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ISSUE #155 DECEMBER 2005
HOW TO
ESCAPE FROM
THE BOX
TRAP
BY BILL HARRIS
ALSO:
THIS MONTH’S
MINDQUOTES
GLOWING
TESTIMONIAL
OF THE MONTH
ONLINE COURSE:
LIFE PRINCIPLES
IMPORTANT
ANNOUNCEMENTS
BOOK REVIEW
A MILLION
LITTLE PIECES
BY JAMES FREY
REVIEW BY KATE SPARKS
Latest news on
Positive Deviants

DECEMBER 2005
Welcome to Issue #155 (December 16, 2005) of MIND CHATTER
Mind Chatter is published once a month, on or about the 16th of each month.
Please send Mind Chatter to a friend, and please send us
your questions, comments, and suggestions.
03 MINDQUOTES
»
Short quotes from various sources
offering succinct nuggets of wisdom
04 RECOMMENDATIONS
A few recommendations to benefit you
07 HOW TO ESCAPE FROM
THE BOX TRAP
By Bill Harris, Director
10 GLOWING TESTIMONIALS
What our participants are saying!
11 BOOK REVIEW
A Million Little Pieces
By James Frey
Review by Kate Sparks
13 ANNOUNCEMENTS
MIND CHATTER contains articles about:
How you create your life—and how you
can stop unconsciously creating
experiences and outcomes you do not
want, and instead begin to create
exactly what you do want
2 MINDCHATTER December 2005
»
»
»
»
Personal and spiritual growth in general
Meditation (high—and low-tech)
Recovery from emotional trauma
Pretty much any other subject I get
excited about and want to write about.
After all, it’s my company and my
newsletter, and I can do whatever
I want with it. So there.

MINDQUOTES
Every calling is great when
greatly pursued.
Use what talent you possess:
the woods would be very
silent if no birds sang except
those that sang best.
- Henry Van Dyke
-Oliver Wendell Holmes
Only a fool knows everything.
A wise man knows how little
he knows.
- unknown
If you judge people, you have
no time to love them.
-Mother Teresa
MINDCHATTER December 2005
3

Recommendations that may benefit you
» BY BILL HARRIS
“Moment by moment, you create exactly
how you feel, what happens to you, and
what you attract into your life...
“Unfortunately, you’re probably
doing all of this on autopilot...
I want to show you how to create the exact life you want—
inside and out! Heres how to experience a FREE preview...
IKNOW THAT MANY PEOPLE MAY HAVE
promised that they can teach you how to create the
life you want. I promise you that I really can—and
have for thousands of people.
I’VE ALSO ARRANGED FOR YOU TO BE ABLE TO
EXPERIENCE A SAMPLE OF HOW I DO IT, FREE.
So, here’s a very special opportunity for you...something
that can totally turn your life around. And, it could be
worth a considerable amount of money to you, as well.
JUST FOR A MOMENT, IMAGINE:
WHAT IF you could be IN CHARGE of what happens
to you—including your feelings and emotions and other
internal states, as well as your external results...
Wouldn’t that be a lot better than waiting for life to “just
happen,” where you sometimes get what you want, and
sometimes you get what you don’t want
ARE YOU WILLING TO LEARN
EXACTLY HOW YOU CAN DO THIS
For the last year and a half, I’ve been teaching three 12-
lesson online courses called the Life Principles Integration
Process, or LPIP, that teach you all of this, and more. I’ve
received thousands of emails and letters from the people
in these courses telling me how what they’ve learned has
transformed their lives, even saved their lives.
So more people could afford the LPIP courses, and as an
introductory offer, I’m offering them for an incredibly low
$249 per course.
AND, IF YOU SIGN UP FOR ALL THREE,
I’LL GIVE YOU THE THIRD COURSE FOR FREE.
This actually made each course $166 each, about $13.83
per lesson. If I taught the LPIP material in seminar form,
it would probably take at least ten long intense days to
teach each course. And with all the personal follow-up
I include I’d have to charge several thousand dollars per
course for you to attend.
AND EVEN AT THAT LOFTY PRICE,
IT WOULD BE WORTH IT, I PROMISE YOU.
Not only that, there is an iron-clad money back guarantee
on these courses. Take the course and do the homework,
and if you don’t think this is the most transformational
experience you’ve ever had, I’ll immediately refund
your entire tuition.
