Author: Grace

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.
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Death, The Greatest Show On Earth

Many of us have spent time thinking about physical pain, illness, trauma, danger, aging or dying. We ALL know someone sick, hurt, injured. We all know people who have died.

Really, Death and Dying seem to be, sometimes The Greatest Show On Earth! 

That’s my own little joke with myself….the greatest mystery of all, though, it seems.

What on earth is going on here in this place? We’re born, and then we will die, no matter what, at least in the body.

Loads of speculation about what happens next, no ability to prove anything. Great effort to find out and explore what happens. Inquiring minds want to KNOW!

Recently, I re-read a wonderful passage of Byron Katie doing The Work with a woman who had cancer. The woman said “my body is in ruins”.

Even if my body is not currently in “ruins”…as I read the script of Katie’s session with the woman, I knew that indeed my own body isn’t getting out of here alive. In some ways, it is already in ruins, too.

Just take a look at this body in 50 years! I’ll bet you a million bucks you’ll see TOTAL RUINS. Maybe even in 10 years, who knows, or next week.

It’s strange how much fear is stimulated with this kind of awareness. Many people have never even questioned the thought that dying is bad, that it’s horrible to have a body that will only end up in ruins.

Is it true that it’s bad news? Really?

I discover that it’s as if there is one part of my mind that is a frightened baby, very terrified, uncertain. It was assurance, doesn’t like the unknown.

But there is another part, that we all have, that is very certain, wise, observing, neutral, peaceful…even deeply joyful.

When I stop and answer the four questions of The Work, my little freaked out mind gets to settle down and answer, and the wise one gets uncovered and comes out to help.

Getting sick, or dying, is bad news. Aiyiyi, look how I react when I think that thought!

Panic, terror, nausea, adrenaline, mind starts finding solutions, the Plan of Attack. (This doesn’t mean NOT to do research. Research can be fun and invigorating when it is without terror).

Who would I be without the thought that getting sick or dying is bad? Even for the people I love?

Well, to be honest, there are many moments in the day when I am not thinking this thought, so it already happens. I am alive, going about my business here and there, sleeping, moving, eating, drinking, bathing, talking, listening, reading…all without the thought that dying or sickness is bad.

What about the second I learn I have cancer, or remember that I will be dying at some point in the next fifty years, give or take?

Who would I be without the thought that dying is bad, right in THAT MOMENT?

I’d be excited. Curious. Willing. Surrendered, relaxed, open. Ready for the adventure. Noticing what TODAY is like. Seeing the clouds that look like cotton balls outside the window right now.

“When it’s no longer at war here [Katie points to her head], it’s no longer at war there-with the body, with cancer, with anybody. When we know we’re going to die, when we really get that, in that moment we realize that we’re not in control. And then we get to watch. We get to watch this beautiful way of it. And love it. And not miss our own death.”~Byron Katie

I don’t know what will happen for the rest of my life and when that day will come that is my last one here, in this lifetime.

But I sure can practice getting ready for it, by questioning my thinking, my fear, my need to be in control, my worries, my angst, my terrors about both life now and impending death.

I don’t really have a choice. I figure it’s suffer, or inquire. That seems to be the case.

“When the fear of death comes up, say yes.”~Adyashanti

A small teleclass is beginning in three hours to address physical pain, sickness and death together…our fears, our imaginings, our worries. We’ll meet for 6 weeks. It is not necessary, of course, to have any current illness or pain…and, you may also have a terminal illness, chronic pain, or someone’s death in your life. Whatever your situation, you are welcome to the group. Click HERE to register or read more about it.

Love, Grace

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That Look She Gave Me Hurt

Do you remember when your mother, or some other important adult in your life, would give you a “look” that might make your heart sink to the floor?

She doesn’t like me! I did something wrong! I’m cast out of favor!

In my adult life, one interesting place I’ve noticed stressful beliefs multiplying and producing conflict is when someone close to me thinks that I am the one with the “look”, and then they react or look worried, and then I think THEY have a “look”, and then I have a “look” that says “I Didn’t Have A Look–What’s Wrong With You!”

Did you follow that?

It all happens in the split second of an eye blinking.

My daughter who is 15 cares very much what I think, hears what I say, and takes in a great deal of what I do, even when I think she doesn’t notice (and maybe she doesn’t).

This morning I exclaimed “Oh look at the time! You might be late!” and it appears she thought I was critical of her. Then I WAS critical of her because she “over-reacted”. Hilarious! Fortunately we were laughing about it later.

It’s amazing how often we assume, based on small conversation, or a look, or a gesture, or the absence of conversation, or silence, what is going on with someone….and that it’s BAD.

If we don’t like it when other people object to something we’re doing…we have to be very careful NOT to do anything that might cause objection.

I used to walk around with a lot of fear about other peoples’ criticism. It still is something that enters my psyche. Especially with people I admire.

Those people who are “famous” in my mind I might feel shy around. I might be watching, hold back, have an attitude of wanting to take in all they are saying and doing, and not fully engage.

Then, on top of wanting them to approve of me, I also think I shouldn’t be caring about that, so there’s a voice that is instantly criticizing the one who wants approval.

GAWD, stop being so sensitive! Stop caring what others think of you!

“I want them to like me, but I really shouldn’t want that.”

