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Saturday, April 30, 2011 Nude and Semi-Nude Women Ed, From time to time I drop by. Always a good place to see nude / semi-nude women embracing life. Not to say this is bad, a natural phenomenon. This might be a hot seat issue for some, not me. I enjoy reports of the process, what brings forth progress is good. Life is a journey of discovery and realization of..........what else, reality. So simple, yet so complex. You have the good vibe, keep it going. |
Thank you for sharing your insights.
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Saturday, April 30, 2011 He Sticks to the System and Cholesterol Goes From 225 to 127 Ed, My research on trading shares and ETFs is successful and I have the strategies in place. However my research on futures trading proceeds at a glacial pace. My frustration at this leads is my hot seat issue today. General comment - I seem to be finding hot seats harder and harder. I call this hot seat resistance. I find I become increasingly unwilling to proceed, even though hot seats have good outcomes. Other tribe members report similar problems. I start with my form and intensify it to a high point. After I while I end up sitting quietly, feeling very sad. I feel like crying but I do not cry, although tears well up in my eyes and runs down my face. We start up the forms again and I end up on the floor shouting and in a kind of tantrum. Again I start to feel very sad. On prompting, I find myself in a scene. I am coming out of a tantrum, at maybe 3-4 years old. I want to go with my father to work. He is standing at the door, impatient to go, looking at me with contempt and disdain. I have the sense that he leaves immediately afterwards. I want to role play the scene but my fellow tribesmen feel I have not gotten to the bottom of the feelings. I somehow "con" them into playing the scene. [Name] is trying to provoke me into getting into the feelings again and inadvertently replays the scene. We go into hot seat again. After a while I end up back in the same scene again. At the check-in at the start of tribe I reported feeling uneasy and uncomfortable. This feeling returns but it is more specific now. I explain that I feel my father never allowed me into 'his' world of men. He was a successful athlete in football, cricket and athletics and I lack strength, speed, athletic skill, and height. He did not finish school and hates intellectuals and I go to college and am a knowledge worker. He is a builder. I feel like a boy among men. Some things are not for me I feel, especially those areas he owned. I avoid competing in these areas, or am deliberately incompetent when I cannot avoid getting into those areas. Somehow futures has become of those areas. When I think about trading futures I feel the same way. It is not for me, it is for real men. Writing this I feel very sad again. My tribe does not want to role-play. I do not want to go into hot seat again. The outcome of the tribe is I commit to complete some specific futures-related tasks by our next tribe meeting in two weeks, to give daily reports on progress and on my feelings, and to buy tribe lunch if I do not do all this. I hope this will bring things to a head and make me hot for next time. I have sent off the plan and the first daily report. Follow up from an earlier hot seat where I resolved my issues with food... I am still sticking to my diet with little effort. My weight, and particularly my waist measurement, continues to fall. My cholesterol has fallen from 255 to 127 in 12 months (no that's not a typo!). My theoretical diet has not changed much apart from cutting fructose consumption to 2 pieces of fruit a day, but the difference is I am actually sticking to it. I recently joined a gym and that is going well - my strength, agility and endurance are increasing rapidly. |
Thank you for sharing your process and your health numbers. In the Austin Tribe, I do just enough provocation and development of forms to trigger reminiscences of a critical incident. From there, the Tribe supports further development of the issue through role playing. During role playing, other Tribe members may also seize the opportunity to "get into character" and to explore their own issues around the situation. Role playing then proceeds to practicing intimacy-centric response patterns and getting a pro-active result. You might consider taking your feelings about <hot seat resistance> to Tribe. |
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Saturday, April 30, 2011 10:21 PM Workshop in Europe and World Tour Ed, Workshop -------- Flying from Australia one priority is to limit flight time and the need for extra connections. Thus somewhere like Frankfurt would be good. There are plenty of flights in, there are plenty of hotels, and things are well-organized. People speak English quite well. While the UK is a long flight for me, there are plenty of direct flights, so somewhere out of London, near the airport would also work well. Regardless of where it is I have the intention to attend. World Tour ---------- At our tribe meeting today here in Melbourne Australia and we agree to invite you to visit us. We do have an ongoing tribe with regular meetings every 2-3 weeks since 1 September 2010. One of us ... has sent in several reports from our tribe hot seats and other tribe updates. Our other two members ... have not as yet. [Name] has sent in numerous hot seat reports from earlier instantiations of the Melbourne tribe, but not from this one. [Name 2] is a veteran of 1 of your workshops and [Name 3] has 3 under his belt. I'm not sure we qualify based on your criteria but if we do we would love to have you visit us. I believe that Sydney also has an ongoing tribe. If you have not been to Australia it is a long way. Economy class is only suited to short / small people with a high tolerance for claustrophobia. |
Thank you for the invitation to visit your Tribe and for expressing your preferences for a Workshop location. | |||
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Saturday, April 30, 2011 Hayek vs. Keynes Video Dear Ed, Welcome back from your trip abroad. I can imagine it fruitful and also enjoyable. Here is link to (for me) an interesting (and somewhat musical) take on some famous economic positions. My agreement with the piece might surprise (if you make it all the way through) "The Fight of the Century." http://econstories.tv./#1 All the best, |
Thank you for the video clip. | |||
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Friday, April 29, 2011 Auckland on Tour Hi Ed, I am delighted that you are doing a world tour and I am both excited and nervous that there is a possibility of meeting you. I would love for you to visit me here in Auckland. I completely understand if you feel this is inefficient as it’s quite a detour to visit only the two of us down here. I would like to attend your workshop. My location preference would be: 1) Austin 2) London 3) Amsterdam Kind Regards |
OK. | |||
