| This article is divided into several pages on your Internet browser. If you are downloading or printing this article, be certain to include Page 1 (this page, Page 2, Page 3, and Jeanie's list. This interview was conducted in 1991, and includes some dated material. |
The two characters in this dialogue are: Joel Metzger, founder and coordinator of The Online Noetic Network, and Jeanie Marshall, Empowerment Consultant with Marshall House. Additional information about both persons and organizations is provided, with hyperlinks, at the end of this article and at the bottom of this page.
The original article is edited to include hyperlinks and other Internet friendly features. Joel introduced the article in this way:
| "Jeanie Marshall is an Empowerment Consultant who uses the net extensively. Her work touches many lives through her many projects--a consulting practice, public workshops, publications, television and radio shows, and the Internet. Recently, I interviewed Jeanie via email about her projects. In preparation for our interview, Jeanie listed several of her interests and projects. Jeanie's list will give you an overview of her activities and interests." |
Joel: Hi, Jeanie. I know you're involved with many things. I thought we'd start by your telling us about your television show. What kind of a show are you doing?
Jeanie: This is a local show, broadcast throughout the Los Angeles area. I began producing it about five years ago, "by accident" as we say! It's called Return to Center. Each 30-minute episode has a theme and I do a 15-18 minute guided meditation, or as I say, "centering activity." A beautiful video is on the screen while I do the meditation, with meditative music in the background.
Past episode themes include: Living in the Circle of Abundance, Focus of Your attention, Working with Affirmations, Symbolic Language of Energy, Freedom from Bondage, Working with Angels, Asking Empowering Questions, Embodying Life Mission, You are my Friend, Saying Goodbye to Struggle, The Light at the End of the Tunnel, Open at the Top. I have also written articles on most of these subjects, some of which are posted at my Web site.
Joel: How about the Marshall House Journal?
Jeanie: The Journal is published 10 times per year (all months but August and December). I write all the articles, from my heart and from my experiences, for change agents (consultants, managers, therapists, etc.) inside and outside organizations. Many of the articles now online are from past Journal issues. I usually have one lead article and several shorter ones. Articles similar to the TV themes also appear. For five years it was 4 pages, and grew to 6 pages in April of this year. In polling the readership to inquire if they would like it to be 8 pages, they said yes! So beginning in September it will be 8 pages.
Joel: And please talk about the consulting you do. Are these personal consultations?
Jeanie: Clients have used my services for a very wide variety of issues. I consider my work is process-based rather than issue-based. What I offer is helpful when anyone desires change or is in the midst of change (desired or not!) -- using the presenting issues as a vehicle. My work is about empowerment and energetics. If someone wants to be empowered or more empowered, we use the issues of his or her life to facilitate empowerment. Clients commonly refer to me as mentor, consultant's consultant, shadow consultant, and my favorite term, empowerment consultant.
Joel: What type of issues do you work with?
Jeanie: The work takes place on the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual levels. I consider that my greatest service is to "be with" my client rather than to "do to" my client. I honor the process of life's experiences. I see my clients as whole and perfect, not needing to be "fixed." If they say they want to make a change, I support them in their transition.
Clients come to me with issues of interpersonal relationships, careers, health, specific illnesses, mystical experiences, organizational change, planetary transformation, ending marriages, starting marriages. Gosh, where to stop the list? I've been consulted because of essentially everything that happens in human life.
Joel: What does the term "personal empowerment" mean to you?
Jeanie: To me, "personal empowerment' means to use the power that is within us. I believe that we can stimulate empowerment in others, but I do not believe that we can empower others. Personal empowerment is an inside job.
Joel: Where do we lose our power?
Jeanie: The short answer is: We lose power any time we have not trusted that we are powerful.
If this is a momentary loss -- such as losing our car keys -- we quickly recover and move back into our power. However, when we repeatedly do not trust our own power, we tend to create powerless relationships. As time passes and we continue in powerless relationships, we tend to identify with them, believing that we are powerless. Powerlessness, though, is an act of creation rather than a definition of who we are.
Joel: How do you use the word "energetics"?
Jeanie: I tend to use the following words and phrases when referring to this area: energy, energetic, energy field(s), and energetics. My underlying belief is that the whole universe is composed of energy. Every person and every thing -- each having its own vibration -- is a part of a whole, interconnected by a field of energy which is invisible to ordinary eyesight.
This field of energy contain information that is available to all who choose to perceive it. Memories of all our experiences are coded in the energy field. The energy field contains sounds inaudible to the physical ear, visions unseen by the physical eyes, and textures untouched by the physical body. Though intangible, the energy field is quite real. As we open to the mystery of it, our world expands. Or some might say, we find a "new" world.