And of course, I sometimes assume that other people want ME to like THEM (and want to hide the fact that they want me to). So I might make sure I’m nice, or draw them out, so theyknow I like them, if I do.

It’s a lot of work and gets very complicated.

But let’s get to the core underlying belief…no matter how much I’ve told myself I shouldn’t care, sometimes I do. So let’s take a look.

Do I really want people to like me? That seems like such an old story, an ancient assumption.

Of course I want that! It would be terrible to be disliked, ignored, shunned, or kicked out! I love having a special, loving, fun, easy connection with someone! I love joking around! I can’t do that unless they like me! Why would I give that up, are you nuts?!

When I have questioned my thinking and done The Work, I realize that I want people to like what they like, and NOT like what they don’t like.

That’s what I want for myself. It’s total freedom. At this moment I like, then the next moment I don’t like. No “have-to” about liking anything.

I notice that “likes” come and go. They change quickly. Preferences shift. Today I like salami, another day it grosses me out.

This person I joke around with, that other person we have serious conversations.

When I relax completely and allow the world to be what it is, with all the personalities within it, life is very easy.

Without the thought that I want anyone to like me, I do not have to be afraid that I’ll be unpleasant, brusk, unlikable and rejected.

In fact, I’m very authentic. I’m deeply happy. I’m like a truly free person, coming and going as I please and allowing other people to come and go as they please.

Someone thinks I don’t like them, and it’s not a big deal. No need to rush in and “fix” or “correct” their perception, unless that’s the kind thing to do and the way it goes.

“How do you react when you think you need people’s love? Do you become a slave for their approval? Do you live an inauthentic life because you can’t bear the thought that they might disapprove of you? Do you try to figure out how they would like you to be, and then try to become that, like a chameleon? In fact, you never really get their love. You turn into someone you aren’t, and then when they say “I love you,” you can’t believe it, because they’re loving a facade. They’re loving someone who doesn’t even exist, the person you’re pretending to be. It’s difficult to seek other people’s love. It’s deadly. In seeking it, you lose what is genuine. This is the prison we create for ourselves as we seek what we already have.” ~ Byron Katie

Even if you do the opposite and instead of being a chameleon, you act defiant all the time, making sure you DON’T CARE if people like you (ha)…you still can’t believe people like the real, honest you, since you haven’t shown them.

My favorite way of breaking down this ancient story of caring what other people think is to find genuine examples of what the advantages are when people haven’t liked me.

  • I don’t have to talk with them, I have more free time
  • I get more alone time to talk with myself (my favorite)!
  • They get what they need or want from someone else
  • I don’t have to “work” at changing their impression of me
  • They show me where I still care or feel “hurt” and I can question my thinking
  • I get to live in a world where not everyone likes, needs, or wants me…phew

“It’s not your job to like me, it’s mine.”~Byron Katie

Love, Grace

P.S. Look at all the teleclasses and in-person retreats below! Join me in questioning the amazing mind, I love your presence.

Learn About All Teleclasses Here 

Click here to register for the Pain, Sickness and Death Class!

  • Earning Money: What’s Your Problem? Questioning Your Beliefs About Money, Work and Business. Tuesday, March 26 – May 14, 2013, 5:15 – 6:45 pm Pacific time. 8 weeks $395. 
  • Pain, Sickness and Death: Making Friends With The Worst That Happens In Life. Thursdays, March 7 – April 11, 2013. 5:15-6:45 pm. 6 weeks $295. 
  • Turning Relationship Hell To Heaven: Working With Painful Hate, Anger, Fury, Despair, Grief, or Disappointment With Someone You Know; Spouse, Mother, Sibling, Father, Daughter, Son, Boss, Neighbor, Friend. Fridays, March 29 – May 17, 2013 8:00 am – 9:30 am Pacific time. 8 weeks $395.  
  • Horrible Food Wonderful Food: Investigating the Love/Hate Relationship with Eating And Food. Tuesdays, June 11 – July 30, 2013 5:15 – 6:45 pm Pacific time. 8 weeks $395. 
  • Our Wonderful Sexuality: A Safe Place For Inquiry on Painful Thoughts About Sexuality. Fridays, July 5 – August 23, 2013 Noon – 1:30 pm Pacific time. 8 weeks $395.    

In Person workshops:

  •  Mini Retreat Seattle. Saturday, April 6, 2013, 1:30-5:30 pm. Goldilocks Cottage. $70 includes intensive, handouts, tea and snacks.
  •  Mini Retreat Seattle. Saturday, May 18, 2013, 1:30-5:30 pm  Goldilocks Cottage. $70 includes intensive, handouts, tea and snacks.
  • SIGN UP FOR BOTH SATURDAY MINI RETREATS FOR $125
  • One-Day Retreat: Question Your Thinking, Change Your Life. Saturday, June 15, 2013, Thunder Bay, Ontario, CANADA. $175 includes workshop, snacks, wonderful catered lunch. Please click HERE learn more and to register. 
  • Loving Your Body As Is Breitenbush Hot Springs Retreat. June 26-30, 2013.For all the information please click HERE.

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Upcoming Teleclasses and Retreats

It’s Announcement Day everybody!