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Thursday, April 28, 2011 Getting Clear Hi Ed, I've being interested in trading for a leaving since July 2009 and since I've being researching a lot on the subject. Still in the journey. I first got to know about you when I read your interview on MW in 2009. I noticed how some interviews were so connected and successful traders had lots in common and learned from each other. Like the Michael Marcus, Bruce Kovner and you for example. More recently, since end of last year, because I was in search to develop the physiological side of my trade, which I believe is the main key to success, I got more interested in your work the TTP and bought your book. Read from cover to back and still re-read bits and pieces. Since then I've being reading your FAQs almost daily and I confess that it is bringing LOTS of CLARITY to my trading. I have a personal blog where I share what I've being learning about trading and I am having a captive audience that share ideas and are "following" me. It is not a commercial blog. It is completely free and I have no intentions to make money with the blog per se, but have the intent to write in order to structure my thinking and my beliefs, therefore find the answers within myself. I often quote you in my blog and make reference to the FAQs content and give all credits to www.TradingTribe.com Thanks for sharing your immense knowledge and sincerity . I am considering practicing TTP. Best Regards |
Thank you for sharing your process. | |||
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Thursday, April 28, 2011 Breathwork Weekend Report Paying off Debts - Getting a Client Chief, I drag my feet to write this report. I am thinking, “Well, that’s interesting”. Part of the issue I deal with during the Breathwork weekend is dragging my feet to do certain things. Things like running a successful professional business. So what is up with that? It takes me a long two weeks to finally sit down and write what happened. Oh, boy what a weekend! Breathwork can easily be one of the most powerful experiences I have ever had. It is late Friday night. I am happy, and tired. I run a few miles in the morning with a couple of friends from the tribe and I imagine it is a high endorphin level mixed with the excitement of exploring the unknown that is keeping me in this state. Some other Tribe members who have already done Breathwork tell me that it works better if you eat very little. So I do not eat. I feel joyful, tired, and hungry. Eleven of us are sitting in chairs and on top of air mattresses facing one another in pairs. Five of us ask the other five, “What is your issue?” One person must take a break each round as there is an odd number of us. “I would like to run a professional CTA business with $10 million AUM by the end of 2011”, I say. I say this over and over and over. I am tired and feel the message is becoming ingrained in my brain. “Show me what stands between you and achieving your goal?” I go ahead and show the feeling I have when I am stuck. I scrunch my face, I feel hot in my face, shortness of breath, heavy and exhausted. Every time I do this I get a new clue, another piece of the puzzle. I learn a lot about my fellow tribe members as well. One tribe member wants to make a lot of money, one wants to stop drinking coffee compulsively, one wants to lose weight, another one wants to have a relationship with a women. We all work hard until late at night. Ed tells us that Breathwork works more effectively when there are very little carbohydrates in the system. We wake up early in the morning and eat very lightly. Ed has a project ready for us after breakfast. There is an old shed in the backyard Ed wants to get rid of. He also wants us to clean the backyard of fallen leaves and dry branches. I feel tired from the run the day before and have a headache. When it comes to physical work I somehow always find a way to really push myself to the limits and exhaust myself. Knowing this about myself I figure I will save some energy and not work so hard this time. I do not want to mess up my Breathwork experience by being overly exhausted or having too big of a headache. So I grab the rake and start raking the leaves. This doesn’t last too long as next thing I know, I am swinging the sledge hammer doing a lot of hard work. As I do this, I am fully aware of not wanting to do it in a first place but can’t help myself. I already have some Aha’s about the way I do things. I generally muscle through things, find the difficult way first, there is a lot of struggle and hard work before I allow myself to succeed. That is my way. I get aggravated while thinking about this and that I can’t just stop – I swing the sledge hammer even harder. Once we are done with the project, we celebrate briefly, take pictures and go for a long walk to further burn some energy before we start to breathe. I enjoy chatting with fellow breathers and enjoy the nature all around us as well as the sun. Coming back from the walk I am tired. I feel excited to finally do the breathing. I also feel some nervousness. I am in the first group of breathers. We are getting ready. I look around and am excited to experience something I have never experienced. Ed gives us our last instructions about the process. I lie down, look at my sitter and relax. Ed speaks slowly…”feel your feet, become aware of them, relax your body, now ankles”…the music starts playing ever so loudly, I begin breathing…….. ……. I am waking up from an amazing experience. I open my eyes and see stars. I see my hands are still catatonic. I am only able to straighten one of them. I am laughing; it’s just crazy funny to me. I try to sit down. It takes me a few times. The whole world is spinning. I feel boundless joy and happiness. I see that some of the breathers are already done. I see some still working and being very active. Ed helps me to the kitchen. I feel very close to him. I quietly sit to eat some fruit and begin drawing my picture. There are many parts of the process I remember quite vividly. I dance around a fire with a tribe, I ride a horse going into battle, I see a soldier shooting another human being, I fly….I experience feelings of boundless joy and happiness and then feelings of sadness, oh so much sadness. I experience feelings of being trapped and not being able to breathe, feelings of nausea and then more joy and sadness. After Breathwork I feel very joyful and close to everybody. The next day, when we are leaving the ranch, I am stuck in the airport for several hours. I do not mind. I hang around the airport and cannot imagine a better place to be. Everyone seems friendly. I feel connected to the whole world and every human being. It is so awesome. The world is so friendly. Now, a couple of weeks after Breathwork, I sit down and evaluate. So what changed? How am I doing since Breathwork weekend? Well, I stopped drinking coffee and started eating healthier. I somehow still eat more in the evenings than I would like to. I am currently exploring the feelings I may be medicating by doing this. I notice some feelings now that I have not noticed before. I feel shortness of breath more often than before. The coffee helped me completely cover this up. As I am experiencing this I notice that I am unhappy in my current business partnership. I notice that I have work and business relationship “snarls” with family members which are suffocating me. I intend to work on these and resolve them. My goal is to run a professional business. Since the Breathwork weekend I am moving closer to this goal. I now have five people on my team to help with various parts of the business operation. I am moving very close to my goal now. Oh yeah, I almost forget. When I attend Ed’s Workshop in early December 2010 I wanted to have more than I need. Back then I always broke even and could never get ahead. Well December 2010 is the most successful trading month of my trading career and I pay off my debts and finally get ahead. Go figure! Now, after the Breathwork weekend and almost three years in the business without a client I finally sign a client and begin trading my managed futures program in his account. How about that? Sound like magic? Maybe it is. Maybe it is a coincidence, but maybe, just maybe, in a world where we hold “intentions equal results” this can mean only one thing… Stay thirsty my friends! Sincerely, |
Thank you for sharing your process - and your recent successes.
