Category Archives: Chuck’s Blog

Welcome to Chuck’s Place! This is where Chuck Ketchel, LCSW-R, expresses his thoughts, insights, and experiences! Currently, Chuck posts an essay once a week, currently on Tuesdays, along the lines of inner work, psychotherapy, Jungian thought and analysis, shamanism, alchemy, politics, or any theme that makes itself known to him as the most important topic of the week. Many of the shamanic and psychological terms used in Chuck’s essays are defined in Tools & Definitions on our Psychotherapy page.

Chuck's Blog

Chuck’s Place: Finding The Jewel In The Futility Of Now

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Rising of the Jewel…
-Artwork © 2026 Jan Ketchel

Our current world predicament gives rise to thoughts of pointlessness and uselessness, the very definition of futility. These thoughts activate feelings of powerlessness, defeat and depression, simply a state of generalized being that says, “What’s the use?”

Astrologically, futility is represented by the Moon in Aquarius. The moon is purely feminine. It represents the subconscious mind. I have written extensively on the divine power of the subconscious mind, that which brings to life, or manifests, all the conditions of our material world based upon the words and suggestions that impress themselves upon it.

However, the subconscious mind also keeps the score. Although it never challenges the suggestions it receives, it is bound to maintain the balance of the universe. Just as the moon never deviates in its phases, as the tides rise and fall in perfect order, so balance in nature also insists upon being restored. The subconscious mind both grants our wishes but must ultimately play out the effects of those intentions, thus the subconscious mind is also the keeper and completer of karma.

The cosmic season of Kali Yuga that we are now in is the ultimate release of the karma of all that has been suppressed for centuries. That which has been repressed to achieve civilization, with all its discontents, is now being pervasively and perversely unleashed upon our current world. This is a cosmic cleansing in the wickedest and raunchiest of forms.

It is abundantly clear to me that the unlived karma of WWII, and its outcomes, is fervently being unleashed upon the greater world. Retribution, entitlement and tribalism are shattering the agreed upon boundaries of civilization, be they boundaries of state or boundaries of civilized discourse, and, most basically, the fundamental right to life.

The subconscious mind is also the warehouse of deep habit and entrenched belief. The current wave of destruction has been particularly focused upon the most prestigious universities and the laws of science itself.

For example, previously unquestioned agreement upon medical diagnosis and treatments is now being seriously questioned, or simply eliminated. Opinion has largely replaced fact, yet consideration of perspectives previously forbidden have been opened for consideration.

The current breakdown of world order is thus a confluence of factors that include the breakthrough of collectively suppressed emotions, the payment of karmic debts, and the destruction of the previously governing constructs of reason and reality.  We are in the midst of a cosmic menstruation that is clearing out the old with unbridled ferocity.

The jewel of this universal cleansing is in the ultimate rising of Aquarius, like a phoenix from the ashes of now. As an astrological sign that defies convention, Aquarius promises a new breed of detached objectivity that is dedicated to the greater good. This is a zeitgeist that issues from truth and wisdom, above and beyond the errors of prejudice and self-interest. This is reality built upon fact and true need versus bullied opinion and greed.

The Aquarian ego, with its dedication to truth and wisdom, advances beyond the rigid fixation upon self-importance, the ruling dominant of our time. Rather than seek fame, fortune, and unlimited attention as its central goal for manifestation in life, it trusts the energy of the intent for the greater good as its chief source of influence. When the teacher is ready, the student will come; no need to hire an influencer.

The Aquarian ego deepens its relationship with energetic reality, where abundance and unlimited supply exist to manifest all things. The Aquarian ego, in alignment with serving the Higher Self, utilizes its divine power of suggestion, in consort with the subconscious mind, to serve the greater good of all. The effect, or karma, of such an intent is positive karma that continuously renews itself to fulfill the world’s deepest and truest needs.

The jewel, for us all in this time of futility, is in the encounter with our own most deeply held beliefs and secrets, which have overshadowed the truth and caused us to manifest errors in our lives. With the fuller knowing of our true selves we are released from the false beliefs that have defined and constricted our lives, and we are able to move into greater alignment with the truth of our Higher Selves.

