Think Queerly

In this episode, I share a process I created to manage prediction and response in disruptive times. I recorded this originally as a video on March 28, 2020, and while the content speaks to many of the circumstances of COVID-19, this is a valid and useful process to deal with disruptive change and understanding what you can and cannot control. 

Read the article to follow along: "What’s Out of Your Control, Right Now?"

And download the free, Personal Evolution Practice PDF Worksheet.

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When you prioritize what’s most important to you, instead of what you need to get done, you reduce frustration, increase joy, and experience more freedom.

We all have too much to do, too many tasks, expectations, and distractions. If you want to live the life of your dreams, why not spend a little time figuring out what’s distracting you. What’s at least one thing you can let go of so that you can spend more time doing what you love or more time working on what you want to create — sooner than later!

In this Personal Evolution Practice (PEP), I will show you how to determine:

1. What’s most important to you (e.g. a project, goal, or creative endeavour);
2. Identify the work and personal projects you’re currently invested in;
3. The 4 questions to ask of each project to determine its value and importance in your life, and;
4. How to create a working boundary to protect what’s most important in your life.

Read the article, where you can also watch the video: 4 Questions to Help You Let Go Of What's Holding You Back.

And download the free PDF worksheet here: https://pages.darrenstehle.com/4-questions

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It is only the ego that, needing to be right and recognized, holds on to resentment.

If you continue to hold on to the past, clinging to a past narrative, however painful — one that you play over and over, embellishing, re-living, and re-creating — you are choosing to stay back, one foot firmly rooted in a past event you cannot change.

Read the article for today's Personal Evolution Practice:

"Self-Forgiveness is the Bridge over the Chasm of Resentment."

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The intention of my coaching philosophy is to help you create more of what you want to experience out of life through the self-mastery of your mind and emotions.

The coaching practices and thought-exercises that I teach are an intersection of self-examination, the neuroscience of transformational coaching — as well as my study and contemplation of the Tao Te Ching which supports the foundation for my evolving Human-Heartedness Leadership Philosophy.

“When you freely love who you are, you can freely create the life you want.”

Those words are my personal mission statement. What I do, I have been doing all my life: Learning how to fully love and accept myself by coming out of gay shame and letting go of rigidly held defences and expectations.

When we — individually and collectively — love and accept ourselves for who we are, we increase mutual understanding and respect for the dignity of others, thus creating joy and wonder in the diversity of humanity. It is from this place of human-heartedness that you can be the meaningful and purposeful change you want to see in the world.

What insight did you take from today’s episode and how will you act on it? How will you cultivate more acceptance, connection, and joy in humanity? Connect with me in the comments or send me a direct message: https://darrenstehle.com/contact/

Here's the link to the episode I mentioned: “Is Forgiveness of Homophobia a Gay Male Gift?”

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My personal manifesto is a set of truthful statements. They are not affirmations, they are not my purpose, nor are they future-based outcomes. They are statements of facts that I see demonstrated in my daily actions. The statements are not about trying to reach perfection or making goal-based proclamations. Instead, this is about speaking my truth into reality and in the present moment.

For example, when I say that I’m a calm person that is true, but also, sometimes I’m not. For my well-being and for how I create myself every day, I realize that if I’m not calm that only means that I am not paying attention. Perhaps I have fallen off track, become distracted, or I’m not doing something that is an active and necessary element of my manifesto — perhaps I haven’t been taking care of my health — that has resulted in me not feeling calm.

We are what we are conscious of.

Listen to today’s episode to hear me share my personal manifesto and how I use it to create freedom, prediction, and direction in my life. 

After you've listened to this episode, connect with me. Let me know what was most meaningful to you and how you'll act on it. https://darrenstehle.com/contact/

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What you believe you know can be questioned.

What you are certain you know may be a mistake; a fault of logic.

Even what you think you know may be challenged with new information, a clearer perspective, a better understanding.

Knowing that you are right is arrogance.

Thinking that you know what you know with absolute certainty is based on the egotistical fear of being wrong, not smart enough, or unwilling to challenge your thinking.

When you know that you do not know, and when you know that you are ignorant, you accept with humility the clarity that comes from detachment.

Holding on to an idea or a way of thinking because it's what you have always done does not make it right or valid.

Being attached to an idea because it is something you were taught to believe displays blindness for having never asked why you hold that belief to be true.

When you recognize that knowledge is based on asking questions and fluid viewpoints, you allow for the self-awareness of ignorance — therefore, you do not assume you are correct.

If you are the cause of a problem or at fault for your way of thinking — when you know that you do not know — you have the integrity to self-correct and rectify the situation.

Thus, knowledge is not power. 

“Not-knowing is true knowledge.”

Knowing that you do not know is power and freedom.

How did today's episode challenge your thinking?

Leave me a comment on the article here:

"Know That You Do Not Know."

Or send me a message on my website: https://darrenstehle.com/contact.

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Expectations are artificial projections onto the external world about something we want to force into being - either unrealistic expectations of ourselves or limitations we attempt to umbrella over others.

Expecting something to happen or someone to do something is out of alignment and discordant with the natural order. To say this differently, just because you wish it were so, doesn't mean you have magical powers to manifest your expectation.

Listen to today's episode to get the antidote to expectations.

You can read the full article on the Ascent here:

"How Expectations Limit Creativity and Personal Liberation."

I'd love to know what you thought or how you felt. Send me a message: https://darrenstehle.com/contact.

https://darrenstehle.com/newsletter

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A few weeks ago I received a comment on one of my most-read articles, “From Sissy Boys to Straight-Acting Gay Men.” The person shared the following:

“I don’t agree with the premise of this article that gay men have to learn to forgive themselves. The act of self-forgiveness is often promoted as a panacea for life’s ills, in this case, self-shaming as a gay man. Self-forgiveness suggests that some wrong has been perpetrated (by me).”

His message was well-intentioned, and I suggested that there is a subtlety in the understanding of what I meant with respect to “forgiveness”.

Read the show notes here:

Do Gay Men Need to Forgive Themselves for Gay Shame?

Did this episode inspire you in some way? 

I'd love to know what you thought or how you felt. Send me a message here: https://darrenstehle.com/contact.

Get weekly updates from me to cultivate more acceptance, connection, and joy in your life: https://darrenstehle.com/newsletter

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To argue that “religious freedom should outweigh LGBTQ rights” is a denial of the existential freedoms of LGBTQ people, which is also a slippery slope to denying freedoms to other “marginalized” peoples.

📖 Read the post here: "There Is a Profound Difference Between Human Rights and Religious Beliefs."

Did this episode inspire you in some way? 

I'd love to know what you thought or how you felt. What did you practice and what was the result? Send me a message at https://darrenstehle.com/contact

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If you want to liberate and experience your most authentic self, you will have to risk leaning into fully expressing your uniqueness, your difference, and your quirkinesses.

📖 Read the post here: "Risk Being Who You Already Are."

I'd love to know what you thought or how you felt. What did you practice and what was the result? Send me a message at https://darrenstehle.com/contact

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.