Self-Mastery, Transformation, and Rehab for the Rest of Us
“Where’s my damn rehab?” transformational coach Libby Adams remembers asking on the third day of her husband’s stint in an inpatient substance abuse program, “Why do you have to be a drug addict or alcoholic to get a good 28-day program?”
Beginnings
Growing up in California in the 1960s, Libby wanted to help people. She was interested in and began studying psychology, but didn’t care for the subjects of mental illness and abnormal psychology. After earning degrees in education and educational psychology, she became a middle school Spanish teacher.
Basic Training
Libby stopped teaching at public schools in 1980. Some of her moments of greatest challenge came thereafter while raising three children and living through her husband Richard’s substance abuse problems. Richard went through a drug and alcohol program and the family through divorce. Eventually, Libby, Richard, and the kids were all right, but Libby remembered her question: “Where’s my damn rehab?”
Rapid Transformation Is Possible
Libby found a new home for her interests in psychology and education – the personal development industry. In search for…something…Libby took est training in 1974. She moved on to attend numerous transformational psychology conferences throughout the decade, and to work with some the top names in the field.
Libby came to understand that rapid transformation is possible at the weekend immersive Date with Destiny conference. Libby next did the Anthony Robbins’ Firewalk. Robbins also helped her on the spot with neurolinguistic programming (NLP) exercises to help to eliminate fear of asking people for money. That very day, she raised over $7,000 for her employer, a company helping hearing impaired children.
Inspired, Libby obtained a certification as a Master Practitioner of NLP from Tad James. She also studied with Jim Rohn, Tony Robbins’ mentor. At different times throughout the coming years, she worked as volunteer staff in the Robbins, Deepak Chopra, and the NLP Organization.
Through the work in NLP, Libby met Dr. Van Tharp (a trading coach with a strong interest in how to use NLP to help traders overcome psychological issues in the market). Not unlike alcoholics or gamblers, traders often struggle with addictive impulses. Many blow up their entire financial account or portfolio. As Libby and Van continued on separate paths seeking to help themselves and others, their professional association developed slowly over the next decade.
Going into Business with IASK
Working for Anthony Robbins and Deepak Chopra helping clients with personal development was all very well but at some point, Libby decided: “I can do this myself!”
In 1994, she started the International Academy for Self-Knowledge (IASK). IASK provided personal development training or coaching sessions for her early clients, many of whom came through the Long Beach Chamber of Commerce.
During IASK’s beginnings, both Libby Adams and Van Tharp used a therapeutic coaching method they called “parts negotiation.” The idea is that our personalities are made up of multiple parts operating at a subconscious level. Thus, a “successful professional” may also be saddled with a “child” part or a “father” part that sabotages his trading (or other goal-oriented activity). The facilitator works with the client to release the non-useful beliefs of hidden or shadow parts. Or, to negotiate between useful parts with conflicting objectives (such as the “trader” and the “husband”) to ensure improved performance and work-life balance.
The Spiritual Connection with TfM
However, Libby felt that parts negotiation was not getting her clients the best results. She felt that a spiritual component to coaching and self-healing was essential. What if – like participants in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) – participants could accelerate their results by turning to a “higher power” for help?
Libby took the idea of parts negotiation – in which the client visualizes one part in each hand and brokers an internal discussion with the parts – and replaced it with her own unique Transformational MeditationTM (TfM) process involving the client’s higher power (aka God, Universal Mind, Infinite Intelligence, depending on the client’s preference or beliefs).
With TfM, Libby discovered that by invoking higher levels of consciousness we can quickly – almost miraculously – resolve our most intense inner conflicts. And according to Michael Hall’s NLP book “Meta-States: Mastering the Higher Levels of Your Mind” (1995), we can experience our most powerful feelings of love, gratitude, wonder, and awe when we reach a “systemic” or “spiritual” level of consciousness.
Hence the spiritual connection. Libby considers a spiritual belief to be one that concerns core questions of identity and the meaning of life: Who am I? Why am I here? Who or what is God and how do I connect? We answer these questions for ourselves with spiritual beliefs that can’t be proven or disproven. And it is more important that a belief is useful, or empowering, than that it is provably true. It is more important that we do get to a higher level of consciousness than how we get there.
Libby and her clients found TfM to be effective at dissolving internal conflicts and non-useful psychological parts to increase peace of mind and performance. I can personally attest to this from my own experience with TfM after taking the Peak Performance 202: The Trader Reinvention Workshop co-taught by Libby Adams and Van Tharp! Simply put, TfM changed my life.
The 28-Day Program for Substance Abuse
By the early 1990s, Libby’s clients were achieving life changing results through TfM. But, as Libby likes to say, “Parts are like clusters of grapes. There could be thousands of them. A “separated self” (or little i) is created every time we encounter a challenging experience and believe something about it or ourselves that isn’t true.”
Once the treatment is over and additional psychological issues get triggered down the road, how can clients take care of themselves? How can they sustain the benefits of their initial IASK results? It would take an uncomfortable visitation from the past, and a journey halfway around the world for Libby to find the answer.
In 2001, ex-husband Richard asked Libby to help him put together a program for drug and alcohol users so people wouldn’t have to go through 13 detoxes and rehabs like he had. Though Libby was initially reluctant, they developed the structure and curriculum for a substance abuse treatment program powered by TfM. The program got good results, enabling clients to resolve their issues and giving them skills and tools for the future.