The energy of the moon provides us with the truth and effects of our hidden selves, as Aquarius rises to lead us in this greater truth. Futility is actually the energy of Spirit working its way into manifesting this greater New Age. Futility rarifies the jewel.

Keep your knowing focused on the greater truth of now.

Refining the diamond in the rough,
Chuck

Chuck's Blog

Chuck’s Place: Simple Guidance For Now From A Personal Experience

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Emanations from the Mount…
-Artwork © 2026 Jan Ketchel

I had the great good fortune to attend a heart centered retreat this past weekend at the Monroe Institute’s Robert’s Mountain Retreat, located on a mountaintop, in the former home of Robert Monroe.

The Monroe Institute employs the use of sound technology to facilitate participants reaching brainwave states that open them to experiences of non-ordinary reality, where they may gain clarity, guidance and connection, as well as an ability to journey safely in transpersonal levels of being, beyond the physical body.

Participants are sequestered much of the time in private units, where light is blacked out and they are freed to comfortably lie on their beds, listening through headphones while they take in sounds of different frequencies, often combined with music and verbal guidance and suggestions.

In between exercises, participants gather as a greater group where people may share their experiences. I liken this group component to a shared lucid dream and am amazed to see people’s individual experiences truly become components of a greater separate reality.

To support the sanctity of both individual and group experiences, outside contact is discouraged during programs. However, the nature of my work, as a member of a helping profession, does require that I occasionally open to the outside world during  a program.

Here is guidance I personally received this weekend:

Listen to your dreams: In a dream on the first night of the program, I  found myself, at night, on the shore, near a tenement complex of the Bronx, in New York City. I was interacting with a very elderly woman, who lived in a cottage by the water. She shared intimate information with me. Later, when others came, I freely shared her stories. She, in turn, acted as if she were in deep dementia and had never had a conversation with me at all, casting a huge shadow over the validity of what I said.

I awoke from this dream on Saturday morning to the news of the attacks on Iran. A pervasive sadness overtook me and I was moved to tears. It’s not so much that I was surprised but that I was struck with the deep knowing that the inevitable was unfolding.

I encountered our group facilitator early that morning and shared the news of this outside energy. She suggested holding that energy within and that our process during our program on the mountain might be helpful to the greater world. Her guidance touched, for me, on two principals: containment and the holographic universe.

Containment: In retrospect, my dream had already highlighted the necessity of not sharing outside information at this stage. Of what value would it be to excite the energy of others with the outside information I had received? I was already infected with the impact of knowing and the consequence of deep sadness. What was necessary was a genuine transformation that required a sealed container to achieve.

Water doesn’t boil if you keep lifting the lid. Cakes don’t rise if you keep opening the oven door. Chicks aren’t born if mother hen doesn’t stay put. This is alchemy. Seal the container, let the heat rise, let new life come forth.

Holographic Universe: Michael Talbot’s classic book explores this deeply. When you shine a light on the minutest part of a hologram the entire hologram appears. This metaphor speaks to the human condition: shine a light deep enough on any one of us and the whole of humanity—all of its parts—will be found. We, at a certain level, are all one. Therefore, change the self and that change becomes part of the whole.

Our group facilitator suggested just that: contain the energy, allow for a transformative process that will impact the whole.

Coexist: In the first exercise we did on Saturday morning, we were taken to different levels of consciousness. As I travelled, the intensity of my sadness magnified, until my consciousness was so far beyond my sleeping physical body that I reached a transcendent perspective and landed at peace. The sadness was present, but I achieved being at peace with being sad.

All that is must be loved: This guidance arrived immediately around a question of opening the heart. The heart can’t open if we maintain walls of hate. The heart can’t open if we dissociate. That which is kept separate won’t allow us to love our wholeness.

Love your neighbor as yourself: This goes beyond accepting your disowned projected shadow. This is loving exactly what is, without changing it, without giving it excuses; this is the only way to truly know it.

