The True Chapters of Life
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Author: ddangler

Dan Dangler is a coach, mystic, change agent and poet. He has nurtured a practice of guidance in leadership as well as spiritual, relationship, and sexual growth. His approach and teachings consist of helping seekers discover self-acceptance and inner wisdom while accessing their vast imagination to rediscover their true original, joyful selves. His approach has been influenced by the work of various thought leaders and authors in the fields of archetypal psychology, mysticism, change theory, and mindfulness including Thomas Moore, William Bridges, Carl Jung, James Hillman, John O’Donohue and Thich Nhat Hanh, to name a few. Dan was born as the youngest of five to an Irish Catholic family. At an early age, he felt he had the calling for a spiritual path, but had little knowledge of what this path was other than being a priest. In his twenties as an undergrad, he took a route away from Catholicism into the world of evangelical Christianity. As a successful leader in that community for seven years, he began to see the superficiality and danger of this spirituality, reaching for a deeper sense of authenticity and mindfulness within himself. This led him on a rich and profound inner journey for the past 35 years through various Eastern and Western faiths, Unitarianism, depth psychology, many personal development paths, the sex positive movement and mysticism. Dan continues on his own path of growth by integrating requisite insights and teachings to his practice along with his own daily practice of meditation, chanting and yoga. Concurrently, Dan has worked as an organizational change and leadership development consultant for 30 plus years. Working as an internal consultant for 20 years and building a private consulting practice for 10 years, the focus of his work has been on creating effective collaborative relationships among groups and developing capable and confident leaders. He use of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and The Hogan assessment helps him assess his clients tendencies and preferences as well as their values, motivations and stress hurdles. Dan has been building leaders in healthcare for 20 plus years along with other industries. Dan earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from Northern Vermont University, a Master of Science degree in Organizational Change and Leadership from the American University, Washington, D.C. in 1993. Dan was Assistant Professor at Newbury College and Adjunct Professor for the Masters program at Emmanuel College for twelve years. Dan has integrated and weaved both his personal and professional experience and knowledge together to use as a gentle, accepting yet potent approach to help individuals and partners uncover what brings them joy, integration and wholeness in their lives. Dan was married for 28 years but he and his wife agreed that they would walk separate paths but remain deep and meaningful friends. He has a beautiful 23 year old daughter and he lives alone in Dorchester, Ma where he teaches, coaches, loves dogs, and writes poetry.
ddangler

For A Moment

Love & Relationship

You awoken my imagination
From the moment I noticed you

I saw thunder clouds filled with white rain
I drew in the sweet smell of wildflowers into my lungs
Red fog drew me up into the clouds of anything is possible
And wild horses ran through my veins clearing out all inhibition

My imagination was on fire and my heart melted at your beauty
Every inch of your soft cocoa skin soothed my burns
Your black hair wrapped around my chest
And your diamond head carved a place into my soul

You awakened my imagination
And I liked you because anything was possible
With you, anything

Dulcinea, I found thy and my world rose above this earth
I believed you were the one I had been waiting for
For soo long

But you, though you lit the secret flame
Were only a dream, made of flame and air
Gave into only what you could see and what could not be
Given from the heart

For what was an impossible dream between two souls connected
Could not bear what was possible
You gave up on your imagination for what was seen, not known

But in that moment, I adored your star
And was willing to march into hell for a heavenly cause
And for that moment I could fly and never die

ddangler

Legacy of an adopted child

Other Authors

(Author Unknown)

poem-reading

Once there were two women

Who never knew each other.

One you do not remember,

The other you call mother.

Two different lives

Shaped to make yours one.

One became your guiding star,

The other became your sun.

The first gave you life

And the second taught you to live it.

The first gave you a need for love

And the second was there to give it.

One gave you a nationality,

The other gave you a name.

One gave you a seed of talent,

The other gave you an aim.

One gave you emotions,

The other calmed your fears.

One saw your first sweet smile,

The other dried your tears.

One gave you up —

It was all that she could do.

The other prayed for a child

And God led her straight to you.

And now you ask me

Through your tears,

The age-old question

Through the years:

Heredity or environment

Which are you the product of?

Neither, my darling — neither,

Just two different kinds of love

ddangler

The Labyrinth

Other Authors

“Each person is no simple, one-dimensional self. There is a labyrinth within our soul. What we think and desire often comes into conflict with what we do. Below the surface of our conscious awareness, a vast, unknown rootage determines our actions. The unconscious is a powerful and continuous presence. Every life lives out of and struggles with this inner night, which cast it’s challenging and fecund shadows over everything we do and think and feel. We are earthen vessels that hold the treasure. Yet, aspects of the treasure are darker and more dangerous than we allow ourselves to imagine. But, when the unconscious becomes illuminated, it’s darker forces no longer hold us prisoner.”

-John O’Donohue

ddangler

Choose Joy

Other Authors

Choose joy. Choose it like a child chooses the shoe to put on the right foot, the crayon to paint a sky. Choose it at first consciously, effort fully, pressing against the weight of a world heavy with reasons for sorrow, restless with need for action.

Feel the sorrow, take the action, but keep pressing the weight of joy against it all, until it becomes mindless, automated, like gravity pulling the stream down its course; until it becomes an inner law of nature. If Viktor Frankl can exclaim “yes to life, in spite of everything!” — and what an everything he lived through — then so can any one of us amid the rubble of our plans, so trifling by comparison. Joy is not a function of a life free of friction and frustration, but a function of focus — an inner elevation by the fulcrum of choice.

Delight in the age-salted man on the street corner waiting for the light to change, his age-salted dog beside him, each inclined toward the other with the angular subtlety of absolute devotion.

Delight in the little girl zooming past you on her little bicycle, this fierce emissary of the future, rainbow tassels waving from her handlebars and a hundred beaded braids spilling from her golden helmet.

Delight in the snail taking an afternoon to traverse the abyssal crack in the sidewalk for the sake of pasturing on a single blade of grass.

Delight in the tiny new leaf, so shy and so shamelessly lush, unfurling from the crooked stem of the parched geranium.

Lara Seven Gryffn

ddangler

What does this mean?

Other Authors

The shape of each soul is different; spiritual clothing one person wears can never fit the soul of another. Each destiny has a unique curvature and must find its own spiritual belonging and direction. I’m a spiritual search is too intense and hungry the soul stays hidden. The soul was never meant to be seen completely. Celtic mysticism recognizes that rather than trying to expose the soul or offer it our fragile care we should let the soul find us and care for us. Then, when you’re soul awakens, your destiny becomes urgent with creativity. – John O’Donohue

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