Moments of Inspiration
At the end of 2 years Libby had trained coaches to replace her in Richard’s program. She was able to bow out of it, but the idea of a 28-day therapeutic structure divided into 4 weeks using one on one mentoring stuck with her.
Remembering “Where’s my damn rehab?” she thought “This is it! I could adapt the drug and alcohol rehab program for the rest of us.”
After completing her work on the substance abuse rehab program, and in search of new ideas for IASK, Libby traveled to India. There, she stayed in Ashram for three weeks at a site near the Himalayas on the Ganges River made famous by the Beatles’ study with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in 1968. During this trip, Libby was able to deepen her knowledge of spirituality and meditation.
The pivotal moment came in a bookstore as the seller approached and handed her a copy of “Living with the Himalayan Masters” by Swami Rama, saying: “You will want this book.” She bought two copies!
The 28-Day Program for the Rest of Us
Swami Rama imparted many new personal development concepts including non-resistance, non-attachment, selflessness, cheerfulness, and fearlessness. With them, Libby found the content she needed to take IASK’s programs to the next level.
And so, the 28-day program for the rest of us was born. Each of Swami Rama’s concepts gets a day of its own in the program – concepts such as such as love, forgiveness, and gratitude. Libby came back from India, created the curriculum, and tried it with a pilot group and increasing numbers of clients.
Karen – another of Libby’s clients – provides a good testimonial. Paraphrasing from her video: “I was stuck and didn’t even know it. I didn’t know what I wanted. I was like “machete girl”, trying to hack through everything when there were easy well-trodden paths right beside me.
My biggest benefit from the 28-day program was finding my true self by peeling off whole layers of beliefs – which I visualized as a ‘posse of bandits’ – that led me into resistance. Once I did this, I discovered my purpose and felt much more peaceful. People noticed the change and started becoming more attracted to me – family, friends, in business – everywhere I go.
After many other self-development programs this was the most beneficial thing I’ve ever done and required the least amount of time.”
Traders – A Target Audience
One of Libby’s early 28-day program trial users was none other than Dr. Van Tharp, who had previously learned TfM from Libby. With that, a strong Van Tharp Institute + IASK partnership was born. As a trading coach, Van believed that psychology, or having a healthy mindset coupled with resourceful beliefs about money and the market, is the critical success factor for traders. And like Libby his spiritual journey took him to India where he discovered the Oneness movement.
Finding themselves on parallel tracks, Libby and the Van Tharp Institute (VTI) formed a partnership that has been running smoothly for 20 years. IASK and VTI market it as a “Psychology Rehab for Traders” mentorship program that helps clients improve performance by mapping true, fulfilling desires to specific goals; manage stress through self-mastery skills; and change any unconscious beliefs or attitudes that may be sabotaging their own efforts. The figure below describes these program concepts in terms of four pillars.
As a student with the Van Tharp Institute’s Supertrader program, I became eligible for Libby’s “Self-Mastery: 28-Day Intensive” program. I worked with Libby myself in November 2022 and went through the program. For each of 28 days, I watched one of Libby’s videos, related the day’s personal development or spiritual concept to my daily To Do list, talked to Libby for 45 minutes, and closed the day with a nightly reflection and Libby’s audio track on an MP3.
I found this to be a fantastic experience, which helped me grow and improve my results and personal fulfillment both in trading and in life. I’ve continued in Libby’s post-28-day graduate group coaching programs that help maintain the life skills and mindsets learned initially. As Libby says: “Once the dentist tells you ‘No cavities!’ you don’t want to stop brushing your teeth. There must be some spiritual law about maintenance that applies to mental as well as dental health!”
What’s Next?
Traders constitute about 75% of Libby’s clients with others being clients that predate the partnership with VTI, or are family members of trader clients. There is something about the trader audience – perhaps above average stress and above average net worth compared to other occupational groups – that make them willing and able to invest in psychological services. Libby also works with entrepreneurs, business executives, and other target audiences.
At the end of the day, however, I feel that Libby just wants to help people. At this point in her life, she is a woman with everything she needs in the material realm, could retire if she wanted, but just wants to keep on coaching!
“I got what I asked for, and love what I do,” Libby confirmed when we discussed the future. But when I asked what would happen next in her vision of perfection, she shared one more challenge:
How do I scale coaching?
Libby strongly believes that personal development coaching should be one-on-one. Libby has been able to expand the 28-day program by training and certifying more than 20 coaches, but even so, by her estimate IASK can only take on about forty five (45) 28-day clients at a time. “You have to have the focus (on the client) and the trust. None of us could handle more than 5 28-day clients at a time.”
“In my dream life,” Libby continued, “I would have 100,000 coaches out there getting this program to anyone who wanted it.”
Call to Action
You don’t have to be “Supertrader” to take – and benefit from – the 28-day Psychology Rehab Program. Most people have some “rehabbing” of the past to do, areas where things could be better or improved. Libby’s tag line is “We ALL need to rehab something…”
Libby and the IASK team offer a free Success Mindset Scorecard Assessment. After taking it, you get an offer for a free 30-minute call. The Assessment followed by an optional 2-hour introductory course is a great place to begin.
Factfulness: A Possibilist’s Book About the World
The Book Factfulness by “possibilist” Hans Rosling can be a balm for our over-dramatic, stressed brains. Why is this? Rosling made a lifelong study of the gap between the way the world really is and the way we think of it. Through this study, Rosling finally came to understand the mental instincts we have evolved to think of the world as much more violent, poor, and endangered than it actually is.