Six week teleclass Pain, Sickness and Death begins Thursday evenings 5:15 – 6:45 pm Pacific time, starts this week 3/7. Room for 2 more. Come join a group for inquiry on some of the most difficult situations.

The next Earning Money class begins March 26! I know several people have asked. We’ll have this one in the evenings on Tuesdays 5:15 – 6:45 pm. This is rarely offered in the evening Pacific time, so jump on board if you’re ready to look at Money, Work and Business. If you’re in Australia, it will be noon for you on Wednesdays!

Turning Relationship Hell To Heaven starts Fridays, March 29 8:00 – 9:30 am Pacific for 8 weeks. A profound look at one person who is difficult in your life: partner, sibling, child, parent…anyone.

Sorry for the delay on all the wonderful details for A Year Of Inquiry For The Addictive Mind. It’s almost ready! It will be worth the wait—I’m sure we will have a powerful, amazing group to work together all year. So exciting! All the information will be ready by this weekend.

Two Half-Day Mini-Retreat Saturdays: April 6th and May 18th, 2013, 1:30 pm – 5:30 pm. Inquiry at Goldilocks Cottage in Seattle. $125 for both days, $70 for only one. Tea and light snacks provided. Come learn, practice, expand your inquiry. Meet others to join in facilitation. A wonderful way to spend a Saturday afternoon…enlightening yourself.

To register for both or one of these mini-half-days, click HERE and then click on the PayPal button.

And of course, last but not least…Breitenbush Hot Springs Summer Retreat: Question Your Thinking, Love Your Body. What if your body wasn’t a problem?

June 26-30, 2013. Please read all about the Breitenbush Retreat and get the registration details by clicking HERE.

As always, if finances hold you back, write to me at grace@workwithgrace.com to talk about a trade or option that can work for you.

“Don’t believe every thing you think.”~ Byron Katie

Love, Grace

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This Moment Needs To Change

As so many of you already know, I work with people often who have some compulsive behavior(s) they want to quit.

Anyone who has ever had this experience knows it feels very frustrating and frightening. The self-criticism that appears around this is brutal.

The compulsion to Do Something is deep in many humans. It feels overwhelming, almost like there is no choice, like the person engaged in the process is compelled, beyond all reason, to act.

It doesn’t matter if the compulsion is to take drugs, smoke, drink alcohol, take medicine, work, exercise, drink coffee, watch TV, eat ice cream, watch porn, smoke something, play computer games, check your cell phone, go on Facebook, be sexual, gamble, or shop….it all comes from a similar source.

I hate this moment. I MUST do something to change this moment.

It has been one of the most liberating experiences for me in life to look at what I think I hate that drives me to force a change.

  • People are mean, stupid or hurtful
  • Someone abandoned me, I am all alone
  • I need money, pleasure, love, entertainment
  • The world is a dangerous place
  • This is boring
  • I can’t handle this feeling of sadness, anger, grief, or fear
  • Something about me isn’t good enough
  • Life is hard

Every single one of these thoughts can be taken to inquiry. Every one can be examined to find out if they are really 100% true.

The best way that I have found to work with what I am against about life, where I conclude in the flash of a second that this moment is not good, is to slow the whole thing down to sooooo slow that it’s practically at a stand-still (can you hear the slow-motion voice moving like molasses?)

First, why is that moment uncomfortable, bad, annoying, or sad? Make a list (like the one above in bullets).

Then take just one of the thoughts you’ve written and look at it.

Is it true? Can you absolutely know it? Are you positive?

You can see how you react when you believe your thoughts are true. You use some substance or behavior or thinking process to “find relief”. You lash out at other people, or at yourself.

You try to find comfort somewhere, anywhere.

I used to wolf down food when I felt someone was angry with me or disapproved of me. It scared me to death, because I thought they were right. I thought I was inadequate, not good enough. Eat-eat-eat, then starve-starve-starve.

This weekend I decided to not drink coffee and just see what my entertaining little mind would come up with about why it needed the coffee, what coffee was for, and what big disaster would occur if I never drank it again.

I identified what I thought coffee did for me. It’s was a cure for lack of energy and boredom.

Which I don’t actually have, it turns out. I was just anticipating the possibility of not having energy and being bored, or not having enough money. That would be HORRIBLE! OMG!

Who would I be without the thought that coffee helps me push, get pumped up, wake up, turn up the volume, do other activities, work, get things done, and get more energy?

Who would I be without the thought that I need anything to be different in that moment right before the auto-pilot cup of morning coffee?

Free. Not enslaved to “having” to drink it.

Without the thought that life is hard, or boring, or that I can’t handle certain feelings or emotions, or that I need money or love or excitement, or that the world is a dangerous place, or that someone was mean to me, or that I’m not good enough…

This present moment is full, expansive, packed with colors, movement, sound. I am awake. This body feels whatever its feeling and there are no emergencies.

Without these stressful thoughts, the feeling that I need to DO SOMETHING goes away.

No compulsions.

“Suffering is how life tells you that you are resisting or misperceiving what is real and true…Deeper understanding and insight flow forth from a quiet mind.”~Adyashanti

Every time I have ever thought “I need to do _____” some small or large level of suffering has followed.

Now when I stop and inquire, I discover peace and quiet. Nothing lacking.

If I can do it, anyone can. Seriously.

