When Your Happily Ever After Just Isn't by Dr. Sunny Massad

Because childhood fairy tales can often result in unrealistic hope and anticipation about living happily ever after with one mate for an entire lifetime, both men and women harbor unconscious expectations about getting all of their needs met by one person. Sometimes, that actually works out. But when it doesn't, I've discovered a remedy: BECOME the partner you always wanted to marry. Whether you are a man or a woman, becoming your own ideal mate will both bring you home to yourself and make you a better partner to others because all of your relationships will emerge from love rather than neediness.

Instead of projecting your needs outward in the hope that someone else will finally save you by giving you what you have always wanted and needed, identify what it is that you want and create it for yourself. If what you want is to be taken care of emotionally and financially, start taking care of yourself emotionally and financially. Once you are intact in those ways, you will be more inclined to attract someone into your life who is also intact in those ways.

Once you can begin to see just how deeply your memories and emotions can have a hold on the way you act and react, it is then that you will stop perceiving yourself and the world through filters of your unresolved past. Unresolved issues can create pain filters in the mind that sabotage clarity.

Healing the wounds of the past is an inside job. If you continue to hurt yourself in ways that others hurt you, if you ignore your own needs, it is almost as though a neon light scrolls across your forehead: “I have needs but I just ignore them and you can too. Although it is uncomfortable, I have become accustomed to being unloved and unlovable. This is who I am.”

When you identify with your wounds, not only do you filter your perceptions through a lens of pain, but you are prone to attract more pain to you. So identify instead with the light of love and joy within yourself. The quality of your relationship with yourself will improve and whether you are with or without a mate, the quality of your life will be enhanced.

If your personal life story is summed up by the song, “Looking for Love in all the Wrong Places,” consider joining me for an upcoming workshop.

When Your Happily Ever After, Just Isn't with Sunny Massad, Ph.D.

Whether you are with someone or alone, employed or working for yourself, confused about how to move forward or clear about your next move, if you are ready to commit to a plan to take you to the next phase of your life, this workshop is for you. This workshop will help you to identify how your personal history shaped the course of your life and then provide the tools to re-script your future. By identifying what happily ever after meant to you when you were younger, remembering the values you held as a teenager and how you imagined your life would be in the future, you will be able to investigate the personal patterns that got established over time, so that you can establish empowering ways to meet your needs.

Tuesday, April 14, 2009 5:30 - 8:00 PM ING Direct Cafe at 1958 Kalakaua Avenue
Tuition: $60 ($90 for couples)

Pre-registration Required at least four days in advance: Register Online or call 848-5544

How to Motivate Yourself by Sunny Massad, Ph.D.

I just read an article that compared going to see a counselor with the eating of good chocolate. Both experiences can be rich and make you feel good. But only an elite few actually know the value of looking within to overcome internal obstacles and sculpt their own lives. Many people actually don't know HOW to chisel away old attitudes or behaviors that no longer serve them. It's not a skill we were taught in the 5th grade, although it would have been a useful one to learn around that age!

Just a small percentage of people know how to motivate themselves to reverse poor choices or turn their fantasies into goals and even fewer actually take advantage of the skills that a good coach or counselor can provide. But self-reflection is the first step necessary to sculpt a life. Taking just a little time to determine how you want to evolve creates a foundation for beginning to clear away the fears and stories that you've been telling yourself and others about why you can't do what you actually would rather be doing.

Most people focus on what they don't want and that keeps them spiraling away from what they actually would prefer to have. If you long to change but have been unable to take the necessary actions to insure you get what you want, begin by identifying an action you need to take but haven't been able to get yourself to do. Now ask yourself some essential questions:

What is it that that action could give you?
How will your life be different if you put the effort it takes into taking that action?
What needs to happen in your attitudes and behaviors in order for you to get moving toward your goal?
What needs to happen within yourself for you to turn your desire into a commitment that you would follow through on?

If you have a history of being unable to succeed on your own but you feel that it's time to turn your hopes and dreams into choices that are finally followed by actions, I invite you to register for UnTherapy for Change, the morning session of the Wellness Counselor Certification Training. Whether you have an interest in counseling others or not, you will learn how to deprogram your early life conditioning, cultivate more effective strategies, and consciously sculpt your future. If you would also like to learn how to coach others to do the same, you would stay for the afternoon sessions, as well. To learn more, consider taking the introductory class:

LEARN TO COUNSEL YOURSELF AND OTHERS IN THESE TRYING TIMES
with Sunny Massad, Ph.D.

You will experience a demonstration of a wellness counseling session with a volunteer from the audience and then have an opportunity to counsel yourself using the technique. If you are interested in learning how to reframe the negative in yourself, your children, your friends, or, if you are a manager, and would like to learn how to help someone in a manner that is appropriate for use in the work environment, reserve a seat at this workshop. For those interested in our more in-depth 64-hour Counselor Training & Certification program, you will learn how this program has changed lives.


Saturday, April 11, 2009 Hawaii Wellness Retreat House
1:00 – 4:00pm
Tuition: $40

Pre-registration required at least four days in advance: Register Online
or call 848-5544