Grace Bell is author of Grace Notes and facilitates individuals, groups, retreats and courses in The Work of Byron Katie. She supports people with eating issues, divorce, difficult feelings and relationship trouble to find peace.
Does it help you to identify whether or not you’re addicted to food? Has it worked for you to call yourself a Food Addict or Compulsive Overeater?
This was a question someone asked, and I love what it helps us look at….the definition of addiction itself, and what supports us in ending the suffering.
We all know addiction basically means to be caught in a negative cycle of “having” to use a substance, eat that food, “do” something that relieves pressure or brings some pleasure….
….and that when we do it, it feels briefly good but overall, the whole cycle basically sucks. It has terrible side effects (in the case of eating, feeling bloated, sick, nauseated, frightened, discouraged, guilty, condemning of the self, angry with the body).
It does seem the process we’re calling addiction is whatever happens when we’re “hooked” and we feel like we can’t stop.
But it’s clear that with all the deep studying of whatever we’re calling addiction, it’s profoundly helpful to focus on the cause: difficult feelings, suffering, pain, trauma, anxiety, fear, rejection, betrayal.
What I find most helpful of all is knowing that nothing is permanent. Everything changes. Many people who were once addicted, no longer are.
It doesn’t matter ultimately if you say you are or are not by definition “addicted”. What is most important is noticing.
Watching the movement and energy and thinking that happens in each moment. Feelings, thoughts, memories, urge to bolt.
Who are we without our stressful or negative or fearful thoughts about what we encounter, including our memories?
Allowing them, perhaps, to pass through…and return to where they came from.
Much love,Grace
P.S. Eating Peace Process, an in-depth program for those of us with eating concerns, will start May 1st. Our focus is ending the repetitive cycle, with loving compassion.
I’m not sure what’s going on, but I just had a second registration for spring retreat come in for a cat.
LOL.
Actually, with cats, dogs, insects, birds; these creatures appear to be living, being, flying, running, jumping, playing, sleeping, hunting, snuggling, eating, moving….even if they are dying, it appears they don’t do it with the stress we humans sometimes have around these activities.
Most living creatures besides humans don’t appear to be sufferingin the mind and thinking they need to forget, or change, or fix, or improve.
Suffering is: remembering, thinking, worrying, regretting, projecting into the future, turning towards themselves with self-criticism and self-judgment (even self-hatred).
Now, truth is, what do I know about a cat’s mind?
Like you probably do, I watch animals and plants and trees and notice they are all there, being themselves, in the present moment.
They’re being “cat”. Or “tree”.
When we observe everything around us it all seems wildly curious, mysterious, crazy, inexplicable.
Where did All This come from?
What’s going on?
Thinking itself is magnificent….but it also creates a lot of imagery, feelings, stories and inventions that aren’t necessarily true in this present moment. (I’m sure you’ve noticed, haha)!
Who would we be without our stressful thinking?
We do think, that isn’t going to stop. We’re human. We have these amazing brains and creative imaginative minds.
What is this fourth question in The Work offering anyway: Who would you be without that thought?
One of my favorite things about the process of The Work, is narrowing our focus down to just one situation at a time. One person, one incident, one experience, on concept or thought that really disturbs us still when we remember it.
We don’t have to force ourselves to Not Be with any thoughts. We’ll have thoughts, oh yes. Many thoughts. We love information and learning and gathering and understanding, don’t we?
And, we can wonder what it would be like without our stressfulthought, and use our imaginations to investigate and wonder.
What I noticed after beginning to practice The Work, was that when I never questioned my thinking about anything, I was rather miserable a lot of the time, with an occasional blip of happiness and joy.
Without believing my stories are the Truth….I’m much more like the rest of what I see around me: living creatures, chairs, tables, houses, pavement.
I am this being, a part of the world, doing, then not doing, awake, then asleep. Not having thousands of stressful thoughts about it all. Noticing the comfort and stillness present, the speed, the slowing down, the movement of What Is.
I’m more like a cat, or dog, or a living entity like a plant, without my stories.
This may be more true than any of us ever realized.
Astonishing.
“Our situation on this earth seems strange. Every one of us appears here involuntarily and uninvited, for a short stay, without knowing why. To me it is enough to wonder at the secrets.” ~ Albert Einstein
Join the practice of presence, clarity….and joy of being. Spring Retreat can help unravel stressful thinking, so we can see the beauty in what is. Register.
Have you ever noticed that when it comes to Other People, you’re not so sure how safe you feel in their presence?
Long ago, I entered an ongoing therapy group. I experienced anxiety regularly, and my attitude towards life was a fine line between kind-of hopeful including noticing beauty in the world and deeply discouraged about humanity and my own plight.
I binge-ate sometimes. I smoked cigarettes on and off for a decade. I drank alcohol occasionally to the point of black-out. I drank a lot of coffee. I ran for miles at dawn. My kitchen cupboards were almost entirely empty. With pride I made sure everything I owned fit in my little Datsun named Ezzy.
These were the outside behaviors, but they reflected what was happening on the inside: disturbance, unsettled, doom.
Like when an airplane is enroute and suddenly the pilot says, after things start to get a bit bumpy and the sky is looking less than pure blue….“please buckle up and take a seat, we’re going through some disturbance.”
Then you see lightening flash and something crashes in the back where the flight attendants sit.
(That’s never actually happened to me, but it did to my sister. Everyone turned out OK).
I felt this kind of gloom and fear about every 3 days on average.
Just so uncomfortable and always trying to find comfort. Where was it?
I didn’t know that it was in my thinking, and the way I perceived the world.
What’s funny is, I was worried about crashes and accidents and death and illness and burning in hell and bad things happening, like an apocalypse, and I was secondarily worried about my experiences with other humans.