Sympathy: In one exercise, my consciousness noticed my heart racing, to the point of possible concern. However, I noticed that I was not a participant, that my heart was, of its own choosing, taking the ride of a frequency it had picked up on. I chose not to interfere.

My current mentor, P. P. Quimby, was a 19th-century healer who would sit with a patient and allow his body to feel the exact feeling his patient felt. He called this “being in sympathy”, or same feeling, with his patient. Having the feeling, he then knew the cause, or mental belief, that was made manifest in the physical complaint. If the patient could then take in the truth of their error the physical condition often disappeared.

As my consciousness relaxed with my heart’s sympathetic journey—I believe, with the current outside energy of the world—I came to peace. It is abundantly clear that many errors are manifesting current destruction, but I do know, at a deeper level, that we are in the cosmic season of Kali Yuga, the grand destruction that clears the way for new life, the rising of the Age of Aquarius. This deeper truth transforms the sadness into calm anticipation.

Anchor: In an exercise designed to shift one, on a dime, to heart-centered love and calm, the guidance came to me to use every disturbing thought as an immediate trigger to return to the calm of the heart. This paired association, or neural pathway, is deepened every time we make the shift, sometimes several times a minute!

As our weekend retreat ended, and the messages I received continue to resonate, I express deep gratitude to the Monroe Institute for preserving the core of Robert Monroe’s gifts for journeyers like myself, for his gifts still have relevance today. And I also express deep gratitude for the Monroe Institute’s continued evolving of those gifts, as they take their own journeys with Monroe Sound Science.

My personal and collective journey this past weekend greatly aided my internal process and enabled the simple guidance that I offer in this blog.

With Gratitude for all the gifts we are given,
Chuck

Chuck's Blog

Chuck’s Place: The High Self’s Relationship With The Subconscious Mind

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Suggestion from the High Self…
-Artwork © 2026 Jan Ketchel

Our Eternal Spirit, in living a human life, which requires a beginning and an end to life, divides itself into a trinity of High Self, subconscious mind, and ego. High Self and subconscious mind maintain their divine identity during our sojourn in human form, while ego is solely identified with a mortal life in a physical body.

Since High Self retains its Spirit identity, it remains always present and observant, but largely dormant in daily life, unless solicited or drawn into action at some critical juncture in ego’s human life.

The subconscious mind, however, maintains its divine identity through its ability to make manifest in physical form any suggestions impressed upon it. It also exercises complete control over the maintenance of the human body, as well as retaining access to all human history, knowledge, and divine intelligence.

Before birth in physical form, one’s Spirit selects the issue or challenge the ego will be born with, for the purpose of deep exploration and resolution—that which will become experienced as the core issue, or purpose, of the ego’s human life.

The intent of this life challenge is, ultimately, for Spirit to grow through the knowledge and maturity gained by ego living out its human life and tackling its core purpose.

Before birth, ego agrees to this mission and consents to enter a human life with amnesia of this contract and its true immortal Spirit identity. Ego is then born through its human parents, with a blank slate consciousness, unaware of its true spiritual heritage and purpose, fully primed to adopt to life in mortal human form.

Much has been written about ego’s relationship with its subconscious mind, where ego unknowingly exercises its divine prerogative. With growing awareness, ego learns more about its innate ability to direct the power of suggestion to its subconscious mind, as it takes increasing conscious command of manifesting the life it intends.

Throughout ego’s earthly exploits the divine subconscious allows itself to be used to manifest ego’s suggestions, even if they are detrimental to the human life it is living. The subconscious does not judge motives, nor does it moralize; it simply exercises its divine ability to manifest the suggestions impressed upon it.

The design here is for ego to grow through the direct experience of the effects or outcomes of its choices and actions. Divinity does not punish; it grants ego its wishes and gives it the full experience of the outcomes of its beliefs, desires, and actions. Ego is fully responsible for its own growth.

Spirit, as High Self, is fully present. However, it remains quite passive, leaving ego to tackle its core issues on its own. However, if directly solicited by ego, High Self may give the subconscious mind the suggestion to manifest an outcome in support of ego on its journey.