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Thursday, April 28, 2011 Austin Trading Tribe Report No. 7 Chief, The first hot seat of the evening brings up the issue of procrastinating on the path to become a successful trader to the tribe. As Ed questions him and investigates his issue, the hot seat stays very calm, collected, and logical. He mentions that he would like to get a job, but he is okay to stay home and not work. Overall I feel very little emotion from him as he describes the issue and by the comments and reactions of other members, I am not alone. Ed continues to push the member to show him how he feels, to give the tribe something to work with. All tribe members share their feelings with the member about not seeing any of his emotions and the issue becomes obvious to him. He is so good in hiding his feelings and controlling them no one can tell what is going on. He tells us that inside he is really boiling and makes this gesture with his hands, while his voice starts shaking. We do not need any more than that. The whole Tribe supports him and encourages him to experience these feelings. He gets into form and Ed asks him to freeze and recollect the first time he felt that way. Tribe member recollects the loss of a baby brother before he was born. He has several sisters and gets in trouble with his dad all the time for teasing and playing too hard with them – he really wished for a brother. Family members never get to express their feelings to one another. Tribe member gets to experience a lot of sadness and grief. Tears are rolling down my face watching this. I volunteer to role play the hot seats father. We share our feeling about the loss. I am truly thankful to the member for allowing me to be a part of his process. It feels good to be there for him, connect with him and I feel it is helping to heal me as well as I carry similar pain in my heart. The second hot seat process seems to relate to the first one. The tribe member is kind of a tough guy not showing many emotions in everyday life. He starts his hot seat with a statement “I hate my family”. He says it in a Bruce Willis kind of way and we all laugh and chuckle. However, a few minutes later I am crying again as he describes the abuse he experiences growing up. The Tribe role plays a situation at a dinner table where he is sharing his feelings about the abuse with his father and stepmother. They are both very loud and it takes some effort to get their attention and connect with them. A few Tribe members trade roles and do a really good job applying the intimacy centric model. The most powerful experience I have from this process is when the hot seat receives and acknowledges his stepmother. His stepmother was really cruel to him, so to reach that level of acceptance was very cool to see. During this process another member begins to spontaneously go into a process. He has a hard time to listen to all the screaming at the dinner table and just cannot stand it. At the last meeting he even went to sleep when we role played some intense scenes with screaming and yelling involved. Ed prompts him to join the role play. During his process he can barely look into the eyes of the abusing father to share his feelings with him. Ed coaches him the entire time and he is eventually able to connect and get his message across. All three hot seats are a great experience for me. The week prior to the meeting I sign the first client to my managed futures program. He is a friend of mine. I am excited to support him and I feel a slight anxiety in my stomach, as I do not want to disappoint him. I feel motivated to work long hours to make sure everything with my system, execution and process of starting his account is in place. During his visit to my office and the process of opening his managed account, I am very excited and show a degree of unprofessionalism. My friend gets cold feet. I am so close, the beginning of serving my first client and ….. I feel sadness, and pain of loss in my midsection. I take a proactive stand and work even harder on finding ways to serve my clients in a more professional matter. During the hot seats of my fellow tribe members I access the feelings of loss and sadness numerous times and get to experience them freely. I relate to the loss of child as well as getting yelled at as a child. Now writing this letter I notice that the drama of opening my first clients account and then losing it even before I made the first trade has some obvious similarities also. Thank you, fellow tribe members for your courage and willingness to deal with these tough issues. This is not the first time you have shown me the way or helped me heal and grow more freely. Sincerely, |
Thank you for sharing your process. | |||
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Wednesday, April 27, 2011 Berlin on Tour Dear Ed, The Berlin Trading Tribe applies for your visit during the World Tour. Two Tribesmen are also interested in attending an European workshop and suggest a large German City as location. As I read the reports from the Breathwork Weekend I feel joy and happiness about the progress of the participants, and anxiety about me for not attending it. Best regards, |
Thank you for sharing your preference. |
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Wednesday, April 27, 2011 Amsterdam on Tour Dear Ed, The Amsterdam Tribe members express a preference for a Workshop held in The Netherlands. Schiphol is a great international airport hub, with a mainline station right under the airport. If you decide this is a good prospect, we are happy to check out some prospective locations suitable for a workshop (drumming etc. at any time + suitable catering & accommodation) - perhaps a rural location within an hour or so of Amsterdam ? Best, |
Thank you for sharing your preference. |
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Tuesday, April 26, 2011 Family Mold Ed, I listen to a Christian apologetics podcast regularly. I wanted to send it to you because the I kept thinking about the things you teach on how our families mold us. I hope you enjoy. |
Thank you for sharing your insight. | |||