Finding Factfulness has been a Godsend for me. Since the 2016 election I have felt that the level of bad feeling between partisans and countries about many things is out of proportion to a world in which I also see so much that is good. If only we could focus on what is going well, and on the things we can agree on! Factfulness provides the data to support a more hopeful world view.
About Rosling
Rosling was a medical doctor, professor of international health, and renowned public educator who passed away just last year in the final stages of writing Factfulness. He was an adviser to the World Health Organization and UNICEF, and he confounded [Doctors Without Borders] in Sweden. The Gapminder Foundation that Rosling founded with his son Ola and daughter-in-law Anna Rosslund continues to promote the dissemination of fact-based world views. Rosling’s TED talks have reached more than thirty-five million viewers so far, and he was listed as one of Time magazine’s one hundred most influential people in the world. Hans described Factfulness as his “last battle in my lifelong mission to fight devastating ignorance.”
Good News and Best Kept Secrets
I thought I knew the world well. I’ve lived for 61 years, traveled to 4 continents, read many, many books and studies as well as news articles. Yet in the little test at the beginning of the book, I only got 8 out of 13 questions correct. Although I knew that extreme poverty has been cut in half over the last 20 years, I did not know that 80% of children across the globe are vaccinated, or that the average girl has nine years of schooling. Judging from a plethora of tests Rosling conducted, the average person gets less than 20% of the answers correct – and that figure also applies to groups of professors, politicians, doctors, and journalists that one would think should know better.
The vast majority of us believe the world is getting worse. But in fact, based on almost every vital statistic of global health, income, and safety world trends are getting better. When tested on our knowledge of these vital statistics we score much worse than chimpanzees would do if given the ability to answer the same questions at random. We are biased toward the negative and the dramatic. To be this way is to ignore “the secret silent miracle of human progress.” Is the world in your head still getting worse? Then get ready for a challenging data encounter: Take the same test online and see!
Are We Escaping Hell?
News, activism, and politics is all about the drama, but perhaps we should take a more nuanced view. For example, Factfulness and Gapminder models 4 global income levels, as shown below.
Each person icon in the figure above represents approximately 1 billion people, and the income levels shown are in thousands of dollars. Now, look at the figure below. How things have changed!
- Good News: The relative number, or percentage of people living at Level 1 – a state of being with no electricity, running water, or reliable food source – has more than halved in the last century.
- Bad News: Despite tremendous per capita progress, the absolute number of people living in poverty or hunger is still at an all-time high due to population growth.
- Good News: Population growth levels off as globals incomes improve.
Extreme poverty numbers and rates are perhaps the most controversial statistic Rosling cited, leading some of his few critics to post “The Confused Statistician.”
Bad AND Better
The ability to hold and balance two conflicting viewpoints in one’s mind is a sign of intelligence, not confusion. Is the glass half full, or half empty? Rosling described himself not as an optimist, or a pessimist. Instead he invented a new word, saying: “I’m a Possibilist.” Rosling urged us to see the world as still bad (in some ways), but getting much better.
Beautiful Data
Pages 64 through 67 in Factfulness list some amazing graphs of bad things decreasing and good things increasing. “Humanity,” Rosling wrote, “Should throw a freaking party!”
Everything is Not Fine
For all the great trending stats, everything is not fine. Rosling: “We should still be very concerned. As long as there still are any plane crashes, preventable child deaths, endangered species, climate change deniers, male chauvinists, crazy dictators, journalists in prison, toxic waste, and girls not getting an education because of their gender…as long as any of these terrible things exist, we cannot relax.”
Why Being Factful is Still Important
But it is just as ridiculous, and certainly more stressful for us to ignore the progress that has been made. Rosling: “People often call me an optimist, because I show them…progress they didn’t know about. That makes me angry. I’m not an optimist. That makes me sound naïve. I’m a very serious ‘possibilist.’
As a possibilist, I see all this progress and it fills me conviction and hope that further progress is possible. That is not optimistic. It is having a clear and reasonable idea about how things are. It is having a worldview that is constructive and useful. When people wrongly believe that nothing is improving, they may conclude that nothing we have tried so far is working and lose confidence in measures that actually work. I have met many such people, who told me they have lost all hope for humanity. Or they may [become] radicals supporting drastic measures that are counterproductive...”
What We Can Do
I believe we need to get the Factfulness message out there as a call for everyone to take heart, regain hope, and turn with new energy to exercise critical thinking, stay up to date, and be a positive influence in the world.
In my next post on Factfulness, I’ll summarize Rosling’s theories on why we tend to be wrong about the world. It’s not just the news, it is our psychology, our ways of thinking.
In the meantime I hope you’ll read Factfulness and/or explore the Gapminder site some of the videos and infographic tools there. And spread this good news to others!
Summer Rhythm Renewal and Sendoff
The last Summer Rhythm Renewal ever at Saint Francis University in June 2018 was a powerhouse of creative expression, spiritual healing, and community. Gone but not forgotten, the Renewal left an indelible impression on all who were there.
Pathways There
Many participants’ paths to the Renewal came through the event organizer Jim Donovan, who is also a rock star, philosopher and healer of Rusted Root and Sun King Warrior bands fame.
Like many, I reached the Renewal through my connection with Jim, which was made in a health and mindfulness workshop at a larger conference last January. I came away powerfully impressed with Jim’s practice of brain humming, and wrote Music is Sound Healing based on a followup interview.
Focusing mostly on the science of brain humming, the sound healing post left drum circles and music as unfinished business. Jim had lauded the power of musical events as a way to reach and influence the multitudes, and discussed plans for the Sun King Warriors band to become a platform for getting his message out on the healing powers of sound. I just knew I had more to learn from Jim.