This is where the therapy group comes in. There I was, surrounded by other humans.
Strangers even, in the beginning.
Terrifying!
It sounds like I’m joking, but that was actually my feeling. Horribly frightened of their eyes looking at me, their words, what they were thinking, what I was feeling…..yikes. Just walking into the therapy room each week where we all met took a lot of courage for me. I had adrenaline pumping through me, and I often thought “gosh, maybe I’m getting a fever” just before it was time to leave for the group on Wednesdays nights.
But I stuck with it.
Because something about being in the midst of all those people was me facing my worst fears. Something in me knew that if I could learn to handle just being a part of the group (or, dare I say it, enjoying it) I might find some freedom and peace.
Little did I know how wise this was.
For what happened, was when I found at first a little calm, then relaxation, then safety, then actual JOY about attending the therapy group (it took a few years)….
….my fears about the apocalypse and plane crashes and horror movie visions also shifted and became far less intense.
Who would have known that becoming comfortable with people was the doorway into becoming comfortable with life itself, and everything that happened in it?
This is why I love groups now, and honest conversations.
True Confession: I still get excited and slightly nervous about retreats, programs, talks, meetings, being on stage, leading something, interviews.
All these things involve Other People, my old fear.
Who would we be without our beliefs about the dangers of other people? It’s never, ever, ever as unfriendly as I have made it out to be. It’s much, much better, consistently. Being with other people has truly opened the doorway to an unexpected, beautiful peace, intimacy, closeness and love. I’m part of a tribe of life called humanity.
And it all started with biting the bullet: Accepting that I’m full of fear and volatile emotions, and I don’t appear to behave in support of my own interests…..and that I needed some help.
So I showed up in therapy group, willing to see what happened and willing to be there.
The pain and suffering I experienced drove me to gather with others.
It was difficult, and one of the best things I ever did. In that group, I felt challenged, terrified, full of grief, crying in front of people (gasp), enraged….and then also, full of joy, unconditional love, and understanding.
We were questioning our beliefs (before I ever heard of Byron Katie). We were finding out who we could be without our stories.
Connected. Loved. Loving.
This is why I do retreats and form groups and gather with the Year of Inquiry people each year, and the Eating Peace Process tribe.
It’s unknown, mysterious, and healing to do The Work in the presence of others. It really takes courage to show up and be honest and share from the heart, mind and soul with Other Humans.
If you’re like me, you start to dream of caves, books and a quiet day all alone as a Dream-Come-True and why bother letting other people hear my plight or my concerns?
Why do I do it?
Because it’s my Living Turnaround: Other People are profoundly safe, My Thinking about other people is what is unsafe.
When I believed speaking out loud was unsafe because those people might shun, reject, criticize, judge or hate me….I lived a fearful, careful, apologetic life.
I wasn’t honest. I hid.
Turns out, it was much safer to be in their presence in a truly honest, open, willing way.
Not comfortable at first, at all.
If you’d like to practice challenging your belief that Other People are not pleasant, unsafe, boring, worrisome, doubtful or judging you (etc, etc) then coming to a retreat is a brilliant way to do it.
It’s not a weekly therapy group for several years, it’s a fairly short and simple commitment (only 4 days out of your life) and a retreat in The Work provides a place to expose your true self gently, honestly, in the company of others who can relate.
Including me.
Spring Cleaning Retreat is an inside cleaning job, but the paradox is that it couldn’t happen unless we gathered with others. That’s the key ingredient, the doorway, into a new way of seeing life.
“None of us, including me, ever do great things. But we can all do small things, with great love, and together we can do something wonderful.” ~ Mother Teresa Much love,Grace Other upcoming events:
Eating Peace Process Online Brand New Version. Same principles, delivered better. Lifetime access. May 1-August 15, 2019
Divorce Is Hell 8 week course Aug 18-October 13, 2019 Sundays 11 am PT/ 7 pm UK with Nadine Ferris France
Year of Inquiry begins Sept 8, 2019–a whole year of monthly topics in The Work, and sharing inquiry together
https://InstantTeleseminar.com/Events/114360906
Event Page Password: eatpeace If you don’t have access to the web, you can listen in by dialing (425) 440-5010, and using the following conference pin: 305799#
An interesting turn of events appears to have slowly been budding in the past six to twelve months here in my little business world.
Like a very slow motion flower blossoming.
Time to prune the offerings and focus even more deeply on a few: eating peace process, divorce/break up, the upcoming tenth group of Year of Inquiry.
(Not the tenth actual year of Year of Inquiry, to be clear–the very first year, I had 4 groups start–one every quarter. It was super fun. And way more work than I ever anticipated. LOL.)
I mention all this because the upcoming May retreat will likely be the last 4 day retreat for awhile (with the exception of Breitenbush summer retreats and the annual Eating Peace Retreat in January–which is a luxurious 6 whole days).
When I began offering 4 day retreats, it was because so many people gave feedback that living in the process of self-inquiry for more than two days on a weekend was profoundly helpful.
I could feel it myself. The group grew ever more deeply as we investigated, shared, and walked the trail of wondering who we’d be without our stories.
I’m always so moved by what I witness at retreat.
And, it takes some courage and time to thaw out those hard, solid stories about hard times we’ve encountered. The betrayals, the disappointments, the experiences that felt traumatic and then affected our lives from that point forward.
If I sit and consider the hard times….I can still make an instant list.
My father dying of leukemia, an abortion, my first husband leaving the marriage, fear and anxiety overwhelming me in my 20s, abandonment, a good friend’s shocking betrayal, a sister cutting me off, having no money and almost losing my home, getting a cancerous tumor on my leg.
All of us can make a list.
