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Relax, close your eyes, and take a few deep breaths. Every breath helps you to sink more deeply into a quiet place inside yourself. This is the source of sacred tranquility. Now you can gently and passionately recite this mantra:

“I will discover a new image of myself that I have long longed for. My awareness tells me that I am indeed a part of this universe. I experience calm and healing. I trust myself more and more confident. I gently follow the inner guidance as I feel strong and courageous.

In a moment, I find out that I carry a sense of knowingness into the world. Amazingly, I can envision myself having more trust to be more focused within and surrender simultaneously. I begin to experience that my world is nourishing to myself and others.

I discover what I have created on the outside is much more beautiful and wonderful than I have ever thought because of this remarkable passion. My commitment to the universe is winsome.” Amen.

DR. Rony Kusnadi
Notable Life Counseling Services LLC

When the truth is told, you can experience trust, doubt, or distrust. The differences between doubt and distrust need to be explained.

Doubt and distrust are not the same. Many people get confused about them and think they are the same. No, they are not the same. Doubt is about uncertainty. It is unsure. It is about knowing something is happening but not knowing exactly what is happening. Distrust means condemning the whole thing. Worse, there is no willingness to open up or learn about such things. One has already made up his/her mind. There is a certainty or final decision in distrust.

Doubt could have multiple directions, such as toward positivity or negativity. One who has doubt with positive direction and being processed with positive belief systems will lead to the capability to see opportunities and grow—the possibility to experience a deep sense of wonder and awe that scents internal and external exploration.

Doubt with the support of the facts and the clarity of evidence will become reasonable doubt. Reasonable doubt powers the journey further, with confidence and a sense of purpose and responsibility.

Unreasonable doubt happens when doubt is processed by maladaptive thought processes, such as “All or Nothing Thinking,” “Overgeneralization,” and “Catastrophizing.” Through this negative processing, the doubt, now transforming into unreasonable doubt, becomes an existential distrust.

When one sees his/her life through this existential distrust lens, life could be a curse, a never-ending suffering, or a never-ending defeat and debacle—life is experienced as a continuous catastrophe, paralyzing and totally saddening. At this point, one has no way of stepping out of his/her discursive thoughts, no way of stepping out of his/her ego fixation and grasping because one is so caught up in that particular preoccupation.

The necessary intervention is needed when rendering doubt with lenses of maladaptive thought processing. Right then, with well-trained mindfulness practices, one can question the process of thinking, exploring the supporting and not supporting facts with rational evidence. Through this process, one needs to pause, stop, and breathe first while learning to let go of his/her preoccupied thoughts.

Furthermore, one needs to learn to take in his/her own pain and put his/her awareness into the rest of the world’s pain. Surprisingly, one will expand his/her knowledge and heart and further reinforce this noble gesture, leading him/her out from the preoccupation of negative thoughts and emotions.

What does this all mean? It is about how one can liberate his/herself from the potential of self-defeating thoughts, emotions, and behaviors.

DR. Rony Kusnadi
Notable Life Counseling Services LLC

The seeds of mindfulness can flourish when one has devoted time tirelessly and happily to prepare his/her internal rich soil. One needs to have the confidence to mastery that through certain attitudes and mental qualities, happy life will prevail. The acts of cultivating and nurturing, along with the rhythm of life, are necessary.

In this process, one purposefully is tilling the soil of his/her own mind to shape character. In this mastery process, one perfects clarity and certainty every day. The process becomes the source of compassion and the right actions, replacing the confusion and maligned thoughts. Endurance then becomes the key here to liberate. As the old saying said, “when you learn or/and practice to love your life, life will love you all the way.”
DR. Rony Kusnadi
Notable Life Counseling Services LLC

The thoughts manifesting from the unsafe and unstable sense of self that yearns to be protected produce a deep affliction feeling. This affliction feeling has great tendencies to repeat the irrational fear, sadness, and anxiety — with repetition and compulsions, internal dynamics become a psychological and emotional disorder.

At that stage, one will try hard to defend him/herself against unwanted events and feelings. Furthermore, there will be a strong tendency to hold on to a certain fondness, which is maladaptive. Automatically the mind filters in only to the favorite ones. These conditions easily lead to overwhelming experiences of despair, anxiety, sadness, compulsions, and addictions.
DR. Rony Kusnadi
Notable Life Counseling Services LLC

Zen Master Unmon said: “The world is vast and wide. Why do you put on your robes at the sound of a bell?”

An old saying is that whatever comes in through the gates is foreign. The gates are the senses: sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch. We obey foreign commands if we decide, move, and act by the senses. In response to our environment, we feel pressured, are easily upset, and become nervous. This is one of the characteristics of modern life. But if one settles down firmly in one’s inner life, all actions, feelings, and deeds come from deep within. The unenlightened one does things because he must do them; the enlightened acts because he wants to. Freedom lies in the center of life — Zen Master Unmon points to the center.
[Zen Koans by Venerable Gyomay M. Kubose]