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Tuesday, April 26, 2011 Expressing feelings Dear Ed, Project Process : at a recent meeting we discuss the time it takes to go through our Project Process reports inc tribe feedback. We decide to streamline this by allowing the reporter just 3 minutes for their report, following which feedback is given by the tribe with no further response from the reporter. After doing this we are happy with the great reduction in time (allowing longer for the Hot Seats), but feel that some PP reports require some interactive feedback. Discussing this further, we decide that at our next meeting we will give both reporter and responders the option for more feedback, with a clear intention of maintaining a time -efficient balance to this interaction. A new member joins us - we now have 8 members. I take the Hot Seat at our last meeting. I urgently feel the need for changes in my relationship with my wife : I feel I fail miserably in applying the intimacy centric model in this most intimate context. I am totally fed up and feel nagged to the point of sickness (if not yet death...). I get into cathartic forms, cheered on by my tribe - I am really angry and frustrated and contorting and writhing, squeezing the breath out of myself. PM freezes the action at some point and asks me to intensify everything, then asks if any memory around this feeling comes to mind...and one does. I am 13 years old during my first few days at a traditional English boarding school; new boys are still being shown around the various facilities of the vast old campus. I am at the Scout Camp and some kind of swing has been rigged up, in which a boy sits on the swing which is then hoisted with ropes along a pulley up a tree, about 30 feet above the ground, before being released and sliding down. It's my turn and, being a very outdoors kind of guy, I enjoy the ride up to the top, not deterred by the wild swinging of the swing seat itself. Suddenly, there is a "splat" sound, a lot of pain and the next thing I know I am recovering consciousness with a lot of anxious faces, including the Scout Master's, looking at me. The swing seat has no safety line and has jumped off the rope and I have fallen 30 feet in a sitting position to the (fortunately sloping earth) ground below. My right arm is broken. I just feel shock and there seems nothing to role play, but then the scene moves on to the hospital to which I am taken. For some reason, I'm sharing a dimly-lit room with a terminally ill priest, who doesn't say much. I don't like it. My mother arrives from London; she's warm, loving and friendly, but real feelings simply aren't expressed in our family (it's 1965) and it seems like a very formal interaction in which I don't express that I just want to get out of there. We role play this. I immediately see that as loving as my mother is, the feelings thing just isn't expressed in those days. As I watch, I see 13 year old me telling my mother my true feelings : I feel shocked, afraid & hurt, I don't want to stay in this room, why can't I be with other children, I want to go home right away, and what is she felling right now ? She has great difficulty expressing her feelings, but eventually does. The connection is warm & soft. During the Hot Seat check-out, one tribe member comments that it might be helpful at some point to role play a "current period" drama with my wife, e.g.. a typical nagging scenario. I think about this scene, as I notice it is very difficult for me to stick to such simple precepts as sharing my feelings and asking my wife to share hers (which she in fact does far more easily than me) : in real life I get into irritation almost instantly (to clarify, we do not role play this). The following day, as the Easter weekend arrives, with a schedule of family events (mostly other families coming to our home), I realize that I simply don't want this - I need a break - so I announce I want a quiet Easter and am cancelling. I have the impression that our friends understand where I'm coming from when I phone and tell that, sorry, I feel I want a quiet space, sorry to screw up their Easter, but that's the way it is. I enjoy a wonderfully quiet and "spacious" Easter and feel that my family do as well. I talk to my wife and we agree to give out relationship more space, reduce the stress we have both been experiencing and see how we progress in sharing our feelings. Best, |
Thank you for sharing your process. | |||
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Tuesday, April 26, 2011 On Slippage Hello Ed, It was really good to meet you the other day and I hope you enjoyed your time in the UK. We had a fantastic Easter here in [Country] (I made the airport) which is always associated with too much food! Very randomly I was talking to an acquaintance about our strategy and he mentioned [Name] who happened to be a childhood friend of my acquaintance, we called him on the spot and hopefully we are meeting with him latter this week for dinner. So I have done the slippage analysis you advised me to do, and at 50% it is quite ugly. The way I have defined slippage is the following. For the long side if I have an order to buy oil at 100 and the high for the day is 102, then slippage = %slippage * (102-100) so if % slippage =50% Entry price is 101. Slippage also works on the exit point. For the short side it is the other way round. I am currently testing my strategy with 5% slippage. At 50% slippage my strategy is not good, however I am trying to decide if 50% slippage is too aggressive for my type of system. I get the feeling that your system is not only less frequent but the also the winners are much larger than the losers than in my system, which makes a difference in how important slippage is. Furthermore over 7 years at 50% slippage it costs me 0.26% more of my equity on each trade, that amounts to a loss of 142% for these 7 years which is the reason why my results are so seriously hindered. Maybe I am naïve to think that such a slippage is too much for a system, if you can let me know I would appreciate it. Keep in mind I am testing a system that is suppose to stop u out on loosing 0.5% of your equity and now I am loosing 0.75% on average, which is quite a significant difference once accumulated! I mean in taking an random example on the S&P my slippage was like 7 points which is massive, don't you think? Anyhow my system is still good even with 25% slippage which I am not sure how I should take that but it gives me some sort of confidence, but I guess you are the one that could really guide me on this. Finally when we were walking the other day you asked me if something I did reduced the number of trades and i answered that it did, I was wondering what your view was on filters which greatly reduce the number of trades. Furthermore wanted to see if I could get your view between Pyramiding and simply staying with your initial positions till exit point. I guess it might vary depending on the time horizon. I also got the sense that the most recent strength matters a lot to you, does this mean you change the weights you put on each market depending on this? I found our discussion helpful in that it got me thinking about a lot of things. It would be great to be in touch although I try to be in touch with [Name] as much as possible as well to guide me through this journey. I hope all is well with you, |
Thank you for sharing your process. Your might consider researching various ways to configure skid assumptions. For example, you might use, for a buy stop: skid = factor * (high - buy_stop) |