Joel: Do you mean using our abilities more?
Jeanie: Using our abilities more is part of what I mean. Keep in mind that some folks don't even know what their abilities are! So empowerment for them is to recognize their abilities and gifts. Others may have misconceptions about their responsibilities; that is, believing they should do this or that or are responsible for changing someone else. So empowerment for them is to recognize they are responsible for their own lives.
Disempowered persons are trapped in false beliefs. Lifting off those false beliefs can be empowering, exhilarating. Everyone is unique, which is why I like to use the expressing "inside job."
Joel: Can you give me an example from the clients and issues you have known? (Something to make this less theoretical/heady for someone who is not familiar with such work.)
Jeanie: Gosh, so many examples pop into my mind when you ask. Here's one that happened long enough ago that I can give you information of what has transpired since the session. He's someone who is not generally powerless, but felt disempowered in a specific situation, which is fairly typical for so many people. I'll call him Andrew because I'd rather refer to him by name, even an invented one. But the situation is not invented.
Andrew was preparing himself for an important meeting with his new boss (the boss's job was new, not Andrew's). He told me his concerns about the meeting, feeling unsafe and unsupported and unheard. He felt his boss really didn't understand his contributions, etc. His thoughts and beliefs were setting him up for a disaster.
I listened respectfully, yet briefly. As he spoke, I saw (I'm clairvoyant) the pictures he was drawing in his head about the inevitable disappointment. I heard the disempowering messages he was saying to himself, in addition to those he verbalized audibly. (I'm clairaudient, also). And I could feel his fear. Visual, auditory, kinesthetic, and emotional sensations are very potent energies in creating our experiences. We might call this Andrew's disempowering video tape.
I asked him what he desired to believe and think and feel about this meeting and his boss. My request prompted him to draw different pictures in his head and create different internal messages and feel different emotions as he verbalized his desired thoughts and beliefs. I tuned into his new images, his new vision. So we might say that we were creating an empowering video tape. While he talked, I got a fix on this video tape which was, of course, going to replace the old one.
Joel: So what he desires to believe is what he actually believes?
Jeanie: That's the general idea that we're working toward, but just desiring to believe something does not make him believe it. Desire has FIRE which can ignite the empowering belief. People often come alive when they open to possibilities, as Andrew did, so I use fire energy. Often people slip right back into the old thoughts and feelings, so I help them to stay focused on the new video tape. Andrew returned once or twice to the old video tape, and as soon as I suggested he re-focus the desired images, he did so.
The energetic work that I did -- that is, the work I did in the energy field -- was to neutralize all traces of the not-desired disempowering beliefs and thoughts while inserting the desired empowering beliefs and thoughts. Keep in mind, that I did not determine the desired empowering belief, Andrew did. I just checked to be certain that everything aligned with his life mission and high intention. Energetically, I replaced the old with the new.
Joel: Like a cut and paste.
Jeanie: Exactly, Joel, exactly. All thoughts and actions and feelings leave marks on the energy field -- memories. These marks can be erased. Some beliefs and thoughts and feelings are in the software (tissues and various layers of consciousness) and some in the hardware (bones and cellular memory). My job is to find all residue that may be in the energy field and erase it while at the same time inserting the new images. And, of course, Andrew's responsibility is even more important, because he has to monitor the video tape constantly so that he doesn't recreate the old disempowering message.
Joel: Do you mean that the old tape can come back?
Jeanie: With this process, the old tape rarely comes back. However, the old tape can appear to come back -- but it usually is a new creation generated by thought patterns not cleared yet. If a well-established old negative pattern is being replaced by a new video tape we may have to create more than one new video tape. Life is a process.
Joel: So, what happened with Andrew?
Jeanie: In twenty minutes of our two-hour session, he became enthusiastic about the meeting with his boss, eager to present his ideas, believing he would be heard, and feeling empathy with the new boss. He changed his beliefs and thoughts and feelings about that meeting.
Following the meeting two days later, he reported his experiences on my voice mailbox hotline (a service to my clients) with exclamation points punctuating every sentence. He created an experience that built a foundation for a more positive relationship with his boss. When next we worked in a session, I questioned him further about his current beliefs and thoughts and feelings with respect to his boss: no similarity to the previous set of beliefs and thoughts! And just three days ago when we last worked, he referred again to this transformation and reported that he continues to enjoy a positive and growing relationship with his boss.
This was a lasting change for Andrew. This energetic and empowerment work enhanced a specific and crucial situation in his life. In addition, Andrew learned a new skill that he has used repeatedly as he faces other challenges.
Joel: A valuable skill he can return to?