Drumming, Humming, Healing, and Connecting
Each day of the event began with a drum circle in the SFU Boileroom building, hung with posters and tapestries on Eastern and New Age religious and spiritual themes as shown in the photo below.
In the first sessions, Jim described the basics of drumming for beginners and gave a brief description of the benefits of using sound for the health of the mind, spirit, body, and community:
- Until recently, modern medicine has forgtten the health benefits of sound that indigenous peoples of many cultures used for millenia.
- Yet our ability to use rhythm and vibration in ways that are good for our bodies, and help us connect with our center is more relevant than ever as stressful modern living causes our bodies to generate dangerously levels of cortisol “fight or flight” hormones.
- The relaxing practice of brain humming sends sound waves to stimulate the Vagus nerve running throughout the body, and (to get technical 🙂 generates beneficial chemicals such as norepinephrine, serotonin, acetylcholine, and adrenaline.
- These applications of sound medicine just take advantage of a built-in feature of our human bodies and nature.
Jim taught us the proper technique to beat patterns with the event’s Djembe drums, which are held between the knees. “Play the beat you hear, but vary the pattern. Randomly strike the side or the center of the drum with your hands. Try not to think about how you’re doing this. By playing different patterns, you are energizing different pathways in the mind. This is great for the memory and for brain health.”
We also learned the rudiments of brain humming as Jim instructed us in touching various areas of the head and body whilst humming different tones: “EEEEEM,” “OOOOM”, “AMMMM”, “UMMMM.” Then he asked new participants to share what they were feeling. Some reported a sense or sleepiness, or feeling a pleasant buzz in the head, as if they were getting high. Jim joked that sometimes he asks participants at substance abuse therapy sessions: “Would you like to learn how to create a natural euphoria for yourself?”
Finding Flow
Outside of drumming, I spent most of my time in painting and writing workshops, including “Wild Writes Nature Writing” by Kim McElhatten and “Transformative Writing by Matthew Adams.” At one writing workshop I wrote:
“During the drum circle we can barely hear our individual notes over the din of others, but we can always pick out the dominant beat. Pound out your own pattern, and if it feels good, just keep going. If not, just listen for the beat and accompany it with one stroke every few seconds. Then resume your pattern. During the morning exercise for bringing randomness and spontaneity to the playing, Jim said to ‘Try to play without thinking about it’ and that seemed to work for me!
Jim had also talked about flow – that state of complete immersion in an activity during which ego suspends, time flies, and all your skills effortlessly engage. I found flow in the rhythm. What if I could bring that same confidence and exhilaration vividly into writing?”
Later in the Meditative Painting workshop, instructor Sandra Sabene encouraged us to take a walk on the wild side of art. She demonstrated slathering paint over the canvas while declaring “I just don’t care.” The purpose of this exercise is to evoke a pure subconscious artistic creativity. For this, one should have no attachment to the painted outcome, just be in the moment.
Although I could not quite let go like Sandra, I began the painting shown above with minimal structure – just the eyes in the circle and the lines radiating out diagonally from it. After a few of the songs in Sandra’s playlist, I became quite relaxed. I noticed the white circle around the eyes was actually coming out pinkish due to the mixing of colors on the brush; instead of trying to “fix it”, I went with the light pink. It evoked thoughts of strawberry ice cream. Almost spontaneously, I drew seven ice cream cones, and the picture felt complete. Well, you have to understand I’m very much a beginner 🙂
I’d found flow again, this time in painting.
Finding Healing
Others in the audience found healing in the sense of community and sharing present in all renewal workshop activities. One woman and repeat renewer shared: “I’ve always felt like a square peg in a round hole. I’m tired of having to be ‘so fucking nice.’ My first Renewal put me into a defensive crouch, wanting to yell ‘Why are you getting your feelings all over me!’ Then I had an epiphany: We who are dark make the light possible. This is a rare place where I can participate as myself and still find wholeness. It didn’t happen overnight, but I’d found my tribe.”
Change the World?
On the final day of the Renewal, first timers such as myself experienced the full power of the event as Jim unpacked more of his thinking on the power of vibration, and participants shared what it means to them during an extended “open mike” session.
Jim began the last drumming sessions on Sunday by recalling his challenges of standing up and speaking in public, of feeling vulnerable without the protective barrier of drums between himself and an audience. He said “I had to throw myself into the fire and just do it, do it, do it.” He urged us all to: “Do things differently, regularly. Things that are hard for us expand the mind, build new pathways. Use sound to put yourself regularly in the healing condition.”
He continued: “This morning we’ll ramp up into the macro view. Think of what we’re doing in drum circles as a sound formula to deepen our understanding of life, to move energy, to open the body. The vibration we’re in together reminds us that although we appear separate, we share the same energy and are made of the same subatomic stuff. Physics tell us that 99% of our bodies are empty space. We can see each other and can hear each other, but we’re made mostly out of emptiness and energy.
“This ideas has been lost from our culture. There is a lack of understanding of how interconnected we really are. But now we’re shifting our frequency and vibration.”
Jim then led us in a long drumming and chanting session to the mantra Ra Ma Da Sa Sa Say So Hung, which he translated as: “The Sun, The Moon, the Earth. All of Everything. I am That.” The effect was palpable, leaving us buzzing with a feeling of connectedness and energy to the room.