The things that hurt. The events that continue to echo within our nervous system or our hearts, leaving us a little (or a lot) unhappy with life, leaving us not feeling well or not feeling ourselves. These situations seem to bring difficulties, compulsive behavior (like addictions), nervous tics, sadness, worry, upset.
The way I know out of the mental chatter, fear, or shattered disappointment, is to question my perspective and find my answers. That thing that happened….you know the event….it changed your life for the worse….
Is it true?
Are you absolutely sure it’s true that it changed your life for the worse?
Right now in this early morning writing, I think about my divorce 12 years ago and the road to having the private practice and business I’ve been dancing in over the past decade.
I thought so many times my life was over, it was a disaster, I couldn’t do it. I thought so many times I needed help, and needed to get somewhere else (not where I was). I needed confidence, employment, support, money, skill development, learning.
When I believe the thought that my divorce was shattering in a permanent way, and that it’s taken me a decade to get up and running….I can still feel sad.
And, I had The Work in my pocket the whole time.
I wrote worksheets on the doom I was facing, the hurt, the sense of abandonment, the deflation.
The feeling was “I’m in danger” or “I can’t make it” or “there’s something wrong with me” or “life is hard”.
But who was I without my story??
Who am I right now without my story that the thing that happened (in this case, divorce) made my financial life worse?
Because what I notice about money-earning and giving service and trading my time and efforts for dollars, is that a completely new world was born for me out of that divorce process.
When it came to business, I started signing up for everything.
Without my story that I’ve been abandoned, my attitude became: Just Do It.
I had an idea, an invitation, a suggestion, and I’d be off. I’d go there. I’ve taken tons of courses: how to build a website, putting a podcast together, course curriculum development, marketing, business and money, organizing your social media, how to give a presentation, creating your signature talk, writing copy, how to write a blog (Grace Notes!), more marketing.
I’ve been in masterminds for small businesses, networking groups, and gone to NYC for media and PR training and how to communicate more directly (I know, that one may be a surprise, LOL).
What I notice now today, is a sense of less rather than more, when it comes to new information and business growth.
Once again I get to look as I write this Grace Note and reflect on my future in business and prepare to pay taxes this year (I’m still shocked that I owe taxes): Who would I be, right now, without the belief that divorce and losing almost everything financially was horrible?
Because I notice right now, each day has brought an opportunity to sit still, to share with others, to dialogue with people about the mind and stories and questioning anything that feels painful or frightening.
Turning it around: it was the best thing that could have happened. What?!
It opened up a profoundly new world. Learning, learning, learning.
And now today, questioning the thought “I need to learn more, grow more, add more” without saying “no” ever.
Who would I be without the story I need to grow, add, expand, gain, build?
Something is narrowing in and allowing other things to fall away, slowing down and becoming more still.
Without the belief that divorce process was “bad” and doing “more” business is required for survival and money and support and freedom…. ….I’m just here.
Woman writing in a comfortable chair noticing the sun rise, noticing a willingness, even a need, to relax the drive for More and to do nothing. Feeling the pace slow down around this business.
Sharing with you how joyful I am that we’ll be gathering for inquiry in May for 4 whole days and knowing there may be a break after that from what’s become the normal schedule (although, what’s a “normal” schedule).
Who would I be without the belief I have to work hard, make anything happen, complete the list, implement, take action, etc, etc?
I’d be remembering I can sit still right now and feel the truth that who I believe myself to be, and the events I believe happened that were “hard” and made life “worse” shaped the direction I took in profoundly beautiful ways.
I wouldn’t be here without the divorce, the money panic, the School for The Work, the ones who listened when they asked four questions, the betrayals, the fear, the anger, the despair, the laughter.
“Trust your wound to a teacher’s surgery. Flies collect on a wound. They cover it, those flies of your self-protecting feelings, your love for what you think is yours. Let a Teacher wave away the flies and put a plaster on the wound. Don’t turn your head. Keep looking at the bandaged place. That’s where the Light enters you. And don’t believe for a moment that you’re healing yourself.” ~ Rumi Trusting my wounds to a teacher’s surgery means for me that I sit in silence and with others and I do The Work. The teacher is inquiry. I question my anxious beliefs, the beliefs that those things that happened were terrible. I question that “I have to” (keep the same schedule, do it the same way, do more, learn more, work more).
If you’re drawn to join me in May, I’d love to have you so we can look at our disturbances together.
And you know one wonderful thing I know already? The people who come and the group that’s formed and the inquiry that happens will all be brilliant–the best that could happen.
The first time I ever decided I had a “problem” with my body weight, I was 14.
The usual solution is to follow a diet and exercise program. Right?
I want to weigh less, so I’ll change the food itself and I’ll exercise more. “So simple” we say.
It’s a math problem!
We’ve all heard over and over how food plans and dieting and exercising in ways we find unpleasant and controlling our food doesn’t ultimately work. It doesn’t get us to where we truly want to be: A person who doesn’t even think about over-eating or under-eating. Someone who doesn’t have a concern or fear or rebellion about eating.
I was once at a conference standing in the tea/coffee line with a doctor, having a lovely conversation. We had a long time, as the line was very long. When I mentioned that I had an eating disorder for many years, she said “oh, you’ll probably need to be vigilant about that for the rest of your life, right?”
What?!
No.
How did I move into a much greater peace with eating, food, and weight?
I worked with the heavy weight of my emotional life. It was very heavy. I still experience swirling emotions, grief, heartbreak, anger, anxiety, nervousness. These are simply experiences that appear to be common, bubbling and normal for me. I’m not emotion-free.
In fact, in the past, when the weight of my emotional life was so heavy, before turning toward my emotional experience with compassion…. ….my goal was to have zero intense emotions.
