Mastermind Blog

  Manipulation Manipulation is a tricky word.   It can be used to describe a way to shift gears in your vehicle, the way a toddler will grin up at Daddy to get him to smile back, a chiropractor manipulating a joint back into place, the way a politician or a preacher presents their take on something, the way a dog coerces you to go for a walk, or the way slot machines are programmed to ultimately get more money than they lose. Some of the elements I list in this article are going to trigger your anger and past guilt.   I want to make it clear that the reason I am choosing this topic is because of the way we use these elements on ourselves.   We can’t change our own self talk until we see how it’s done.   Instead of blaming ourselves for something that has been modeled for us by our parents and society, we need to acknowledge that it is a manipulation and that we can learn to honor ourselves by adding new tools to our toolboxes. Bullies target your weaknesse...

  Entre chien et loup  (Ontra shy loo) means “between dog and wolf”.  This represents twilight where it could be difficult to discern the difference between the dog and wolf.  I immediately pictured a dark shadowy night, fog rolling through twisted trees, and a warm fire where men toast themselves.  Looking up toward a knoll where reflective light of a neighboring campfire spot lights a slinking dog.  It morphs into a wolf as it melts into the night.   I am caught by that metaphor in regard to my life right now.  Politics, corporate medicine, insurance companies, the media.  There is a fine dance, a delicate rendering by a graceful elephant that we admire as it performs for us while behind the scenes the bill for the services rendered is calculated by the weight of the elephant.  This is not a tirade about anything.  It is simply a reflection of flame from the fireplace in the mirror.  A level of seeing.  Not comprehe...

  People will not modify their behavior until their desire to change becomes greater than their desire to remain the same .   -Kain Ramsey, course instructor of Modern Applied Psychology. Why have I made the changes I have made in my life?   Because my desire to change was greater than my desire to remain the same.   I have committed to not defining myself by my circumstance and I embrace my commitment to myself with joy, wonder, and curiosity. Before I had a world view, I knew that I wanted my life to change.   The circumstances of my childhood included more than one reason to change.   I wanted my mom to be part of our family.   This was something that I couldn’t change.   None of us could change this.   I wanted my stepmother to be nicer and fairer.   I couldn’t change that either.   I can list a lot of things that I could not change and very few things that I could change.   The sense of helplessness that causes is a br...

  Fear is a Learned Response In 1920 a scientific experiment was performed on a baby called Little Albert.    John Watson wanted to know if fear was a learned response.   He proved a point, but at what expense to Little Albert? It is very easy for us to be appalled by what I’m about to share with you.   Do your best to set that response aside just long enough to reflect on how this style of teaching may have been practiced on you and the possibility that it has led you to have perpetrated actions on people in your life that used this style of teaching.   Boiled down, I am suggesting that we as humans, teach what we have been taught, in the manner in which we have been taught.     The good news is that we can modify our behavior once we become aware of it. Little Albert was placed in a room with all manner of things around him.   One of those things was a live rabbit.   As it hopped around the room, Little Albert crawled around afte...

Cognitive Bias We all make decisions based on cognitive bias.   My example will be one I borrowed but expanded on to show how far we can take cognitive bias before we allow our mind to rest on an even larger truth than the truth we see in the moment. I’m driving a long and winding road up into the mountains.   I’m doing the speed limit and enjoying the scenery.   The trees, the birds, and what… a moose!   OMG!   What a lovely drive.   I slow down as I approach a hairpin curve.   Thank goodness I did because as I come out of the curve, I am behind a car doing about 10 miles under the speed limit.   I’m okay with this until I realize the car isn’t going to go faster even when it appears (to me) to be safe to go faster.   I begin my cognitive bias thought process as I decide the car has a good reason to drive through the curves slowly.   This is my perception because it is my experience too.   As I see that the car could safely s...

People are individuals with their own thoughts and opinions but rarely grow up with their own beliefs.   We learn our beliefs from our family of origin.   Sometimes a person takes on beliefs different than their family of origin when they marry somebody with different beliefs or if in the process of changing their own life, they realized they had to choose a different path in order to grow and thrive.   It is important to question our beliefs every once in a while, or we can find ourselves in humiliating situations.   It is important to attempt to discern the difference between belief and opinion.   It is important to see how we are manipulated to act, see, do, buy, vote, based on someone else’s opinion or belief system.   It is important to note that scoffing, ridiculing, or bullying, falls into the category of manipulation.   If you bully me to say what you want me to say, you haven’t convinced me of anything other than my fear of you. ...

Everybody has a vision.   Some people know that they have a vision.   Some don’t.   Some people groom that vision and make it come true.   Some don’t. The people who don’t know they have a vision are the ones that you hear complain the most.   They look out and see what they don’t like and they make it important and discuss it and think on it, until it becomes their vision which brings more of those things to complain about into their sphere.   You will notice that sometimes they will actively look for more proof to egg on their complaints and this is how they accomplish their vision. Sometimes people who are making progress toward their vision, get caught in the loop of what is wrong in their life right now.   That can happen when a concerned friend or relative asks about their issue in a way that forces them to try to be honest if things aren’t going right.   That can also happen with the smashing impact of fear and wondering if that...

The crisis of 2020 that our world is in has stimulated a toilet paper shortage for many people.   I am not one of them but I do have a son with a wife and three daughter’s who were ecstatic over the stack of toilet paper and paper towels my sister Kari had brought me.   In our Zoom meeting they asked to see the house and that pile of paper was the most exclaimed over thing they saw. When I knocked a stack of egg cartons off of the fridge, I remembered that I had posted that I knew how to make my own paper so I wasn’t worried about the toilet paper shortage.   While in the Zoom meeting my son Kelly asked if I had made that toilet paper yet.   I realized that it is truly possible that people out there might really need a recipe for making toilet paper so I have begun the project.   I have made homemade paper twice so I understand the basics.   Of course, you have to have some old paper around to start with and for our tushes the only thing I can f...