Finally: “We are all part of one vibration and raising your vibration has an effect. It is one the most important things we can be doing. If I can’t create my own peace I can’t do anything for others. That feeling we all seek that everything is right in our world is not ‘out there,’ it is ‘in here.’ There’s nothing you can buy, nowhere you can go to get that feeling, but you can find it through sound. Sound is the companion that you were built with. It is the power through which we can communicate and also center our own vibration. And it’s power increases with repeated use.”
Leaving Renewal
Towards the end, there was an open mic sharing session almost too poignant for words. Participant after participant recollected their experiences at this and prior events. A few struggled with tears or broke down because the Renewal has been so important to them; a few had even met their husband or wife-to-be there. So many related their feelings of belonging in this event, of being taken to a higher level of awareness, or of finding a dream they didn’t know they had, All thanked Jim for giving us so much, and for closing down the Renewal with such loving care and transparency when the time came. In many ways, this part of the closing ceremony felt more like a graduation than an ending.
And Jim sent us off with a few final thoughts: “Don’t get the idea your car can fly. What we have created here is an altered state of consciousness on a higher frequency, but not all others are ready for it. This is not the week to quit your job or get a divorce. Give yourself a week to settle down and see if you still feel the same way. Believe and hope that by getting together here we can help to co create a world in which people of all kinds can disagree, like many of us actually do, but still work together to create love and abundance.”
To Be Continued
After the event formally ended with a giant group hug, some drifted off and others lingered to talk on. I made my way to the car without further leave-taking. In parting, I must caveat that I’m (obviously 🙂 not prescient in all things, nor do I have an eidetic memory. I missed things that were going on in other rooms, may have misunderstood much that was going on before my very eyes, and many of the quotes herein are probably poor paraphrases. Yet I hope this post shows how the event touched me too, and gives something back to those of this community that find the link to it on the Renewal participants’ Facebook group.
I’m not great at goodbyes, but I’ll close with what I was able to share during my own minute on the open mic:
“As a first timer, I found this fantastic! Thank you all so much for accepting and welcoming me into your community. What you and Jim have created here is indescribable. There’s a line from a song that goes: ‘Every new beginning is some other beginning’s end.’ Don’t let this be the end of your awakening and transformation. Go out into the world like stardust, bringing light and love to other events and places. Don’t say ‘goodbye,’ say ‘to be continued.'”
Opportunities to continue abound. I hope to see many of my new Renewal friends next year at the Renewals’ parallel Summer Rhythm Revival event in Western New York, and at other drum circles in our Great Northeast.
Music Is Sound Healing
Jim Donovan is a professional musician, writer, and educator. He uses music to help people achieve deep personal healing and transformation. On the course of his life’s journey he stumbled across an amazing discovery:
We can use the power of sound to stimulate our nervous systems to promote relaxation and memory function while reducing stress and inflammation as well as serious diseases such as depression, Parkinson’s, and epilepsy. Known to ancient Chinese, Hindu, African, and native American cultures, sound medicine techniques are now being rediscovered in modern studies of the Vagus Nerve Brain-Body pathways.
Jim’s Dream: “In a perfect world the information I teach would be taught in kindergarten and elementary school. It would be part of Western medical practice and prescribed by doctors before pharmaceuticals in many cases. It would be used for preventative medicine the way diet and exercise are today. It would be prescribed for stress, anxiety, sleep problems, depression, and pain relief.
Kids would come out of school with a whole body of knowledge and experience managing their own stress. This would taught to them like ABCs. Teachers could use this too! If and when this happens, I know that attendance and behavior problems will improve and learning will increase.”
Jim’s Story
From Jim’s earliest memories, music was a constant companion, especially when life was challenging. From the age of 8 Jim wanted to play, but the family was poor and he didn’t get to play until he was 15 and earned the money from a job at Burger King to buy his own drum set. Playing the drums was life changing, Jim says: “It gave me an instant way to move tensions, to move my teenage frustration and young adult frustration out.”
Jim went on to become a professional musician, landing a place with the American world music band Rusted Root. Jim traveled the country and the world with Rusted Root, and he lived many dreams. His intuitive connection to the transformative nature of music deepened over time: “We were fortunate to have success and play every night in front of thousands of people. I watched people react, dancing, laughing, crying to the music we were making. It was a visceral experience to people and I would meet them afterwards and hear story after story about how the music changed them.”
Jim also said he repeatedly heard audience members say the music was “life changing.” I asked him what that meant. “It’s hard to explain,” Jim answered, “But it’s as if the music made people feel more themselves, more comfortable in their own skin, able express emotion and let it out. They would say things like: ‘OMG you have no idea what you guys did. I’ve never felt anything like it before.””
Over 15 years from 1990 through 2005 with Rusted Root, such stories were identical. After 2005, when Jim left the band to raise his children, he found a new occupation teaching music at Saint Francis University and leading drumming workshops both privately and for the university. Interesting things happened: “I thought I was just teaching people drumming technique but what I found was that they would show up and then come back because – like our concert audiences – they said they were having a transformative experience. Only this was different: less euphoric, more relaxed. Some said it was the first time they’d felt really relaxed.”
From Music and Relaxation to Medical Breakthroughs
Within a year at Saint Francis, Jim was approached by university researchers wanting to study what he was teaching to see if it would help kids with autism. They invited kids with autism to drumming workshops. Autism educators observing the workshops couldn’t believe the results: Jim could keep the kids’ attention for 30 to 60 minutes – something that would otherwise be impossible. Saint Francis University obtained a grant from the Army to study the phenomena further.
