The BIG Question … “Why MythoSelf?”
Author’s Preface:
It’s been quite some time since I’ve sat down to write a post for Blognostra … for a million and one reasons!!!
I’ve been fixated on shifting my presentations to what I’ve begun to call the “Foolish Wisdom” an alternative life perspective that’s all about seeing the world in ways you haven’t before considered.
Another project that’s been consuming my time is finishing up the new book manuscript I’ve been working on (… lot’s of writing has gone into that!). I’m tentatively entitling it: “Foolish Wisdom Book One: An Apprentice of Wonder” … and it’s about my time learning with Roye and developing the MythoSelf Process. I’ve done my best to capture the feel of what it was like growing into the role I now work from, and some of the learning I’ve accumulated along the way.
I’ve also been working on the total revision of my main training presentations, i.e.: the MythoSelf Professional Training (more about that below in the P.S.), and what had been the original Performance Design workshop I developed for doing group personal work into the current presentation of the Foolish Wisdom/Performance Design combined weekend workshop I’ve just run in New Hope, PA last month (very cool format and workshop IMO).
I don’t want to go into the deep, deep details … but let’s suffice it to say that I’ve been busy as a stud bull.
WWWWH…W:
Who? What? When? Where? How? … Why?
The big question that continues to resonate around my work is “Why bother with MythoSelf® Process training … or work with a MythoSelf® Facilitator or Trainer?”
To answer this question I had to address the questions (plural) surrounding the MythoSelf Process … “WWWWH…W” … Who? What? When? Where? How? … and then the one that all the others depend upon, “Why?” comes into direct focus. But rather than make this a book unto itself I’m going to jump directly to the “Why” question.
Why MythoSelf®? …
The answer can be contained in the simple answer … PERFORMANCE!
I’ve been working on the design and refinement of the MythoSelf Process for over twenty years now … a kind of obsessive, compulsive love affair of sorts. Each time I ask myself the question, “Why bother?” again I get to the same place … “PERFORMANCE!” I’ll break it down just a bit …
The MythoSelf Process is built on the premise that …
My clients are seeking a common resolution …
to achieve an outcome that exceeds or eludes them from the way the are operating in the world today.
This is beyond “problem solving” or even “doing” in the classic sense of the word. The MythoSelf Process work focuses on shifting the relationship between being and becoming from separate or distinct to singular. Okay, that’s kind of esoteric and dense, so we’ll go through it step by step a bit.
Almost everything we are exposed to educationally suggests that the world is static or moving towards a static state. We’re constantly looking for the steady, stable state … e.g.: homeostasis.
For instance we could use an example from the world of medicine. The ideal that’s suggested is physiological homeostasis, that the body is constantly moving towards some ideal state even when it’s not stabilized there at that state.
The same could be said to be true in regard to the way some folks think about the ideal psychological state, e.g.: calm, loving, peaceful …
We could also look to the world of business, where I’ve played for a quite some time around folks at the top levels in the game. In business there’s a kind of “dynamic steady state” that the aim … a steady state of growth … an endless desire for more.
Even our language suggests a preferential “static state” when it nominalizes words like “love” as though this is a fixed way of being.
Which brings us to the concept of “Being” itself.
There is no ongoing “State of Being” … this is Plato’s mistake, i.e.: the ideal.
We are always in a state of Becoming AND in a state of instantaneous Being.
We go from “Being” to “Being” to “Being” … in an unbroken stream of events that are our lives. In each event we are “Being” and we are “Becoming” … a singularity that almost everyone finds difficult to hold on to conceptually … yet, there you go!
However, when you get this concept deep into your bones, absorb it and operate from it viscerally … that you cannot help “Being” in any given moment … you literally cannot not “Be” … AND you get that the “Being-ness” you possess in this moment is simultaneously “Becoming-ness” as well, you are free to choose.
When you are free to choose you become present as a performer of a higher caliber than you could possibly ever be while you are operating from a static state.
It really is that simple … when you are free to choose your performance skyrockets … it goes off the charts … you’ll exceed your wildest imagination.
But this idea comes with a profound caveat, i.e.: you have to be free to choose … and that’s one of the most unlikely things you’ll ever encounter … a human being who’s free to choose.
