The Work of Byron Katie with Grace
question your thinking, wake up to a kinder life
People ask me from time to time….how will I ever figure all my thinking out, find all the awareness I need.
Like, will I need to write things in a journal forever? Will my thoughts never end? What if I’m sick of analyzing myself?
Here’s something short and sweet to do when it comes to compulsion.
It’s he one thing you really need, to discover peace.
Much love, Grace
Today I can’t wait to be at East West Bookstore in Seattle doing a little mini 3 hour workshop on eating, body image and our relationship to food…..and how to enter peace instead of war.
Doing The Work is of course my favorite tool and method of inquiry for working with stressful beliefs, and naturally inquiry is what we’ll be doing in the workshop.
HOWEVER.
When it comes to addiction, fear, compulsive behavior of any kind….
….when we’re doing things we hate ourselves for later, feeling needy, feeling upset, feeling angry, feeling like we want to escape or attack (the perfect pain points for addictive or compulsive behavior)….
….then it’s often hard to find WHAT it is you’re troubled by?
What would make me troubled enough to overeat when I don’t really want to, or smoke, or drink, or start house-cleaning, or surf the internet, or try to find someone to hook up with?
The thing is, moving into your compulsive favorite thing to do, if you have one (most people do, some are more destructive than others) is a REACTION to a belief you’re thinking.
You’ve already bought the belief.
You already assume it’s true, and it’s frightening, aggravating, infuriating, and it feels hopeless.
So you do the behavior instead (in my case, I ate, and sometimes drank or smoked cigarettes or over-exercised).
It kind of works for a little bit, when you’re hunting down the substance and caught in the energy of your compulsive pattern.
When I went into the addictive behavior, I would not be aware any more of what was bothering me, and instead, I’d be thinking about eating, the food I would buy, the taste, smell and feeling of it as I devoured it. The anticipation was all-consuming and overwhelming. It was mesmerizing. Obsessive. Nothing else existed hardly, except getting my fix.
With such a wild energy taking over, the energy we’re calling “addictive”, it is actually a bit tricky and difficult to put on the brakes and see what’s hidden.
Why?
Because what’s hidden is SO PAINFUL.
I’d rather not take a look at it. Do I have to? Can’t I just eat instead? Or get stoned? Or run 10 miles and beat my body into a pulp of exhaustion? Or have sex in a bathroom with a stranger?
You can. I did.
But it wasn’t ultimately satisfying. It was shameful, embarrassing, I felt horrible later, and it kept me on the cycle I refer to as CRIME – GUILT – PUNISHMENT.
You committed a crime, you’re guilty, you must be punished. You feel horrible and gross, you vow never to do it again, and then….
….the background underground haunted old pain starts to wake up, since you’re not busy hating yourself as much, and it starts to get louder.
Sooner or later, when it gets too loud to tolerate, you need to do the thing again, the thing that helps you forget about it.
Let me tell you, I am so happy not to be in that severe cycle anymore I kiss the ground with gratitude.
It doesn’t mean I don’t do it in smaller, much more subtle doses. For example, I’ve noticed a tendency to compulsively try to be pleasing to people so they’ll relax, calm down, like me, or become safer for me. This compulsion to be in communication with others in a pleasing way shows up sometimes by me withholding what I really want, or not saying what’s really true. (We’ll talk about that another day).
Here’s what’s important for stopping a cycle of compulsive thinking, and then compulsive acting, that zips you away from seeing what you ultimately really WANT to see, even if it’s painful.
First, decide you want to see what’s going on, what’s hidden. Part of you already DOES want to see it….encourage that part.
Then, notice these two options.
Old Way, Defensive Way, Conditioned Way (called “Believing Your Thoughts”):
New Way, Loving Way, Freedom Way (called “Questioning Your Thoughts”):
Much love, Grace
What would you have, if you had a perfect, thin, strong, young, supple, attractive, athletic body?
What would you have, if your eating woes were gone….or it no longer mattered what you ate?
It’s not a new idea that underlying beliefs, or hidden negative stories, fuel overeating or other compulsions….
