The Serenity Solution: How to Use Quiet Contemplation to Solve Life's Problems (3 page)

In addition, Dr. Park is the founder and director of Solutions Counseling (a solution-focused-based counseling service) and Inner Life Meet-ings (a small group forum), both which are devoted to helping people discover and develop their own inner potential and life goals.

To Write the Author

If you wish to contact the author or would like more information about this book, please write to the author in care of Llewellyn Worldwide, and we will forward your request. Both the author and the publisher appreciate hearing from you and learning of your enjoyment of this book and how it has helped you. Llewellyn Worldwide cannot guarantee that every letter written to the author can be answered, but all will be forwarded. Please write to: Keith Park

c⁄o Llewellyn Worldwide

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125-2989

Please enclose a self-addressed stamped envelope for reply,

or $1.00 to cover costs. If outside the USA, enclose

an international postal reply coupon.

Many of Llewellyn’s authors have websites with additional information and resources. For more information, please visit www.llewellyn.com.

T he

Serenity

Solution

How to Use

Quiet Contemplation to

Solve Life's Problems

keith park, phd

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

The Serenity Solution: How to Use Quiet Contemplation to Solve Life's Problems
© 2013 by Keith Park. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Llewellyn Publications, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

First Edition

First Printing, 2013

Cover image: Wildflowers © iStockphoto.com/Pawel Gaul

Interior art © Llewellyn art department

Editing by Nicole Nugent

Llewellyn Publications is a registered trademark of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Park, Keith, Ph. D.

The serenity solution: how to use quiet contemplation to solve life problems/Keith Park, PhD.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 978-0-7387-3678-5

1. Thought and thinking. 2. Contemplation. 3. Meditation. 4. Problem solving. I. Title.

BF1999.P295 2013

158.1—dc23

2013013191

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd. does not participate in, endorse, or have any authority or responsibil-ity concerning private business transactions between our authors and the public.

All mail addressed to the author is forwarded, but the publisher cannot, unless specifically instructed by the author, give out an address or phone number.

Any Internet references contained in this work are current at publication time, but the publisher cannot guarantee that a specific location will continue to be maintained. Please refer to the publisher’s website for links to authors’ websites and other sources.

Llewellyn Publications

A Division of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125-2989

www.llewellyn.com

Printed in the United States of America

To Mom and Aunt Joanne, my spiritual connections;

Dad, my foundation;

and Amy, my warm and patient companion.

Contents

Acknowledgements xvii

Part One: Calm Focus and Problem Perception

One: Focus Determines View of a Problem

and its Solution 9

Focus as Lens and Filter 11

Autofocus 15

Calm Focus Opens Views 16

Two: The Focusing Continuum 19

No Focus 20

Hyper Focus 20

Common Signs of Fixed Focus 22

Avoid the Extremes 25

Calm Focus is Optimal Balance 26

Three: Flexible Focus Control 37

Rating Focus Control 42

ix

x Contents

Four: Broadening Awareness

(The Detached Observer Mode) 45

Situation Overview: Extracting the Central

Factor 45

Opening Access to Broader Information 48

Five: Concentrating Awareness

(Up-Close Immersed Mode) 61

Factors that Enhance a Solution State 66

Physiological Effects of Immersion 69

Six: Overview 83

Targeting Questions 85

Seven: Zooming Out and Framing

Overall Bearings 87

Troubleshooting the Target 88

Framing the Overall Scene 96

Example Framing Dialogue 99

Eight: Zooming in on the Target Solution 103

Identifying Target Markers 104

Pinpointing the Next Step 108

Target Resolving Dialogue 110

Nine: Landing and Staying on Target 115

Ongoing Target Monitoring 116

Contents xi

Broader Mind 121

The Quantum Connection 123

An Evolving, Interconnected Universe 128

Thought Reception 129

Thought Transmission 131

Enhancing Thought Reception and Transmission 137

Thought Research 143

Harvesting Broader Mind Exercises 143

Eleven: Observing from Broader Mind 149

Identifying a Fixed View 151

Zooming Out of a Fixed View 152

Mind Versus Brain 155

Twelve: Tying it all Together 163

Practice, Practice, Practice 164

Defining a Life Goal 165

Glossary 171

Research in Distant Mental Effects 179

References 181

List of Exercises

1.1: Observing Your Focus 17

2.1: Entering a Calm Focus 29

3.1: Settling Focus 40

3.2: Redirecting Focus 40

3.3: Breaking Fixed Focus 41

4.1: Opening Focus 54

4.2: Expanding Body Awareness 55

4.3: Opening Focus in Daily Life/

Maintaining Situational Awareness 56

4.4: Thought Streaming 57

4.5: Identifying the Central Factor 58

5.1: Target Detailing 72

5.2: Imagery Immersing 73

5.3: Evoking a Solution State 74

5.4: Evoking a Healthy State 78

7.1: Framing Overall Bearings 101

xiii

xiv List of Exercises

8.1: Resolving the Target 112

10.1: Tuning into the Broader Mind 144

10.2: Dialoguing with the Broader Mind 145

10.3: Utilizing Inner Insights to Evoke a

Solution State 147

11.1: Broadening Inner Space 159

11.2: Identifying and Defusing Auto Reactions 159

List of Illustrations

1.1: The Vases/Faces Illusion 14

2.1: Optimal Zone of Performance 27

4.1: The Central or Common Factor 47

4.2: Areas of Mind 50

6.1: The Solution Targeting Process 84

9.1 Target Chart 117

xv

Acknowledgments

The Serenity Solution
is the result of several contributions that I would like to acknowledge. First, this book would not be if not for Angela Wix, my acquisition editor at Llewellyn. Thank you, Angela, for your faith in the book, insight and guidance, and speedy and always helpful responses to my many questions.