I could tell they came in and took over, and I wanted to shut it all down. Who would we be without this story that being upset, troubled or anxious is bad or wrong? Who would we be without the story that the emotional and feeling life is torturous and must be avoided? Who would we be without the thought my feelings are frightening?
Sigh.
It may not feel comfortable, but it does feel human. For me, to be human is to feel. What I notice is….having feelings is a part of reality, whether I like them or not.
You want your body to be thinner?
Let’s turn it around: I want my thoughts about feelings to be thinner. I want emotional experience to be thinner.Just start with ONE fearful or troubling experience. You don’t have to handle all your terrors, upsets or grief at once. Begin with one, and study it, investigate it, chew on it, allow it in, allow it to be digested and to pass through you with understanding.
One of the best ways to do this?
The Work of Byron Katie.
Start with one difficult emotional experience where you felt betrayed, cut off, unloved or hurt, and take it through the four questions, then find turnarounds.
It may be easier to handle than you think.
It’s certainly worth the trip, because on the other side is a relaxation about having emotions without shame, and allowing them to live with compassion.
When this happened for me, I simply didn’t feel like binge eating, or starving myself, anymore.
“Since the beginning of time, people have been trying to change the world so that they can be happy. This hasn’t ever worked, because it approaches the problem backward. What The Work gives us is a way to change the projector–mind–rather than the projected. It’s like when there’s a piece of lint on a projector’s lens. We think there’s a flaw on the screen, and we try to change this person and that person, whomever the flaw appears on next. But it’s futile to try to change the projected images. Once we realize where the lint is, we can clear the lens itself. This is the end of suffering, and the beginning of a little joy in paradise.” ~ Byron Katie
Since the beginning of time, I was trying to change my weight and my body and my eating so I could be happy. This never worked, because it approached the problem backward. What The Work gave me is a way to change the projector–mind–rather than the projected–my body, the food.
I thought there was a flaw on the screen–my body itself–and I tried to change it constantly. I also tried to change this feeling and that feeling, trying to change myself and all “my” flaws when they appeared.
It was futile for me to try to change the projected image–the body, the food, the diet, the vision of perfection in the future, my feelings.
What worked instead was to clear the lens by questioning the beliefs and feeling the turnarounds with surrender, acceptance, trust.
I always say, if I can stop having an eating disorder and really notice the obsession to think about food is no longer present, then anyone can.
First Friday is tomorrow! Open, free meditation in The Work for anyone and everyone interested in questioning their stressful beliefs. No experience necessary.
Friday, March 1st 7:45-9:15 am PT. Everyone dials in (no video), is guided through filling out a Judge Your Neighbor worksheet (the fabulous step one), then 2-3 people get to “do” The Work out loud. Join us HERE. Choose phone or WebCall if you want to be heard. Choose Broadcast if you prefer to listen-only.
Also, if you’re in the free Eating Peace facebook support group, I’ll come at 10 am PT to do a facebook live also on Friday. Request membership by visiting here. I’m a part of it but only share about once a week. Sweet people there for simple encouragement and inquiry.
Doing The Work is sometimes like an arduous excavation, it seems.
Kind of like what’s happening in my back yard, literally.
As the digging began, it was very exciting and kind of sad at the same time (goodbye old garage rec room where many memories happened). A huge loud machine, not exactly relaxing, came rolling in.
Sometimes, the gigantic machine was inches from my actual cottage as it squeezed into the small driveway to get to the back yard.
Smash, crash, loads of garbage and destroyed material, wires, glass, roofing, door. I was absolutely fascinated.
And then….five days into the destruction….a phone call.
“There’s something too unstable about the soil. It’s very sandy (this was once a lake bottom and a swamp). We have to do MORE foundational work before we even get started building”.
Oh.
Reminds me of diving deeply into self-inquiry and all the beliefs about life, the world, relationships, incidents, scary things, sad things. AGAIN.
Here comes the mind all over again. Believing something’s wrong, dangerous.
But there’s more. It’s not as easy as we thought.
The other day in a private group, where we do inquiry together (it was the Eating Peace program)….someone brought up her feeling of being Against Ambivalence.
Wow, what a permeating and long-lasting stressful thought.
As I considered this belief and perspective, I noticed that in anything my mind perceives as “a relationship” I’ve often experienced ambivalence.
Love interests, friendships, family, the city I live in, my neighborhood, politics, the weather, a major project I’m working on (the new version of Eating Peace curriculum which has been a year in the making), a book I think I’m writing, my body, saying yes, saying no, food and other substances.
Ambivalence.
The word comes from combining two important words only about 100 years ago: ‘ambi’ and ‘value’. Ambi, meaning “two” and value meaning to have “worth”.
As we looked at this idea of ambivalence and how it shouldn’t happen, I was struck by noticing that the nature of everything appears to have worth, and, absence of worth.
Both. And all the variations in between, like a song with hight notes and low notes.
Someone brought to an individual solo session in inquiry this past week the deeply stressful belief that the mind shouldn’t be so unstable.
There is was again: two, multiple, variety, many, unpredictable, shared. BAD!!
I’m against it. The mind says it wants: “one, singular, same, solo, individual, non-dual, clear, final”. Decision made. Game over.
That’s better….right?
Is that true?
How do we react when we believe something shouldn’t be ambivalent, including my own relationship with x, y, or z?
I get firmer and more convicted. I seek for how to fortify my thinking or my decision. I have intolerance for the unknown. As a thoughtful inquirer said in our eating peace group call; “I KNOW”.
I know how this should be going. I know how my mind should react. I know how the future will be. I know what’s wrong. I know what’s right. I know that unless I quit being ambivalent about food or eating (or whatever it is I’m looking at), I’ll be doing it wrong.
