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 Place: Of Your Choosing But Not Of Your Choosing

The law of nature is growth…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

After Jeanne Marie Ketchel left her life, in a human body, she was amazed to discover that she was still very much a part of this world, though in a much more subtle body than the physical body she had recently shed. Following a period of rejuvenation and orientation she chose a task that was to become her new life mission.

More precisely, she describes this afterlife choice process as, “It will be of your choosing, but not of your choosing. It will be granted because it is exactly where you need to go, but it will also be where you fit perfectly.” (The Book of Us, p. 165)

No outside judge decides where we need to go, we are the ultimate judge of our lives.

“Where you need to go” is how I define karma. The underlying law of nature, both physical and spiritual, is growth. Spiritual growth progresses through lighter and lighter stages of being. We shed the denseness of physical matter upon physical death and enter our lighter energy body soul-state.

However, an individual who remains attached to their worldly possessions and physical proclivities upon death will, of necessity, enter a bardo environment that fits this state of evolution. The Buddhists define bardos as alternative worlds that reflect a soul’s state of spiritual accomplishments, high or low, offering what is necessary for continued growth, for every soul is destined to grow and evolve at their own pace.

Thus, continued life would be in a bardo of one’s choosing and yet not; it would be the only fitting place in which to evolve, hence, would be a natural next step. Souls remain in bardo states until they are ready to move on, meaning until they have grown or progressed enough to shed their attachment to the coveted activities of physical life or have completed the necessary expiation resulting from them.

The significant point here is that we are in full control of where we land based upon the choices we make and how far we spiritually evolve, in whatever world we are in. Upon changing worlds, at death, we can only go where we have prepared ourselves to go.

Karma is not punitive, it is objective. Though we might covet a highly evolved spiritual existence, we will only manifest it when we have completed the prerequisites for such an existence. Death does not automatically result in spiritual advancement, unless we have consciously worked toward it during our lifetime. Alternatively, though we may in fact be spiritually advanced during our lifetime, we may be placed in a remedial bardo to complete the necessary requirements for even greater ascension.

The same principle governs the life we are currently in: we can only advance in our careers and relationships to the extent that we have learned and prepared ourselves to advance into deeper fulfillment.

We are the ultimate judge of our lives, as we place ourselves where we need to go based on the choices we have made and the consequences of those choices. Judgment is based on full transparency—the truth. We are free to ignore the truth, but in that case we land ourselves in the bardo best fitted to allow us to accept the truth that we avoid, and to grow beyond it.

Our truest judge is the voice of our conscience, which is located in the heart center. This is the heart not of sentimentality nor romance but the heart of our morality, our deepest knowing of what is right. This voice of the heart is to be distinguished from the voice of the aberrant inner critic, the product of the conjuring mind’s incessant storytelling.

If we quiet our mind and ask our heart to speak the truth, it will calmly reveal it—no drama, just the plain truth.  The true judge—the voice of heart centered conscience—will always know and choose rightly where we must go next.

If we align our decisions and actions with the truth that we are shown, we will advance as spiritually enlightened beings.

From the heart,

Chuck

Chuck’s Place: The Heart Beats to the Intensity of Activation

Heart centeredness…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

 We live in a time that many have identified as one of quickening. The impact of such fevered evolutionary activity on the central nervous system (CNS) is quite palpable in the form of heightened anxiety and quickened escalation to panic. The heart beats to this intensity of activation. 

Underneath the energetic impact of our times is our innate temperament. The genetics which inform the inborn settings of our CNS greatly impact our innate resilience to stress. Thus, an inheritance of ancestral trauma can program our CNS to approach life with constant   vigilance. The heart beats to this intensity of activation.

In addition to inheritance is the impact of many experiences post-conception that are regulated by the subconscious mind. To assure survival and balance the subconscious might split off and store these unprocessed experiences in the body and shadow regions of the psyche. These splintered complexes form autonomous mini-psyches that occasionally are triggered and disrupt ego functioning. The heart beats to the intensity of  their activation.

Whether the source of activation be engrained habit or triggered complex is immaterial, the result manifests physically in the tempo of the beating heart. The challenge is to reset the CNS in order to find calm.

