Dedication To Seekers of Truth & My Suffering

The biggest problem i've had in the past, is that my suffering and anguish have started to rule my daily interactions.  The rabbi doctor Lynn Kesselman has created a system he calls the five gates to help figure out where some of these cycles started in our past, how to accept them, and how to move forward.  My cycles I've uncoverd stem from much of the interaction I had as a young boy.  My parents were the typical distant parents.  I don't think they were ever truly loving to each other.  Maybe their love died some time before I became aware.  They took care of me, fed me, clothed me, made sure I went to school, that sort of care.  But they were never quite encouraging of me.  Dad always made sure that I did well in school, or else I'd feel the consequences on my behind.  So I had a certain amount of respect, by way of fear.  I guess that is the way people felt authority was doled out in those days.  It seems that times now have changed... we can barely handle the crime in this country, I think that also is a problem of parenting... anyway, my parents really kept me motivated through negative reinforcement.  I've now realized that I'm really just mimicking what the same behavior that my parents taught me.  This was a big realization because I've integrated this painful way of reinforcing the people I love in my life, and I really didn't notice it.  Even though it's so very prevalent in my every day sort of interactions.  Whether its with my coworkers, my wife, my children.  It scares me to think that I'm teaching my child the same thing that my father taught me.

  This has been a real big awakening for me.  I know now that I've seen my past cycle come up and hit me in the face, that I want to change who I am in the present.  I think I'm coming to acceptance of my past interactions.  I think I'm even coming to acceptance of my parents and family's past.  Really I can't blame myself or even my parents.  WHy should I blame anyone.  Not that I'm not taking responisbilities for my actions, but jsut like some one who is sick, they can't be blamed for feeling badly.  It's really a symptom of some bad expereicnes and defenses against suffering.

  So back to Dr. Lynn Kesselman.  His Five Gates Program is all about looking back, looking inward, to find these exact sorts of moments in time in our past that have caused us so much suffering.  Only by seeing, uncovering, and realizing what has happened to us in the past, can we really start to have these epiphanies.  I've started to sense a change in the way I see my interactions now, in the past, and use those realizations to help allow me to take control of my future interactions.

So here is some of what Dr. Lynn Kesselman has to say about Suffering:

Suffering is not only pain; it is the hopeless feeling that

our pains have no solution. It makes us feel alone because

we are convinced no one really knows or cares about how

we feel.

If you think no one cares about how you feel, you may

be right, even though people may also tell you they care

about you and want to help you. Too often they don’t know

that how you feel is your real problem. The main thing that

matters is how you feel about yourself. As your love for

being who you are increases, you will feel less alone. In

wellness, our worries about ourselves diminish and we are

able to positively experience our connections with everything

and everyone. As you feel more connected to life your

feelings of being alone will quickly leave you.

Do you believe recovery or getting well is accomplished

by stopping “using” or not doing things others, or even you

don’t want you to do? It’s not. Instead, it’s learning how to

be happy, which means training ourselves to banish

needless fears. When you are happy, you can most easily

achieve the changes in yourself, which will change your

world. Working the Five Gates Program here will positively

change your reality.

A lot of the problems we see in our selves are caused by

“using.” Using is not only our misadventures with drugs or

other negative habits, it’s a much larger idea about how we

run away from life into habitual patterns which we use to

keep ourselves from seeing life on terms we find uncomfortable.

Using is a method by which we misdirect our

minds and senses to help us cope with our self‐doubts and

fears. Drugs, gambling, obsessive thoughts and compulsive,

escapist actions are just a small part of that list.

Recovery is equivalent to feeling great and no longer

feeling the need to escape reality at all. It’s not about your

willpower or fighting your destructive thoughts and

actions, it’s about losing your interest in thinking about,

believing in, and doing those destructive things to which

you are addicted. When you’re well, life becomes easier,

and not so much of a battle. If you can start caring more

about yourself, and caring less about how others feel about

you, you’ll be well on the road to recovery immediately.

The only other things you’ll need are a belief that you can

give yourself a happier, and a more secure life. You will

need some special thinking tools for navigating life as a

more powerful person, and practice. That’s what you will

find here.

More From Lynn Kesselman's Five Gates

I write again about my journey through life and how I've been finding help in my struggles and strife.  I've had a difficult journey so far and have found some help that is useful and effective.  Not just some twelve step or wacky psycho babble.  This is real world advice that can be followed and taken in real world steps.  The Rabbi Doctor Lynn Kesselman has a program, he calls it the five gates, by which I've started down the path of understanding my past fears and traumas.  Lynn Kesselman went through a similar journey and has documented the process by which he helped himself out of a dark place.  I'm already starting to understand my past and relive the painful cycle of reliving the past.  Rather than staying in the trauma of my past injuries and expecting things to always be the same, i'm starting to realize that the past is just that.  That I can move forward without the burdens of the past coming up in my every day life.  I also know that I cannot change the past but I must accept it for what it is, what lessons it has taught me, and realize that I can step forward into the future, a future of bright and hopeful opportunities.  I've started to gain faith in myself, faith in the world, and faith that things will be better as I move forward.  Here is what Lynn Kesselman says about Faith, Religions, and God.