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Tuesday, April 26, 2011 Compounding Hi Ed, On this page http://www.seykota.com/tribe/tsp/trends/index.htm Ed says:: "Say we compound one penny at a three percent per year interest rate from year Zero-AD to the present. We get about $5.48 * 10^23, or around a half trillion trillion dollars. Clearly someone in those early days has a penny earning interest, per stories of money lenders in temples. That no such investment survives today indicates severe financial setbacks, from time to time, in which people and whole societies experience collapse and have to start over. Compounding interest seems to work pretty well for a few hundred years at a time." I'm not implying your statement is incorrect, but here is a spreadsheet with some variables you can fiddle with to see future value calculations with a bit more realistic inputs. (If you care) Spreadsheet |
Thank you for the extension of the concept. If you split the estate three ways every generation, then you have to multiply each branch by 3^N to accumulate all the fruit. Then, you are pretty much back at the original conclusion - that no such investment survives today. |
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Tuesday, April 26, 2011 Teaching Math Ed, 1. Teaching Math In 1950s A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price. What is his profit ? 2. Teaching Math In 1960s A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is 4/5 of the price, or $80. What is his profit? 3. Teaching Math In 1970s A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is $80. Did he make a profit? 4. Teaching Math In 1980s A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $100. His cost of production is $80 and his profit is $20. Your assignment: Underline the number 20. 5. Teaching Math In 1990s A logger cuts down a beautiful forest because he is selfish and inconsiderate and cares nothing for the habitat of animals or the preservation of our woodlands. He does this so he can make a profit of $20. What do you think of this way of making a living? Topic for class participation after answering the question: How did the birds and squirrels feel as the logger cut down their homes? (There are no wrong answers, and if you feel like crying, it's ok.) 6. Teaching Math In 2000s If you have special needs or just feel you need assistance because of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age, childhood memories, criminal background, then don't answer and the correct answer will be provided for you. There are no wrong answers. 7. Teaching Math In 2011 Un hachero vende una carrtada de maderapara 100 pesos. El costo de la producciones es 80 pesos. Cuanto dinero ha hecho? |
8. Teaching Math In 2015 A logger sells a truckload of lumber for $1000. The buyer flips it the following week for $2000. What is the rate of inflation? 9. 您欠我1000元。 |
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Tuesday, April 26, 2011 Logo Hi Ed, Please excuse me if this email comes off as being intrusive as that is not my intention. But I was wondering whether you have any affiliation with a company by the name [Name] who use the same logo as you only blue ? Have a look if you can be bothered. |
Thank you for the heads-up. The TT-in-a-Circle mark, in any color, is in registration to me at the Office of Trademarks and Copyrights. |
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Monday, April 25, 2011 My Breathwork Experience Part 2 – The Joy of Physical Labor Dear Ed, Below is the second part of my Breathwork experience. The setup for Breathwork begins on evening of day one with approximately eight hours of goal setting, tribe member verification of those goals, and feeling identification exercises. We pair off and express our goal succinctly to each tribe member. The tribe member helps point out any inconsistencies in my goal. I share any feelings that stand between me and reaching that goal. At the end of the brief meeting the tribe member announces my goal to the entire tribe, the feelings the I share, and any forms I demonstrate, focusing on forms I am unaware of. This is repeated several times with each tribe member. Ed explains these feelings act as a bus, which can meet us on the other side of awareness during our Breathing experience. Announcing my goal to another, for what seems like dozens of times, is very intense. It feels like picking up a sharp, heavy sword for the first time – I am aware of the beauty, and potential. I also feel fear and instability wielding such a powerful instrument. Looking into Ed’s eyes and affirming, “I want to be a fund manager,” is especially memorable. My form is rubbing my knees, hunching over, squinting my eyes and rocking back-and-forth. I feel fever in my forehead, an itch on my chest and cold hands and feet. Dinner is light on day one to facilitate breathing, and breakfast on day two consists of minimal sustenance: just a few pieces of fresh fruit, and water. We complete a waiver form and share our feelings about having a legal agreement for Breathwork. Ed shares his experience with simple and complex legal documents, and the importance of having a clear and concise agreement before engaging in any business dealings. After breakfast we exercise by demolishing a large shed on the property – no instruction is provided, only some tools, and a few hours later the shed is gone. Our collective intention of the demolition and cleanup is very clear, and a good example of how quickly results, especially with the support of a Tribe, can occur. I think about some complaints I make about “having a tough day at the office” while doing this physical labor (before I correct, Fred just typed “psychical labor”). We then hike in the hot 90F Texas sun. After the exercise I feel surprising light, not as hungry as I imagine, and ready for Breathwork. I begin breathing in pace with the music. Immediately I am in another state of consciousness. I arrive at my sister’s funeral. I am three years old. I see everything clearly – the casket, grieving family, and me. I feel incredibly strong sadness and begin crying and screaming. I cry for my sister. I cry for myself. I cry for my family. I cry for the little three year old boy facing such loss. I begin to reach for the casket and I feel intense anger. I am angry at the loss of my playmate. I am so, so angry! I waive my arms and twist and scream and kick! I scream until it feels like I exhale every last molecule of CO2 from my body. I begin intense, hysterical laughter. I can’t recall what is so funny, I just laugh for what seems like hours. I begin laughing at my laughter, and this seems to have an exponential effect. I recall feeling great about just being able to laugh. No judgment, only pure laughter. I am in a jungle with my wife and children. A spirit is showing me how my family can learn and grow through travel. Everything is OK in the jungle, including feelings of fear and danger, and the need to protect my family from tropical infections and insects. Everything is OK in the jungle, including feelings of joy of the tremendous bounty of nourishing tropical fruit, replenishing rain, and endless beautiful green leaves. I dance with my wife during a tribal ceremony. I feel extreme joy and close connection with my wife. While