Think Queerly

Jeffry J. Iovannone joins me on this week’s episode for an expanded discussion about his latest article titled, “Madeline Davis’s Queer History of Buffalo.”

Read the complete show notes here: 

"We Have a Past, But Not a History." The Various Dimensions of LGBTQ History, Leadership, and Community."

P.S.

What happens when we do things together? I'm excited to announce a new program, the "Queer Creators’ Guided Mastermind Group." The mastermind offers support and guidance to four queer-identified creators to make more efficient progress than you would by working alone. 

You will bring your challenges and questions to the group to generate strategies and solutions. You will accelerate your progress and production by interacting with the other members who are each pursuing their unique, creative projects. Click here to find out if the program is a fit for your needs.

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

Today's episode of Think Queerly goes much deeper into the concepts expressed in my article, "The Path of Self-Mastery."

I discuss the concepts of mutually arising dualities and the idea of 'not forcing' as expressed in the Tao Te Ching. I explain the usefulness of water as a metaphor in the Tao to express 'being in the flow' (which is how you avoid resistance). Then, I pull everything together under 'self-mastery, which is the congruence of personal responsibility, human-heartedness, and the various paths that lead to destinations yet ultimately always come back to ourselves.

Learn more about the many ways we can work together here: DarrenStehle.com/coaching

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

One of my passions is to inspire LGBTQ+ people to connect with their creative genius and use their unique potential to make an equitable difference in the world.

That passion sparks a flame that burns bright within me, but what’s the opposite? The darkness of course, but in the context of doing inspired work, the opposite is boredom, frustration, and procrastination — the death of joy, creativity, and productivity.

Boredom results in procrastination, which is doing something meaningless to avoid taking action and facing your fears about why you are bored in the first place. This ultimately leads to frustration, the state of feeling upset and annoyed at your inability to change or accomplish something. 

To get clarity about your purpose you need to dig deep. You need to get clear about the other areas of your life that support a meaningful and fulfilling purpose. This includes things like your core emotional states, values, living environments, and your beliefs. 

⇨ What Do You Stand For and How Does that Affect Your Most Important Life Choices

If you’re feeling stuck, frustrated, unsure of your direction, or dealing with a challenging situation, I can help you get clarity and direction about one specific challenge. You will create personalized strategies that will help you solve the problem, or get unstuck and back on track. Click here to book a Coaching Office Hour with me.

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

The idea that insults, prejudicial or racist language is a form of violence is a highly problematic one that needs to be addressed.

If we change the definition of violence so that the simple use of words could be used to ruin the life of another person, we create a slippery slope with no end towards a permanently polarized world built entirely upon an "us vs. them" mortal dichotomy.

We need to maintain a clear distinction between violence and its meaning as a physical manifestation of accumulated aggression, hate, or rage as opposed to the verbal abusive or hateful use of language to demean, insult, or slander.

The former causes physical suffering or even mortal wounding as the result of a physical attack. The latter — language — can be ignored, walked away from, or internalized.

Get clarity in an area of your life where you’re feeling challenged with one of my free, Personal Evolution Processes. Download one or get them all here:

https://darrenstehle.com/personal-evolution-process-downloads

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

Your purpose can be found in your lived experience if you obverse your past through a lens of self-awareness and acceptance. 

When you live in alignment with what’s most important to you — like your values and beliefs — you will tap into the wisdom of what you already know about your own life. This will make living your purpose natural, compelling, and exciting.

If you don’t know, or if you don’t feel excited and motivated by your purpose, I can help. 

My purpose as a coach is to help human-hearted creatives cultivate their purpose and potential to experience more freedom, peace of mind, and acceptance. If you want to wake up every morning, excited to be working on what most excites you and fulfilling your purpose, let’s have a conversation.

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

Success Is Not an End-Destination, It’s a Measure of Progress

1. If you don’t accomplish a goal, does that make you unsuccessful and a failure? If your actions are too stressful, it’s human nature to fight, flee, or freeze. The solution is to do less to reduce or eliminate stress.
2. Failure and success are not dualistic. This is why people get stressed out about failing.
3. Success as a measurement is a process of acting towards an intended outcome, but failure is a moment.
4. Failure is not a process. Failure is the “nonperformance of something due.” No value judgement is required.
5. Success is a process that requires mistakes and well as missed-takes on the way to solving a problem or accomplishing a goal.
6. Success and failure are not in opposition to each other. If you don’t succeed at a goal, that doesn’t make you a failure. If you recognize that truth, you will be more successful in life.