In other words, you have nothing to lose but whatever
ways you have been automatically creating what you don’t
4 MINDCHATTER December 2005

Create the Exact Life you want continued...
want in life.
I will warn you, though. These LPIP courses are not
your typical pablum-filled feel-good seminars where you
feel high at the end but realize three weeks later that little
if anything really changed.
If you take these three courses, EVERYTHING will
change—and, for the better.
Your life will be transformed. You will have all the
tools you need to be in direct control of your life—your
feelings, your internal state, your external results, your
behavior.
And, you will gain a huge insight into who you really
are, why you’re here, and what life is all about.
Plus you’ll learn, step-by-step, the exact strategies, internal
and external, used by the most successful people in the
world to get anything they want. And, I’ll show you how
to make sure you use them and make them work for you.
And, as I said, if you don’t
get what you want from these
courses, for any reason, you
can get a refund. I’m taking all
the risk, other than your time
investment in actually doing
the lessons.
If you’re not serious about
changing your life, if you aren’t
willing to do what it takes to
operate at the highest level and
really be happy, peaceful, and
successful ALL THE TIME,
this isn’t for you.
But if you’re serious, if you’re
sincere, these three courses will utterly and completely
change your life.
Here’s a huge and very unique benefit you’ll get from
these LPIP online courses:
In addition to everything else, all LPIP course participants
get unlimited email access to me for any questions
they have about course content. I answer every one of
these emails personally—no staff members are involved—
and some of my answers, when necessary, are sometimes
three, five, even seven pages long.
I put everything into this course, because I really, sincerely
want you to get everything I’m promising.
You though, have a part in the success of these courses—
in fact, a big part. I don’t wave a magic want over you and
change you into a happy, peaceful, successful person in
complete control of his or her life.
You can read more about
each course and what it
includes, and even listen to
a free preview lesson, just
by visiting the URL below:
http://www.centerpointe.com/life/preview
I JUST TELL YOU HOW TO DO IT,
AND GIVE YOU AN EASY WAY TO MAKE THE
CHANGE.
Because I have such a huge personal time investment in
answering all your questions, I want to make one thing
very clear, though. Please DO NOT take these courses unless
you’re willing to do your part. I do not have the time
to waste on those who aren’t sincere and aren’t willing to
pay the price to create the internal changes they want.
But if you ARE sincere, and you really do want to
change your life, I want to show you how to do it, and I
will take you, step by step, through everything you need to
know.
You CAN create an entirely new life for yourself, regardless
of your past or present circumstances.
You can read more about each course and what it
includes, and even listen to
a free preview lesson, just by
visiting http://www.centerpointe.com/life/preview.
So please, go listen to the
free preview lesson, and if you
really are ready to change your
life, enroll in this amazing
courses risk-free.
I look forward to having
you in these courses and
showing you that the possibilities
for what your life
can be really are limitless...
regardless of your present or
past circumstances.
Just visit http://www.centerpointe.com/life/preview to
listen to the free preview lesson and to take advantage of
the old low price before we’re forced to raise it on
March 1st.
Be well,
Bill Harris, Director.
MINDCHATTER December 2005
5

Recommendations that may benefit you
Positive Deviant Update
IN THE LAST MIND CHATTER I TOLD YOU
about a free teleseminar I helped create with one of
the smartest people I’ve ever met—Mashall Thurber. I
met Marshall through Jack Canfield, co-author of the
Chicken Soup for the Soul series of books, and...
...BOY AM I GLAD WE MET!
Marshall was a colleague of the great genius Buckminster
Fuller, and also of J. Edwards Deming, father of the Japanese
industrial miracle of the 1980s.
Fuller and Deming are considered to be two of the greatest
minds of the 20th century.
Partly because of his association with them, and partly
because he is a genius in his own right, Marshall Thurber
is considered to be one of the greatest teachers in the world
today. For several decades, Marshall has helped hundreds of
thousands of people develop both business greatness—and
personal greatness.
I’ve had the great pleasure of becoming Marshall’s friend
over the last several months. As a result, I’ve become involved
in several projects he’s working on.
Now, I want to make sure that everyone who subscribes
to Mind Chatter has the opportunity to benefit from what
Marshall is doing.