Why/How the MythoSelf® Process Creates The Freedom To Choose
The most significant thing that you can do if you want to embody this concept of begin and becoming flowing into a singularity you can begin operating from is to remain aware of your sense of self AND simultaneously of the change happening at all times around (and in) you.
The essential premise of the MythoSelf Process is to work with the idea of change and changelessness in simultaneity.
In order to do this we have to go beyond language. Language, as soon as it is spoken or written, freezes what is spoken or written about in the words spoken to represent what is being pointed at by them.
Getting this bit about language is critical if you want to get what I’m pointing at here myself.
Language only points to experience, including the experience of things … not the experience or things themselves.
Most people treat the language that they and others use as the experience or things themselves, NOT as a pointer towards those experiences or things. HOWEVER … language also has the ability to generate experience itself in the system of the individual using or experiencing it. This is just a critical a concept, because when people experience language it “feels” like they are experiencing what the language points at not something that points to something else.
The MythoSelf Process introduces the body directly into the conversation, bypassing the confusion that language creates when it is misunderstood to be the experience or thing itself. Because we focus on what is happening at the experiential level in the body we can (and do) access the pre-representational forms that are not the experience or things themselves.
The other thing the MythoSelf Process does is organize and align the conversation along a positive trajectory, i.e.: in regard to what is working, and how to move from that to how it must be present, to create intended future outcomes.
A powerful applied principal of the MythoSelf Process is what is referred to within the MythoSelf model as a “Future Memory” … a wholeform, embodied experience of the future state experience/outcome. The Future Memory creates a teleological pull towards the realization of the outcome experience by virtue of holding and expressing a way of being that constantly updates in a moment to moment way based on an emergent and unfolding present.
This is all aimed at a singularity of sorts as well … not a fixed singularity, but a dynamic singularity … ADAPTABILITY.
Why Is Adaptability So Powerful???
The main question I’ve been posing here is:
Why bother with the MythoSelf Process at all … either studying it … or experiencing it for yourself?
We can point to an answer based on the ideas I’ve outlined above and say …
It can truly be summed up by the idea of ADAPTABILITY.
Why adaptability?
Because the world … heck, the entire cosmos as far as we can tell … is in a constant state of flux, it’s dynamically and endlessly changing.
We are all dealing with uncertainty in one way or another. The individual who can perceive most clearly the situation as it is based on the existing data in the system has the most options available to them.
Rather than operating based on a single path forward the adaptable individual continually makes choices that are most likely to reset the system to aim at the outcome intended.
By resetting the system it becomes possible to reset the opportunities the system presents to us. These folks are not locked in a static state experience that resides within the cause and effect paradigm most people are limited to, they can choose adaptability. Regardless of the seeming present state situational limitations or constraints … the individual who can choose from alternative futures can aim the system as they desire it to be based on a future state.
The primary idea here is attuning to the subtle, sublime signals in the system and making subtle, sublime adjustments to use the signals as beacons to realize the alternative future of choice. Rather than being powerless because of circumstances, adaptability allows you to use the circumstances to your advantage … think, Mac Gyver, or Colonel Hannibal from the A-Team … now generalize that to everything.
The Next Step:
Professional MythoSelf® Process Training
Professional training is the most powerful way to access the ideas of MythoSelf Process, first incorporating them into your own life … and gaining the skills to lead others to a powerful, wholeform position themselves.
From the start the entire MythoSelf Process will be present in each moment during the training. Instead of presenting the material as a series of steps or topics, every step of the presentation will be presented as a wholeform immersion experience. By working with the participants in the training program with whatever is present for them in the moment the MythoSelf Process becomes a living, organic experience in the room.
Unlike in standard educational pedagogy, only after the fact, once the experience has been presented in wholeform, is there any intention to unpack it for the participants.
The same thing is true of learning to replicate the work presented. Instead of building from a series of steps, MythoSelf Process training is learned in wholeform as well, by actually engaging in entire pieces of work with other participants. The advantage of keeping the programs small is that there is ample opportunity for direct supervision as you’re learning the material, however when operating in a wholeform design it’s almost impossible to do it any other way … in this case think about how you learned your cradle/birth language.
Anyone who has experienced Professional MythoSelf Training gets it in their bones. Once you experience something in wholeform it’s yours forever.