….but how do you find out what you’re hiding inside, if it’s HIDDEN?
Here are some ideas, especially one key exercise, you can do to discover unexpected “hidden” reasons you’re doing what you’re doing with food and eating.
Much love,
Grace
Let’s be honest. It sounds good to meditate, or be a meditator.
Someone who is quiet, at peace with silence, so comfortable they can sit still with themselves for hours.
When you’ve experienced compulsion for anything though….
….that fiery, pushing, wanting, intense craving to eat it, get it, hunt it down, consume it….
….then meditating is the LAST thing on your mind.
But what if it didn’t have to be?
What if you called “meditation” an act of Not Responding to the thoughts in your head about what you need or don’t need in order to be happy?
I know it’s hard to actually sit down….so here are a few ideas for at least slowing down, and two techniques you can find out more about.
Much love, Grace
“I am the source of my pain, but only all of it. One hundred percent.” ~ Byron Katie
Sometimes, when people read a statement like this out of context, they say things to themselves like……
……”That’s so true. I am my worst enemy. What a schmuck I am, causing myself such turmoil. I wish I was different. It’s hopeless. My life sucks.”
But you know, of course, it’s not the intention that you feel bad about yourself and take this personally.
Often, when we feel frightened or nervous about conditions of life, we automatically get defensive, or attack something….anything.
This moment, this condition, this situation is WRONG!
And so am I!
But the more I work with people in mindful inquiry (and feeling deeply) the more I see that every time there’s a compulsive movement towards something, like binge-eating for example, or obsessive thinking, or other addictive behaviors…..
…..the thing we miss is what was so dang scary that eating felt like the better choice.
Could it be that the self-hatred or judgmental stream of thoughts or compulsive behavior actually covers up something more frightening, that we’d rather not think about at all?
What I found in my own internal excavation was….yes.
Big time.
I had a huge amount of fear, anxiety, resentments and unacknowledged grief about things that had happened in my life.
And I had never spoken of them to anyone, and certainly hadn’t done The Work on them.
No wonder I wanted to eat like a maniac sometimes (or starve myself, or smoke, or move to another town, or start making plans for something in a non-peaceful way, or spend time thinking about how to improve myself).
The other day, I read a quote that most humans would love to take the easy, fast solution to a problem that’s highly unlikely to work, than a slow, hard solution to a problem that’s guaranteed to work.
Isn’t that crazy?
We really hate the idea that something might take awhile, that something might be a practice over time.
Believe me, I tried all the fast solutions. I still lean that way at times, depending on the moment, before I realize “oh, right, there is no fast miraculous solution….time to slow down and take it one step at a time.”
If you’re wondering where to look more closely to find out what’s running below the surface, the underlying thoughts and fears you’d rather not see….
….and yet, you really DO want to see them in the end….
….then watch here today for one exercise that may help. It’s something a therapist did with me many years ago. It will slow you way down, and you may make some discoveries about what’s driving you to eat, be stuck, do that compulsive thing, avoid change.
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An exercise to help you uncover underlying stressful beliefs that may be driving you to compulsive thinking or behavior
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Much love, Grace
P.S. Not everyone has an eating issue, but if you do….and you want to take a closer look in this sometimes scary but profoundly life-changing way at what’s going on….come join Eating Peace Retreat. It’s in San Francisco area next month. We’ll be in a private home in Newark, and it will be wonderful, and safe.
To celebrate leap year, I’m offering an early-bird special fee for the upcoming Spring Retreat in The Work in Seattle on May 13-15 (including all day Friday starting at 9:30 am). If you register by next Monday Leap Day February 29th, it’s $325 (you save $70). Click HERE to register.
Write me separately to reserve a room in the lodge (two left) for only $50 per night.
And, if you’d like to get a sense of this work of self-inquiry and un-raveling stressful thinking in your life, especially the way stress leads to compulsive behavior like eating, then onight I’m opening up my home for a new meetup called Eating Peace (which is a drop-in group for only $10 donation).
We’ll take a look at beliefs that drive compulsive reaching for food (or anything, really) and use self-inquiry to explore what’s going on in that stressful moment.