This is illustrated in AA, where the first step is for the alcoholic to acknowledge powerlessness over the compulsion to drink alcohol. The second step is to acknowledge a power greater than ego, a Higher Self. The third step is for ego to ask High Self to exercise its power to lift one’s compulsion to drink. An alcoholic in recovery often experiences success at this third request, as the High Self suggests to the subconscious mind, who has total control over the body, to lift the compulsion to drink.

Many people who experience a near death experience (NDE) report that they are given the choice to return to life on Earth or to die in human form and continue their journey in infinity. However, sometimes ego is denied this choice, as High Self insists one return to life in the physical body. High Self, in this instance, is insisting that ego dig in deeper to its mission, its contract for the life it is in.

Jan shares this experience:

“It was 1989. I was with my former husband and my 6-month-old son, driving along a major highway in Nashville, Tennessee. My son was fussy and I kept turning around to comfort him. We were heading to a mall. There were two exit options. We had decided we would take the second exit, as it would bring us slightly closer to our destination. As I turned to my son, reaching back with my left arm, I was aware of the large blue cab of a tractor trailer bearing down on us, coming closer and closer. I sensed that my infant son could also feel the energy of this large blue force, as I could not console him. All of a sudden the atmosphere in our small compact car got very quiet, my son stopped screaming, everything seemed to slow down and we glided effortlessly off the highway onto the first exit, the one we had decided not to take. “Why did you turn off here?” I asked my husband. “I don’t know,” he said. “I just did.” Within seconds there was an accident. The large blue truck that had been behind us smashed into a van that had been in front of us, killing most of the occupants, including several children. Our small car would have been crushed like an accordion, our little family gone in an instant. We had sensed our car being driven off the road by some other, higher, intelligence that knew what was coming. It was not our time.”

Once again, we have an example of High Self intervening, instructing the subconscious mind to take physical control and exit the highway. From the vantage point of now, it is obvious that the High Self was determined to preserve Jan’s life to complete a recapitulation, or soul retrieval, of her early life of sexual abuse, the core issue of her life.

High Self is that portion of our Spirit that can be called upon for guidance as we journey through this life. It might respond via direct communication in vision, dream, or channeling. It might also suggest directly to the subconscious mind a path of events synchronistically arranged to communicate its guidance.

Be empowered to seek guidance and support from High Self and subconscious mind. Trust that High Self will protect your ability to complete your mission in this life, or continue it beyond this life, if it is the right time to leave.

With Gratitude to High Self,
Chuck

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Chuck’s Place: Being In The Abundance Of Total Love

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The Abundance of Loving it All…
-Artwork © 2026 Jan Ketchel

The term scapegoat had its literal origin in instructions outlined in the Old Testament for a practice on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement (Leviticus 16:8-10). An actual goat was chosen for practitioners to, literally, project their sins upon that would then carry those sins away from the community as it was sent off into the wilderness.

The relief afforded by this ancient ritual, of assigning the weight of one’s committed sins to another to carry, was defined in modern times by Sigmund Freud, as the ego’s defense of projection.

The action of this defense is the ego protecting itself from the negative judgment of its conscience (superego), for wrongful thoughts and actions, that would otherwise result in the consequences of shame and punishment. Thus, in scapegoating or projection, an innocent person is blamed for the very actions and thoughts one seeks to disown.

Both Freud and Jung emphasized that projection was not a conscious choice, it happened unconsciously and automatically. Jung went on to broaden the function of projection beyond a psychological defense only. He identified that the unconscious mind reveals its fuller self to the conscious mind by projecting its contents, or complexes, like through a movie projector, upon the outer screen of our daily lives, replete with all its characters and dramas.

Through its projections upon other people in daily life, that snare us in emotional reactions and entanglements, the unconscious mind communicates with us by drawing our attention to people who mirror our own hidden selves.

Our conscious ego is then offered the opportunity to individuate, that is, to welcome home its unknown and disowned parts. This requires extreme moral courage while we face and reconcile with our shadow, or unknown self.