Best,
Joseph Riggio, Ph.D.
Architect & Designer of the MythoSelf Process and SomaSemantics
P.S.: If you want to see into the Professional MythoSelf Training program a bit deeper you’ll find the logistics and details here:
Professional MythoSelf Training: Module 1
Ham says
Joe! You are offering the training as a simulcast??! What the what?! I’m stunned. This is absolutely unprecedented in the Mythosphere and I signed up immediately. I am frankly amazed that you would ever do a Mythoself Professional Training online and my anticipation is through the roof. Thank you so much for this incredible opportunity.
Joseph says
Muchos Gracias!
Lenny says
@ ham; I would calm down until you see the actual simulcast &/or recordings.
On some of Joe’s recent programmes, his incredible work has been ruined by significant technical issues and poor AV work.
Bear that in mind, when signing up. Caveat emptor!
Joseph says
Lenny … fair enough … we’ve been developing the ability to broadcast the events live with as much of a “live” feeling in the program as possible, and we hit the wall more than once, but we’ve almost always recovered too.
I also always keep a second camera in the room that we use to upload the live video from for replays, and that’s typically be quite good.
The simulcast experience is about the experience as well, and on that note I’d argue (just a little) that none of the difficulties have ‘ruined’ my work … although if you can’t get access to it that doesn’t matter … from your POV it’s been ‘ruined’ I guess.
However, if you’ve ever been, or are, a Live Internet Simulcast participant and you feel that the program isn’t worth every cent you paid for it between the live event and the replays due to technical issues on my end send me an email and if I agree (that we had technical difficulties during that event) I’ll refund you in full … no questions asked, or I’ll give you carte blanch access to the next two simulcasts I run, your choice.
So we totally agree on at least one point: Caveat Emptor … as a consumer know your sources well, and we’ll stand 100% behind what we do … and make it right when we fail, as we are wont to do on occasion, I call that being human (the failing part on occasion) … and the divine part is recognizing and accepting it, then doing what it takes not to make that your problem.
Thanks for the comment …
Ham says
@Lenny: I’ve attended four simulcasts and yeah there were some technical problems, but they pale utterly in comparison with the content and the dazzling presentation. I’ve had a thoroughly good time on there and when there have been a few bumps in the road… so what?! I can check in with the other online participants, I can pick up my guitar and have a shred, I can type questions to the AV controller and all is good/beautiful in my world. I can even watch the recordings whilst I cook up a simple, honest meal with fresh, vibrant flavours.
To know that I have communion (yes, a religious metaphor, deal with it my son) with Joe and willing active participants half a world away is… well, a blessing.
When I read stories of Erickson from Steve Gilligan or Bill O’Hanlon, what touches my heart and soul the deepest is the preciousness of the time they spent with him, how they grew and lived lives of wonder in Milton’s presence. They almost didn’t realise at the time how impactful his words and behaviours would be and how fortunate they were to find a master such as he. When Joe speaks of his relationship with Roye, the respect and the love, I am similarly transported.
Joe changed my life, and gifted me with sublime joy. A few pops and crackles along the way aren’t about to alter that, digital or otherwise.
See you soon!
Thomas says
So the question that comes to my mind is how is this any different than what I’ve done so far. While I’ve had some minor successes I’m still not where I want to be.
Joseph says
Thomas … I have no idea, really.
If you’re referring to stuff you’ve done with me then I’d say it isn’t different … in fact I’ve said for years that I’m a “one trick pony” … quoting Roye about me.
However, I can speak from my own experience with Roye as well …
When I was learning with him there were two things I recognized after some time (with the same sense of frustration beforehand that I was showing up and not getting it all as I’d wanted and/or expected).
The first thing I recognized is that I always got what I got … and I always got something. Using it and keeping it were then up to me. However, once I’d gotten it … whatever it was that I’d gotten … I couldn’t lose it again, I always had access to it … even when I didn’t choose to take advantage of that access.
Of course life keep coming up too. With all of the other events in my life, that weren’t happening in the training room with Roye, I kept getting bumped off-track so to speak. Instead of living within the paradigm I was experiencing when I was with Roye, I would get pulled into another way of being that didn’t give me the same sense of choice or competence to have what I wanted when I wanted it.