Psychopharmocology approaches this task with chemicals that both enhance or block the influence of hormones and neurotransmitters, whereby exerting regulation upon the CNS and the beating of the heart. This might be viewed as a material intervention to influence the physical body and, secondarily, the mind or spirit, which finds peace in a calmed body.

Heart centered breathing brings consciousness directly to the heart and can reset its rhythm to homogenize with the pace of the breath. Focus upon the breath also screens out activating thoughts through mindful presence with the heart center. Yogic pranayama breathing, as a regular practice, develops greater conscious control over the CNS. 

When we breathe with awareness the mind shuts off thinking. Conscious breathing is the mind exerting direct influence over the CNS. Psychotherapy offers another integrated mind body approach to CNS regulation through the processing of complexes and strengthening of control of the mind over itself.

Meditation and neurofeedback address CNS regulation at the most subtle dimension. In the stillness of inner focus one encounters the impact of complexes and habits, each vying for attention with stories and feelings, and notices their impact upon the heart. Release of attachment to these stories and feelings, while traveling deeper into the quiet dimensions of the soul, brings the CNS to utter calm. Sustained practice affords everyday life a modicum of detachment from the storm and stress of life in human form.

Finally, repetitive mantra, prayer or intention directly instructs the subconscious, the mind body center that automatically controls the CNS.

With sustained practice these programs can be altered through conscious effort. Of course, deep resetting of the CNS will take time and may require a combination of the practices outlined above.

And though the heart will always beat to the intensity of its activation, activation can be greatly transformed through mental practice. And mind you, all mental practice issues from the province of the soul. 

Soulfully,

Chuck

 

Chuck’s Place: The Journey Continues…

And the journey continues…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

Every time we change we move into a new life. This coming December 9th will mark the 20th anniversary of my wife Jeanne’s definitive departure from human life. Since then, though we remain connected in a different configuration, I have moved into a completely new life. I experience myself and the world from a very different perspective. Though I remain connected to what I once was, I have grown into a totally different person.

I would characterize my change as my soul reincarnating further into its latent potential. Even my body has reshaped itself to support my soul’s current journey. The great Hindu Guru, Sri Sivananda teaches that the physical body is actually the expression and creation of our soul. As our soul ventures into new life it shifts the body to serve that change.

Carlos Castaneda was emphatic that shamans should avoid looking into mirrors. The trap of the mirror is that it literally catches one’s self reflection. Such was the fate of Narcissus, the namesake of narcissism, who became frozen in his gaze, unable to see beyond his own physical reflection.

For shamans, the trap of self-importance is the greatest impediment to human evolution, as is mirrored in the greed apparent in our world’s energy crisis. Despite their contribution to the climate crisis, fossil fuels continue to dominate our energy demands, as we place our self-interest above the true needs of the world. Similarly, our ego’s fixation upon receiving validation of its personal importance absorbs the lion’s share of our personal store of energy, severely underfunding our evolutionary potential.

Practically speaking, the mirror can also serve to reinforce a static view of ourselves that does not allow for the possibility of change. Like the monotonous internal dialogue, the image in the mirror may be typecast to deliver the same old message, i.e., “You’ll never be good enough.”

Of course, we need mirrors to reflect to us the orderliness of our outer presentation. The shamans would suggest only cursory glances to achieve this, avoiding the judgment of sustained viewing. I am actually fascinated with the changes glimpsed in these brief glances. I ask, “Who is that being; he keeps changing!”

Don Juan Matus warned that we should pay scrupulous attention to the agreements we enter into as to who we are, consciously or unconsciously, when we fixate on socialized beliefs or frozen images in the mirror. Transpersonal psychotherapists recognize the power of heredity and archetypes to shape our physical bodies when we believe their influence to be sacrosanct and irrevocable.

Hypnotists stress the power of suggestion to manifest what we become. In fact, the subconscious mind is both the storehouse of all inherited and acquired habit but also the home of every individual’s personal genie. As the body is constructed by the intent of the soul, everyone has the latent opportunity to assume full control of who they will become. It’s all in what we believe and what we choose to tell ourselves.