Jim realized that if he was going to take what he increasingly perceived to be transformational therapeutic benefits of music to the next level, he would need to have a lot more research and to be able to communicate the benefits to everyone from the scientist to the layman to little children.
Jim began researching and writing, publishing his own “Drum Circle Leadership” book and also writing for the OmniVista Health Learning programs, for which he runs the “Jim Donovan Whole Body SOUND HEALING System.” Writing for OmniVista has increased Jim’s knowledge base and helped him branch out. He has developed training programs for autistic children’s support staff and teacher’s aides, as well for people in recovery, and in recovery centers across Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and North Carolina.
Author’s note: I did a bit of my own research and learned that numerous medical studies of Vagus nerve stimulation (using electrodes or implants) have been done in the U.S., showing clinical benefits in treating heart disease, epilepsy, depression, and other diseases. If you google “Vagus nerve stimulation” you’ll find many references to such studies, as well as studies in India of the benefits of stimulating the nerve by chanting or humming. Jim’s core observation is actually that many therapeutic benefits can be obtained through sound and touch alone. Our nervous systems are then known to trigger release of beneficial chemicals, such as norepinephrine, acetylcholine, serotonin, and adrenaline. I’m not able to prove or disprove the science of this, just to say that since attending one of Jim’s workshops. I’ve been using the brain humming and brain tapping procedures. I find they relax me and reduce some chronic neck, back, and shoulder pain symptoms. I subscribed to the Jim Donovan’s Whole SOUND HEALING System myself to learn more!
As with all our True Stories of Giving and Inspiration, I’d like to close with Jim’s moments of greatest challenge and inspiration, and a call to action.
Moments of Greatest Challenge
Jim said his greatest obstacle was finding self-confidence, especially early in life: “Once I had success as a musician I thought I was cured [of a lack of self-confidence], but when I pivoted to education, it reared its head and I had to rebuild it. I’ve also tried hard to invent a life that I wanted to live (and still make a good living) rather than doing something imposed on me by normalcy. I’ll be 50 soon, and I want to look back on my life and say I would do that again in a heartbeat. I’ve realized I’m good at manifesting things, the next challenge is making sure I’m thinking big enough!”
Going forward, Jim has big plans. He wants to continue creating music-based products that are educational, and use his new Sun King Warriors band as a platform to get the word out on whole body sound healing: “Music is a way to reach a lot more people; we have a record coming out and will do something a little bit risky and audacious: We will give it away!”
Moments of Greatest Inspiration
After each of his children was born, Jim said: “I felt like my heart grew 2 sizes bigger. What it increased in me was my capacity to love people without needing anything from them. When I get in front of people I think: Love them first, then perform.”
Jim was also inspired by getting to play with some of his heroes: “When Led Zepplelin played Pittsburg they said we [Rusted Root] were the best band in Amercia and dedicated a performance of ‘The Song Remains the Same’ to us as Jimmy Page came out on stage wearing a Rusted Root t-shirt. This was reminder to me that anything is possible!”
Authors Note: At the workshop, Jim told us another inspiring story. During the Rusted Root days, playing as the backup band one night the group found itself on a stage in the middle of a completely deserted parking lot. It was time to play, and the band members looked at one another in disbelief and uncertainty. Jim recalls: “We were in a dire circumstance but we decided to go all in, to take pride in what we do, and to play like it was the last time we’ll ever get to play. This is something we did it consistently from the very first night we played together and I didn’t realize until years later the power of that mindset; whatever it is do it right, go all the way, and don’t hold back.” As the band played, a woman wearing sunglasses came out into the parking lot, walking a dog, and then it was as if they were playing just for her. After the song was done, she came up to the stage and introduced herself; it was Sheryl Crow! After saying “People need to hear you guys!” Crow referred Rusted Root to radio and concert connections in New York City, leading eventually to the band selling over three million records.
Call to Action
We should all take Jim’s story to heart and learn from his mindset and experience. Each of us will follow a different path, but we can all work on visualizing our dreams, being the best version of ourselves we can be, and going all in to the flow of giving and receiving in the stream of life.
Jim’s sound healing tools like brain humming may be an important addition to Technologies of the Mind we’ve already discovered here on Thirdways Communities. If you ever feel stressed, depressed, can’t sleep, or just plain curious check it out at the links provided in this post. And let’s talk in this space here about what works for us. Perhaps the time will come to get on board with Jim’s Dream!
Friends of the Homeless National Resource Center
Dianne Fanti describes herself as good at finding and helping to fill in missing gaps. She loves to connect people with resources and support, and to help them understand how they are uniquely aimed. She has developed an educational program enabling those experiencing homelessness to develop essential life skills through the healing and expressive arts. “It’s in my nature to help and I’ve been working with the homeless for many years. At 15, I had my first encounter with the homeless and I felt this calling.”
Fast forward to 2013. Dianne and her partners created the Friends of the Homeless network, a Maryland non-profit designed to provide an organized structure and support system that both helps the homeless directly and helps organize, mobilize, and improve support for them.
Dianne’s Story
It started one day when, at 15, Dianne and some friends were taking a short cut through a field in the Baltimore, MD suburbs and stumbled upon a homeless encampment. Some of her friends were acquainted with the people there and got into a conversation with them. Dianne was surprised, she didn’t know there were any homeless people in their town. After listening to the conversation for a little while, she came to discover that, “They didn’t sound that much different than the other adults that I knew, and even had similar problems, only theirs were stacked or compounded. So while one person might be going through a divorce or have lost their job, they would have many problems occurring simultaneously. But something about their humanity touched me and I would return to see them regularly after school.”