If you’d like to inquire in a group on your biggest fears about life and the world being a dangerous place, come join the Pain, Sickness and Death teleclass that starts Thursday. We’ll meet from 5:15 – 6:45 pm Pacific time. All you need is a telephone. All assignments are sent via email. Write me at grace@workwithgrace.com if you want to join or have questions.

Love, Grace

Learn About All Teleclasses Here 

Click here to register for the Pain, Sickness and Death Class!

  • Earning Money: What’s Your Problem? Questioning Your Beliefs About Money, Work and Business. Tuesday, March 26 – May 14, 2013, 5:15 – 6:45 pm Pacific time. 8 weeks $395. 
  • Pain, Sickness and Death: Making Friends With The Worst That Happens In Life. Thursdays, March 7 – April 11, 2013. 5:15-6:45 pm. 6 weeks $295. 
  • Turning Relationship Hell To Heaven: Working With Painful Hate, Anger, Fury, Despair, Grief, or Disappointment With Someone You Know; Spouse, Mother, Sibling, Father, Daughter, Son, Boss, Neighbor, Friend. Fridays, March 29 – May 17, 2013 8:00 am – 9:30 am Pacific time. 8 weeks $395.     
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In The Desert, You Can’t Remember Your Name

The desert is a wide open exposed place. I was in the desert very recently to spend some time in inquiry.

One day I was outside stretching my legs in the very bright, cold afternoon. The sun was so bright, I squinted my eyes. My skin felt the dry, crisp air. I had to run to stay warm even though there was not a single cloud in the sky.

All the yards were full of gravel. Maybe a cactus bush or two.

I marveled that as I was there in the desert town, moving down the sidewalk, that the landscape matched my inner mind.

Vulnerable, brighter than I can almost stand without dark glasses, and sort of harsh but full of delicate, colorful structures. And the most infinite, vast sky, full of mystery.

Right there on the sidewalk I felt scared for a moment about how vast the sky was.

How strange that thought is, right in the middle of your day, “I am vulnerable” or “this world could be a dangerous place” or “this place is so mysterious, I don’t get it.”

It seems like stressful thoughts sometimes appear out of nowhere, for no particular reason.

It’s a clutching inward, like a stomach ache, or muscles tightening, except it’s the mind tightening.

Wouldn’t want to get too vast or anything crazy like that!

Fortunately, in those moments where a fearful thought arises, not long afterwards, almost on the heels of the thought, there is an awareness that the thought isn’t actually true.

It was just a thought.

And by looking at it, off it goes into the wild blue yonder.

Later, when I was safely inside again and not contemplating the big humongous sky…I laughed because that worried mind is such a nervous ninny.

But there is something to lose here, in this big mysterious world. It’s the sense that “I” am important, that I mean something, that I’m extra special.

Honestly, I am of course unique in all those ways we know, but not really. In the great big scheme of things, whatever this person is that I seem to be, is just another human being living life.

My name will not be remembered in only one or two generations. Even if my name is written down somewhere, or I do something that is written down, no one will actually know me. No one.

People still study “famous” figures in attempts to understand their motivations. Only the story remains, not the person. Most of that person’s daily living is unknown, forgotten.

The interesting thing about all of this, is that in the past, before The Work, my attitude towards the impermanence and inconsequence of ME and my little life was sadness, pessimism, a sense of being so small. It all seemed so pointless. The feeling was that in my little lifetime, who cares.

My name not remembered…sooooooo saaaadddddd. I should do something important!

But now, with self-inquiry…I need to do something, or be important. Is that actually true?

My name needs to be remembered, I need to make a difference, I’m NOT making a difference…really really?

“The basic creative energy of life—life force—bubbles up and courses through all existence. It can be exeprienced as open, free, unburdened, full of possibility, energizing. Or this very same energy can be experienced as petty, narrow, stuck, caught.”~Pema Chodron 

I notice that when my world opens up and a vast desert landscape lies before me, inside and outside, without the thought that “I” am something or that I need to be, all is well.

Everything is free, untethered, unnamable…and that’s wonderful. Maybe things don’t need to be named. Including me.

“The tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao. The name that can be named is not the eternal Name. The unnamable is the eternally real.”~Tao Te Ching #1

Love, Grace

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I Hate Those Complainers

Only nine days until the Pain, Sickness and Death 6-week teleclass starts on 3/7. If you would love signing up for this class if it started at 5:15 pm Pacific time on Thursdays, instead of 6:15 pm PT, running for 90 minutes, then write me at grace@workwithgrace.com. I ask because I’ve had several inquiries for an earlier time. There’s only room for 3 more participants.

If you’d like to read more about the Pain class, click here.

Physical maladies, trauma, injury or threats produce a great deal of painful thinking in the human experience.

I was working with a sweet client who has had a chronic pain from a back injury for several years.

She said to me “I have so many complaints.” Her discouragement was deep. The list seemed long and overwhelming.

The very definition of “complaint” in Webster’s dictionary is “an expression of grief, pain, or dissatisfaction”. Complaining can happen silently, to oneself, or out in the open to people around us.

Byron Katie offers a great exercise to root out complaining, see its cause, investigate it. She says you can write out a list, just let yourself go nuts, with the prompt “I complain about____ because____.”