I had the thought….how can this topic be covered in two hours?
With people who have a full range of experiences, all of which may be completely different?
It’s difficult to hold still, and see what’s happening, when you’re used to popping something in your mouth when you feel bored, confused, angry, nervous, you’re around other people, or you feel uncomfortable in some way and the call of eating (or other behavior) is so strong.
But we’ll dive in, identify some of what we’re thinking, and investigate.
Often the very first place we start, when we’re looking at behavior we don’t like….
….is pretty vicious:
How do you react when you believe any of these thoughts?
Ugh.
Drowning in the movement of compulsion. Trying hard to fix myself. Making plans to change, and this might even include “get enlightened”.
Anything but be here now, in all my imperfections and troubles.
So here’s the profound question that can sometimes be pondered for days:
Who would you be without your story?
Who would you be if there was nothing wrong with you, you shouldn’t be any different than you are? Without thinking you can’t stop doing what you’re doing, or that the thing you reach for makes you feel better?
Wow.
It seems like reading books and spiritual teachings makes me feel better. It seems like drinking coffee makes me feel better. It seems like doing “x” makes me feel better.
But what if you didn’t have that thought?
I notice, anything I’ve ever thought that’s outside of myself that makes me feel better….only does for a temporary amount of time.
It never really supplies a wonderful, fabulous feeling, or a peaceful feeling. Not completely, not permanently, not with full satisfaction.
So what to do?
Notice what you don’t like, right now, that’s happening. Notice what you don’t like feeling. Notice what frightens you, makes you sad.
Take these thoughts (and feelings) as a practice, through self-inquiry.
It’s not easy.
I myself would sometimes like a temporary, short, easy activity to end my boredom, or anxiety, or sadness.
It never does in the long run.
If you’re not sure where to begin, start to write in your journal what you’re upset about in your current condition, situation, life circumstance. Write about what you find disturbing.
Then….you can do The Work!
Join me if you’d like support at a retreat or meetup. There’s nothing like gathering together with others to give you the freedom to inquire, notice, slow down, feel the help available to you, personally.
I couldn’t have started out all alone….and being with others never stopped!
When I can’t seem to do it myself, the presence of others brings it all home, once again.
One week of special early bird sign-up for spring retreat in northeast Seattle. We’ll have an awesome time.
Much love, Grace
Every year at the summer Breitenbush annual retreat in late June, we have a movie night.
We watch the film Turn It Around with Byron Katie.
In the movie, quite a few courageous people get up on stage with Katie.
They share their innermost suffering and disturbing thoughts with the whole audience (and in this case, all of us who ever watch Turn It Around, too)!
That’s brave!
Last night, I showed Turn It Around in my Eating Peace retreat.
I’ve seen it about 10 times now, and it’s still moving for me.
One of my favorite pieces of work is when a young woman shares that her brother died in Afghanistan, and how enraged she’s felt about the loss, her devastated family, and death itself.
What an amazing question to ask someone as they consider death (to ask myself)….
….who would you be without the belief that death is so awful?
Without being against death, and anything leading to death?
It does seem to be the overwhelming way of it, as in 100% of the time, that we die.
So why get so disturbed?
What’s this deep, terrifying upset all about, anyway?
It’s profound to think of, at this level.
Almost the same, for me, as the process of addiction (which is what everyone is looking at so very closely in Eating Peace these three days).
Craving.
This whole over-eating, under-eating, worrying about eating thing.
What’s So Upsetting?!!
What’s going on in any moment, that we would choose to start to eat, and eat, and eat…..or drink, and drink, and drink…..or smoke, obsess about a person, shop, internet, clean, facebook….
….want, want, want?
What is so disturbing about the moment we insist we need something to…..
WHAT??
We looked at this today, in our retreat.
What does that thing, person, activity…..give you?
People noticed they thought eating, in those compulsive moments, would give them comfort, reward, compensation, soothing.
What does believing that death-is-terrible give you?
Huh.
Why would I choose to think death-is-terrible is true?
