Inklings Bruce Sanguin's blog
Your Desires Are Legitimate
When was the last time you gave yourself permission to feel your true desires?Without guilt, shame, or second-guessing?For many of us, especially those who have spent years adjusting to others’ needs and expectations, the idea of honoring our own desires can feel foreign or even selfish.We’ve been taught to believe that to desire something is … Read more
Why I Do What I Do
You may have already read a few posts of mine. I thought you might want to know a little more about who I am and why I do what I do. It starts in an ayahuasca ceremony. After a bout of “cleansing” ( a polite way of saying puking as this medicine is a purgative.) … Read more
Self-Expression vs. Self-Justification
There’s a big difference between proving who you are—and simply being who you are. Think about it for a second. How often do we find ourselves justifying, explaining, or trying to prove that we’re somebody—worthy, good enough, lovable? That’s the ego talking, the part of us that feels like it has to hustle for our … Read more
We Are Not Born People Pleasers
We’re not born people-pleasers. We’re born for relationship, to enter into a dance of intimacy with the world. In other words, for love. Somewhere along the line, we discover it’s not on offer. Or it’s hit and miss. The “miss” is what breaks our heart. Like, really, breaks our heart. Our little brains and nervous … Read more
Being Treated Well Is a Non-Negotiable
When we’re not treated well when we’re young, it tends to keep happening in adulthood. Sometimes, it’s hard to even notice because some part of us thinks it’s normal. Early neglect leads to self-neglect. But it’s important to end the habit of accepting bad treatment from others. Phone calls not returned, friends chronically showing up late … Read more
The Heart Self
One way of holding your life journey is that it’s a journey into the Heart Self. Ego was built for survival and self-protection. Thank god. Many of us barely survive childhood. Self-protection, through the construction of a false self (yup, the people-pleaser) was intelligent and genius. Good on ya! But in adulthood all this survival … Read more
When It’s Never Enough
If you’re familiar with the feeling of “no matter how much I do, it’s never enough,” then this post is for you. Most people-pleasers know it well. There’s always one more thing you could do to make someone happy, to prove yourself, or to earn acceptance. And yet, no matter how many times you push … Read more
People Pleasing and What To Do about It
Over the years of practicing psychotherapy I have found that there’s a lot of people pleasing going on. Its forms are legion. David keeps taking more and more projects on at work because he can’t say no to his boss and is worried about losing his job. Mary wedded her husband 25 years ago, but … Read more
Distinguishing Desire and Craving
I’ve written elsewhere about inheriting a negative attitude about desire. I interpreted the opening line of Psalm 23 ( “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want” ) to mean I shouldn’t want. Obviously, it means something more along the lines of God provides, chill out. Whether that’s true or not is beside the … Read more
Trauma Doesn’t Just Disappear
Failures of love, physical or emotional, persist in the psyche. They are disastrous, and in my experience there is no magic way to “get over” them. But they don’t have to run your life either. When we break through the denial that we were devastated by failures of love, it becomes possible to live in … Read more
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