Even if it be the case that our present life was chosen as expiation for choices made in past lives, we all have the free will to change the course of our development. Once we’ve squared with the reasons for our fixations we are truly freed to release them. Freeing the ego of its self-importance, its routine judgments, and its unnecessary agreements allows it to consciously direct its subconscious companion genie to manifest positive and evolutionary changes in the self.

Our world now mirrors how the power of the beliefs we attach to generate the reality we live in. We live in a virtual marketplace of suggestion, where we see dear family and friends become beings we hardly recognize. The sublime gift of such manifested polarization is absolute proof of the power of suggestion. We can choose to use it for the advancement of self and the greater good.

As don Juan Matus wisely advised, enter into no agreements you have not consciously chosen. As well, freely choose to make new conscious agreements and retire old agreements that are no longer necessary or helpful to your evolutionary Spirit. Join your personal intent with your Spirit’s intent for the ever-unfolding journey of fulfilling life.

Take humble but definite charge,

Chuck

Chuck’s Place: I Fought The Tao and The Tao Won

In the Tao…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

Sometimes a song gets into the head and keeps on playing. For me it’s generally a spirit sending a message. The other day I sang the line “I fought the law and the law won”. The tune hooked Jan as well and she found herself a little frustrated that my tune successfully suggested itself to her own subconscious with incessant replays!

Of course, as always, I searched for the synchronous relevance of the message to our lives. It came quickly that the law is the Tao, and the Tao always wins. I understand the Tao to be the underlying rules of nature that control all of life. The central rule of the Tao is the law of cause and effect: Every action will cause a reaction.

A common example of this would be karma. When we recapitulate our lives we will determine what we must do next, based upon the life we have lived. The actions of our lives are the causes that determine the reactions—where life will take us next.

Strictly speaking, everything is Tao. All actions cause reactions, thus all actions are indeed part of the Tao. Thus, even a hurtful action is part of the Tao and will be appropriately compensated for by a reaction of equal intensity. Nonetheless, the expression to be in the Tao means to respond in the best possible way, the most efficient, least line of resistance to a given situation.

Nature herself expresses the Tao at its most favorable action. The waters of a stream accumulate most patiently in a crevice, awaiting the moment of saturation for the stream to proceed upon its course. Humans are endowed with the ability to take the Tao to extremes in their decision making, losing the favorable status of being in the Tao.

Thus, if someone is aggressive and cutting, the best response might be to go inward, depersonalize the action, have compassion for the other’s state of imbalance, then calmly move on. To challenge the offender is another option, which will illicit its own reaction. Both actions are governed by the Tao, however, the former may be said to be in the Tao.

The Taoist oracle, the I Ching, teaches us the Tao of all changes, while also highlighting the best actions to take to remain in the Tao when confronted with any situation. Most mornings, before sunrise, Jan and I feed a couple of feral cats up the road. We wear headlamps to find our way in the dark. For two days in a row, as the tune “I fought the law…” moved through me, I was attacked by giant hornets along the road, apparently attracted to the light.

On the second day, as we walked Jan’s beautiful quartz labyrinth before sunrise, I was again attacked by a giant hornet that actually made me jump into another rung of the labyrinth. Mind you, we have routinely done these behaviors for weeks and never been attacked.

Suddenly, it dawned on us that autumn has arrived and that the hornets are confused and jumpy, as their end is near. We were adding to their confusion, bringing light into night, and they were reacting to this intrusion. We realized that indeed we were fighting the Tao’s law of the change of seasons, and that law had won.

The next morning we waited until sunrise to feed the cats and walk the labyrinth. We were indeed in the Tao; no attacks, just a calm, thankful meow.

Might I suggest, to the subconscious of all, another Taoist mantra for your listening pleasure:

All you need is love, love is all you need, love is all you need, love is all you need…..

Yeah, Yeah, Yeah,

Chuck

Chuck’s Place: Animal Magnetism & Human Bondage

Seek freedom from the web of human bondage…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

Jan, in a recent communication with  Jeanne, received this essential download: “You and Chuck have learned things about the relationship between the mind and the body that I had not learned while still in human form. I focused more on healing from without and not on the importance of thought and belief within. Had I known that then, my outcome may have been very different. Now, I do know that.”