It’s full of getting convinced and looking for the right answers and energy.
Hmm. Not very relaxing. Not very free.
So who would we be without the belief that when something is ambivalent, including my own thought process or feelings (even life), it’s wrong and shouldn’t be that way?
WOW.
Without the belief, I almost begin to wonder if anything is NOT full of multiple values, multiple variety of ways it can go, a huge unknown of infinite possibilities and happenings.
Without the belief that ambivalence shouldn’t be, I relax. I notice the innocence of this situation. I notice the sweetness of not knowing, and the immense joy and freedom available, no matter what this mind is doing.
In this moment, there’s a huge hole in the back yard, and sandy soil, and stillness while it all waits for the soil scientist geo-something-or-other and the architect to decide what needs to make it stable.
I’m not in charge. I’m not the expert. I wait.
I notice I don’t say “stop the project! I can’t stand it!” (it’s not true) and I don’t say “I don’t care if it costs thousands of dollars to fix!” (because I do care, and I don’t have the dollars).
I just pause. I watch. I go about my day.
Turning the thought around: it’s wonderful to be ambivalent, it’s natural to be ambivalent, I am supported in this ambivalence! I should be ambivalent, because I am. The mind is ambivalent–about everything! Yahoo! (Haha).
Could this be just as true, or truer?
Maybe there are wonderful reasons for this feeling of being torn.
Maybe there is effort, understanding, discomfort, energy required for this process.
Maybe it’s helping me surrender to what is. To cry, rage, laugh, hold still, be curious, be open.
I notice this building project behind my house is a phenomenal effort, three years in the making (architect, plans, permits, saving money, refinancing, taking a loan, trusting the future, consulting).
It’s requiring awareness of thought once again about money, change, creativity, creation, patience.
Part of the building will be office and retreat space for the work I do. This requires great trust in my life’s work, today, and the future of service I imagine offering.
I get to see how it goes, whether my mind is torn, or not.
I get to see that I am not in control of so much of it–just a player in the dance. Isn’t this what I always want when it comes to being alive, here on planet earth, with all this?
If you want what visible reality can give, you’re an employee. If you want the unseen world, you’re not living your truth.Both wishes are foolish, but you’ll be forgiven for forgetting that what you really want is love’s confusing joy.~ Jalaluddin Rumi
I like the part about love’s “confusing” joy.
Ambivalent. Confusing. In love. Laughing. Wondering how this is all going to go….
Much love,
Grace
P.S. Spring Retreat in The Work is May 15-19, 2019. Register.
P.P.S. If you’re on the Eating Peace mailing list (not Grace Notes), you’re receiving this note because many of you are so interested in simply doing The Work of Byron Katie you might like coming to First Friday tomorrow. See the link at the top to join us! Other upcoming events:
Eating Peace Process Online Brand New Version. Same principles, delivered better. Lifetime access. May 1-August 15, 2019
Have you ever been starting something new, and the thought comes in, “Jesus, when will this be over?”
It’s literally the first fifteen minutes of an all-day workshop.
The tech equipment isn’t working on stage. The people look suspicious. The venue is very cold. The first exercise is to turn to our ‘neighbor’ and share why we came to this workshop.
Seriously? I don’t care why my neighbor came. Maybe I should leave.
Doubt can come careening through our experience about anythingnew. (Gosh….maybe there was nervousness about turning to the neighbor. Maybe we’re in the right place, at the right time, on the right day. With the right neighbor).
About a month ago, I started lifting weights to address my hamstring injury from 2013.
The one where, if you’ve been reading Grace Notes for awhile, my right hamstring tore from the sits-bone (followed by surgery to re-attach it) because I decided it was a good idea to do a gymnastics move I used to perform when I was fifteen.
It’s been mostly hurting in one way or another since then.
I’ve done many physical therapies, checked with the surgeon who originally performed the repair, had another MRI, myofascial release therapy, massage, stretching, feldenkrais, yoga.
And done many worksheets: “This should go away, I hate this, my leg is ruined, I’ll never run again, my life is over”.
One day, I heard strengthening all the leg muscles would help. Not exactly a new thought. But for some strange reason I will never know, I suddenly downloaded a program for weight training, and started.
To do this program, I had to go to the gym. That’s not unusual for me. But going into the weight lifting section of the gym….that’s a different story.
I generally stick to exercise equipment I can do while reading my books.
Off I went, with youtube videos on my phone of how I was supposed to perform each new weight lift.
There were some uncomfortable moments trying to figure out the name of certain machines or where that particular dumbbell is in this place (don’t look at me)!
But one day, a few weeks into my new program, I went to the gym at 5 pm in the afternoon.
Bad idea.
Triple the amount of people, with clanking noises and hard rock music more prevalent on the speakers. Lots of men with very big arms, spotting each other.
They know I’m a novice. They think I don’t belong here.They’re staring at me.
I caught myself having this pattern of thought energy: I am not like them. I don’t belong.
Nervous. Turning up my headphones. Watching them, but not too long, or too much.
Noting some of the equipment and how they’re using it. Seeing the huge size of the weights they have on their bars. Noticing another woman in the area and thinking “oh good, I’m not alone.”
Such suspicion about not belonging!
Who would I be without the thought they think *something* of me (and it’s not good)?
Who would I be without the belief there’s any danger here? Or that I need to know something I don’t know?
I notice the delight of seeing these unique people. I listen to their voices, especially one man’s whose normal speaking voice appears to be yelling. I love hearing their banter, the cadence of their laughter, the jokes to one another. Noticing they don’t address me, bother me, or even say one thing to me. I’m completely welcome, I’m not kicked out. In fact, one muscular man with gray hair looks at me and just as I begin to think I need to move out of his view, he asks “Did you leave a blue sweatshirt over there?”