A more advanced technology than scapegoating, to redeem our sinful selves, has been attributed to Moses in Leviticus (9:18), via the commandment, to “Love your neighbor as yourself.” This exact guidance was reaffirmed and highlighted centuries later by Jesus Christ, to “Love your neighbor as yourself”, as a core ethic of his teachings.  (Matthew 22:36-40).

The wisdom of this biblical injunction, to love your neighbor as yourself, is in its practicality and scope of healing potential. This is a technology of true love.

In order to love our neighbor we must retrieve and love our disowned, or unknown selves, completely, particularly the parts of our projected shadow that we loathe and have scapegoated in our projections onto our neighbors. No scriptural exceptions are made to this commandment. All neighbors, and consequently all parts of the self, must be loved.

The refusal to love and assume responsibility for the true self, with all its flaws and prejudices, results in the living of a false self, which creates illusion and dysfunction, both within and without. As psychosomatic medicine reveals, very often our physical ailments reflect the soul mirroring to ego consciousness the error of its judgments.

A physical ailment may reflect the unconscious mind using the physical body as its projective screen. For instance, digestive problems might be the unconscious mind symbolically communicating to the ego the ego’s refusal to accept a truth, as mirrored in the physical body being unable to properly digest food. In this case, acquiescing to the truth at the mental level might resolve the physical symptoms. Love of truth promotes physical vitality.

The shamans of ancient Mexico discovered that the wear and tear of living our illusions causes our vital energy to be dispersed to the periphery of our physical beings, compromising the efficiency of our vital energy centers, or what the Hindus call chakras.

Some of these illusions are traumas, stored in the body, whose life experiences have yet to be individuated into our wholeness. To access the abundance of our fullest potential, we must fully accept and love every aspect of our selves, including our entire lived life experiences.

If we scapegoat any life experience, or anyone in that life experience, we are a fragmented, divided wholeness. We must love it all, unconditionally, no exceptions.

Gay Hendricks, in his classic book, Learning To Love Yourself, taught the practice of declaring love for every challenging or disagreeable part of the self, as it emerges. For example: “I love the part of me that feels hate. I love the part of me that objects to me admitting it feels hate. I love the part of me that hates that I hate. I love the part that judges me harshly…” With love comes acceptance. With acceptance comes abundance.

Out of sheer love, Carlos Castaneda gifted the world the fruits of his shamanic lineage before he closed the door and ended that lineage. One of those gifts was the magical pass of recapitulation, where one fully restores one’s energetic wholeness through reliving, and ultimately fully loving, every aspect of oneself and one’s life. This is being in the abundance of total love.

Love is the energetic vibration that opens us to the experience of our oneness with everything, the ultimate abundance. From this place of wholeness we are best positioned to suggest to our subconscious mind to manifest outwardly our heart’s desire.  As within, so without.

All is one,
Chuck

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Chuck’s Place: Honing A Relationship With Your Supreme Being

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The Two and the One…
-Artwork © 2026 Jan Ketchel

Carl Jung posited that human beings have an innate religious instinct, as distinct and powerful as the instincts of hunger or sex. This religious  instinct drives us to experience transcendent existence beyond the limits of human form.

At different epochs in human history the religious instinct has manifested as both wrathful or loving supreme beings, whom human beings have felt accountable to and sought support from.

With the rise of logic in the modern mind, the rational mind, for many, has become the current tenant of the religious instinct. Heaven, for the rational mind, is creation in the material world, its one and only true world.

Our current breakdown of civilization is actually a war on the god of rationality, as the power of the irrational breaks down the former dominance and felt stranglehold of the rational mind. We are actually experiencing the supreme power of just one person, one mind, manifesting an irrational, whole new world.

What is being mirrored for humanity, in this example, is the religious instinct being embodied as the supreme being within the human psyche rather than being projected outward onto some separate, invisible supreme being. Though this, of course, raises clinical concern around the consequences of a supreme ego inflation, let us not throw the baby out with the bathwater.