I would also like to thank Laura Graves and Nicole Nugent, my pro-

duction editors, for their expertise in the preparation of the rough and final drafts of the book’s text.
The Serenity Solution
is an easy read in part because of their knowledgeable input.

The beautiful cover and interior layouts are the creative work of Lisa Novak, my cover designer, and Bob Gaul, my production designer. Also, thank you to Kat Sanborn, my publicist, for presenting
The Serenity Solution
to the world, as well as all those at Llewellyn Worldwide who took part in making this book happen.

I would also like to thank those authors who were kind enough to provide endorsements of the book, including Stephen Hawley Martin, Eliza-beth McAdams, Natalie Reid, Lynn Robinson, Neil Crenshaw, Zoé New-

man, and Amy Lansky.

Finally, I would like to thank Milton Erickson and the Solution Focused Therapy community for inspiring me as a counselor. Much of the ideas presented in the Solution Targeting section of this book are in keep-xvii

xviii Acknowledgments

ing with their strategic, goal-oriented, and strength-based approach to counseling.

In addition, I would like to thank the brilliant physicist, David Bohm, for his theories on a deeper, implicate order and the holographic nature of the universe. His ideas were ahead of their time.

To all of you, I am very grateful.

desire, but most by calm and prudent forethought.”

—Thucydides, Greek Historian

In this book, I will share with you a variety of ideas and exercises that will help you harness a calm focus and use it consciously as a tool to solve problems and create the life you want. With a proficient use of calm focus, you can do away with the fixed negative views that maintain fear and sadness and bad behaviors, and instead, bring into full view, joy and peace and better health and relationships.

Though there are many books on the topic of problem solving, and

even focus control or meditation, very few instruct you specifically how to use your focus in specific ways to solve problems. The Serenity Solution both teaches you how to condition an observant focus as well as how to use this focus flexibly to solve problems, including work, finance, health, and relationship problems.

Its major emphasis is on how to maintain a calm observant state of mind so that you may be more aware of your focus when approaching life
1

2 Introduction

situations and better able to see other options in getting past difficulties and reaching desired outcomes.

Some of the ideas and strategies you will learn are not new. They have been used for thousands of years by great thinkers and problem solvers the world over. Yet, they are distilled here as a simple and ready-to-use guide.

As you read, you will discover helpful hints, age-old wisdoms, and exercises that can be applied to any problem and that will help you increase the range of your thinking and problem-solving ability.

Some of the things you will learn are how to:

• Slow down and be more observant of life situations and your

reactions to them

• Increase control of your thoughts and feelings

• Size-up situations before acting and

• Open insight into problem situations.

In addition, you’ll hear examples from clients in my private practice (whose names have been changed to protect their privacy), which may help clarify and inspire your use of calm focus.

Moreover, you’ll learn how to use calm focus to tune into your broader, inner mind and harness its informative and transformative power. When a calm focus is turned inward it can unleash much more potential than we can otherwise. We will explore how and to what degree we can harness this power.

As you read this book, put aside your preconceived notions of how

you believe your mind should work and simply consider some of the concepts and exercises presented. The exercises are easy, safe, and fun to do.

Perform these exercises on a daily basis and see your skill in calm focus increase along with its benefits. Like any skill, calm focus takes practice
Introduction 3

and this requires quieting down your thoughts and monitoring yourself and your situations on a regular basis.

The Serenity Solution is divided into four parts.
Part One
explains how our focus works to create our perceptions of problems and the importance of calm focus to solving problems. In particular, we will look at the connection between arousal level and our perception of problems and at calm focus as the optimal state for the flexible awareness of problems and their solutions.

In
Part Two
, we will explore the three major problem-solving advantages of calm focus. The first is flexible focus control, which creates the condition for the next two advantages: broadening awareness and concentrating awareness. Broadening awareness enables us to gather information about problems and observe them objectively, while concentrating awareness enables us to immerse ourselves in important details needed to solve a problem. Together, these three problem-solving advantages increase our chances of producing viable solutions.

Part Three
introduces a problem-solving technique called Solution Targeting that employs the ideas and techniques learned in Parts One and Two. This section is a practical guidebook on how to apply calm focus (and its two major advantages of broadening and concentrating awareness) in real–life situations.

And finally, in
Part Four
, we look at the deeper, broader mind and its connection to a larger capacity for solutions (and quite possibly the universe itself!) as well as the means by which we might harness this larger awareness for solutions. In the first chapter of this section, we look at our quantum connection with this broader mind; and then in the last chapter of this section, we look at how we might use this broader mind to step out of fused experiences and regain our overall bearings.