Don’t worry about how long the list is or how ridiculous your complaints actually are. There is nothing wrong with this Complaining Voice. You are giving it a voice so that you can look more closely.

  • I complain about clutter in my house because it looks ugly, I want it to go away
  • I complain about my left leg hurting because I want to stop sitting in that chair and stop working at the computer and I want it to stop hurting
  • I complain about my dry skin because I always need lotion to soothe it and I want someone to get me some lotion
  • I complain about the dishes being undone because I want someone else to do them
  • I complain about those other annoying complainers because they bring me down

In fact, my biggest, most repetitive complaint has been about other people who complain.

Caught in the act!

It is absolutely fascinating to see why I think there is a need to complain, to express grief, pain or dissatisfaction with this situation or person, with what I am hearing.

I want those complainers to shut up! Stop their talking on and on about negativity!

And why do I want it to end? Seriously? What is the actual problem? Why do I think their complaints “bring me down”?

Well…that complaining person wants me, or someone, obviously, to do something about their complaint! They want me to fix their disturbance. They are unhappy. I SHOULD HELP THEM.

Is that true? Are they really unhappy and wanting me to help? Am I as sure, as they are, that they can’t do it themselves?

“You think if you complain enough, something magical is going to happen….Any time you complain, notice what you want us to do. “~Byron Katie 

It’s as if I believe that if I say what I don’t like (complain) enough then I will eventually get what I want. Someone will do the dishes, someone will straighten up the house, someone will stop telling me their irritating complaints!

The wonderful Marshall Rosenburg, founder of non-violent communication, suggests that people learn to make direct requests, instead of complain. He says that it works so much better when we recognize that we need something, and then ask for what we need!

Do I really need those complainers to quit complaining? Can I make a specific direct request to someone, can I tell them the truth, can I have a genuine conversation?

I could say something like this; “when you are complaining, I feel sad because I think you want me to fix it, or God to fix it. You sound powerless, instead of the strong person I know you to be. You sound like you won’t ever be happy, and you feel helpless, and I know that’s a hard place to be. I love you.”

And then….they can get excited about what you’ve said, or not.

“When another person suffers, there’s nothing I can do about that, except maybe to put my arms around them or bring them a cup of tea and let them know that I’m totally available. But that’s where it must end. The rest is up to them. And because I made it through, I know that they can do it. I am NOT special.”~Byron Katie

I discovered that the real reason I’ve complained about other people complaining is that I want them to be happy and powerful. Because if they are happy and powerful, then I don’t have to try to help them. I can be free to be happy and powerful myself.

I can only be happy if they are happy, and so I have to try to help them get happy….is it true?

Wow! I can be happy even if other people are complaining? I don’t HAVE to help them? Even someone very close to me?

“She who is centered in the Tao can go where she wishes, without danger. She perceives the universal harmony, even amid great pain, because she has found peace in her heart.”~Tao Te Ching #35

If you’d like to zoom in on your deepest complaints, how to be around pain whether yours or others, and your feelings about the biggie….death….come join the six-week teleclass starting next week.

Love, Grace

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I Did Something Wrong

I did something wrong.

Isn’t that a nasty little aggravating, or life-crushing gruesome thought?

When humans believe that they did something wrong….it can be devastating in a huge variety of ways.

Some people react to this thought with anxiety, some with defense, some with attack.

The anxious reactor feels they did something wrong and adrenaline shoots through their system. They immediately begin trying to repair the wrong with a new right. Apologizing compulsively.

Please forgive me, I’ll do it better from now on. I didn’t mean it.

It doesn’t matter whether or not it’s true, the goal is to make others feel better and love me again!

People with anxiety sometimes can’t sleep, trying to sort out how this could have happened, where they made their “mistake”. Guilt is a predominant thought. Must fix it NOW, I need to have that other person’s approval, I need to have my own approval. Emergency!

Then there is the person whose stressful reaction is defensive. He or she puts up a barrier, draws a line between themselves and that mean person who thinks they did something wrong. The greatest need seems to be to escape the presence of this other human. Go into hiding!

Again, it doesn’t matter whether this “wrong” is true or not, the forces must come in for protection. The Sea Anemone reaction.

And then there is the person who attacks in response to believing they did something wrong. This person might shout, explain, and hold whomever is accusing them of being wrong to be the guilty one. They might come off as “controlling” and angry, vicious, malicious, vindictive.

The attacker might bark “how dare you…!”

All of these are human ways of reacting to the fear that something wrong happened, and I was involved. Even if it’s clear I didn’t commit the crime, even by being accused there is danger.

We all may jump around in all kinds of reactivity, entering all zones and strategies for managing the emotional and mental discomfort.

Whew. As my friends used to joke in high school if any of us got a bad grade or didn’t win the race or got ignored by someone we liked…”that’s rough, girl”.

My favorite way to look at this kind of Big Reaction is to zoom into focus on that original painful belief. There might be several ways to write the belief, there might be extensions to the belief…but getting a core belief identified is an amazing opportunity for discovery.

I did something wrong.

Is it true? Are you sure?

What does “wrong” mean for you? Is it irreparable? Could you have done any better than you did at the time? Do you really need that other person’s approval? Are you sure you don’t have it?