If you have a business, or want to start one, you will find
what Marshall teaches to be...
...VERY EXCITING.
Why Because it’s the super-fast way to success. And, I
promise that this isn’t the same old information you’ve heard
before about how to create a successful business.
Look. I’ve had a very successful business for over sixteen
years now, and many people come to me for business advice.
I thought I’d seen and heard just about everything about
how to create a successful business. But when I attended
Marshall’s Success Secrets of the 21st Century two-day seminar
several months ago I was literally blown away by...
...HOW PROFOUND AND
CUTTING EDGE HIS IDEAS ARE.
As I participated, it was as if everything fell into place all
at once.
It wasn’t just because I could see, in a whole new way,
WHY Centerpointe has been so successful (without knowing
it, I was already doing several of the key things Marshall
teaches). It was also because I could now see many new ways
Centerpointe could give much greater value—and how we
could much more rapidly tap into...
...HUGE GROUPS OF NEW CUSTOMERS.
In fact—assuming that you have something of value to
offer—Marshall’s methods create such fast success that you’d
better be ready, if you implement them, to operate at a very
high level right away. And, if what you offer doesn’t have
what Marshall calls DyVal, or Dynamic Value, he’ll show
you how to create it or find someone to partner with...
...WHO DOES HAVE IT.
I’ve never seen such an elegant and foolproof method of
creating a successful business, or taking an existing business
into the stratosphere.
And, you’d better be ready to have fun, because Marshall
is NOT a dry business lecturer. He’s a master of what some
call “superlearning,” where the right and left side of the
brain are engaged, and real learning happens. His seminars
have the entertainment value of a Broadway show, and you
leave remembering what Marshall wants you to learn and
eager to implement it.
The easiest way to learn more about the Success Secrets
of the 21st Century live seminar is to listen to go to his
website,
http://www.positivedeviantnetwork.com, which is full of
fascinating and useful information you can use right how to
grow your business, no matter how large or small it is.
Then listen to a free web seminar I created with Marshall
and another of his colleages, Dr. Bill Siedman (another
genius).
All you have to do is visit the link below. Then, you can
attend the live two-day event Marshall has created if you
find that you’re as dazzled by his ideas as I think you will be.
The live seminar, by the way, is VERY inexpensive,
because Marshall is interested in sharing this information
with as many people as possible, especially people who aren’t
already rich.
And, it just might change your life. I know it did mine.
And, there’s also a free Special Report posted on the web
site called “How Network Science Can Speed Up Your Success
By 10 to 20 Times.” Just visit the link at the very bottom of
the page to download it for free.
So visit the URL below to receive all this powerful information
for free, and after you do, if you’re as excited about
these ideas as I am, then I look forward to seeing you at
Marshall’s next seminar, because I will be there, too.
Here’s the link:
http//www.positivedeviantnetwork.com
6 MINDCHATTER December 2005

HOW TO ESCAPE FROM THE
BY BILL HARRIS, DIRECTOR
Many people who come to Centerpointe for help feel
trapped in their situation, and have a lot of trouble with
the idea that they can create their own reality, or that it is
possible to get out of the situation they find themselves in.
When what you are creating is being generated
unconsciously rather than consciously, it always looks as if
you have little or no control. When your internal map of
reality is operating outside of your awareness, the results
it creates seem as if they come from outside of you, and
it often seems as if you have little control over what is
happening.
FEELING HELPLESS
Such people often feel as if they are trapped in a box,
with no escape. The box could be an uncomfortable
situation they feel trapped in, like an
unhappy relationship
or an
unfulfilling job. It could be a way of responding
emotionally, such as always withdrawing, always getting
angry, or being anxious or depressed. It could be a lack of
prosperity, or continuing to create one bad relationship
after another. Or, it could be a negative health situation.
When you feel trapped, you’re telling yourself that the
situation is something you can’t doing anything about,
and that it must be accepted. While I am totally in favor
of emotionally letting whatever happens be okay, I
also think there is always something you can do to
create a different reality for yourself.
Here’s another way to think about these
situations: Consider that there is a price that
must be paid for everything. You pay a price if
things stay the same, and you will have to pay a
price if you are to create some sort of change. The
price might be time, effort, money,
emotional turmoil,
physical
MINDCHATTER December 2005
7

The Box Trap continued...
discomfort, or something else, but in every case, there is a
price.