in a circle of dance I see a very clear vision – my life is a circular flow of water. One side of this circle is serving others, and the other side is serving myself. In between are all other processes in my life. I realize if there is a blockage anywhere along my path, it prevents flow. I see how getting stuck in one area (this translates to blockage of a feeling) interrupts my entire flow of existence. I see how I solve a problem - not by staying at work late myopically laboring over the answer - rather, by celebrating the moment of now and dancing with my wife. I am being held down. This is a very uncomfortable feeling and I break from my trance. As I emerge to consciousness, the desire to explore deeper overcomes my fear of the feeling. I breathe and I am a young boy at the doctors office being held down. I begin to enjoy being held down, and enjoy its partner feeling of trying to rise up while being held down. I force myself to rise and am pulled down with tremendous force. It feels like doing a sit-up with a 200 pound weight on my chest. I experience a very clear AHA that in order to experience success, I need to be willing to experience all my feelings – including the feeling of being held down, the feeling of rising above being held down, and the feeling of breaking free of anything that holds me down. During my journey I see everything is OK just the way it is. During my journey I discover the answers to all of life’s questions – and these answers connect directly to my feelings. Now if I can only remember them all! I experience intense grief, anger and sadness over my sister’s death. I feel as if I experience these healing feelings for the first time. I feel clear understanding of no longer having to set up drama as an excuse to feel sadness. I am willing to celebrate grief, anger and sadness as they come up in the moment of now. I also feel surprise and wonder how these amazing visions are just below the surface of my mind. It makes no logical sense to me how a trip like this occurs by simple breathing. The experience is like finding the entrance to a magical, hidden city just under a few leaves in my backyard. I wonder what other worlds are hiding just below the surface. Thank you very much for your support, inviting me to your home, and hosting such a wonderful weekend. |
Thank you for sharing your process. For photos of the weekend, see: http://www.seykota.com/2011-Apr-14_Bastrop/ |
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Monday, April 25, 2011 Getting By Ed, Thanks for the feedback [on my feedback dynamics model]. I notice it’s hard to get anything past you. |
Most stuff, by most people, gets by me rather easily. People I care about have trouble getting away with things. |
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Saturday, April 23, 2011 Quantitative Easing Ed, This cartoon says a lot. http://www.businessinsider.com/ quantitative-easing-cartoon-2010-11 |
Thank you for the video. | |||
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Saturday, April 23, 2011 Breathwork Report - Sex, Connection and Viagra Dear Ed, Thank you for the wonderful Breathwork weekend. I go to Texas with high expectations as the TTP has a huge positive effect on my life and I hear Breathwork is TTP on steroids. I am surprised to receive a lot more than I plan. At Breathwork I want to accomplish the following: Stop using Viagra to have sex with my wife, complete business projects faster, and program a profitable system in TradeStation. The feelings that stand in my way are intimidation, inadequacy, and of being small/dominated. The phrase “I am never good enough.” comes up. The Breathwork weekend turns my old reality upside down. Before, I use my judgment and desire to prove that I am good enough as my primary motivator. Now, I am able to better use my emotions and energy to motivate me. After watching the new rocks process I gain a deeper understanding of emotions. I become aware of the emotions driving language and conversation. I do a productive rocks process dealing with my addiction to Viagra on Friday. Ed is explaining the Breathwork process. This leads to a discussion among the group about coffee addictions. I then bring up my addiction to Viagra. I have a game plan of experiencing the feelings of intimidation, inadequacy, and of being small. The conversation immediately goes in a direction I do not expect. Ed asks me “Is your wife really demanding in bed?” No. “Would it be ideal for you to have an erection for four hours?” No. Ed continues to talk about how many people use sex as a way to connect with one and other. You are able to have sex, so what is the big deal. I confirm that performance anxiety has affected other areas of my life. (I take from this dialog the message that I am so focused on my own performance that I am missing the whole experience of connecting with my partner. This is different that me missing the whole experience because of intimidation, inadequacy, etc.) I demonstrate forms of “the desire to perform / desire to be good enough / desire to be a man”. This quickly leads to a memory I have with my dad in our backyard doing yard work. My dad at this time is a workaholic and I am spending time with him outside, but he is working too hard to look up or even give me the time of day. My dad does not let me help and I watch him. I feel like a disappointment. I feel alone. I feel shame. This is common with our relationship. I am a young boy wanting to be good enough and thinking that being able to perform will give me attention and an escape from the loneliness and disappointment. I see this relationship style in many areas in my life. I feel great sadness. The new rocks process opens me up to a different relationship style. Instead of choosing to try and escape from my loneliness and disappoint through playing the “being good enough” game, I can choose to connect with others, share my feelings and receiving theirs. We do this in the rocks process. As we act everything out, I find it difficult to look my dad in the eye. The person role playing my dad makes me work for his attention. I let me know the shame, disappoint, and the strong desire I have to connect with him. It takes a number of times for me to do this. I make sure I look him in the eye. I make sure he does receive my feelings. I thank him for sharing his. Wow. The world looks a lot different now. I am surprised by the strong connection between my Viagra addiction and my relationship with my dad. The next time my wife and I have sex I do not use Viagra (one of the first times in four years). I am also no longer playing the never ending game of trying to prove I am good enough (based on the belief that I am not good enough). The Breathwork capitalizes on my hot seat. I am blown away by the experience and I am amazed at how hallucinogenic breathing can be. Again, thank you Ed and the rest of the tribe for helping me out. Enjoy, |
Thank you for sharing your process and you insights about
connecting and being enough.
