Inklings Bruce Sanguin's blog

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Unto Us a Child Is Born

By Bruce Sanguin | February 16, 2023

For thirty years the Christmas season was actually a source of stress for me as a minister, and frankly it’s a relief that I’m not having to saying something original on Christmas Eve, something that hadn’t already been said, again and again. For decades I’ve thought that most Christians miss the point of Christmas. Actually, … Read more

Live your own life

The Pulse of Possibility – A Retrospective Review of the Work of Bruce Sanguin

By Bruce Sanguin | February 16, 2023

Written by Trevor Malkinson First published in the Integral Leadership Review This new cosmological model called the human being comes equipped with the creative power of a supernova, the radiance of a golden spruce, the resiliency of our bacterial cousins, the determination of a spawning Coho salmon, and the heart-wisdom of Sophia. And in the … Read more

The Elusive Mystery of Happiness – Part 1

By Bruce Sanguin | October 25, 2022

  Ever noticed that the more you try to find happiness directly, the more it eludes your grasp? My hunch is that this is because happiness isn’t properly a goal of life. It’s a feeling that happens when you get some other things right. The U.S. Declaration of Independence affirms that the “pursuit of happiness” … Read more

Are You Out of Your Mind?

By Bruce Sanguin | August 10, 2022

I walk my dog between 7 and 8 am most mornings. We are grateful to live beside a gorgeous, off-leash ocean walk with mountain views across a strait. This stroll through paradise is interrupted by the screams of a homeless gentleman who does a version of primal therapy most mornings. The screams are blood-curdling and … Read more

What Are You Trying to Prove?

By Bruce Sanguin | August 1, 2022

What are you trying to prove? Maybe you’ve heard this one directed at you when you did something reckless or annoying. Minus the emotion and directed objectively toward ourselves it can be revealing, even healing. When taken seriously, as a question of self-inquiry, (and not as an attack) it gets at what’s driving our emotional … Read more

Does Psychotherapy Enable Social Repression?

By Bruce Sanguin | July 24, 2022

  I’m reading two challenging books by the late British psychologist, David Smail. Ironically, he was dubious about the effectiveness of psychotherapy. Particularly when it does account for the oppressive impact of hidden societal “interests” on the quality of our individual lives. Why, he asks, do we always direct the client inward, as though something … Read more

Boooring….

By Bruce Sanguin | June 22, 2022

    Boredom. Tolstoy defined it as a “desire for desires”. You want to do something, anything, but nothing is compelling. And then there’s the awful restlessness. If you could be simply bored and sit there with equanimity you’d be a guru. But you’re not. The emptiness/restlessness combo is maddening. Lars Svendson, in his book, A … Read more

Beyond the Brain: What Is Mental Illness?

By Bruce Sanguin | April 22, 2022

  I was shocked to discover that approximately 100,000 lobotomies were performed throughout the world, starting in the early 20th century and continuing right up until the 70’s. The heyday was the 1940’s. The procedure might seem both bizarre and gruesome. And it was both. But it was consistent with a burgeoning belief, still prevalent today, … Read more

I Am Walter White

By Bruce Sanguin | April 4, 2022

I just re-watched Breaking Bad. It’s a character study of a brilliant high school chemistry teacher, Walter White, who discovers that he has lung cancer, evoking a critical reckoning. Who am I? What have I accomplished? What is my legacy? It turns out the answers to these questions respectively for Walt are: I don’t have … Read more

Contending with Your Inner Critic

By Bruce Sanguin | March 21, 2022

We’re our own worst critics. It’s a cliche but it became so by being true. Yes, a minority of humans have the opposite problem. They let themselves off the hook too easily. These folks have zero capacity to objectively assess their own behaviour, show remorse when they’ve wronged somebody, or hear any critical feedback without … Read more

BOOK OUT NOW!

Dismantled: How Love and Psychedelics Broke a Clergyman Apart and Put Him Back Together

This book describes my healing
journey with psychedelics.

Dismanteled by Bruce Sanguin

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