A box, then, is any situation or way of being that keeps
you from being happy, peaceful, or from getting what you
want in life. You’re in such a box if you assume that there
is no alternative to the way things are now.
HOW TO GET OUT OF THE BOX
There is, however, ALWAYS a way to get out of a box.
Here’s how to do it:
1. Recognize that there is a price to pay for every
moment you remain in the box you’re in, whatever it is.
In many cases, you may have been paying this price for
a very long time.
2. Acknowledge that there IS a way out (there is a price
that, once paid, will get you out).
3. Become clear about both the price for staying
in the box and the price for getting out. With that
information, you can make a choice about what to do.
So, here is what I suggest you do if there is some area of
your life that is not working the way you want it to.
First, find a quiet place where you can be alone and
relax, undisturbed, to think things over.
Then, identify the situation that is causing you
discomfort. Get clear on exactly what the discomfort is.
Write it down, just to make SURE you are clear about it.
(Remember, by the way, that it is your resistance to things
being the way they are that creates the discomfort. You can
always eliminate the discomfort by ending your resistance,
but in this case we are talking about how to change the
situation.)
Then, think of what you would do if you weren’t in
this box. At first, you may only think of wanting the
discomfort to be gone or the situation to end, but there
are probably many things you could do, be, or have if you
weren’t in the box. Imagine what you could and would do
if the box were gone.
WHAT IS THE PRICE
Next, identify the price you must pay to get out of the box.
If the box is a job you dislike, the price may be looking
for a new and better job. It might involve being out of
work for a short time, or even taking a cut in pay (though
it certainly doesn’t have to involve either of these things—
there’s almost always a way to get exactly what you want,
IF you’re willing to pay the price).
If the box is a relationship that isn’t working, the price
might involve a discussion (or even a confrontation)
where you express your displeasure and ask for what you
want. Or, it might involve getting out of the relationship
altogether, which will have its own price.
If the box is being overweight, the price might be
changing your eating habits and establishing an exercise
program—or, some other price.
On a deeper level, the price might involve identifying
and changing beliefs that have helped create the situation.
It might involve rearranging your values structure to make
something more important or less important in your life.
It might involve looking at your strategies for choosing a
job, a relationship, what you eat, etc. In some way, your
Internal Map of Reality is creating your internal response,
and your external results, and the price of changing
things—if you really want permanent change—will
probably involve figuring out what changes need to be
made to various parts of your internal map.
(For help with boxes caused by beliefs, values, strategies,
and other aspects of your Internal Map of Reality, please
take my Life Principles Integration Process online courses.
You can listen to a free preview lesson by clicking to here.
DECIDE TO PAY THE PRICE
Once you are clear about the price you’re currently
paying and the price you’d have to pay to make a change,
picture yourself paying the price. Try to think
of unexpected things that may come up while you’re
paying it, and how you might deal with them. Think
“what if...” and be prepared for as many “what if’s” as you
can think of.
Go through the entire experience in your mind. If it
is the least bit painful, mentally go through the process
a second time. You will find that each time you imagine
paying the price, any pain you associate with doing so
will diminish. For some changes, one time will do it. For
others, you may have to imagine paying the price several
times to get to the point where you feel okay doing so.
At this point, you will have identified the three things
you need to know to get yourself out of the box:
1. the price you are currently paying for staying in the
8 MINDCHATTER December 2005

The Box Trap continued...
box
2. the price you will have to pay to get out, and...
3. what new and better results you could have once
you’re out.
And, you’ve mentally practiced paying the price, which
will make doing so much easier. Often the anticipation
of paying the price is much more difficult than actually
paying it, which keeps people from taking action. By
imagining yourself paying the price, you keep this from
happening.
Finally, pay the price and be done with it. No matter
what the discomfort, there’s always a price you could pay
to end it, if you’re willing to pay it. Usually, the price to
change is less than the price to stay the same. Cultivate
the ability to look for a price to pay whenever you want to
create a change.
Remember, there is always a price that can be paid. If
the price seems too big, think about it some more. Perhaps
there is an easier way that you haven’t thought of. If you
focus on getting what you want and achieving a possible
solution, your mind will create one.
