Tagged: Five Things You Don’t Know About Me

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I’m it.

Alexander Becker over at WOW has tagged me in the Five Thing You Don’t Know About Me game. Thanks for the tag, Alexander.

So here they are, five things you don’t know about me.

1. Let’s start at the beginning. About one-hour after my birth, I was given up for adoption by my biological mother. Six-days later I was picked up by my adoptive parents. At 23, I searched for and found my biological mother. Six months later I flew to Phoenix to meet Joan and my half-brother, Noah.

At 28 I searched for, found and visited my biological father. He’s a fly-fishing instructor and guide for Orvis. So most of our time together was spent fishing. Fine by me.

Much of the psychological, emotional and energetic healing work I have undertaken in the past 20-years has focused on the many complex issues connected to this event. One of these days I may actually complete the book, Raised By Strangers, An Adoptee’s Search For The Truth, which documents my healing journey into and out from the shadow of adoption.

2. My Virgo nature comes out in full force around dishwashers. I’ve been known to unload two-thirds of a dishwasher just to squeeze in two, maybe three additional plates. My wife teases me mercilessly about my “system” for the silverware tray: Each utensil has its own section, knives in the back left corner, teaspoons middle left, big spoons front left, you get the idea.

Sounds a bit obsessive, I know, but if you try it sometime, you’ll be amazed at how quickly you can unload the silverware tray!

3. I spent 7-months working with Jean Leidloff, the author of The Continuum Concept (aff). We were writing a parenting book that would have followed-up and expanded on the ideas in the Continuum Concept.

The book was never published - that’s another story - so I never got paid since I was working on a percentage basis. (Silly me!). But even without the money, I am extremely grateful for the time I spent with her and the information I learned.

4. In 1983-4, my sophomore year at Syracuse University, I was a member of the cheerleading squad. It was pretty incredible doing back-flips in the end-zone of the Carrier Dome in front of 50,000 people after SU scored a touchdown, or walking around with beautiful women standing on my shoulders during a basketball time out.

5. When my daughter required 5-days of care in the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) immediately after she was born, I dropped everything and spent most of my time there with her. There was no way I was going to let her stay isolated in that plastic box. (Are you seeing a theme here? Adoption, Continuum Concept, Attachment Parenting, isolation in NICU?) It was a profoundly healing experience for me. It was as if, by being there for my daughter, I was able to heal some of the wounding I experienced being left alone for the first six-days of my life.

And here’s a bonus one since I couldn’t decide which one to cut out!

6. I spent most of my 8th grade year completely wasted. (I guess this means if I ever run for president I won’t be able to say “I didn’t inhale.”) It was the thing to do: at least it became the thing to do among the group of friends I had hung out with since first grade. One time I actually passed out and fell off the bench at our local Brigham’s ice cream shop. As you can imagine I didn’t do so great in school that year!

One day during the summer before 9th grade, I walked into my friend’s house and saw lines of cocaine on the table. A voice inside me - my guardian angel? - screamed at me to leave. I did leave and never hung out with those guys again. I’ve never smoked pot since then either.

I know it sounds pretty boring. It was for a while, but lately, I’ve found plenty of non-drug-induced ways of getting high!

So that’s it. Five Six things you previously didn’t but now do know about me. You can’t ask again, because there’s really nothing left. All my secrets are out. Well, most of them, anyway.

Thanks for asking Alexander. Now, I’m going to tag, my friend, Christine Sisk, David at the Glittering Muse, MsQ at Qmusings a relative newcomer to the blogosphere with some great writing and great ideas, Richard Lemmon at MindPlunge and another relative newcomer worth visiting, Andy over at Thoughtful Consideration.

You’re it!

Posted by Edward Mills | Filed Under Adoption, Fun, Parenting, blogs 

Thanksgiving, Family And The Millionaire Mind

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Thanksgiving is just around the corner, and the corner is right here!

(Ed’s Note: This was supposed to come out on Wednesday, but it was hiding in my drafts folder instead of scheduled for posting. So use your imagination. And I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving!)

Tomorrow morning, my wife, daughter and I begin our big Thanksgiving adventure.

We’re flying up to Boise tomorrow morning to spend Thanksgiving with my biological mother, Joan, her mother and brother, his wife, and my brother, Noah. It will be the first time that we have all been together.

From there, Melissa, Ella and I will pile into a car with Joan and Noah for the drive to Boulder for two days of sight-seeing in Noah’s relatively new hometown.

Then Joan and Noah will watch Ella while Melissa and I head down to Denver for three days at T. Harv Ecker’s Millionaire Mind Intensive seminar.

