Welcome to Insights and Implications!
2020 has been quite a year! Though the year has brought illness and tragedy to many lives, there have also been countless moments of human kindness. And if we didn’t already know it, the pandemic illustrated, in the words of John Muir, we are “hitched to everything else in the Universe.” Our Insight Principles team wanted to take a moment to share with you, in our own words, lessons learned (or reinforced) during this challenging year.
Wishing you a Happy and Healthy 2021!
2020 Reflections
From Robin Charbit
My prevailing and deepening realization this year has been about the magnificent intelligence behind life. Seeing this intelligence allows you to look at the events of 2020 in a different way. For example, the virus has shown us that independent of wealth, class, religion, education or where you live (!), we are vulnerable if we don’t act together.
Likewise, the political theatre in the US has illustrated our need to realize that we all live in separate realities. As social media reinforces our personal worldview, it is easy to see other people’s realities as wrong. Hopefully, by realizing this, we can change how we live with each other and what we view and favor as important.
Lastly, at a more individual level, we have seen so many people use their understanding of the mind to stay more balanced and deal with things in a more effective way. We’ve even had clients tell us the year has allowed them to have valuable and in some cases, life-changing insights. Life truly is an “insight-out” endeavor!
From Sandy Krot
Connection is the word that comes to my mind as I reflect on 2020. Seems odd given this year of social distancing.
The complete quote from John Muir is, “When we try to pluck anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.” I love this quote and find it easy to observe in nature where diversity and interdependence are not at odds. Among us humans though, our ideological, religious, and political differences can breed conflict and separation. The Covid 19 virus hitched us back together.
The pandemic spared no one in my home state of Washington or in the US. My colleagues and clients in South America, Europe, Asia, and even Africa were affected. Suddenly the planet seemed smaller. We truly were all in this together.
When a connection to another human being is felt, a unity can happen. Compassion often follows. I have observed this pattern countless times during this year. My hope is that it sticks and that we remember we are more the same than we are different. There is a universal wisdom built into all of us. Let’s use it and make 2021 a better year.
From Robin Taffin
I was reflecting back on this past year, thinking about my insights and transformations, and I remembered a question I saw in the middle of all this confusion:
If you could go back to the beginning of the year and erase everything that happened, the bad AND the good, would you want to?
I can only speak for myself, but the answer would be a resounding NO.
Although I have had many shortcomings this year and could complain about a bunch of them, I never found myself doing that. The main reason for this lies in my understanding of how our minds and life work.
Two insights I would like to share that have been clearly evidenced this year are: 1) We have no way to predict the future – a point the pandemic has clearly made, and 2) The intelligence that runs through us helps us adapt to any circumstance. Though we may have suffered, felt insecure, at a loss, depressive even, we still made it through and are completely capable of taking on whatever may come with ease and grace.
From Ken Manning
Of the many insights and revelations that stand out for me in this extraordinary year, the one that resonates the most is the continuing and deepening realization of the way our divine intelligence manifests. When I stop all the doing and quiet the internal noise, I find myself peaceful, balanced, and strong. Then wisdom and joy bubble up from within, no matter what may be going on around me. The more I have seen this living process from within, the more resilient and happy I find myself – reliably and sustainably.
We are blessed to have come across the understanding of the principles (thank you, Syd Banks, for having illuminated this for us) and to be able to share its benefits with so many others. We have shared it with people all over the world who have had COVID, who have lost loved ones, who have lost jobs, who have had to fire their friends, and/or who are simply suffering from a lot of unhelpful thinking.
One client stands out in particular. While moving his family to another country, he was suffering considerably from his thinking about the change. It was so helpful for him to see that even though the situation was painful in many ways, the worst was the unnecessary suffering he was creating with his own mind. When he could see that and allow it to subside, the pain was still there, but the suffering was gone. He was able to get quiet, and the peace, balance, strength, wisdom, and joy began to flow again, which, in turn, allowed him to help his family members find their own and avoid the same fate.
What a blessing to consciously know that grace works its way into us regardless of our circumstances.
I feel blessed to have the time this year to look more and more in this direction.
We all wish you the same for this holiday season and for 2021 and years to come.
From Cheryl Bond
What I love most about the Insight Principles work is that there is no Mastery level. No matter how long you’ve been sharing the understanding with others (for me it’s over 20 years), there is always more to see for yourself. It’s doubly fun because whenever I see something new, I get excited to share it with my clients.
Like everyone else, I spent a lot of time alone this year, so it makes sense that my biggest insights had to do with me.
I deeply and absolutely saw that everything I think about myself and everything I think about other people is made up. It’s all thought. It’s all up for grabs all the time. Previous to this year, I hadn’t seen this for myself with such certainty. I was living with an image of my own creation that looked so real…and had been with me for so long. How could it be anything but true? It wasn’t.
The implications of this insight go far beyond my own perspective. It gave me great hope to know that everyone has the potential to go beyond what they think they know about themselves and others. These truths we’ve told ourselves for years are only held in place by our lack of understanding. If we can just stay curious and open, who knows what will turn up to help us?
From Nikki Platte Nieves
2020, you’re a rascal, but thanks for all the lessons, and thanks especially for the hope.
This year, I was lucky enough to catch another glimpse of the limitless potential for beautiful feelings and insight that lives within all human beings, no matter how long we’ve been thinking ourselves away from it, no matter how bleak or troubling our circumstances, no matter how dark or fast or stressed or heavy or [insert your flavor of choice] our thoughts have been.
The miracle of insight remains a mystery to me (like really: where does it come from??), but the mere fact that it’s possible is just plain ol’ comforting. As I personally saw this year, even if the lights have been off for a while, the switch still exists. The electricity behind the scenes – which might be compared to universal intelligence/wisdom/God/whatever you want to call it – is just waiting for its opportunity to flood our filaments with light. It might be set to dim and slowly come back to bright, or it might get flipped in an instant. Either way, it only takes a moment of quiet – just a glimmer of insight – to connect to the deeper truth, the deeper wisdom, the deeper feeling, the deeper something that I can’t quite explain but can somehow intuit.
This something is powering everything. When we’re lucky enough to let it flow, it will light our way. And goodness, does that flow feel good.
I hope 2021 uncovers as much of this light and love as possible, for all of us. It’s in there. It’s waiting. We can do this.
From Julia Rebholz
What has stood out to me most this year is how amazing human beings are!
2020 provided plenty of opportunity for us to realize this over and over again. I remember speaking to people at the beginning of the pandemic and hearing myself say things like, “Well, I should be in Paris or my son should be in school.” Clients would share how they should have more revenue or how this or that would or could have happened.. .
All of that reaction of “should”, “would”, “could” was getting in all of our way of realising a beautiful fact when we are not caught up in the illusion of what our minds create, we are truly free to be with “what is” and access the deep intelligence powering the system. This amazing intelligence has been hard at work this last year as we have adapted the way we live, connect and work in small and profound ways.
When we stop long enough to notice that we are built for adaptation and insight – which is extraordinary and ordinary at the same time – we can truly be peaceful with any situation, person or object.
I hope that we all realise and uncover this peace within us – it’s the default setting of the human system.
From Kim Sturgis
2020 has taught me deep lessons in patience and gratitude. It has taught me to be brave, have courage and love life no matter the circumstances.
My mantra 15 years ago when pregnant with my daughter was “I am strong, she is strong, we are strong”. This has helped me again this year and the belief I have everything I need inside of me…
May 2021 be the beginning of everything you want!