In her blog post, Warming the Stone Child, Dianne describes her own challenges with almost experiencing homelessness as an adolescent, before receiving the support she needed and turning her life around. She recovered, began to thrive, and went on to college. She started in social work, but went on to study the holistic health sciences, and healing and expressive arts. But she never forgot the homeless, and in so many ways she still lives for them today.
Origins of the Work
After college, Dianne continued to think of the homeless and wanted to share what she had been learning. She developed an educational curriculum of essential life skills, and taught her first class at a shelter. Over several years, she refined the curriculum with the help of the participants and staff, so it became customized for them. She developed a passion for discovering how each person’s journey through the kinds of troubles that may lead to homelessness is unique. For example: “Some people cannot hold a job for more than a few months. But why? Have they taken jobs that don’t suit their nature, like an introverted hostess? Do they need to feel validated and supported to unlock their potential? How can we help them discover what they need, and become their partners in getting it?”
Friends of the Homeless National Resource Center
After years of teaching and working with the homeless directly, Dianne and the colleagues she connected with along the way formally established FOTH in 2013. The website describes FOTH as: “A nonprofit project fostering resilience and resourcefulness in marginalized women and men through the sharing of community resources and our transformational educational curriculum and programs.”
The Resource Guide and Resource Cards are now being distributed in 20 states. FOTH is a network of professionals and concerned citizens working together to provide the following services:
- Street Outreach: FOTH publishes and distributes street cards (resource cards), which volunteers can hand out directly on the street when circumstances seem appropriate. The cards can also be distributed to friends, colleagues, churches, or other care-giving organizations. The cards can be handed out along with recommended gifts of toiletries, snacks, or other articles as well as the simple gift of human contact and encouragement. For many homeless or challenged clients (hereinafter, “clients”), a street card is a starting point for recovery and receiving further help. FOTH volunteers can also connect clients with local and national resources.
- Resource Guide and Workbook: FOTH’s freely-downloadable resource guide is a “train the trainer” sort of publication that can be given to clients and their supporters. It is designed to provide awareness of helpful resources available in communities, including hotlines, meals, lodging, counseling, and career support. It also provides guidance on discovering one’s skills and strengths, reducing stress, and building or rediscovering life skills for budgeting, saving, and job search. A free companion introductory video accompanies the guide online and is used to train volunteers in multiple centers. These materials have been peer-reviewed and approved by a panel of expert clinical social workers, psychologists, and human service professionals.
- Educational Curriculum: The educational curriculum is a teacher-training program for professionals working with the homeless. It enables them to provide hands-on training with participants in shelters and centers to acquire essential life skills through “engaging classes that utilize the healing and expressive arts and holistic health sciences, through 42 techniques and over 20 additional activities.” It includes evidence-based and proven techniques for helping clients with many of their challenging problems and can help them to build a new life.
- Connection: FOTH connects supporters in communities with giving initiatives and helps them find a way to contribute that suits their individual skills, talents, or abilities.
- Advocacy: FOTH also advocates to dispel myths about homelessness and the causes of homelessness through public talks and their videos online
Moments of Greatest Challenge and Inspiration
Dianne explains that: “Street outreach is really challenging. Yesterday I was visiting some people under a highway bypass, keeping out of sight. Sometimes they manage to make themselves fairly comfortable. It can be worrisome as it starts to get cold outside and people don’t feel an incentive to change or leave the cold. Some may not be able to feel the cold due to some of the substances available on the street and so we worry about them and encourage them to get inside, even if it’s just to an ER, library, or fast food place. Of course, we’re doing our best to connect them with resources and helpful shelters and centers, but it’s ultimately up to them. While we ultimately want to help them connect with further support and opportunities, our goal in the Winter is for their survival.”
On the other hand: “Our greatest inspirations occur when we have success stories. When we connect with someone at the right time, then through the education process, their life really can rebuild. It is both humbling and rewarding to see.”
Call to Action
I’m sure that most of us have walked down city streets, seen people hopeless or homeless, and felt powerless to help. We’ve handed out a dollar now and then, but as we walk away we know that nothing really changed. But what if there is a way to make a change?
Dianne’s heartfelt dedication to the homeless, and her wonderful achievements should inspire us to act. We can all be part of the FOTH network and/or help in these or other ways.
Gain understanding with helpful articles and a video series on YouTube.
Contact FOTH and stay in touch through the mailing list.
Share the RESOURCE CARDS and, if appropriate, help a client take the next step by calling “211” or “311” to find shelters or other assistance centers and contact caseworkers.
Download the Resource Guide and share it with clients or other supporters.
Donate at this link.
Recovery Without Walls
Recovery with Walls (RWW) is a Cape Cod-based center that offers structure, safety, support and stability to women following treatment for substance dependency. It’s services are free of charge. RWW is Bill Dougherty’s gift to the world, so we begin with his story.
Bill’s Story
Bill Dougherty spent his first 40 years growing up and then working in various pursuits while struggling with alcoholism. He served in the military, and also worked in marketing, as a schoolteacher, even as a bartender but never found fulfillment. As Bill puts it: “I was continuing to hit dead end streets.”
At 42, Bill hit a low. He recounts: “I’d hit low points, lost my family, and I was in darkness. I was going to doctors and psychiatrists. I was taking medication. I found myself at Cape Cod on a bridge looking over the water. I couldn’t jump, I couldn’t NOT jump. Fortunately, by the grace of God I’d met a young woman who’d been to a treatment center. Someone who understood me. Although she was tough with me when I hit bottom, she was my last friend. I came down from that bridge, called her and said ‘I’ll do anything.’”