Then, on Monday it’s back to Oakland International.

It’s no coincidence (never is) that I’ll be with Joan and Noah in the days leading up to the Millionaire Mind Intensive. If you haven’t read the book, Secrets of the Millionaire Mind, it’s all about understanding and changing your “financial blueprint,” the mostly unconscious thoughts and beliefs that influences your relationship with money.

My financial blueprint is definitely connected to my adoption experience. Over the past few years I’ve noticed an interesting pattern: Whenever Joan (my biological mother) is coming to visit or we are going to visit her, my income takes a major hit in the days and weeks leading to the visit.

I’ve been working on this pattern for a long time. And I’m happy to say that the dip before this trip was not as acute as in the past (nor was my reaction to that dip) but there was still a noticeable decrease in my income.

I’ve heard that this seminar is extremely powerful, and I’m hoping to implement some major blueprint revisions!

From a personal growth perspective, spending a week with Joan and Noah immediately before the Millionaire Mind Seminar is absolutely perfect: If anything is going to activate the parts of my blueprint needing revision it’s time with these two people. And I say that in a very loving way.

So I’m looking forward to a holiday adventure on many levels. I’ll keep you posted as much as I can during the next few days. And, if I don’t have time to get to the juicy details, you can look forward to hearing more after I return.

Posted by Edward Mills | Filed Under Abundance, Adoption, Money, financial freedom 

The Language of the Pain Body

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I’m just now digging in to Ekhart Tolle’s newest book, A New Earth: Awakening To Your Life’s Purpose. In it, he offers a more detailed exploration of the Pain Body than he did in The Power of Now. And this exploration has definitely heightened my awareness of the manner in which my Pain Body speaks to me.

Just yesterday, after writing about my 30-day trial of arising at 5:00 am, I got a taste of the language of the Pain Body.

As I was getting into the shower it occurred to me that I had not told my wife about my plan to wake up at 5:00 am for the next 30-days. “Why haven’t I told her,” I thought. And then a voice that was very different responded, “Because she’ll take it away from you.”

That was strange, I thought, but my curiosity was aroused so I asked, “What do you mean she’ll take it away from me?”

“Oh, she won’t do it ‘on purpose.’” The voice replied. “No, it will all be very subtle. But you watch. If she finds out about this, you’ll notice that Ella starts waking up at 6:00 or even 5:30 in the morning.”

The voice had more to say, but by that point I was aware that it was my pain body speaking to me. And I could very clearly trace that voice and the belief system that the Pain Body was expressing all the way back to my adoption. The experience of having the one thing I wanted most in all of the world - my mother - “taken away from me” has become the fuel that my Pain Body lives on; fuel that is still burning even now, almost 42 years later.

And the reason that fuel has not burned out is because the Pain Body is a master at conserving its own fuel. The Pain Body burns anything else that it can find in order to save the precious resource of its initial painful experience.

As I stepped into the shower yesterday morning, the Pain Body was attempting to throw more fuel onto the fire, fuel that would have burned up my relationship with Melissa. That is how the Pain Body works.

But this is where the Law of Attraction comes in. Once I recognized the presence of my Pain Body and its desire to draw me out of the present and into the quagmire of an old traumatic emotional/energetic experience, I was able to ask the question, “How do I want to feel in this moment?” That one question brought me fully back to the present moment and allowed me to step out of the grip of my Pain Body.

“How do I want to feel in this moment?” So much power in such a simple question. When you have the presence to ask that question, you have no choice but to answer. For me, in that moment, I was quite clear that I did NOT want to feel the sense of dread and resentment and anger that the Pain Body was attempting to arouse by pointing out the possibility that Melissa would “take away” my newly found morning time. I did NOT want to slip back into that familiar but painful place of rehashing and re-experiencing the pain of my adoption.

What I Did Want was to feel good. I wanted to feel the peace in which I had been fully immersed during my alone time earlier in the morning. I wanted to feel the enthusiasm that I was feeling about the extra time I had to write and share my writing with the world. I wanted to feel calm and trusting, confident in the knowledge that Melissa will support and encourage me in my effort to take actions that lead me to deeper happiness and peace.

With those answers I felt the heaviness of the Pain Body slip away, unable to hold onto me, no longer able to pull me down into the depths of its darkness.

And as the cleansing water continued to wash down over me, I offered my thanks to the Pain Body for helping me become even more clear about what I want, and for giving me the opportunity to envision a more supportive, open and joyous relationship with my wife.

Posted by Edward Mills | Filed Under Adoption, Emotions, Fear, Law of Attraction, Pain Body, Relationships