What Stops Transformation? (this is a trick question!)

In this episode Dr. Sally and Dr. Jen delve into what hinders, blocks or oppresses the momentum of transformation.  

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S1:E12: Blockages to Transformation

Show Notes, Aug 6th 2023.

0:19  Sally welcomes everyone, Episode 12, Blockages to Transformation. She recaps the purpose of the podcast. She uses the metaphor of a cross section of a tree to illustrate expansion and flow within a transformative field. We are held by this creative force of flow, psychologically, ecologically, cosmologically. If we understand what blocks flow, or transformation, we can work with it. She uses the metaphor of a hose pipe to describe flow. This episode will describe the bio, psycho social and political blockages to flow, using different scaled lenses to digest this information.

10:10  Jen asks “does transformation want to participate with us, as much as we want to participate with it”? Is there something sentient and intelligent about transformation that is participatory? The paradox is that nothing can ultimately stop transformation. It is an unstoppable train, on all levels of reality, psychological, social, cultural, ecological, cosmological. We are nested fields of transformation. And we are being informed by, and informing, our environment all the time. But sometimes things hinder transformation, such as attachment to things, and getting stuck in a particular pattern. So we pay attention to those places we get hooked, using inner awareness. If we are not aware on the inside, we can't leverage those moments for maximum healing and growth. She then cites James Baldwin and describes how naming her own PTSD and her negative inner voice helped her become conscious. Fear of change is another major blockage. It's a lot easier when we're in environments with supportive people. Procrastination, seeking short term solutions, and unresolved trauma are blockages on the personal level, and not having the family, friends and mentors to support our growth. Yet those who have experienced complex trauma also have the capacity to move more dynamically with transformation.

21:08  Sally points out that upcoming episodes will look at trauma specifically. Some transformation teachers tend to bypass trauma, and head straight for enlightenment. It's actually not possible and results in distortion. We have to look at the nervous system, how we become hyper vigilant, how we can no longer be present to our lives. We can not flow in fight and flight. Coming fully into the present moment requires we heal the past, and the nervous system. And looking at our adverse early childhood experiences, or ACES, which affect what we fear and doubt about ourselves, and our possibilities. Healing our trauma takes energetic resources. Once we've dealt with our story, we can liberate some of that energy, and undo some of the kinks in the hose pipe, and become fully present in our own lives.

26:05  Jen agrees that bringing our past into presence is the first step. Parts of us act out in bizarre behaviors, because those parts want to be integrated into the present. In the same way that personal transformation is complex, cultural transformation is also deeply complex. Social Transformation is hampered by political, cultural, institutional, military, economic, educational, religious factors. These power structures can be unjust, in an unequal patriarchal, white supremacy. These factors are upheld by laws, regulations, policies, standards, norms, and people who are resistant to change. So when we talk about what hinders transformation socially, we have to look at all of these lenses. Change often means changing power structures, which can lead to a tightening of conformity demands. It's easy to regress, become overwhelmed or apathetic. Intentional small changes can have big impact with that - diet, the products we consume, our environmental footprint – and noticing the fractal relationships between each of these levels of reality. 

32:40  Sally says when we take responsibility for that inner flow there is growth, personally and culturally. Like the healthy tree, our branches move outwards into the political, sociological, and cultural, reaching into relationship with family, neighborhood, community, and the politics of our country, and the global situation. By honoring our own healing, we open up to flow, and then our own gifts can be shared with the “other”. We feel into the cultural blockages intuitively. There's a glass ceiling there, family dynamics here, lack of support there, a projection here from that community, all because we're growing. We're not going to pathologise all blockages, because we do need to be contained. We can't just do whatever we want. Sally shares the metaphor of “krupplehout”. We are shaped by our context. And we shape our context, we have power, we have agency. It's a dynamic, communal flow between parties. And that includes an understanding of power and how that shapes us, because some groups are invested in preventing transformation for everybody. That's how entitlement and privilege is maintained. But our creativity is about to be unleashed, despite the backlash. And it takes energetic resources. There are limits to growth that we also need to observe. We've got to be more creative with our resources - attention, time, energy, finances, the earth. We have to look at family, political and eco systems – do systems thinking, in order to transform in balance. 

40:57  Jen says this podcast stands up for the right to transform, on our own terms. One of the primary obstacles is that we are fundamentally estranged from our ecological bonds. The dominant stakeholders of power, who don't want us to change, want to keep us separate from our ecological roots. If we don't know who we really are, then it's easier to perpetuate crimes against the planet. We stay focused on short term gains, and extraction. There's no reciprocal relationship with our Earth home. We have to restore the balance between humans and nature, so that we can move with ecological transformation. Those stakeholders, and the economic interests they represent, and the industries that benefit from the status quo, are not interested in change. It's really hard to make ecological changes when we feel separate from our Earth home. And that lie of separation needs to be addressed. We need to marry our ecological intelligence with our spiritual intelligence and restore that balance. 

49:07  Sally says we're suffering under an illusion of hyper-individuality - that we can survive and thrive as separate beings. We've also separated the mind from the body. Sally talks about Ian McGilchrist’s work on the left and the right brain hemispheres. We have come to value the left brain over the right brain. And this has distorted our entire thinking. She describes how it objectifies the world into parts, and is cut off from feeling, relationship and embodiment. It devalues and neglects the right brain, which is about relationship, ecology, the big picture thinking, or the Yin, which is about relationship to the earth, or to the values that women bring. As a species over time, we've all moved into the left brain, including women. So this is not about men. This is about humans. We're still in a competitive thinking, and survival mode. We're hoarding resources. And this will be our downfall. The left brain tends to do short term thinking. It divides everything into parts, doesn't see the whole picture anymore. And it devalues anything that values relationship.

So blockages to ecological transformation are actually internal, in all of us. We objectify the universe. That includes other humans, animals, soil, land, and those with yin values. According to MacGilchrist, this is the root cause of our dilemma right now - that we have denied sentience in every other living being, in our desire to dominate. Healing this split requires we re-inhabit our right brain, our body, our hearts again, feel connection with ‘other’, with land, with animals, with plants. And that's how we start to do systems thinking, which is the next level of our human development. We heal the illusion that is hyper individuality, a product of patriarchy and late stage capitalism. There is no transformation without the core transforming of the human, of all genders, and learning how to cooperate, relate and love, and acknowledge sentience in every single being, and value others. 

 55:31  Sally says goodby and lets listeners know that the next episode will discuss one of the major blockages - which is trauma,