And, in some situations, you may conclude you just
want to leave things the way they are (though my belief is
that there is no reason to ever be in a situation you don’t
like, unless for some reason you want to).
RESISTANCE
Sometimes part of the price is to drop your resistance to
whatever is happening, to people being the way they are,
or to the world being the way it is. Usually, in addition,
there is a price you can pay to also change the situation
itself, but you might as well not be resisting “what is”
while you’re making the change.
If you’re in a marriage in which you aren’t happy, you
may think you have no alternatives. Perhaps your spouse
is the breadwinner, and you have few skills, and that keeps
you where you are despite the fact that you are unhappy.
But, no matter what your situation, there IS a price that
would get you out of it, and if you were willing to pay that
price, you COULD leave.
The price might be learning new job skills, being alone
for a while, moving, or one of a number of other things.
Or, it could be to resolve the problems that make the
relationship unworkable. You might find that as you set
out to pay this price it turns out to be a tremendously
transformative positive experience, rather than whatever
you feared it would be.
The point is, there is ALWAYS a price, and the only way
to know whether you want to stay in the current situation
or make a change is to evaluate the relative prices of the
various options. In any case, it’s good to know that you are
not stuck and without options.
And, remember, in most cases the price to be paid
involves making some changes to your Internal Map of
Reality, since this is ultimately where your entire internal
and external experience of life is generated.
PAY IN ADVANCE
Two more important points:
1. The sooner you pay a price, the less it costs you.
Waiting to pay always raises the price.
2. When making a change, always look for direct
alternatives—things YOU can do, as opposed to
alternatives involving getting someone else to change.
You can make changes in yourself without anyone’s
permission or help, while changing other people or the
world is always a very iffy proposition.
You always have choice. Nothing is without price, so
you have to evaluate what is valuable to you and what isn’t.
But it’s all up to you.
Be well.
Bill
MINDCHATTER December 2005
9

Glowing Testimonials
Hello, Ken here. I just want to take this time to thank
you so much for such a true blue, honest, supportive and
caring company you’re all a part of. I’m finding out how
wonderful this system of self-growth and how effective it is
and could be if the people practicing the program are following
the instructions and are patient and persistent. You
all know how important the followup letters are especially
in the beginning because the progress is very often slower
than expected which can be very frustrating at times
(including overwelm, upheaval etc.. which may give the
impression that the program isn’t working). I’ve emailed
your company many times in frustration but I’ve always
had a very prompt reply with just what I needed in order
to continue with revitalized
enthusiasm. (trust is
so important)
“
I can’t tell you how
much I’m enjoying the
meditation exercises and
look forward to them
everyday now. I know
they are doing their job,
maybe slowly, but knowing
that they are working
is enough.
I’ve been doing the
program since June 17th
(haven’t missed a day).
I’m just so grateful about
this new part of my life.
I sure needed it. It seems like I discovered it just in time.
You know just before I started the program, I was getting
worse in my anxiety problems, but now I’m getting better.
I can feel it and I know it.
I will complete the program. I’m convinced.
Thank you as always.
-Ken
I’m just so grateful
about this new part of my
life. I sure needed it. It
seems like I discovered it
just in time.
In deepest gratitude, I thank you for the phenomenal
gift of Holysync. As a forty-year meditator, I’ve experienced
the theta and delta states much of the time. Yet, the
lifelong challenge has been to live life consistently in that
natural state of being. After only two weeks of Awakening
Prologue, I am already integrating these brain patterns in
conscious awareness. How astounding and also how wonderful.
I have worked with people for twenty-seven years,
as an independent counselor and my intention is to share
this incredible technology with everyone. Your work certainly
holds one of the biggest keys to the collective evolution
of mankind. Thank you for being so dedicated to the
well-being of humanity. My clear intention is to learn and
grow throughout the
entire twelve levels.
Also, I feel guided
to attend the retreat in
”
service for your human family.
-F.B.
Austin, Texas, next April.
Please give me more
specific information
regarding it. That is very
much appreciated. May I
extend a warm thank-you
to every one that serves
all of us on your staff
Please know that what
you give mankind is the
best blessing of a persons
lifetime and that you
could be doing no greater
My Name Is Drew and I have been using your program for about ten weeks now and I must admit that I can feel a substantial
difference in how I deal with anger, frustration, joy, happiness and many other emotions. I believe that without positive
emotions, all the exercise in the world will not help anyone in any aspect of their lives and that is why I wanted to say thank
you for this one of a kind program. There is no price that you can put on a sense of well being!