Eventually I began to get the second piece of my realization …
Learning is cumulative, and sometimes it happens by accretion, very slowly … if steadily.
I needed to accomplish two things before I was able to sustain the way of being and becoming that I was seeking when I first began my learning with Roye. I needed to let go of many old patterns I’d developed over time … habits that limited my ability to get my outcomes when and as I wanted them. I also needed to learn new ways of operating where I didn’t have the skillfulness to create outcomes that I wanted by required skills I hadn’t yet developed.
This Roye called, “gaining a critical mass” (of learning and skillfulness). It was a kind of state potentiation that preceded massive transformational change, but it came with a cost … massive, intensive learning coupled with massive submission to the new ways of being and becoming, while letting go of the old habitual patterns of perceiving and behaving.
This built up for me over literally five years of almost weekly training with Roye … every weekend for probably 40+ weeks a year or more, at a cost of tens of thousands of dollars a year to make that happen. Plus, ongoing personal interaction with him in writing via fax (pre-email days … later via email). At the end of those five years I was burnt out, depressed, and ready to give in (‘in’ not ‘up’) to what was as it was … not what I’d hoped for or expected.
At this point I was ready … within the next three months my life transformed in ways I could not have predicted based on the path I’d taken. Leave it that once I’d given in to things being what they are I began to see the world without the constant interpretation I’d applied for nearly all of my life prior to that point.
With that clarity came choice … with choice adaptability … and with that the life I now live.
I’ll give you an example I just recently shared with someone else. For many years I struggled financially, and I was striven to become wealthy. No matter what I did, or how much I had in my pocket or bank account it wasn’t happening for me. Then things changed for me … I stopped, literally stopped all my concern about my financial condition.
I have never been truly wealthy, i.e.: financially independent and able to do whatever I’d like without considering the cost or having to consider working to replenish my wealth. HOWEVER … I am financially free and independent of financial concern … and have been for years.
I know how to make money when I need or want to … and I know how to spend it as well. I have more than enough to live a life of extreme comforts and pleasures, and the total comfort of knowing I can have what I need/want when I do what it takes to get it … and I know how to do that too.
I told the person I was speaking with that this was the key … moving beyond an expectation of how things could/should/ought to be … or my consideration of any criteria like that … to a position where I make valid choices in the moment that move me towards where I place my attention.
I don’t know if this addresses how this is different for you … but this is the essence of what I teach nonetheless …
Shyaam says
Dr. Joseph, I am so very excited about the Mythoself process!!! I intend to be a Mythoself Facilitator in the future – helping myself and others to tap into their Generative Imprints and stabilize them.
All this, I seem to get only ‘intellectually’ – that – going beyond language is the key but I am not able to embody it and the existential longing continues…
Being and Becoming…
P.S: Unfortunately, I am nowhere (or now-here??) near able to afford the training. I think, I should wait for the book instead and commit to attend the trainings in the future.
Joseph says
Shyaam …
First, read my answer to Thomas above … very carefully and many times.
Next … stay tuned here, read my books, get all the free stuff I put out until you can afford to spend something on training … and consider starting small, e.g.: the video/audio material I make available, until you can be in live training with me or another MythoSelf Trainer/Master Trainer.
Thanks.
Shyaam says
Hmmm. Thank You Dr. Joseph for the response!
Yes. I am here and will check out everything 🙂
I read Your response to Thomas (again and again). I resonate with the fact that it’s all a ‘readying’ process – a process that leads to our realization that we can’t control IT.
I have a question – how can I develop the trust required for the letting go process? I am so addicted to comfort and security.
Ham says
Thank you… more than you’ll never know, thank you.
T says
Hey Dr. Adaptability,
I enjoyed this piece. Our brains, bodies and semantic artistry is built for exquisite adaptability or exquisite stagnation and death. It’s fun to know that this technology, orientation, training and transformative process returns a person back to their at-will mythogenic capacity to live and be alive as the greatest story ever told.
I read, re-read and snack on your words, your audio and your other offerings. I’m looking forward to the experience and staying behind with my interpretive structure to be present to all that I can dance with.
Even now….I am waiting for the access instructions…hence….I’ll access GDS/GTS/INTENT and go with now this what next? Be ready to enter when the door opens to the training and access the training in other doors simultaneously.
Best,
T