It’s like there’s some kind of idea within that if I didn’t think death was terrible, I’d twiddle away the hours I’ve got, I wouldn’t care, I’d be weird, I wouldn’t get freaked out about loss, change, and things coming and going (people or animals).
I’m afraid I wouldn’t truly love, I’d be too detached.
But is that true?
Whether it’s death I find frightening, or this empty moment, or this gruesome image from a memory….
….when I believe my story that this situation is lousy, or bad for me….
….I become fear, loss, sadness, distress, drama, excitement.
That’s who I am when I’m believing my story.
Alone, confused, not exactly trusting of the universe and reality.
So who would I be without the belief that my mind, my thoughts, my story, the images I see, my fantasies about death, my fantasies about this moment (that invent the need for some compulsive behavior) are true?
Who would I be if I didn’t believe my stories?
Including the story of death?
Including the story of uncomfortable feelings and moments and situations and addiction?
I would be feeling, seeing, being myself, which includes for me nutty pictures (some frightening) and judgments racing by and a brain full of thinking (sometimes).
Noticing that even though I see pictures of what death might be like, or other people I love dying, and even though I wonder about death a lot….
….and even though it sometimes occurs to me that a moment is annoying, missing something, more than I can handle, or boring….
….I don’t have to believe it.
In fact, I often don’t.
I don’t have to do anything.
I don’t have to get up, or fix it quick, or eat something, or figure out how to handle it.
Without believing my thoughts, they are just there, being themselves.
Me, too.
Oh, and look at that.
The universe is being Itself, too, in all its wild mysterious glory, full of lives being lived temporarily (it seems) and moments happening only for an instant (even moments full of craving) and things morphing, moving, opening, closing, changing.
Turning the thoughts around in every way: death is wonderful, craving is wonderful, life is terrible, not-craving is terrible, my thinking about death is terrible, my thinking about craving is terrible.
Could these be just as true, or truer?
“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. Music or the smell of good cooking may make people stop and enjoy. But words that point to the Tao seem monotonous and without flavor. When you look for it, there is nothing to see. When you listen for it, there is nothing to hear. When you use it, it is inexhaustible.” ~ Tao Te Ching #35
Question your thinking, feel wonderful and open, rather than terrible and closed.
Yes. Even about Death. Even about Addiction.
The world keeps doing what it does….
….and yet, it looks so different.
Much love, Grace
You might be able to tell, there’s a theme lately going on in Grace Notes or Eating Peace videos on youtube.
Retreat.
On the inside.
But you may not be so happy about that theme if you feel like you’re not doing it right.
If you feel like you’re completely pissed off, agitated, anxious or depressed. Or on attack mode (the opposite of retreat) running forward trying to get it handled, or fixed, or done forever.
I get it.
The other day I thought a stream of thoughts, all of which were along the same vein….
….like the way there are veins in the old granite rock up near Ross Lake in the wilderness, driving distance from my home.
Up near Ross Lake, huge slabs of rock are exposed, with a highway cutting through the edge that winds up through the mountains.
College and high school classes go there for the observation and learning about geology of the region, where the under-layers of earth pushed and cracked to the surface and became exposed.
Huge veins of deep or light color run through the rock.
Like the pebbles you see on beaches that have one line running through the pebble that’s different from the rest of the rock, making the pebble appear to have a ring around it.
Since I was little, the kids all said “pick up this kind of pebble, make a wish, and throw it over your left shoulder into the water….your wish will come true.”
Wishing rocks.
Who said so?
Maybe someone many generations back, or far, far back into so many years ago we don’t even remember.
That one thread running through the rock was so solid, so beautiful, so permanent, so colorful.
As I was noticing a thread of thinking running through my own mind, I suddenly had the vision of one of these pebbles….
….or a whole side of a mountain, like near Ross Lake, that had a thick vein of color running through it in massive proportion.
My thoughts were thick and tight and strong, and repetitive, like this vein.
Sigh.
