How is the balance in you and your life, presently, among these elemental portals?

Emotions/feelings; Behaviors/doing; Body/physicality; Thinking/intellect; Social Systems, and Spirituality.

Try journaling your answers – and – creating a sharing community for this adventure. Remember community is an essential part of the journey!

(Always feel free to share your adventure with me, Anastasia, at SuperSleuthDSW@aol.com.)

We’ve only just begun! 

If you care to read more of and/or from  these two Masters of human development and beyond it, here are several resources –

*Groder, Martin G., M.D. – in Transactional Analysis After Eric Berne,  Edited by Graham Barnes, Harpers College Press, 1977.

**Yagan, Murat – Ahmsta Kebzeh: The Science of Universal Awe,Volumes I and II, Kebzeh Publications.