Bill was one of those people for whom Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) really worked. As for many, AA became his second home and he eventually met his wife there.
For the next 20 or 30 years Bill worked in hospitals and treatment centers to try and help others recover as well. Through experience, Bill learned from that treatment programs usually don’t cure long term addiction. “Eleven years ago I was working in a very good center where I could actually get to know people. But I kept watching same cycle: They leave, lack backup, they relapse. And it seems to be even more of a problem with women than men.”
The Real Treatment Begins the Day You Leave Treatment
Bill began to develop his dream to establish a post-treatment support center for women. Services would be free of charge. Bill didn’t want depend on reimbursement from governments or other organizations because that would give those organizations authority over his work. When he talked about his vision, however, others in the treatment business told him it would never fly. He would run out of funding, they said.
Recovery Without Walls
Bill opened the Recovery Without Walls (RWW) office in Falmouth, Massachusetts in 2006 with the support of his wife and a few volunteers. RWW’s model was and is to provide immediate help for women who have completed a course of treatment for addiction, are in a 12-step program such as the AA’s, remain sober or clean, and also abstain from relationships for their first 12 months in RWW.
As Bill puts it, those in recovery “Need to have an attachment to something healthy and move on to other healthy things.” Through its volunteers, RWW is highly flexible about finding ways to help women. The first priority is to help with any safety issues, then to offer services.
The approach to assistance is highly-individualized because everyone has individual needs and challenges. For example, the immediate safety issue may be getting a car fixed, finding a place to live, or getting a job. Then clients need a point of attachment, a way to commit to something and in turn, to themselves. This may be counseling, an opportunity to volunteer at the office, another support group, a job, or something else.
The RWW website details the following services:
- Basic services including client support services, referrals and resource information, coaching, skill development, limited financial assistance, and advocacy.
- Mindfulness & Meditation For Women in Recovery: A weekly class with an Instructor and Integrative Life Coach that assists participants in “cultivating a sense of deep relaxation and renewal, combining soothing guided meditation, calming rhythmical breathing exercises, energizing body movements and rejuvenating sound therapy…”
- Acupuncture: RWW has found this ancient Chinese treatment highly effective in reducing cravings and anxiety. It facilitates an overall sense of wellness even for patients that are resistant or fearful of other interventions. Here’s a link to a moving video describing the acupuncture program from the RWW site.
A Community that Runs Itself
RWW does not charge for services, does not seek reimbursement from government, and does not have employees. It is in fact the model that Bill envisioned 11 years ago that others in the recovery space said “could not work.” So how does RWW do it?
RWW runs entirely on volunteer efforts and private fundraising. For volunteers RWW has Bill himself, family members, and RWW program alumni. Current and former clients often drop in to help, or sometimes Bill calls them for help. Money for RWW’s dedicated yoga, meditation, and acupuncture service providers and other expenses is primarily raised through athletic and concert fundraising events.
As Bill puts it: “RWW sort of runs itself. One of the beauties is program serves clients forever. You can always keep coming back.”
Moments of Greatest Challenge and Inspiration
RWW has been operating for 11 years, and Bill hopes it will still be here in 20. It has helped over 500 women in recovery so far, 120 this year alone, and plans to help 250 next year. RWW has been opened to other programs, so that women in recovery at those programs can draw from 800 hours of mindfulness and acupuncture care paid by RWW.
Not surprisingly Bill describes raising money as the biggest challenge: “Sometimes we have periods when money is running out, it is a big challenge to raise more and the needs keep coming in. On those days, one gets disheartened.”
On the inspiring side: “I know that somehow what we need will be provided for, with God’s help” and “The women – there’s much more laughter than tears.”
Call to action
Studies show relapse rates after treatment for alcoholism or drug addiction are as high as 90%. Addiction is one of this country’s worst issues, accounting for more than two-thirds of arrests and enormous health costs.
How is this for inspiring? RWW touts a 74% long term success rate at keeping women in recovery sober, safe, housed, and employed or productively occupied.
These numbers – 74%, 500 women – represent a wonderful gift from Bill to so many and an inspiration to us all. Please watch the acupuncture video and read Troy Clarkson’s articles from The Falmouth Enterprise (link1, link2) – they capture RWW’s human story so well.
Knowing that recovery is a long road, look for opportunities to help people on along it. If you are in the recovery business, do what you can to meet clients wherever they are. Give them a hand up, or a point of attachment.
And please help keep “Bill’s Gift” going. Donate or help RWW here!
True Stories of Giving and Inspiration
Some of the posts on this blog belong to the category “true stories.” Click on the true stories link anywhere you see it for the list.
Here’s the back story. In 2017, I decided to write a book: “True Stories of Giving and Inspiration.”
It is easier for me to write one chapter at a time with an audience in mind. So I decided to serialize at least the first drafts of the stories here on Thirdways. Herein I’m following familiar footsteps of authors like Charles Dickens, who serialized all his novels. but reconceptualizing serialization in a non-fictional, blogged format.
Maybe True Stories will become a best seller, maybe it won’t make a penny, either way it will make me richer in life through the writing, relationships, inspiration, and giving opportunities it brings along the way. Already, I feel richer for having met the subjects of the first two stories!
Have you noticed that “giving” and “inspiration” are (along with “independent thinking”) core values for Thirdways? That’s no accident. Here’s hoping Thirdways will have many True Stories that become part of the book and much more besides!