They went like this:
Life is kind of dull, like the weather. I don’t feel like (fill in the blank). Maybe I should get a different regular normal job (I always love when this thought comes in). How about a cup of coffee? Yeah, that’s it. It’s not possible to be on retreat at all times. It’s too boring, too slow, and not practical. There are too many things I want to do in life, and I need to clean. And pay bills. My cottage is too small. The carpet needs vacuuming. Nothing ever works out perfectly.
Yeah.
It was that self-piteous. Piss. Moan.
It continued.
My clients and students who are angry right now, or having a hard time, especially those who experience a contentious relationship with eating?
There’s no solution. They’re right. Life is hard. Holidays are difficult. Family is troubling. People are complicated. Addiction is not easy to overcome. Compulsion is too strong to address. It’s too hard to change one’s story.
And while we’re at it, can I mention that I hate shopping?
BEEEEEEEPPPPPP.
Did you hear the loud horn?
It was the kind that is built to scare away bears in the wilderness.
You hear it?
It means “stop now”.
Because these kinds of thoughts are strong, compelling and they have babies faster than you can say Jack Robinson.
(Which, by the way, do you know where the saying comes from “faster than you can say Jack Robinson?” From the 1600s in England. Talk about passing along ancient impressive history and old stories through phrases, like the line in the hard rock lasting for generations into the future, even if we no longer know who Jack Robinson is anymore).
Pause.
Even though everything is happening.
Even though you are getting on and off airplanes, or wishing you could and you aren’t.
Even though you are upset with the weather, and worried about global warming, and its not snowing where you live anymore, or snowing too much.
Even though you were fired, or your love of you life divorced you. Even though you lost your hearing, or your health. Even though you can’t read every amazing classic book ever written. Even though you don’t know what to get your kid for Christmas. Even though you’re sick of decorations all around you when you do not even celebrate this holiday. Even though you ate too many cookies at the office party.
Just stop.
Do you notice how you react when you think it’s hopeless?
Do you notice what happens in your body when you believe the world is a dangerous place, or disappointing?
Ow.
When I believe these kinds of thoughts, there’s a crushing weight of self-criticism, responsibility, grief.
So who would you be without these thoughts?
Without beliefs that pack tightly together and create a line inside a rock?
What if you just caught that chatter that says “I’m sick of it” and wonder who you are without the belief?
Because there are already huge parts of you without the belief.
My pinky finger on my right hand, for example, doesn’t have any of these thoughts.
I also didn’t have these thoughts yesterday when curling up in bed to go to sleep after a productive day.
I didn’t have the thought when walking into the gym, or listening to one of my best friend’s messages about her own thoughts with love and acceptance.
Or when I noticed the beauty of red car tail lights filling the night streets. I’m not kidding.
You don’t even really have to work so incredibly hard to wonder what it would be like to not have these kinds of solid, ancient thoughts.
Because there is already a great part of you, far bigger than the energy of this thinking, that doesn’t have any of these thoughts.
Who are YOU anyway, who believes it has stressful thoughts?
Are you sure YOU have them?
Where are they?
I notice they are only an energy, zipping through.
I notice they only come into vein-formation if I begin to follow them, and believe them, and take them seriously.
The other day a student wrote to me “I feel like breaking something!”
“How do you know you’re supposed to be angry? You are!” ~ Byron Katie to me when asking her about my own anger and how to get rid of it.
Just because I think it, I feel it, doesn’t mean I AM IT.
Turning the thoughts around….
Life is full of movement, like the weather. I do feel like (fill in the blank). I am not the one in charge. Nothing is required. There are no solutions to “life”. It IS possible to be on retreat at all times, it’s already actually happening, I don’t have to try. My thoughts are profuse, and that’s fun. Only my mental noise and mind believes them, not the rest of me. I will never be “done”. My mind is too small, my mind needs vacuuming. Everything works out perfectly.
Pause a moment longer, now that you’ve been pausing to consider your thoughts, and not taking them seriously.
Take a very deep breath.
Relax your entire body. Hold still a moment.
Even if your mind yells and makes noise and comments and gestures and demands you get up and do something….
…..notice how you do not have to act like it’s true.