Can you stand in what you did, which is now over by the way, and let it be? Is it OK that you’re human?

What would Martin Luther King, Jr, have done if he was worried about what other people would think when he spoke up, if that rose to the top of his concerns?

What if you did something right? Just perfectly right for that situation, at that time, in that circumstance? What if that experience can teach you…perhaps bring you into a place of love like no other you’ve ever known?

When I went to The School for The Work with Byron Katie in 2005 I identified my absolute worst thing I had ever done in my life: I had had an abortion.

I had such shame, grief, and desperate unhappiness about that experience I reacted every way I’ve described above. I was saying “I am so sorry” to the little unborn constantly, I would be reminded to say it when I saw my children, and many other circumstances. I would calculate how old the child would have been.

I wanted to hide it and never tell a soul for the rest of my life. I felt nauseated thinking about it.

I attacked the bill boards of the organizations that had anti-abortion slogans and felt anger and bitterness towards the groups who displayed them, and renewed sadness.

But when I looked deeply, the deepest I possibly could, given what I believed at the time, I found I could not know that I had done anything wrong.

I would have liked it to go differently, it caused such pain within. I would have liked to have known back then that I could question my own thoughts and give myself love.

I would have liked to have access to another way to do it (or so it seems), but I didn’t. That’s reality.

Are you really supposed to know more than you actually do right now? Are you sure that what you know is not enough in this moment?

“You can’t not be in grace. Everything about you is totally absolutely perfectly appropriate. All the things you think are wrong with you are absolutely right.” ~Tony Parsons

Back in 2005 at that school, I began to find turnarounds to this terrible thing that I had previously believed was wrong, that “I” had done.

I began to see the beauty in that movement, that experience going the way it did. There was great love present in that original “wrong” experience.

You can find it in the things you think you’ve done wrong, too.

Love, Grace

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We Have A Situation Here

When something happens in life that feels frightening, whether very small or very big, it’s amazing to watch the mind and body react.

The inner all-about-me mind will say that this is the most important thing to think about, this frightening situation. It will return to it over and over.

If the mind is NOT thinking about the troubling situation over and over, then some other voices may come in and say, “Hey! Pay attention! This is worrisome, you need to watch out!”

Its as if this all-about-me mind is a president sitting in a grand office, working on important things….and then OUT THERE in the regular world something threatening happens.

The president is busy, but the police force and other military officials come running and knock on the door and shout, “WE’VE GOT A SITUATION HERE!”.

And then all forces are enlisted to figure out how to handle this “situation”. The underlying assumption is that this situation needs to change, to go away, to adjust, to get resolved.

There are extremely painful situations, that seem to be agreed upon somehow in the human condition, that feel bad, terrible and important to avoid or fix…

Losing all our money, getting a terrible disease, getting physically hurt, someone close dying or leaving, our house burning down, not having enough of something, like love.

The Work is a way to question our assumptions about what happens in life. Every “situation” can be examined and investigated.

Just because I’m afraid, or upset, or sad, or angry, or disappointed….doesn’t mean it really is Bad. 

That’s quite an amazing first step, to stop, and ask Is it really true that this situation is wrong, or shouldn’t be happening, or is terrifying, or is permanent, or devastating, or dreadful?

The situation IS happening, but if we open to it happening, allow it to be as it is, then there might be a calmer response to it.

This doesn’t mean being passive, like swinging to the opposite of ATTACK-MODE and doing nothing. Calmness does not mean being mute, or extremely cautious.

Sometimes a bigger response is what is called for in a moment…with strength, love, and kindness.

If there was a toddler walking towards a huge freeway with cars speeding by, and any one of us saw the child, we would run (if we had legs) and call out (if we had a voice).

That would simply be the way of it. We would not say, “I am practicing allowing everything to be as it is, so I am going to lie here and do nothing”.

Recently I was thinking about leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr, Mahatma Gandhi, Aretha Franklin, Desmond Tutu, Byron Katie, Marshall Rosenburg…people who speak about what other new vision they have for difficult situations, an alternative to suffering.

I don’t like conflict much. I don’t like arguments with people, or shouting, or name-calling. I hardly ever have had situations that even look like this, I’ve avoided them.

The urge to withdraw or not speak up is very interesting, very subtle.

I find there are thoughts dancing about that make it more difficult to respond to a situation, to be truly honest. These are thoughts like:

  • that person will hate me if I say “no” or if I say what I think
  • if I don’t explain why I am saying “no” then she will get angry
  • if I speak up about this situation, to authority, to others, they will get mad
  • I should make people feel happy at all times, not upset
  • if I tell the truth for myself, as I see it, I will be rejected
  • people will think I’m stupid, mean, cold, immature, aggressive, mistaken
  • I will be shunned, left, abandoned
  • I better be NICE!

But after doing The Work on troubling situations, I find that my responses to new situations that arise are different.

I am not afraid of breaking the rules like “only say nice things”….because a deeper, more penetrating love comes alive, where I don’t have to constantly worry about if I said the wrong thing or that I MIGHT say the wrong thing.

I find the turnarounds coming alive from all these painful stressful beliefs about what nice-ness or kindness is supposed to look like.

