If A Mindful Cult (Of GRAD) Can Exist, We Are It!

Answer, Short Form: 
With a lot of help from our friends.

Coming Soon!

But Where Are The Men?

And, if we be "IT," we want you to know all about us and how you, too, can find your way out of the "dark." 

Be it the Mindless Cult of --Trump OOPS!!! -- my bad -- I meant the Cult of the Dark Side, the darkness of the pandemic, or the darkness within yourself, we've got a method for moving beyond.

Check us out. Here's a place to start --

 "How Did We Get Here, Part I?" 

More to come.

But What Is The Cult Of GRAD?

Also see: Work (Mostly)  From Home -- With Anastasia

And how can it help YOU stand up to the Dark Side?

You will want to know -- and - we will want to "tell" you more of the awe of our adventure, as I've (Anastasia) lived it, along with many of my students and supporters. My new book in progress, Camelot Disrupted: Book One, Lost Hope Regained, due out Fall, 2022, will take you on a fantasy adventure of what it means and is like to devise a life path based on the principles of GRAD.

But alas, our adventure cannot be known by the mere "telling -- and -- even in fantasy, the story can not be told in full of the living it, until the book is ready. Still the real deal is known through the DOING, the experience, the living it, the BEING it.

This is our challenge here -- how to translate, for your understanding, transforming experiences on the level of the body, the mind and the spirit.

We are contemplating the subject of it now.

That's why I'm writing this, worrying some about the doing of the description, Mindful Cult of GRAD.

3:30 a.m. Sunday morning.

11:30 a.m. Sunday morning

I am standing back, looking at the complexity of the topic here and considering options about how best, now, to use this blog site to meet unfolding objectives. 

Maybe one or both of my/our Blog Talk Radio shows?  

In online discussions you can join?

With myself and what NH ZOP has now defined as our permanent Council Of Elders? 

(Meaning those of us on our Board of Directors who made it through the pandemic year past (one, Lisa Boyer, now deceased from ovarian cancer)?

In an almost miraculous fete of collective resilience, support, love and transformation, given the circumstances of each one of us and the pandemic, as our backdrop. we are here now to pass on the gifts.  

The principles of our GRAD theory practiced in the exceptional community approach that has gotten our small group of NH/ZOP dedicated members through our pandemic ordeal are a remarkable example of people working together, body, mind and spirit, to survive as winners through our pandemic ordeal.

We wish we could make it easy to follow us. We will definitely keep trying because we know that what we discovered through the pandemic, in the amazing way we have been able to manage it is something you are likely to want too, for your own.

You just keep reading. We;ll keep writing and soon speaking out more. After awhile we'll find our ways to one another, if we're going the same direction -- with a dedication to truth telling and truth listening at our basr.

More to come.

The Media Wants Your Attention. Donald Trump Wants Your Attention. What Do You Want?

Get out of the GAME! Get on with your life!

(Coming soon, GRAD GAME theory, or how to lead a great life!)

Consider yourself a hostage, if you are led by what others want and are without clarity about what you want.

Think about it! Is codependency with politics what you want for yourself for the next four/eight years? Another possibility is to make this a time of growth and even transformation for yourself, along with others for whom you might care. In other words, choose to live this time of stress and trial wisely so you can come through it well.

Being bound to what others want for you, without a discernable definition for yourself – of your self, is one of the main characteristics of codependency. 

Being snared in this trap, in and of itself, is a sure warning to me, if and when I find myself subjected to this GAME to get myself out of it! Staying in ensures a diminishing of the health and well-being I strive so arduously to maintain on a daily basis through nutrition and exercise, tending to my relationships, spending time in nature etc.

How about you? What, where and how do you finally come to realize that you are being led like a sheep by the politicians, the media and the internet, along with whatever else you are being pulled into– and – thus not leading YOUR OWN LIFE?

Add to that minimizing of your true personhood, being a follower of a gang of others who are intent on fighting (i.e. Republicans and Democrats, the media and other special interest groups) and you have made a deal with the Dark Side.

Do you not yet realize you do not need to fight what is now touted as he war now going on in our society and politics?

Now why would you want to do that, unless you do not value the days of your life?

Look again. Here is a place to now re-read Jonah Goldberg’s article, "Trump’s Relationship With Media is One of Codependency,” to help yourself see if you are also in the GAME, or not! 

(I have found a number of other articles on Goldberg’s same theme; the craziness surrounding our political climate that hooks all of us in with it through abuse of our news outlets (i.e. what the media is doing to itself as well as how it is being used nefariously by others) that we depend on for the NEWS we truly need to connect us with the world and our place in it. I will post them too, as I locate their links.

Here's one by Ben Shapiro, Addicted To The Apocalypse.)

Beware politics and the media are addictive activities, seeking your undivided attention; your dependency on them for your daily sustenance like a drug!

So who is in control of your life?  If it’s not you, is that something you truly want?

Giving up oneself to be led by others is a Survival Driven activity; in other words this giving up of self is an addiction, a manifestation of living your life in darkness. Check it out!