-Drew
10 MINDCHATTER December 2005

Book Reviews
» BY KATE SPARKS
A Million Little Pieces
By James Frey
THE HUMAN EXPERIENCE IS RIPE WITH
ugliness—pride, greed, shame, anger, dependency,
addiction. Waking up to our potential
for goodness also means seeing the darkness
of which we are capable. Never has someone so keenly
conveyed these dark emotions as does James Frey in A
Million Little Pieces. If the title alone sends chills down
your spine, you may know the feeling of being broken.
The feeling that nothing can put together again the many
pieces of your broken life.
The book has been said to be the final word on the
topic of addiction. It is the memoir of Frey, who, at age
23 wakes up on a plane with a broken nose, a hole in his
cheek large enough for two fingers, and no memory of
the last two weeks, nor any clue about where the plane is
headed. He has been an alcoholic for 10 years and a crack
addict for three. The book recounts Frey’s six weeks in a
treatment center in Minnesota, his struggle to find a working
philosophy to keep him sober, and the friends he relies
on in the process.
Frey’s language is raw, candid and poetic at times. He
doesn’t follow traditional rules of grammar, neglecting to
use commas where they don’t fit the flow of his enraged
mind and capitalizing random words to signify their importance.
His conversational and readable style makes you
feel like you’re sitting right next to him as he tells his tale.
Simple and real, he immediately wins over the reader.
Frey checks into the best treatment center around at
the time, which still had just a 15 percent recovery rate.
As you might guess, the 12-step program is the central
component to the recovery efforts of the clinic and staff.
Frey is stubborn, angry, and intelligent. He isn’t about to
accept the twelve steps, the concept of powerlessness, or
God. Yet, he’s told he will die if he drinks or uses even one
more time. Mornings of vomiting bile, blood and chunks
of stomach warn of the same fate.
As his days at the center go by, Frey begins to imagine
a life without drugs and alcohol. Still, he won’t concede to
the 12-step philosophy. As it often happens when we are
broken, Frey finds himself at the beginning of a spiritual
journey, though not one that meets with the clinic’s views.
As he sits on an empty bench outside the clinic one afternoon,
he thinks, “I am opening to myself. I don’t know
what I am opening myself to. Is it God or something
Higher. Is it me or what is around me. Does it matter do
If you would like to
read more about or
order this book visit:
HTTP://WWW.AMAZON.
COM/EXEC/OBIDOS/
ASIN/0307276902/CENTER-
POINTER-20/103-3656485-
3609455
I need to know. It matters because it is what is keeping
me together. This opening is allowing me to pick up the
pieces of a shattered life. I need to believe in it to continue
to believe in me. I need to know what it is. What is it that
opens me.
“I stand and I walk along the edge of the water until
it ends in a Sea of yellow grass. The grass is dead now but
will return in the Spring that is the way of the World.
Things die and they return. Is that biology or God or
something Higher. Are we biology or God or something
Higher. I know my heart beats and I listen to it. The beat
is biology, but what is the song. Will this song exist when
MINDCHATTER December 2005
11

Book Reviews continued...
the beating stops. Will one stay when one is gone, can one
live without the other. Does it matter. It does. I have to
believe in something. It is holding me together.”
Side plots of love and friendship fill the pages, but the
question of how one stays sober after being so severely
addicted to drugs and alcohol is the central point of
interest. Frey is unwilling to surrender to a power greater
than himself. He is, however, quite willing to admit who
he is and what he’s done wrong. He continues to remind
himself, “I am an alcoholic and I am a drug addict and I
am a criminal.” His challenge is not in knowing his weakness
nor taking responsibility for those people he’s hurt in
the self-obsession of drug use. However, he is determined
to stay sober without believing in a higher power and says
his decision has “nothing to do with God or Twelve of
anything other than twelve beats of my heart. Yes or no. It
is a simple decision.”