Click here for the complete show notes.

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

We all want to be connected with others, to be cared for, and to be accepted for who we are. To different degrees, that’s what we call love.

Your beliefs about relationships affect your experience of love, compassion, and self-acceptance.

Until you clearly define your beliefs about what is true about things like dating, sex, and relationships, you won’t know if your choices and behaviours are based on scripts written and directed by someone else. You might be living the belief and values narratives of your parents, religion, or a political ideology.

Read the full article here: "As a Gay Man, What Do You Believe About Sex, Love, and Relationships?"

⇩ Download the “How to Define Your Core Beliefs About Sex, Love, and Relationships” P.E.P. Worksheet.

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

Lachlan Smith grew up in Australia before moving to the UK in his early twenties. Growing up, he was a passionate cricketer and a fan. After coming out, he gave up the sport, not seeing it as compatible with being a gay man. 

Having rediscovered his passion for the game in his late thirties, Lachlan came out at his new club and has since enjoyed his time there. However, something was missing. In 2020, at the height of the pandemic, Lachlan had the idea to set up a new LGBTQ+ cricket club in Birmingham, England. It would be only the second such club in the world.

Lachlan reached out to me for coaching in early January. He needed my help to help think through how the leadership and ethos of the club might look, issues of equity and inclusion, and what he needed to do to make it all happen.

Read the post on Medium, "A New Beginning: Birmingham Unicorns LGBTQ+ Cricket Club."

Learn more about the Birmingham Unicorns on their website and follow them on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. Read Lachlan’s writing on Medium and follow him on Twitter.

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

About two months ago, I decided to withhold Part IV of my “Where You Stand” moral philosophy article series. It was titled, “Towards a Harmonizing, Universal Morality Based in the Tao Te Ching.” It was close to 4,500 words and I had submitted it to one of the philosophy publications on Medium.

The article felt like something approaching a philosophy — or at least an approach to living with personal and moral character integral to supporting a harmonious, civic society and humanity. In the article, I finally went to great length to explain the six principles of Human Heartedness, which when practiced together become transcendent values — essentially what we would call virtue in the sense of doing good for the greater good.

Circumstances led me to pull the article from submitting, and takes some steps back to contemplate what I wanted to accomplish. This turned out to be an important and defining moment for me. I realized that I’ve been struggling with how to keep two things separate: my coaching content and this evolving universal moral philosophy based in the Tao Te Ching, that I’m calling Human-Heartedness.

These two things, however, have been overlapping in my life and in my work with my clients. What I once thought I needed to keep separate in fact work better together. And together, as the paths of coaching practices and methods intersected with Human-Heartedness, I need I had something more impactful that can really make a difference for humanity.

In a nutshell, I have taken inspiration from the Tao Te Ching about virtue and naturalism to create an evolving universal moral philosophy — something that is not rigid, nor a template. Human-heartedness is a state of personal character and self-mastery that can and will empower people to create a harmonious, loving, accepting, and more civilized world.

Coming early Summer, 2021. Click here to sign-up for details and early access.

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

Take a few, deep breaths and then get curious about why you feel that way.

Being curious isn't going to solve all your problems. However, being curious is great for your state of mind and for the humility and self-awareness that comes into play - especially when you are truly open-minded and genuinely curious to learn and improve your skillfulness.

Sharpening the saw is how you refine your skills to become more effective and efficient at cutting that block of wood. Not knowing something — your ignorance — may allow you to ask the kinds of questions no one else has ever considered. 

If you’re a deep-thinker, a creative, or if you’re struggling with how to make a difference, especially during these COVID-19 times, this session will engage your curiosity. I’m offering free exploration sessions to help you get clarity, focus, and direction that you can immediately use to enjoy more freedom, peace of mind, and impact.

☞ Click here to request an Exploration Session with Darren.

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