This caricature of the supreme human being, graphically projected upon the current world screen, also reveals the structure and potential impact of the human mind. The human psyche has a resident divine being within, in the person of its subconscious mind. The subconscious mind has the power to heal body and soul, as well as attract to it and manifest  suggestions that impress it deeply.

The subconscious has the power, as mimicked by AI, to search all of human history, and beyond, in an instant. The subconscious mind is non-local, capable of remote viewing the past, present, and future . All things are present in the subconscious self; it is one with everything. This is Omnipresence.

The interesting thing about the subconscious mind is that it puts itself completely at the beck and call of suggestion, particularly from the conscious mind in the form of its beliefs, thoughts, and intentions. The subconscious does not question the morality of the wishes presented to it. It manifests good as well as bad, self-serving impulses as well as magnanimous intentions.

The only check upon the power of the conscious mind to get what it wants from the subconscious mind is the law of cause and effect. The subconscious mind, for instance, cannot erase the impact upon the body and mind of the action of one choosing to minimally sleep. Eventually, a psychotic process will threaten the perception, judgment, and functioning of a conscious mind that refuses to sleep.

The subconscious mind appears to be a god that will grant us all our wishes, without judgment, leaving us to grow by having us experience the full impact of our suggestions. Thus, the impact of the disruptions to our current world order, as driven by the subconscious effects of one person, sows the seeds of its own destruction. What goes up will come down.

Many people are frustrated with the challenge of influencing the subconscious mind to manifest their intent. Actually, in many cases this reflects powerful beliefs, often unknown to consciousness, but deeply embedded in the subconscious mind that nullify the effect of one’s conscious intent.

In this case, the subconscious mind is manifesting the more powerful suggestion it is receiving or has received in the past. If, for instance, I want to feel attractive but have always hated my body, the suggestion of longstanding hate is the more likely to be manifested.

Our world leader demonstrates par excellence the rote method to have suggestions reach the subconscious mind. The incessant repetition of the same suggestions, accompanied by powerful emotions, will ultimately attract the attention and action of the subconscious mind. Word and emotion impress, perseverance furthers.

To counter the potential negative consequences of suggestions, it is wise to restrict one’s suggestions to the intent of the greater good for self and all. The subconscious mind, like all relationships, is highly receptive to positive emotions, like gratitude and genuine love.

Make it a practice to express gratitude often to the subconscious for the experiences of its responsiveness to a request. This can be as simple as having a name or word pop into your mind that you have asked to remember: Thank You Subconscious Mind!

As our world leader models, confidence that one’s suggestions will manifest is a critical quality in attracting the attention of the subconscious mind. Many feel a lack of confidence in their ability to impress the subconscious, particularly as they feel they are not seeing their suggestions manifest.

The gratitude practice for small requests being responded to will accrue to a growing confidence as the more rational side of the mind sees results. This will begin to bring genuine and greater confidence to such requests.

The 12-Step program wisdom, to “let go and let God” is particularly apropos in strengthening one’s relationship to the divine intelligence in the subconscious mind. The challenge for the conscious mind is to ask for what is truly right, then trust its divine partner to bring it to physical life as it knows best. No attachment to the outcome.

The human mind is one of a divine relationship between the conscious and subconscious minds, the two made whole. The current world is discovering this inner manifestation of its religious instinct. What now remains to be achieved is a loving relationship between these two sides of supreme being that responsibly exercises its divine power for the greater  good of self and all.

Wondrous are the works of the infinite intelligence within,
Chuck

*** By the way: Just wanted to let everyone know that we have added a New Sidebar Feature: 365 Days of Drawing Meditation, just below the “Add Riverwalker to your phone” feature.

We thought we would share the drawings Jan has made so far to meet her 2026 New Year Challenge of drawing one drawing a day, with a wooden stick, in small scratchboard pads. Originally, we gave the scratchboard pads as Halloween treats and Jan soon began drawing in the leftovers. She loved it and has not stopped since! In fact, most of the drawings she has now been doing to illustrate our posts are done on the same scratchboard pads. Her New Year’s intention is to keep drawing, one a day, while meditating. So check back often to see how it’s going!

Here’s a link to the sidebar.