  • if that person is upset when I say “no” everyone is still OK and this is an amazing opportunity
  • if someone is angry, it is safe, I am safe, no need to explain
  • if I speak up they will get excited
  • I can’t “make” anyone feel happy at all times
  • if I am rejected, all is still very well
  • people will think all kinds of things, and it’s their business
  • I will be loved, cared for, set free
  • I better be honest!

People come, people go, that’s the way of life. People certainly all won’t like what I am saying in every moment.

“…The path of the warrior is a lot more daring: you are cultivating a fearless heart, a heart that doesn’t close down in any circumstance; it is always totally open, so that you could be touched by anything.”~Pema Chodron

Today, after doing The Work and contemplating how I am so human when I feel afraid of other peoples’ reactions, I have such joyful energy towards those feisty, outspoken, action-oriented humans who have shown what its like to speak up.

Even if the words they speak are not favorable to me, how incredible to hear the honesty, the willingness to be courageous and SAY IT.

As I see beauty in ALL the people who speak…I see how it can be done with skill, with loving kindness, with trust….I can watch the great leaders and see how they did it.

“Know the male, yet keep to the female: receive the world in your arms. If you receive the world, the Tao will never leave you and you will be like a little child.”~Tao Te Ching #28 

Today, I’ve questioned my thinking about that difficult person and un-doing my beliefs, the president calls off the troops, the situation is really not that important.

We have a situation here? Not anymore.

Love, Grace

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Thank You Debbie Ford

When I look back over the past ten years when I first put a toe in the pool of inquiry, very tentatively, it seems like the whole idea hit me somewhat slowly.

I had Byron Katie’s book Loving What Is. In paperback (there was no rush to get it in hardback when it first appeared). Her book was in all the bookstores, and I heard about it from other people in the holistic health professions like me.

It’s as if during the course of reading the book, one night I had a dream and woke up and for an instant, for one-one-hundredth of a hair, I thought I was in another unusual place.

Then I realized I was still in my own familiar bedroom, and as my day unfolded I forgot about it, mostly.

Every time I came back for another chapter I got more intrigued.

I would think “Really? She can’t be saying….no, that can’t be possible to question THAT…oh gosh, I think I’ve been believing a bunch of stuff this WHOLE TIME (my whole life) that may not be true…But no, not that, too…”

It was like a seesaw of deep doubt and incredible fascination.

In the course of the next few “early” years my life exploded into finding other authors and teachers. A huge expansion of awareness…and confusion.

My first crisis after meeting The Work, that I’ve shared before with you all, was my primary relationship falling apart.

It felt like I was falling down a gigantic black hole. I had a dream that I was Alice In Wonderland at the time, but a little more creepy.

Fear around many turns and twists. My mind full of images and panic, or its own personal army.

And also at that time…just the right dose of sane.

Someone would say a little sentence that was filled with love and trust.  I got facilitated in The Work every single week on Monday mornings by a dear fellow-journeyer on the path, and I facilitated her back. We did that religiously for two years.

I had three other powerful friends who also facilitated me. They seemed to be available right when I was having an “emergency” of painful feelings.

My top beliefs: I am abandoned, I am betrayed.

Every time they perked up, I would do The Work. It’s what I had found that “worked” the best for my speedy rabbit mind.

Right in the middle of that time, someone said “there is someone called Debbie Ford who has the perspective of turning around Divorce as a spiritual initiation of sorts, an entrance into a whole new world of love.”

I got Debbie’s book immediately “Spiritual Divorce: Divorce As A Catalyst For An Extraordinary Life“.

I now honestly see that that period of time was an evolutionary step for me into ending my stressful, imprisoned beliefs about love relationships.

I had a lot to uncover and un-do. I believed thoughts like this:

  • People shouldn’t leave me
  • If someone is close, they should talk with me and tell me what they’re thinking
  • Men shouldn’t get tired of me (they do)
  • I need to be “nice” every possible minute to other people, even if that’s not honest
  • I need to hide my feelings of disappointment, anger, or hurt
  • I can’t be happy without a primary partner
  • I can’t depend on anyone
  • No one should ever resent me (I try so hard at being GOOD, jeez!)

Boy. I thought I was so mature, advanced and intellectual.

But those childish, desperate, non-politically-correct beliefs were there, loud and clear.

As I did The Work every chance I could, I began to read Debbie’s book. She was a living example of a turnaround, right there in the pages, when I couldn’t find my own turnarounds.

Because I was there, reading her words, I knew this turnaround existed. I could pull it in to myself. I could start finding my own turnarounds.

I could find how this might be the best thing that ever happened to me, given that what I most wanted in my entire life was freedom, understanding, and unconditional love.

I wanted a powerful, brilliant, trusting, willing, ecstatic relationship with The Universe, the world, Reality.

I had no idea how afraid I had been of reality. Pure terror. I hadn’t felt safe in life. It had nothing to do with my partner, or any of the people who I felt had abandoned me.

“One day, while I was pointing my finger at [my estranged husband] Dan and blaming him for my pain, I realized that only the unhealthy, unconscious part of me would blame someone else for my feelings. I saw that from the day we got married I had been blaming Dan for my circumstances. While a neat excuse, this explanation had the unfortunate downside of being a lie. “~ Debbie Ford

I was stunned back then at how wide my illusion spread.