Oh.
Yes I did.
How kind of him.
I turn my thoughts around: They don’t know I’m a novice, and it doesn’t matter if they DO know it. They think “oh how cool, a woman who could be my mom is here in the gym. Love it.” They think I belong here. They’re not staring at me.
These could all be just as true, or truer.
Turning the thoughts around to myself: I don’t know I’m a novice. I think I don’t belong here. I think they don’t belong here (want them gone). I’m staring at them! The thing is, none of these thoughts are true, when I inquire. They are all founded in the assumptions that I should know something before I know it, and that being new at something is “bad” or will bring rejection from others.
With something new, you have to start. It’s weird at the beginning. You might not like the change.
“Sometimes the ‘fault’ that you perceive in another isn’t even there. It is a total misinterpretation, a projection by a mind conditioned to see enemies and make itself right….And what you react to in another, you strengthen in yourself.” ~ Eckhart Tolle
Has Not Belonging ever really happened in a permanent, unresolvable way?
Not one time, ever.
Today, how fun to notice what’s new. This moment here, now. This gorgeous morning.
How many things I’ve learned so far in this lifetime going from baby to experienced.
The brilliant and helpful people everywhere on planet earth.
In this new moment, I open a full calendar telling me what needs to happen when, including my gym visit. I notice the hamstring injury pain has been reduced to almost nothing over the past 4 weeks.
Perhaps a new thing you find uncomfortable, and yet you’re drawn, is beckoning you today?
Without believing your stressful thoughts about it…you might walk towards the door, being a new baby learning how every step of the way.
Much love,Grace
P.S. Spring Retreat is May 15-19, 2019. Register. Other upcoming events:
Long ago, I was ranting and complaining about myself really viciously.
It wasn’t the usual kind of inner rant, as if I had a really mean, abusive voice yelling at me “Why did you eat that? What’s wrong with you? Really? You’ll NEVER get this right.”
This particular rant, I was actually sharing what I was thinking out loud.
I was in a 12 Step Meeting (I can’t remember which kind, I went to many). I felt full of despair, and it was definitely about food and eating and my body. I felt entirely disgusted with myself and the whole ongoing experience.
What I wanted most was to shut down my behavior, my mind. I did NOT appear to want to understand what was going on with a more open mind.
I knew what was right and what was wrong, and I was definitely wrong.What if I had been able to pause, and treat myself with loving compassion….and ask if what I was thinking was true?
How did I react when I believed I KNEW I was doing it wrong?
Full of despair, anger, self-attack, aggression, dictatorship.Who would I be without “my” opinion?
Someone shared something with me after my sobbing and complaining and agonizing about how awful I was.
It changed my life.
Not instantly and forever. I went into that mode of judgment to the self again, oh yes.
Many times.
But something was aware of the words the person shared with me, and how they were truer than what I was saying to myself.
What I see is, when I give up being furious with myself about my behavior or my appearance related to weight, I have a chance of understanding what’s happening in a bigger picture, and ending the torture. Love allows all the “bad” things we do with food and eating, it seems, to dissolve.
Not violence and control.
“We grow to believe we need to be improved and are badgered into self-improvement programs. But none of that is true. We don’t need more criticism or badgering; we need a loving, supportive ‘coach’.” ~ Cheri Huber
Much love,Grace
P.S. Eating Peace Process, an in-depth program for those of us with eating concerns, will start again May 1st. Stay tuned for more about this program about self-inquiry, ending control vs wild abandon mentality, and using the way we eat to enlighten ourselves to what’s really true: love has the power.
In the past week alone, five people have asked me what spring retreat is like? Schedule, pace, environment, group, breaks, meals, exercises…. what’s it all like anyway?
At first, I saw in my mind’s eye a bigger picture response. The 30,000 foot view from the airplane way above in the sky–where we can see the whole landscape:
Spring “Mental” Cleaning. Unraveling our stressful thinking by questioning what we think is absolutely true. Undoing the repetitive processes we get into that build up like scummy soap film or grime in the bathroom.
We’re cleaning up our thinking, slowly and steadily answering four questions and finding turnarounds.
It’s giving the mind a bit of a scrub. Things become clearer.
In the airplane all-expansive view, I thought of the new brilliant craze of decluttering brought forth by Marie Kondo and her lovely quintessential Japanese approach to junk clearing.
We’re doing this with our minds, spending some time with situations we’ve found kind-of disturbing….or deeply traumatic.
We lay the whole thing out before us (the way Marie has everyone lay their entire wardrobe out on the bed).
There it all is, that situation we feel troubled by. We’re starting by simply looking at the whole situation.
We write down what we most objected to, what we wanted, what should have happened instead, what we really needed and maybe still need now, our most frustrating or anguished thoughts, who we blame.
And then, we begin to take each item–each thought or story-form or concept about that particular contact with Reality–and investigate. We’re checking to see what’s genuinely True for us.
Marie tells her customers to say “thank you” to the items they’re sending to Goodwill, or to the dump.
It’s pretty hard for us to let some things go, or to empty the storage container….even if it’s been a bad or anxiety-producing memory.
“I have to remember this! I have to hold on to it! I have to fix it! I have to get rid of this awful thing! I don’t know how else to think!”
There’s quite a bit of psychic “stuff” and memories to wade through when it comes to some situations, right?
Thank you, goodbye.
It seems to happen naturally when we give ourselves space and time, with other people, to consider our thoughts so deliberately and attentively.
Some people leave retreat feeling like 100 pounds of weight have lifted. No longer storing and carrying that painful story. They know what to do the next time something comes up: The Work.