For some, religions provide many of the same spiritual

benefits as does the Five Gates Training Program. In a

sense, each religion is a program of recovery. The Program

does not conflict with any constructive and positive views

of any major religion of which I am aware. There are,

however, important differences.

All religions tell us that we need faith to give us the

needed strength to function well in life. When they give

hope to a spiritually bankrupt person, they will take away

that person’s anxieties and depression. But when a religion

is based on blind faith and an assurance that this person

will have a good life once they give their faith to believe in

that religion, it is necessary that the believer continue to

experience a good life or that person will lose his faith and

once again fall prey to the ravages of anxiety, fear and

despair. This is an impossibly difficult test for any religion

rooted in superstition, since life itself as it reveals our successful

and unsuccessful beliefs will always be the litmus

test of our spiritual condition. Their positive principles and

reality rules must prove worthy of a person’s faith as life

itself reveals their truth. If the belief structure fails, that

“believer” will be more confused and despondent than

ever.

Most modern and ancient spiritual teachings tell us

many of the same things: to focus in the present, reject our

judgments and resentments in favor of self‐management

and acceptance, live on the positive side of life’s choices, be

generous, loving, constructive and your life will reflect

back the light you bring to it. All the great spiritual

teachings of this world throughout every epoch have universally

informed humans on the virtues of processing life

focused on the present, with a loving embrace towards all

creation.

The problem is that none of these fine teachings tells us

how we can quickly, without relying upon superstition,

change from being the fear‐ridden, judgmental person we

are to being the more open, loving person whose spiritual

fullness has opened up his or her talents and pleasures

beyond anything possible for most of us today. All spiritual

programs, except those that believe your virtue and salvation

are delivered by an outside magical power, say that

if you keep studying, praying and doing positive deeds,

you will eventually be transformed by this process into a

more effective, happier you.

The method of the Five Gates Training Program can

help you do much of this job more quickly because it

focuses us on the basic ways by which we process reality

itself. The Church of Religious Science, Hindu Ashrams,

Judaism (including the teachings of Jesus), Alcoholics

Anonymous and many others to some extent hold similar

truths to healing the spirit.

Five Gates from the Rabbi Doctor Lynn Kesselman

I recently read a book by Dr. Rabbi Lynn Kesselman. The book was Recover with me. Lynn Kesselman talks about his past and his troubles in dealing with addiction and anxiety and depression. The book was really helpful and Lynn Kesselman gave some great advice and a real strategy which is already helping to get my own life back in order. I've personally dealt with alcoholism for a long time now. Maybe I'm not a belligerent drunk that beats his wife and dog, but I still get a bit raucous at times. I've been known to throw the TV through the front window because dinner isn't ready on time. Or to sob like a little baby till my tears run out. I've felt like I've been on an emotional roller-coaster since drinking has taken over my life. Slowly but surely I've lost my self down the neck of a bottle.

Don't just take my word, here is what Roy Evans had to say about the Rabbi Doctor Lynn Kesselman's Book"

I have served as President and Executive Director for

Bridge Back Correctional Re‐Entry Facility (prison) for the

past 35 years where I have attended to the needs of

countless recovering people. I have come to see recovery

from addictions as only one dimension of a far greater

need. The greater need touches all of us; we need a firm

connection with a sense of faith that we can have a good life

free from anxiety, depression, addictions and all of the

emotional and mental disorders which typically plague

almost every inmate at Bridge Back.

The early vision for Bridge Back was that we would

help our inmates recover from substance addictions, but

early on we learned that all who suffer from this affliction

also suffer from anxieties, depression, and other emotional

and mental disorders. They are connected in ways brilliantly

and thoroughly explained in Five Gates — The

Science of Healing the Spirit. We’ve all dreamed that one day

there would be a magic pill that would banish these

problems, but until now it seemed as though such a universal

answer would be many years in coming.

Five Gates — The Science of Healing the Spirit is not a pill

but it is the first program I have seen which holds the

promise of arresting and reversing the epidemic which

keeps mine and all other prisons full and the courts overwhelmed

with an endless supply of new disturbed and

addicted offenders. Five Gates starts by helping us see how

we have become who we are and continues to describe not

only how we would ideally be, but also gives us a method

by which we can improve ourselves quickly.

At first it seemed wrong to believe that one program

could solve all of these problems at the same time and

quickly. We have fellowships for alcoholism, narcotic

addictions, cocaine addictions, rage disorder, eating disxii

orders, sexual compulsions, emotional unrest, and

countless others. We have medical specialists for every one

of these, yet so few people really get well. I believe that

Lynn Kesselman has hit on the method for tying all of these

together into a single perspective and treatment method for

reversing their underlying cause, the dysfunctional fears

which drive people into these states of disrepair. The Five

Gates Program attacks these problems at their root which

we all knew was

I urge anyone having similar issues with anxiety induced depression and addiction to search out the Rabbi Doctor Lynn Kesselman and get help to quickly and effectively change their patterns for the better. Make today a new day and yesterday just fade into the past.