I thought my feelings about fear of being abandoned had to do with other people. I even thought my view of God/Source/Universe was that it/he/she was busy, someplace far away, not all that interested.

What if I questioned, truly questioned, whether or not I was abandoned, or betrayed?

Could I absolutely know that it was true?

No. I was set free.

“The journey of awakening—the classical journey of the mythical hero or heroine—is one of continually coming up against big challenges and then learning how to soften and open….starting to say yes to life, is first of all realizing that you’ve come up against  your edge, that everything in you is saying no, and then at that point, softening.”~ Pema Chodron

Thank you Debbie, for showing me how.

Love, Grace

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Trust Your Struggle

I will never forget one time when I was at a Byron Katie event, I can’t remember which, and I raised my hand.

“Katie, I am doing The Work on the same person over and over again. I’ve done The Work so many times on this person, and I’m still very angry. I wish I wasn’t angry!”

Katie replied “How do you know you’re supposed to be angry, Grace? You are!”

We may have spoken a bit longer, those conversations with microphones and hundreds of people watching and listening make me blank out a little (sometimes). It’s a bit…public.

But that comment from Katie was so incredibly powerful for me, because in it I recognized what a ginormous goal I had of making myself “not angry”.

Anger, in my opinion, was bad. Anger caused suffering, it caused other people to harm themselves or hit others, it started wars, it caused tension, heart-attacks, violence. It made people break things.

Anger had to be controlled and squelched. Otherwise…..very bad things could happen.

And I was angry. So I had to “work” on my anger until I was a nice person.

If I had stayed in that framework towards anger, I would still be working on it and hating it, and wishing I didn’t have it inside of me. I would still be afraid of people who seemed angry.

Well, loud shouting or screaming, throwing something, rage…that is all still alarming. They are BIG expressions. But I’m not so scared now that I’ve done the work on anger.

I had many thoughts about anger. I felt so upset about anger that when I even had one tiny little speck of a sensation of anger, something in me got scared.

I even realized that in my twenties, when I suffered so terribly from bulimic binge-eating and vomiting, I was filled with rage. I was livid.

And I was determined to smash my anger to the ground and push it down, like holding my hands over the geysers at Yellowstone National Park. It took a lot of work and a lot of running around, just to keep the geysers from spouting.

Of course, they spouted anyway, and then I would feel horribly guilty and filled with self-hate.

But back at that time that I recognized all the anger inside me and how I was judging it, I went to work doing The Work. It was like a lightbulb went off, and it was time to let anger be free to exist, without my condemnation of it.

“Something terrible will happen if I or anyone else is angry”….is that true?

No. Not at all.

There is an energy that is rising up to say NO. There is passion, creativity, determination.

Marshall Rosenberg created non-violent communication, out of his great desire to express anger clearly and cleanly, with respect.

Anger brings on clarity, laser energy, awareness, brilliance, sharp thinking.

Who would I be without the thought that what I am feeling, this energy I am calling “anger,” should be obliterated rather than expressed? Who would I be without the thought that something terrible will happen if I express anger?

What if something wonderful could happen!?

I turned the thought around and began to find examples of amazing expressions of anger, and how wonderful things happened out of these expressions.

Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Aretha Franklin.

And I knew, as a turnaround example for myself, that it was wonderful to be angry with respect to that very person I kept feeling angry about, because my anger was a message that I was believing a bunch of conflicting thoughts that were not true.

I did not need that person to be close with me, I did not have to push myself to like everything about that person, I did not “have” to do anything towards that person I did not feel comfortable doing.

I could have preferences, like allowing myself the same basic respect to eat if hungry and NOT eat if NOT hungry!

I could say yes or no, and attend to the inner answer at the center of myself.

Doing The Work does not always result in peace, flowers, dancing and love songs.

Sometimes the truth is that under the first level of concepts about that awful person you’re doing The Work on, there lies fear about what might happen next.

If I really question this person’s presence in my life, they will leave and I’ll be alone. But I don’t want to be alone, so I will attack that person with my anger and not question my terrifying beliefs about being alone.

Anger is one of the greatest gifts I have ever experienced. An arrow of zinging power that says “hear me now!” Warrior energy. And it is part of reality. I loved discovering that!

The funny thing is, once I didn’t judge my own anger so harshly, and then questioned all my beliefs about that person…I could allow them to be who they were, and I didn’t have to ever talk with them again.

I think of that person now, who I haven’t seen in years, and smile so widely. I absolutely love what I learned in being connected back then. What grand, broad, sweeping learning. Smacking down the walls, breaking apart the beliefs I had about how people are supposed to behave.

Dissolving my angst, rage, and urge to attack what was “out there” (a person).

Dissolving my need to feel division with anyone.

“Life will give you whatever experience is most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness. How do you know this is the experience you need? Because this is the experience you are having at this moment.”~Eckhart Tolle

Let yourself be as angry as you are, and write it all on paper. Now you have your work, your amazing personal project that anger is helping you understand….and as you look, the anger will not be necessary anymore.

“Trust your struggle.” ~ Adyashanti

Love, Grace

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  • Earning Money: What’s Your Problem? Questioning Your Beliefs About Money, Work and Business. Mondays, February 4-April 1, 2013, 7:30 – 9:00 am Pacific time. 8 weeks $395. No class March 4th.
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