So, what’s spring retreat like in Seattle, in the trenches?
Well, first of all, it’s not exactly “trenches”. LOL.
We’re not going to war. It feels much more like we’re declaring peace. It is a retreat from daily life, but concentrating with a sharp focus on our minds.
We gather in a circle in a rather ornate living room of a place I discovered a few years ago for retreats and weddings. It’s less than a mile from my cottage, where I used to offer spring cleaning retreat. Nowadays, the cottage is just too small.
The retreat house, built in 1918, has an elegant and quirky feel; old push-button light switches, statues of fairies and woodland creatures throughout the gardens, a meditation space outside, Alice-in-Wonderful little benches and hammocks scattered about.
Plus, a hot tub. With a towel warmer.
I loved it when I saw it because much of what this work is about is using our imaginations to see complete opposites, other possibilities, and the magic that can happen when we question our subjective reality.
Why not this new way? Did that statue of an angel just move?
The support of the circle is brilliant. Somehow because we’re together and we know our thoughts affect the way we’re navigating life….together we can understand more how our thoughts have patterned themselves.
People always seem to have the right questions, at the right times, even in the right order. It’s a bit cliche, but it really does appear that every retreat is unique; the perfect people have come together to inspire one another’s work.
I learn every time from listening to someone else’s work or insights. Inspiration comes alive. New endings to old stories.
Curious about retreat logistics?
We start most days at 9:30 am. Saturday we begin at 8:30 am as we have a special outing to move the body your way–or sit still or walk (you’ll get to decide exactly what’s right for you. Nothing is mandatory).
Meal breaks are on your own, and since we have our own kitchen, people use the fridge for groceries and cooking, or venture out to the town center for something good (tons of options). We usually take 90 minutes midday, and 90 minutes again for evening break.
Every evening after dinner except Friday we have a session together. Friday is open for out-of-towners who frequently request one evening to go into Seattle for fun, or to have a night at the retreat house in silence to contemplate and digest their work so far.
Onsite during our retreat, we’ve got a beautiful laundry room, a basement sitting room, a dining room table to gather around. It’s like we all move in for the 4 days together (even though some people commute daily) with all our comfort needs cared for. Tea, cream, coffee is all provided. I set up my little chairs when we need more seats (better than back jacks for most people).
Finally, the feel and the flow….the essence of spring cleaning retreat in The Work with me:
Everyone has a folder with all the handouts supplied that you’ll ever need for doing The Work, and for facilitating The Work.
Many therapists, healers, coaches and holistic practitioners have come to spring cleaning retreat to learn and practice this process step by step.
As I mentioned, you get to begin with one situation you’ve found disturbing when you consider it, or re-consider it, and ponder, and wonder, and wish it had never happened or wish it could have gone another way. Something that feels unfinished. Something troubling about life.
You get to pick what it is you want to work on. You’ll know.
And then, let this fascinating activity begin: stepping into the four questions one by one. Answering, noticing.
During our time together, we pair-off a few times. No expertise, special knowledge, or know-how is needed to be a facilitator. In fact, approaching this work with the innocence of a child, like it’s a brand new moment, is encouraged.
Like all groups coming together, there’s a sense of bonding and cohesion that happens as each time goes by. If you’ve been in retreat with me before, you know I love the way of checking in called “talking stick” style. Instead of discussion, each person gets to share something they discovered, perhaps something they’re wondering about, something they’ve become aware of.
This work is about uncovering blind spots.
It’s like holding a yoga pose in these profound questions: Is it true, the meaning I’ve placed on that incident, or person? Who would I be without these glasses on?
No one is pushed or cajoled, there is no right or wrong way to do it. Curiosity comes up, questions come up. All of them are welcome.
I love offering some unique exercises for practicing living turnarounds and digesting our inner work. We walk almost daily in silence for 30 minutes to one hour in the beautiful exercise called “The Morning Walk” from the School for The Work. We have a special module on saying “no”. We look at body issues for those who want to. We look at common snags in facilitating others.
Everyone who attends spring cleaning retreat comes away with knowing how to do The Work from start to finish, and knowing how to work with others as a facilitator.
But far more important than knowing The Work is feeling the “cleaning” and decluttering that happens, and the lightness of being that floats into the atmosphere.
Much love,Grace
P.S. For a taster of this process, I’m doing a half-day retreat at my cottage on February 24th. Some knowledge of what The Work is, or fully experienced all welcome. Join me here.
Outside my living room window the Seattle spring retreat seems in a galaxy far, far away. Three whole months. May 15-19, 2019.
By then, the the future, spring will likely have arrived. Despite volatile weather and unexpected extremes, all this snow will certainly be gone. Giant buds and blossoms will be filling the gardens at the retreat house.
Change will have unfolded in the atmosphere, things will be different. Some things will seem familiar and others the same.
Often, our minds think as if the status of the current situation (either the miserable one or the fabulous one) will never end.
The way it is now is bad. And it could get worse.
Mental thoughts rush towards other disasters occurring, not just the one(s) we’ve experienced.
Since we got in a fender-bender, we could get into another one….
….and this time someone could be hurt. Or maimed. Or killed.This happens in the movies and great stories constantly. Just when you think everything’s going to be OK after all…. .
…a twist. Not so fast thinking all’s-well-that-end’s-well, buster.
Bad Things Happen, remember?!
We all do it. We take our thoughts very, very seriously. (You’ve probably noticed).
We experience something, it gets placed in our mental file as “true” and BAM, it comes up as a re-minder when something is happening you don’t like or something is happening that makes you nervous.
The other day, someone in the Eating Peace Process shared a fabulous thought that’s very, very stressful and often piles on top of our negative outlooks about something that’s happened.