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Saturday, April 23, 2011 Breathwork Update Riding Winners with Frank Zappa Hi Ed, First, thank you for a fabulous Breathwork weekend. People ask me how it went and there is not a word to describe how great it is, I need new words. We all start off with an issue and a form. At first my issue is that I stop blaming my parents and stop jumping the system. This changes to, I am responsible and respond-able and I follow my system by letting winners run. My form stays the same. On the second day once we get to the actual breathing, I start out slow and then really start the heavy breathing. I am getting into my form, saying I am responsible and breathing heavy. I notice my hands tighten up. It is not long and I cross over and hear “of course you are”, “Duh”, “now lets ride a winner”. All of a sudden I am a flying thing of some sort, my arms are stretched out and I am flying. I start out at the top of a tree I climb as a child (my father cut this tree down to stop me from climbing it) and then I am flying above the trees and then to the edge of space. At this point I meet Frank Zappa, we sit together in a circle, odd cause it's Frank Zappa and it is just two, but it is a circle. He talks to me about his album “Over-Nite Sensation”; he gives me the goods on Over-Nite Sensation, like simple here is how to be an Over-Nite Sensation. I have to say now it is more of a right livelihood feel then anything else, a shift in feeling and thinking, recognizing and embracing the truth the reality, like yes we all are a right livelihood sensation, we always are. Then Frank and I ride a winner and fly into space. We come to what is called a worm hole. We are about to get in it and I ask “is it safe?” (I relate this now to I want to sell my winner). I get back “what is safe?” I say “I can’t think now.” I get back “what is think?” Then I am back in my conscience state. I am not satisfied, (I cut my winner). I want to get in what every that thing is. I breathe even harder, my form comes on by itself. Then I cross over and am with Frank at the worm hole. I say I want to ride the winner. I am told I have to be willing to ride it and go with it completely, let go and experience anything and everything, every feeling. I say “yes I am willing.” We get in it and all of a sudden I feel the urge to pee. Then I feel I am peeing. I want to resist and then I remember what I am told and I just go with it. I figure I will throw away my clothes and mat and go shower. I get into it and enjoy it. Now I am really riding the winner. The other breathers seem to be exploding with excitement at this moment. All of a sudden we are out of the worm hole and into a place of bliss, all creative power, all feelings. I am told this is everything, this is it all. I feel and feel. I feel everything all at once. I see some sort of round rotating thing in front of me at this point which is the source of it all. After a bit I start to drift back, but this place follows me and I am told this is part of me and is always is with me. This is a hugely powerful experience for me and I feel a change. After this I come out of it and am glad I did not pee. Since the weekend I spend a ½ day with my old trading style and it makes no sense to me. Then I work on following my system, cutting losses and riding winners. It feels much better. However, I feel the system is to complex and takes profit to soon. I am in the process of attaining a post Breathwork system. As far as parents and the past; the idea that my results "now" have anything to do with memory of my parents or the past, just makes no sense to me. For example, Old thinking: I do not have enough money because my parents abused me. New thinking: the amount of money I have "now" is in direct relation to my intentions about how much money I have "now". I hope this explains my experience to readers of FAQ it seems almost like a dream that is directed and focused to helping with an issue. Frank Zappa: ”Success to me is if I have a musical or let's say any kind of an artistic concept and I start out to execute it, if it is executed to 100% of the specifications of what I imagined when the idea first came up - that's success. That's the only thing that really matters to me because if I don't enjoy listening to it myself when it's all done, then why did I bother to do it? because there are other things I can do to make more money than this. This is a high overhead business. I happen to like what I'm doing so, to me success is if you get close to 100% “ “On a personal level, Freaking Out is a process whereby an individual casts off outmoded and restricting standards of thinking, dress, and social etiquette in order to express creatively his relationship to his immediate environment and the social structure as a whole.” Thanks again for your devotion to the tribe! |
Thank you for sharing your process - and your insights.
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Thursday, April 21, 2011 Breathwork Update: Sharing feelings / Using Meditation as Medication Hi Ed I hope you had a good vacation. I have been following your teaching instruction. I've done this with a particular emphasis on where I think I need to do the most work i.e. on willingness and on building rapport. I have been making it a point to try and fully experience whatever feelings that come up. My way is to try and be with that physical sensation and focus on it as best as I can. Not to run away from it or try to avoid it. Just to focus on the sensation. At times I also try and see it as a novel experience and enjoy the sensation as much as I can. The way I do that is to focus on the sensation itself rather than the meaning that I have associated with it or what I consider as the cause behind it. I still recognize the tendency to try and sleep it over / sleep it off but I have been consciously trying to avoid doing that. Whenever I am conscious that there is an opportunity, I express my feelings to someone as well. My sense is that I'm conscious of the opportunity about 80-90% of the time but that is only a sense. Sometimes I look back and think that I should have expressed myself but I was too caught up in the feeling itself. When this happens, I, at times, express it in the past tense. Recently, when I was feeling down, I openly expressed that to my parents when they called. My dad said that that worried him and I am a bit concerned that I should not be a source of worry cause he is a heart patient. He had, a year ago, told me that concern related to me was one of the reasons his heart condition had deteriorated. (I was very hurt by that. Even when I think about it now, there is a burning sensation near my heart) He sent me an email asking whether "there was any cause for concern" and I used that opportunity to tell him what was happening. I didn't hear back. My mother also told me that she was a little concerned. Its a start. Its much more than what I've been doing for a while. I can use the reason that I wouldn't tell them what I was going through cause it would cause them concern but I think that that might just be an excuse. I have also been using the opportunities to express my feelings to my friends. I think that that has been going really well. I've used the opportunities to tell them not only about how I'm feeling but also about the physical manifestation. They have been surprisingly receptive. (surprisingly to me, I guess). I can see that the friend that I am staying with has really opened up to me in a way that he hadn't before. Last evening, for instance, he was very candid about an experience where he was very scared and its not something I would have expected him to admit to or express so openly. I can also sense that I have built a closer friendship with his wife as I have been openly expressing my feelings at any time or on any subject. I've found that there are no arguments/discussions on a topic if I honestly express my feelings. For instance, when I told them that I was single cause I was fearful ... they just let it be. Normally this topic would have expanded into a long, drawn out, relatively painful discussion on my personality and expectations. This time, it was just accepted. It felt nice. I have other examples of how my friends have been very receptive to receiving my feelings and it does indeed lead to a closer friendship / relationship. I used to be worried that I might be judged. Perhaps judged as overly sensitive or emotional or weak. A while back, I had tried the complete openness and honesty strategy in the corporate environment and I felt it had really backfired. The more important thing is that I feel lighter. Like I'm traveling lighter and that's what I want to do. I have also noticed that if I am experiencing a set of emotions and I start my yoga and meditation practices, then I feel lighter at the end of it. The emotions are not as strong. I have remembered our last conversation on numerous occasions. Your voice would ring in my head and I would keep going over some of the things you said over and over again. I could sense the truth but it was still hard to swallow and often I would tear up or cry. I guess I have a lot to learn. I tend to be quite hard on myself when I make mistakes. After the breath workshop I felt terrible that I basically just "slept" through it. One of the things I find hardest to accept is that I'm using my spiritual pursuit as a medication. I've given a lot of myself to that path and for it to be solely for the purpose of medication shakes me quite fundamentally inside. When I think about it, I feel a pain in my chest. (I've noticed that a lot of my feelings seem centered around the center of my chest whether they be pains, burning sensations or like someone's placed an ice pack on it) I must admit I don't fully understand the difference between being willing and building rapport through expressing feelings. Also, how can I change my intention to making money instead of losing money or disappointing myself slightly? I feel a little awkward cause this email is as long as it is. If it is too long, please let me know and I will adjust accordingly. Thanks for taking an interest in me and being willing to teach me! |
Thank you for sharing your process and your insights about sharing feelings and using meditation as medication. | |||
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Thursday, April 21, 2011 Tribe Report - Expressing Anger Constructively Dear Chief, In last tribe meeting a tribe member takes the hot seat, his issue revolves around anger and abusive family dynamics, he seems to be struggling with his work, he later reports that "the hot seat is a lot more difficult than it seems." His role playing includes a lot of abuse from his dad and step mother, this is impossible for me to bear, I can't stand the sight of people being abused, the feeling is especially strong this time, I basically go nuts. Ed discovers this situation, and everybody realizes I am hot. I am not willing to work since I think "feeling anger at people being abused" is totally ok, it might be, but I also realize the feeling might have a positive intention, at least I try to let the feeling evolve to see where it can lead me. I participate in the role playing, but it is impossible for me to act the part of an abusive father, I notice I get angry at the whole situation and I just want to explode against the abusers, my feelings range from revenge all the way to physical harm towards them. Suddenly I AM IN THE HOT SEAT, Ed tells me to let go of my anger and I go completely nuts, shouting and I am on the verge of checking out and faint, the tribe members support me and allow me to stay in the now and work. I remember my father being constantly abused by other members of my family and I let my anger develop. A friend role plays my father and I share feelings with him, I immediately feel love towards him, I share my feelings of sadness, we also shares his feelings. I feel much better. My control tendency would lead me to try to "fix" his problem, but I realize that is impossible, in the intimacy model, the only thing I can do is to share my feelings, receive and help by being a good model to him. I notice it is exactly the same way he educated me, by example, I also notice that my greatest strengths as a person are the ones he showed me by example as opposed to the ones he tried to "teach". I love the intimacy model. I love the tribe. I am very glad I found TTP. |
Thank you for sharing your process.
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Thursday, April 21, 2011 Workshop Europe Hello Ed, I notice a new trend of volunteering for a Workshop in Europe. I want to take part in it as well. Best regards, |
Thank you for supporting the Trend. I am thinking of making a world tour of active Tribes - culminating with a Workshop in Europe. |
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Thursday, April 21, 2011 Richard Feynman Ed, I’ve been meaning to ask you this. Did you know or ever run into Feynman while you were at MIT ? |
I know Feynman mostly through his writings and videos. I associate him with Cal Tech. |
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Thursday, April 21, 2011 Back in the Groove Hi Ed! Last week you wrote: "Overcoming pain is one approach; allowing it to come over you is another." and "You might consider taking your feelings about <others getting a better deal> to Tribe." I think you have a good point in the suggestion to bring "others getting a better deal" to tribe. I have already received feedback in a few tribe sessions regarding "unfair" treatment. I received the good advice not to spend energy on it. That is exactly what I am now better at - accepting the situation as it is but still I benefit from taking it to tribe or talking to my wife about it. I am now better at reacting in the now towards something I dislike. To me it helps me to be in the now, instead of, as earlier, mourn over it afterwards. Today feels great! It is autumn, sun is shining and I have a happy Easter to look forward to. In one week we are expecting our second child and me and my wife are a good team in this fantastic experience. One thing has happened lately that has caused a great change in my focus level. For the last 15!!! years I have tried to get back the feeling that everything is fun, I am excellent in any endeavor, optimistic, happy and enjoy life. That was the feeling I felt in my last year in school. After that something happened as I moved to my own department, ended parts of my hard training in sports. Also other things changed as I met my soon to be wife. Anyway, all these changes had a negative impact in me in terms of well being. But now I feel I am back! I have started to enjoy most things in life. I love the feeling of waking up before the alarm clock and looking forward of everything exciting that is going to happen. As you say, when everything is okay, you are free! I like lists, so here is my list of things that has attributed to my well being. - started to drink aloe Vera every day. I guess most people reading this will laugh but actually it has made my stomach work much better and I don´t have to eat so much and still being less hungry. I think it contributes to functionality to better absorb nutrition in what you eat. - drink water between meals instead of other stuff (fruits, nuts, candy, ...) - Eat four good meals daily and enjoy it. Add a lot of vegetables that makes me eat slower and get lots of healthy stuff. - I focus on every moment I really feel happiness, no matter what situation. By this way I get a sense of wonderful feelings five to twenty times every day. (of course I count them...) - I count everything I want to improve. I summarize it every night when I write in my diary. - I bike every day to work and back (2*10km) - I run our tribe and we are now in our sixth year. People has come and gone but I am the constant. - I sing every day when I drive home from work (I both bike and drive) and that makes me feel happy when I arrive home and makes my voice improving. - I try to play guitar and sing as much as I can. At least 3-5 times a week. - I express my feelings when it feels wrong in some way - I have a non flexible work and a family to take care of and it has helped me to stay on the road. - I have always had a very strong wish to win, even though I am not a natural winner I don't give up. I constantly work against my goal. - I give a lot a love, just as my mother gave me. The feeling of giving it to my child is wonderful. Best thing every day is when I come home and my four year old son comes running to give me a huge hug :-) That's all for now! Have a happy Easter dear master! Regards, |
Thank you for sharing your process. |
