PeaceTalk Episode 141: When my kids were younger, I was virtually obsessed with their well-being, especially when it came to them attending school(s). Regular school, homeschool, what was the “right” or “best” way? Thank goodness I was exposed to The Work when they were 7 and 10, and I could question my belief “I am responsible for their happiness and education”. Listen here:
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There’s something especially beautiful when we go through this process of self-inquiry, step by step, and then have a little light-bulb moment of surprise (or a huge in-breath and gasp).
We find a turnaround that brings a smile to our faces. A discovery. Even laughter.
Living our turnarounds is where a particularly beautiful transformation seems to happen when it comes to questioning stressful thinking, for all of us.
It’s the last step in The Work.
First, we take a stressful belief through the four questions, starting with asking if what we’re thinking is actually true?
Then, we study what it’s like, what we’ve been like, what we see happening, what we notice, and how we’ve reacted because we’ve believed this troubling thought.
But then, the fun really begins.
Who would we be without that thought?
Yes…without THAT thought. The one you’ve thought so many times. Like “she abandoned me” or “life is hard” or “they don’t love me” or “I need more_____”.
What if you didn’t think it?
This is an exercise using your imagination. You don’t have to automatically already BE the one who isn’t thinking it. That’s too difficult. If you’re thinking about pink elephants in the room, or the mean world out there….too late. You’re already thinking.
But you have such a genius imagination, so it’s only about wondering, creating, seeing who you WOULD be without your stressful belief?
Then, we find all the turnarounds we can. She didn’t listen to me? Turned around: I didn’t listen to myself. He didn’t love me? I didn’t love him. They didn’t accept me? I didn’t accept myself. He ruined my life? I ruined my own life. I don’t have enough money? I don’t have enough of myself.
If something “clicks” and feels curious, fascinating, or “wow”….
….then we might have hit a turnaround we know we want to live, to work with, to practice, to hold in our hearts.
We might ask ourselves the question “If we lived this turnaround we’ve found….what would it look like? What would it feel like? How would we talk, act, walk, be?”
Last Friday morning (Pacific Time) on the First Friday call….we filled out, slowly and methodically, a Judge Your Neighbor worksheet on a stressful situation.
I love how everyone has a completely and entirely different situation custom made for their own life, totally unique to their experience….and yet on the page we all write the same kinds of thoughts.
He wants me to…..She doesn’t think I can handle….They don’t like me when…..I hated that they…..
It’s actually wonderful that your thoughts come right out of you, without editing, and you get to write them down. They’re stuck there, on paper. They can’t move or wiggle away.
Good.
At the end of your inquiry work, you can feel what it’s like to be aware of a wider, different, grander perspective.
Who knows what can happen when you become aware of a different way of believing, thinking, noticing or being when it comes to your stressful relationship or situation?
Not long after I got off the First Friday call, a sweet inquirer wrote me a note.
She said that after her inquiry the previous First Friday on nobody caring about an important health concern in her life, she easily found someone who DID care. She got something handled that she said was the best it felt in 55 years.
She let go of needing to go to where she always had gone, and went somewhere new….after questioning the belief “they don’t care about me”. She found the turnarounds “I don’t care about myself” and “they DO care about me” and “I don’t care about them”.
It all came together to a living turnaround that carried her right into a new and satisfying solution.
WOW.
Hearing her turnaround, I felt so happy to be witnessing The Work.
That’s what I know to do: question what I’m thinking that feels off, or hurts…and discover the safety, clarity, happiness or joy I was missing.
The Work uncovers blind spots. Who knows what can happen then.
“The turnarounds are your prescription for health, peace, and happiness….
….Through these realizations, the doing changes. I was the same as you. I couldn’t change. I couldn’t stop hurting my children and myself. But as I realized what was true for me, with the questions alive inside me, the doing changed. The problems stopped. I didn’t stop them; they stopped. It’s just that simple.” ~ Byron Katie in Loving What Is
Much love,
Grace
P.S. I’ll be a part of a pretty incredible summit of speakers where the focus is parenting….but my part will be sharing about doing The Work. I’ll be sharing how questioning our thoughts about our kids, ourselves, our own parents can change our lives. To sign up for free, click here.