“Practice not doing, and everything will fall into place.” ~ Tao Te Ching #3
Much love,
Grace
When I was a kid, I felt ashamed and embarrassed to feel just about anything.
Ecstasy and attraction (wanting) something, anger or fury, sadness or self-pity.
The shame of feeling these, and wanting to cover up that I felt them, I took with me into adulthood.
The problem is, if you feel ashamed to feel, you have a MAJOR BLOCKADE going on with reality.
Because you are a feeling person.
Watch here to find out how to allow all feelings to be present and come into the light.
Dear Grace…..I HAVE to change, but I haven’t figured out how, even though I’ve tried everything.
Dear Grace…..I’ve been told I could benefit from an inpatient program for “addiction” (in this case eating disorders), but I don’t think it will work.
Dear Grace…..I know there’s no magic bullet or pill or weekend workshop to end all my concerns and stressful behaviors, so why should I bother signing up for any program (like Eating Peace, or The School, or that meditation workshop)?
Dear Grace…..Are there going to be other people who are: my age, my behavior, my experience, my problems, my gender, my size, my shape, my religion, my background? Or will I be the only one like me?
I notice when I’m offering a time to gather together, especially a workshop like Eating Peace (this coming Friday, Saturday and Sunday 10/9-10/11) where we’re exploring the end of suffering especially around eating and investigating the internal world…..
…..people have many questions.
What I see them asking, at the deepest level, is this:
Dear Grace…..This is my story and it’s really painful. I’m afraid it will never end. I know coming to your retreat won’t save me, heal me, stop me, change me completely. But will it at least make a difference? Will it be worth it?
Have you ever felt this way about something you have a choice about?
I need it to be good (and good means: _____)
I need to NOT be bad (and bad means: _____)
What’s strange is, of course, there is absolutely no way to get any kind of solid, 100% confirmed, complete, guaranteed answer.
Ever.
How does anyone know to try something new, or different?
How does anyone decide Yes or No about a possibility?
A few years ago, I signed up for a program that cost a lot of money (according to me, it felt like a huge stretch) and travel time and planning.
Before I decided to sign up, I kept going back to the information presented online about the program, and reading about the founder and teacher, and re-reading articles and books by her.
It was offered every year, and I took a look for about 4 years in a row thinking “I should do this, I really want to see it for myself.”
What was the kernel of truth, the THING I really wanted, the spark of interest that stayed alive and afloat for all that time, that invited me to say “yes”?
It’s kind of undefinable in concrete terms, but I wanted to grow my feeling of feminine power and awareness and sensuality. I loved imagining FEELING pleasure, joy and self-love.
I had already done The School for The Work with Byron Katie quite a few years before.
This felt like a way to practice a turnaround about being thrilled to be alive, and being surrounded by supportive sisters (the program was for women only), and tapping into the joy of my unique life.
I wanted some examples of what it would look like to be living and practicing that turnaround.
My old stressful beliefs were “being female isn’t that great, sisters can hurt or compete with you emotionally, and joy is elusive.”
I knew those beliefs weren’t true.
I wanted to BE who I was without those thoughts.
However, I knew that once the program was over, I’d still be in the world with myself, in my own personal life, with my mind, feelings, soul, and unfolding steps.
And that’s what happened.
I participated in the program, and then it was over.
But I had tools and very solid examples of what this kind of energy looked like. I had pictures now of how I might open up to practicing the energy of whatever I felt “feminine power” was or “awareness” or “sensuality” or “pleasure” or “support” of other women especially.
I remember during that program I walked down the street one day by myself on the way to the morning session with the sudden question “what if right now, I experienced joy and felt every ounce of this body with gratitude?”
I walked into a Starbucks, to get the most fabulous drink that felt the most divine for my body, the most healthy and nurturing.
As I ordered my tea at the counter, the man said “pretty in pink!” and gave me a huge smile (I had on a pink shirt).
Everyone was smiling in the cafe.
People were happy walking their dogs on the morning sidewalks.
I thought “I adore New York City!!” (which is where I was walking).
Was it the program, or me…..
…..or a fabulous convergence of forces and energies all coming together at once.
