One of the most interesting exercises and invitations to us all as we do The Work and self-inquiry….
….is to wonder what it would be like to “live” a potent turnaround.
As you probably know….
….the turnarounds are all the opposite angles, perspectives and views to our stressful beliefs.
“He should give me flowers” becomes “he should not give me flowers” and “I should give him flowers” and “I should give myself flowers.”
We sit with these crazy opposites and find examples of how they are also true.
It doesn’t mean any of them are the “right” answer.
They’re like trying on completely different coats, or wearing a different pair of shoes (or moccasins, as the ancient wisdom native saying goes).
Sometimes, we’re hit with the implications of a turnaround, and we might feel great excitement in turning our life situation inside out into something new and different.
The situation that seems so very threatening and awful….
….with a turnaround seems challenging, but possible.
Or, super thrilling!
Or, hilarious!
We get to ask this awesome question: What If I Lived This Turnaround?
What if I actually went into the flower shop, and bought myself the most gorgeous bunch of flowers in the whole place?
Instead of holding onto my thought that HE should be the one doing the flower-buying.
If it can start with something simple, like buying myself just the thing I always wanted someone else to buy….
….what else might be possible to turnaround?
What if I really could bring something different to life, even out of the tragic thing I experienced?
Yesterday I got two sweet and brilliant examples of living turnarounds right before my eyes.
The first was….
….getting to talk with an amazing woman who has clearly lived an astonishing turnaround in her life after giving birth to a baby with down syndrome 28 years ago (Debra Ruh).
I was so moved by her lifetime example of turning her difficult experience into something beautiful, I interviewed her to share it with Peace Talk listeners.
(You can download this Episode 106 of Peace Talk on itunes right here).
The other example of a living turnaround yesterday was…..me.
I led a retreat online, with people dialing in using their phones or computers, for three hours about questioning love stories that hurt.
I shared my biggest painful love story of divorce (that has turned into a blessing).
You know what the living turnaround is?
That I was leading a Valentine’s Prep Day retreat online, where people came from all across the United States, Europe, Australia….
….and this is what I do for a living now.
I join with others to question stressful thoughts.
I get messages like these….both of which I also received in emails yesterday:
I had the thought….wow….
….it’s bragging to share these beautiful comments.
But my life is full of these kinds of expressions of love now. Full of thoughtful, incredible people so sincere about questioning their suffering.
Who would you be if you lived one of your turnarounds?
If you opened up to the thing that happened, that incident, that relationship….
….could now morph into something spectacular, or new?
I was once on staff at a School for The Work and was partnered with a woman who was very distraught about a horrible tragedy in her life.
She had been the driver of a car, on a family vacation, and the tires had suddenly blown out (they were later recalled for all these types of vehicles) causing the SUV to flip wildly off the road.
The accident killed her husband, one of her daughters, and the best friend of her other daughter.
In her path of healing, at a future point in her life, she founded an organization to help people handle the shock of sudden death, including helping firefighters and police officers deliver shocking news to families after accidents.
I cried with her, as we did The Work together, as she undid the terrible pain one level further.
We could both already see, in that inquiry, how stunning it was to see what came out of what seemed awful. It was something helpful to humanity, to her community.
Love prevailed.
She’s an inspiration to people of overcoming accidental death and living an incredible life beyond beliefs about how reality should be.
Just like Debra Ruh, the woman I spoke with on Peace Talk.
Now….my own experiences have never been so dramatic.
But I certainly never could have dreamed I’d get to question my thinking, talk with other truly powerful people on a daily basis, or have three hours fly by while asking and answering questions, and turning suffering around into blessings.
What turnaround are you living right now?
Meditate on what it might look like, if you did turn what you’re imagining around.
Let it come in as an idea, an inspirational thought.
You don’t have to know right now….let it come to you.
Let it take as long as it takes.
“To exclude anything that appears in your universe is not love. Love joins with everything. It doesn’t exclude the monster. It doesn’t avoid the nightmare–it looks forward to it.” ~ Byron Katie
“The most authentic thing about us is our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform, to love and to be greater than our suffering.” ~ Ben Okri
Much love, Grace