Not only do I dislike the way things are going for me in “x” area (I have proof, I can give you my list of examples that bad things have happened)….but I also condemn myself for being upset or stressed out by saying:
I should be over this by now.I have my own top hit parade. I can relate. Here are the things I should be over by now:
I should be over that troubling relationship with the guy from 10 years ago–I should never think of him for a second, ever
I should be over the bizarre betrayal by one of my best friends (who vanished from my life) from 7 years ago. Especially when the majority of what came from it was good for me.
I should be over my preference for staying on the sidelines and not enjoying crowds or huge groups
I should be over my string-light fettish–getting annoyed when they burn out or stop working within 3 months of buying
I should get over wanting my husband to stop drinking coke every single day
I should get over thinking I’m never doing enough to refine or expand my career, work and service in the world
I should get over being concerned about my practically non-existent retirement fund
I had the thought 1,000,000 times that I should get over my insane binge-eating behavior for years and years. It was on repeat every few days, with a vicious criticism, followed by deep sadness and despair.
But is it really true we should be over thinking something we didn’t even try to think? Is it really *me* who’s Not Over it, and therefore me who should be? Can I stop the mind from running? Can I stop it from showing me those scary pictures? Am I the one who created a mind that even does this in the first place? Who is this “I” who should be getting over something in this moment?
Am I sure I need to listen to with great interest, or believe, what the mind is saying?
(Uh, No.)
I always notice if something really terrifies me, when I try to STOP the pictures or directives in my head….it gets a little worse. I have pictures and examples of the future looking way better, or more grim, than this present moment.
The present moment appears to be an enemy, when I think the thoughts in my mind shouldn’t be here, when they are.
I’m in resistance. I’m tight, defensive, and making plans and lists. I really isn’t fun, or funny, or light, or free.
So who would we be without this troubling thought “I should be over this”?
Well first of all, I immediately take a deep breath and relax a little. I feel less critical about the situation, and less worked up.
I might even start laughing.
The other day, someone wrote a comment on my youtube channel where I share about eating obsession, eating compulsion, emotional eating, and suggestions about stopping the insanity that may or may not work for you.
The comment was under the video interview I got to do with Byron Katie a couple of weeks ago where I asked her questions about the topic of eating.
The commenter said word-for-word “god I hated your voice, it sounds like a dying mule”.
OMG.
Today, I was laughing one of those deep, carefree, tear-inducing laughs with a friend on how incredibly and absurdly funny the comment was….which had honestly disturbed me for a day or so.
I should definitely be over someone roasting my voice like that, especially a stranger on the internet.
Right?
Because….it’s all such a story. The meaning is never what we think.
One person’s dying-mule voice is another person’s gentle and very relaxed voice. (I remember thinking after watching part of the video again later–but before the comment–that my voice was soooo soft and I was kind of dazed with gratitude that I was even talking with Katie in such a way, so I didn’t have much to say–so this commenter could easily have been speaking to that energy).
I love finding the turnarounds.
First of all, I should NOT be over it. Obviously. It’s occurred to me, that’s the reality. Here comes the photo album and novella about That Topic once again.
I do however love noticing, with such delight, that the thing I wish I was over is actually in the past, and I AM over it. It’s only my THOUGHTS that aren’t over it.
I’ve gone about my business in the world, shared laughter and crying and good times and hard times and woken up each day and lived a human life….AFTER that thing was entirely over.
More turnarounds: I should be over my thinking. I should be under it.
Yah. I should notice that my thoughts are the only thing all revved up. The room is quiet. The heater is whirring. The string lights are twinkling on the porch.
Under my head and my brain, there’s a neck, and an entire body with hands typing away, and torso and legs solidly holding everything up, and feet resting easy on the floor.
Drawing the attention under, past, away from thinking is hard–sort of–but not impossible.
And maybe not as hard as we “think”.
Let it play. Let the show go on. Let the movie rewind and play again and rewind (don’t they have this kind of scene in haunted houses sometimes, there’s a movie playing forever on a screen)?
There the mind is being itself, an image-producing machine.
It doesn’t mean it’s true.
If you want to join an always-incredible group of inquiring minds and dig in to your own thought process, and question it in a way that works….oh that spring retreat.
Remember the one I mentioned so long ago at the beginning of this email? Come and do The Work to bring peace to your awareness and the way you perceive any moment.
We’re not changing the fact that something happened–it did. We’re looking at the meaning we put on it that holds us back now, that has us continue to suffer.
Of course it’s not possible to change the past, but I notice over and over again that when I question my stories, I’m not so sure that what happened….shouldn’t have.
I’m not guilty, or missing something, or wrong, or incompetent. I’m just human. Able to notice all that I AM over. Able to notice all the immense joy in the room, in this life, which isn’t even “my” life.
Even with a drop of ease on this present moment, how might that flavor the next one, or tomorrow, or the entire future?
If you’re looking for some spring mental cleaning, read more and sign up here. If you need to stay onsite, please ask about the five rooms available for reservation (OK to share).
“One of the greatest addictions is the addiction to thinking. Can’t stop drinking, can’t stop smoking, can’t stop eating…can’t stop thinking. Thinking is the greatest of any addiction. It’s a drug that’s been around for a long time. Thinking has the ability to create havoc in your life, and confuse you. Your choice is not to understand more, but to practice the state of Not Thinking….We call it presence, or awareness. ~ Eckhart Tolle
When we just seem to NOT stop thinking certain thoughts, and feeling bad about them or about the memories….the best thing I know that works for dislodging the thinking “addiction” is The Work.
Four questions and finding the turnarounds. Nothing more complicated than that.
We turn towards the story, look at it closely head-on, and question it.