It puts you in the position of living like sheep, mindlessly

Here are some things to learn, or remind yourself of, to get out of the codependency trap of our current society and politics.

• How to identify a power/aggressive addict (See underlying identifying characteristics here and behavioral characteristics here. Want to have some fun, take this inventory a if you were someone else in high visibility these days whose behavior you think is a bit over the line; Trump, Hillary, Bernie, Morning Joe co-hosts. Want to have some fun, take this inventory a if you were someone else in high visibility these days whose behavior you think is a bit over the line; Trump, Hillary, Bernie, Morning Joe co-hosts.);
• What to do about power/aggressive addicts when they show up in your life and/or those close to you, personally and/or professionally. 

Bottom line: detach from the drama, get lots of support from healthy people and healthy living, find workable intervention strategies and/or GET OUT, if the going gets too tough);

• How co-dependent personalities intertwine their passive addictions with the power/aggressive addict to foster a whole multitude of problems. For example: sleepless nights worrying about our political state of affairs, high anxiety about same, excess amounts of time obsessing about what you hear or read about politics, politicians, the media and/or entertainment such as comedy that keeps you still in the GAME.

(Bottom line: All types of survivor addicts indulge in varieties of psychological game playing. Check here for a catalogue of psychological games. If whatever does not produce health, get out of it!)

Bottom Line Here: 

• Get out of the GAME! Get back in charge of your life;
• Survival driven behaviors; those that are yours or that you attach yourself to; take you down into darkness; 
• Find light! Your Light is essential, especially now! 

Here are some tips for getting out of the GAME today!

• Go back and read Jonah Goldberg’s article, Trump's Relationship With The Media Is One Of Codependency, to remind yourself of the GAMES the politicians and the media are playing;
• Re-read the beginning of my article, Survival Games Power Addicts And Co-Dependents Play, to remind yourself of the objectives here for healthy, well-balanced living;
• Go out and enjoy the sunshine and fresh air today;
• Take a long walk with family and/or friends and forget the highly charged drama going on around you.

Get Out of The Game!

The GAME Is On! A Modified New Horizons’ Truth Or Dare Game Seems To Be Coming To Capital Hill

New Horizons “Truth Or Dare GAME” was known formerly as New Horizons “Discount Derby.”

(Update: As of May 1, 2019, New Horizons is still heading toward Capital Hill. However, if "truth" is the goal there, of course, it takes a whole lot of planning and preparation. 

Stay tuned in for this "adventure of a lifetime.")

Background of Martin G. Groder, M.D.’s GAME at Marion Federal Penitentiary, as per wikipedia that became New Horizons Truth Or Dare Game. 

(Scroll down to the wikipedia section in this post on therapeutic communities in the U.S. 

This will provide some historical background on the foundations of New Horizons GAME that grew out of Groder's Asklepeion GAME and was modified, under Marty's supervision to grow into the profound life transforming process it is today.

A survey of this wiki post will also shed light on the how and why of New Horizons' "exceptional community" approach to building small "zones of peace.")

According to Wikipedia, the Asklepion Therapeutic Community, created by Martin G. Groder, M.D. was established in the late 1960s within the US correctional system. The Asklepion Foundation, the supporting organizational structure for the program, initiated therapeutic communities in the Marion Federal Penitentiary and other institutions that included clinical intervention, based upon Transactional Analysis, the Synanon Game, modified internal twelve-step programs and other therapeutic modalities. 

Some of these programs lasted into the mid 1980s, such as the House of Thought in the Virginia Correctional system. These were able to demonstrate a reduction of 17% in recidivism in a matched-pair study of drug-abusing felons and sex offenders who participated in the program for one year or more.

From these early beginnings, I, as Executive Director of the New Horizons Support Network, Inc., advanced Groder’s approach, also referred to as the Total Learning Environment model. New Horizons Truth or Dare GAME, which was originally called the Discount Derby grew out of this background.

This information is going to become more and more essential as I, through the three sites for which I write, take up the task, with my team of volunteers, of contributing perspectives – and – sometimes applications to help move our society forward and out of the swamp within which it has seemed to be sinking.  Destination: Capital Hill.

• Anastasia The Storyteller
• Exploring Your Dark Side: The Adventure Of A Lifetime; and 
• New Horizons Small “Zones of Peace” Project
• 
  
• Lots more to come, as I believe that Attorney General Sessions Congressional testimony, up against that of James Comey, has now brought the governing bodies of our United States into a new version of "Truth Or Dare" that has the potential to turn our country to the good. 

If what I am SEEING bears out, we may be on the verge of important changes, depending on whether or not our national government can get all the way behind finding out the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Or as Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein like to say, "The best obtainable version of the truth."

(Update: May 1, 2019 -- Looks like Mueller's report has elegantly poised our nation to move thoroughly into the GAME in the nation's Capital. He has certainly provided us with the "facts" we, as Americans, need to drain that swamp, if we be dedicated enough to stick with it which I feel certain many of us will do.)

I am feeling very hopeful. I certainly hope I am SEEING right. Let’s find out together. 

Just keep reading.