That it could be a simple decision is the subject of
much controversy. Nearly 900 reviews posted on Amazon
since the book was published in 2003, many surrounding
the debate on whether or not someone can recover
without relying on a higher power. While it is generally accepted
that very few addicts can find permanent recovery
without the twelve step program, and while this book may
certainly upset those in the recovery community, there are
those who tell a different tale.
Recovery for Frey begins to take shape when his brother
gives him a copy of the ancient Taoist text, Tao Te Ching.
Though distrustful of religion or anything resembling
spirituality, he gives the book
a shot. In it he find wholeness and an awareness of the
existing perfection in the world. He writes, “This little
book feeds me. It feeds me food I didn’t know existed,
feeds me food I wanted to taste, and have never tasted
before, food that will nourish me and keep me full and
keep me alive. I read it and it feeds me. It lets me see what
my life is in simple terms, it simply is what it is, and I can
deal with my life on those terms. It is not complicated unless
I make it so. It is not difficult unless I allow it to be. A
second is not more than a second, a minute no more than
a minute, a day no more than a day. They pass. All things
and all time will pass. Don’t force or fear, don’t control or
lose control. Don’t fight and don’t stop fighting. Embrace
and endure. If you embrace, you will endure.”
Though Frey rejects the 12-step approach in lieu of
the Tao, spiritual seekers may question whether there’s a
conflict at all between the two teachings. Could it be that
the more one looks at these teachings in general terms, the
more one sees their unity—that they all present the common
ideals of acceptance, non-resistance, and surrender to
the flow of life Frey quotes from the Tao throughout the
book. “If you want to be whole, you must first be partial.
If you want to be straight, you must first be crooked. If
you want to be full, first become empty. If you want to be
reborn, you must first die.”
Apparently what he found worked for him. Frey is said
to still be sober 10 years later.
A Million Little Pieces succeeds in conveying the
powerful emotions of failure, fury and longing. It is about
self-destruction, the frailty of being human, and how
sometimes falling apart is just what we need to put our
lives back together. Though this may not be a good book
for someone newly sober as a result of working a 12-step
program, I recommend it to anyone looking for a powerful
story of human triumph.
If you would like to read more about or order this book click here:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0307276902/
centerpointer-20/103-3656485-3609455
12 MINDCHATTER December 2005

Announcements:
The Amazing 5-Day Transformation
for those who don’t have the time to
wait for Tremendous change!
Austin’s Omega Institute
site for Spring retreat
The dates for Centerpointes spring retreat, at
The Omega Institute at the Crossings in Austin, Texas, are April 9-15, 2006.
If you have a big issue you’d like to
resolve, if you’re in a transition period
in your life and you just can’t seem to
complete it, or if you just want to take
things to a higher level—one where
you understand more completely how
you’re creating your life—please, do
yourself a favor and come spend a week
with me at The Omega Institute.
I promise that you’ll have an incredible
experience you’ll never forget.
I tell people they’ll receive six months
of growth in just 5 days at these retreats,
but they keep improving every
time, and people now tell me they’re
received much more than that.
I tailor each retreat to the needs of
the specific people who attend (which
means YOU). My goal is to help you
see the ways you may be unconsciously
and unintentionally creating your internal
and external reality, and how easy it
actually is to consciously and intentionally
create the life you want, both inside
and out.
This is your chance to make a big
change, and to work with me personally.
So visit this URL for more information:
www.centerpointe.com/retreats
And, I guarantee results! Here’s the
guarantee: Attend the entire retreat.
If by the end of the retreat you don’t
think it was the most incredible growth
experience you’ve ever had, just see me
before you leave, and I’ll refund your
tuition.
You do not need to be a program
participant to attend (though most
people who attend are). (And if you’re
not a program participant, why the
heck aren’t you Quit procrastinating
and join.)
Visit this URL for more information:
www.centerpointe.com/retreats
Or, you can call retreat coordinator
Katie Sparks at 503-906-6027 to learn
more about Centerpointe’s retreats.
“As I watched and listened during my experience, I sensed throughout that I was safe and that
I could go deeper and deeper because of the love and confidence and strength I felt around
me. Without that, I probably could not have released, what I believe to have been major life
time blockages.
Although I have been able to create so much happiness in my life, I was always aware that
something was blocked and I did not have a clue how to access it. Something very big happened
to me and I am still processing it.”
—Dori
MINDCHATTER December 2005
13