Neither me, nor the program, nor the curriculum, nor the city is the “cause” of that moment.
It was all of it, joining together. Connected.
Does this mean it was “worth it”?
On the very last day of the School for The Work with Byron Katie over a decade ago, as I left the big conference room after our very last session, full of goodbyes, a staff person said to me….
….”Now is the real school. Your life.”
Gasp. All untethered? Without guidance?
But who was I in that moment without the story that this meant I had to do it all completely alone, that I was by myself, that I had to figure my whole life out independently from anyone else, or that I was not supported by the universe?
Who would you be without the beliefs that if you decide to join with something, anything at all….
….it HAS TO make a difference and I KNOW WHAT THAT LOOKS LIKE!?!
Who would you be without the belief that you’re in charge?
Even with the simple act called doing The Work, or how about the simple act of eating (I know both do not seem so simple depending on your situation).
But what if you questioned your stressed out mind without expectation of the way it is supposed to look once you question it?
What I have found, over time, is when I do NOT know how something will affect my life, my behavior, my choices, my actions in a clear way….
….it’s actually a bit easier.
I let go of being The One who has to Know.
After my first School for The Work, I got a weekly partner and we kept questioning thoughts every Monday for two years.
All I need to know is that I hurt when I believe a whole novel of thoughts about a topic, and they’re all stressful.
When I inquire, I hurt less.
“You don’t need to figure anything out. You don’t need to see how it all fits together. All you need is to practice directing your attention to the life you want.” ~ Cheri Huber in What You Practice Is What You Have
Signing up for a program, a college course, a vacation, a class, a workshop, a date, a marriage, a retreat….
….what if you didn’t focus on the outcome, trying to make sure you won’t stand out, or trying to make sure you’ll be safe, or getting proof that you’ll be different (better) by saying yes?
All these are impossible to know.
What if you allowed yourself to join in simply because you’re curious? Because the way you’re doing it feels All Alone, and difficult?
Who would you be without the belief that you could make a mistake, or waste time or money, or fail at your plans to change?
I have no idea if I’m so different after my program in NYC all those years ago, but I love the story that keeps playing in my mind, the movie I get to watch, when I think about all the scenes and exercises and activities I was invited to do.
They still remind me to consider what it feels like to be responsible for my own joy in any given moment.
I could say it wasn’t “worth it” (I wondered sometimes after it was over) and I could have saved time and money NOT going.
But I can’t find that this is true, when I question it.
“Investigate all the beliefs that cause you suffering. Wake yourself up from your nightmares, and the sweet dreams will take care of themselves. If your internal world is free and wonderful, why would you want to change it? If the dream is a happy one, who would want to wake up? And if you dreams aren’t happy, welcome to The Work.” ~ Byron Katie in Loving What Is
If you’d like to enter the journey, even if you’ve started long ago, or taken it 1000 times, of questioning the beliefs that create suffering around food, diet, weight, failure, or your conviction that you must change (or else)….
….then Eating Peace is a 3 day opportunity to practice, learn, ask questions, find what’s really true for you, get a dose of quiet and insight that only you can really give yourself.
I have been down the long road of terrible suffering around food and eating, and it’s over now.
It has helped me immensely to consult those who have taken this journey and come out.
Now I can be that for you.
Someone wrote to me “I just want to get back to normal.”
Clearly seeing what you’re thinking that produces pain, the urge to eat weirdly, to rage at yourself, to be angry with your body or metabolism, to feel disappointment about food, to be upset with bread or despairing about sugar….
….and questioning these deep old thoughts is the fastest way I know to get to normal.
Whatever that is.
“Your great mistake is to act the drama as if you were alone…..Put down the weight of your aloneness and ease into the conversation…..Everything is waiting for you.”
~ David Whyte from his poem Everything Is Waiting For You
Much love, Grace
P.S. Eating Peace is for those interested in peace, and those willing to look at war. Inner war, outer war. Inner peace, outer peace. To register or read more, click HERE. You don’t have to have any kind of disordered eating to attend, and if you do, you’re truly welcome.