This blog is dedicated to passing on what we have learned, that those seeking such guidance might profoundly change their lives and the direction of the world.

Animal magnetism is a term coined by Franz Mesmer to explain the mental influence exerted upon a body to shape it and attract to it the object of its intent. Animal has its root in the word anima, which implies a soul body that breathes, thus a sentient being that has life. Animal, then, designates a living, breathing physical body.

Magnetism is an energetic force that influences the structure and organization of a body through the power of what it attracts to it.  That power emanates from the mind. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word became flesh,” begins John’s gospel. The mind produces the Word, which attracts to it the matter that creates the flesh it inhabits.

We become what we think. Our thoughts and beliefs are the primary suggestions delivered to the subconscious mind, the part of the soul body where the blueprint of mental suggestion is transformed into physical reality.

The shamans of ancient Mexico called this meeting place of mind and matter the assemblage point, where energy is molded into specific forms. Thus, the human form is a solid physical configuration of energy, an energetic alternative, among others, for human beings.

Don Juan Matus called human beings Magical Beings, due to their innate ability to exist simultaneously as both physical beings and energetic beings. Unfortunately, most human beings have forgotten and lost access to their energetic potential. They only know themselves as beings frozen in their ways, creatures of habit. As Carlos Castaneda put it, “Our wings have been clipped.”

This loss of freedom is human bondage. Human represents our classification as people in a physical body. Bondage has its root in bond, which means to confine, to dwell in a fixed state. Human bondage is thus a fixed confinement of our energetic potential into a solid physical mold, with limited awareness of options beyond its current fixation. Fixation represents the beliefs we attach to, which become molded into how we know ourselves and the world we live in.

What maintains this fixation of the assemblage point, in its generation of our rigid selves and the physical world we know, is the power of intent. Intent is energetically comprised of our thoughts and beliefs, the words we tell ourselves that become the automatic internal dialogue that suggests constantly to the subconscious the very definitions of what we are and how we are to manifest.

I am and become what I believe. The words I use to know and describe myself are the instructions delivered to the subconscious to fashion my existence. Typically, those instructions come from unchecked default programs unconsciously transmitted through genetics, instincts, and the humanly nuanced archetypes of the collective unconscious. Nobody has to think to breathe, the subconscious automatically runs that program.

Other programs are derived from suggestions internalized through socialization and the course of human development. Jeanne realized that from the first moment she received her cancer diagnosis, she believed she was going to die. Despite her heroic cancer journey, as detailed in The Book of Us*, she never fully overturned this strong suggestion to her subconscious mind. As mentioned in the opening paragraph of this blog, she has since learned the vital importance of reprograming and reshaping our ingrained beliefs if we are to change our lives.

Though extreme in her dogma, Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science, suggested that human beings cannot be ill, as a physical body is merely an illusion. Like the shamans of ancient Mexico, she encouraged people to return to their energetic essence.

To apply animal magnetism to the state of our human bondage is to assume conscious control of our intent. The materialistic dominance of our consensus reality is what gives rise to our sense of helplessness in the face of our current planetary apocalypse. This condition is aptly diagnosed by the title of a book that Jung wrote long ago: Modern Man in Search of a Soul.

To retrieve the Soul one needn’t take a hallucinatory shamanic journey. To retrieve the Soul one need merely take back the power of the mind, which is held in the prison of limiting materialistic beliefs. “Yes!”  Don Juan Matus emphasized to Carlos Castaneda, “We are solid physical beings, but we are energetic beings first.”

Physical reality exists. Modern medicine can offer a cure. But beyond our human form is the mind of the Soul, whose energetic intent, expressed in words and beliefs, can work miracles. This is the power of placebo, and the power of thousands of faith healings at Lourdes.

As mothers often say to their children, “Use your words!” In a state of true faith—a hypothesis without prejudice—use your words to suggest to the subconscious that which you would become. Use your animal magnetism to overcome human bondage. See what happens!

INTENT,

Chuck

*A new version of The Book of Us, on the 20th anniversary of Jeanne’s entry into the afterlife, is scheduled for release in December 2021.