Yesterday late morning on the last day of retreat, a beautiful group of inquirers shared hugs, goodbyes, gratitudes, I-love-you’s, phone number exchanges, photos.
The joy of a circle of people gathered for several days to inquire together from morning until night is an experience strangely impossible to explain.
Part of the power of gathering, I thought to myself, is the presence of questions, rather than teachings. Each person is their own guru, their own guide, their own closest companion.
They find their own troubling situations, recalling them vividly, and then hold still long enough to examine them very closely, like looking under a microscope at what they believed to be true in that situation–because of that situation.
To make it simple, we begin our time together with one situation we’ve found difficult. Only one. We don’t need to make it more complicated, as the mind can so brilliantly do.
I see the images from the past 5 days now in my own mind’s eye: mother deeply connected to her son who died last year, sister open to her brother who said “no”, wife who doesn’t feel so harsh about her husband’s habits, man less frightened of environmental destruction or war, woman excited about new possibilities with her sister and mother, woman seeing the benefits of staying with her current partner, or not.
There are no plans. There is no agenda. There is no special format for what is next.
And yet after The Work, we sense there’s something different, something changed, from doing nothing but sitting in inquiry.
I love how this happens.
We’ve allowed ourselves to sit with our most despairing, disappointing, heart-breaking moments….
….and instead of closing off to them, pushing them down or trying to “be positive”….
….we look with the four questions.
And we’ve done it all day for several days in a row with companions doing the very same thing.
Beginning with Question One:
Is it true, what I’m thinking about my mother?
Is it true, this thought about my husband?
is it true, this belief I repeat internally about my sister?
Is it true, this sadness I have about my brother?
Question Two: Can I absolutely know for sure my thought is true about them?
Question Three: How do I react when I think my stressful thought? When I remember that rough thing that happened, or those words they said, or when I picture them being themselves and it brings me such uncertainty and worry, or I anticipate the very worst happening in the future?
How do I react? I’m nervous. I’m fearful. Maybe even panicked. I’m sad. I’m desperate. I’m frantic. I’m trying to find relief. I feel hatred, anger, sadness.
I notice I’m suffering.
Then comes Question Four: WHO or WHAT would it be like if I did NOT have this thought running through my head as I remember this person I feel close to? What if I didn’t think my story was 100% true? Who would I be without this belief?
What if I paused, relaxed, and looked at that poignant memory or relationship without starting to panic, or complain?
What if everything is in order, I am not in charge, and most importantly, me not being in charge is actually the Way of It and a good thing?
LOL.
At the very end in closing yesterday, a thought flashed through my head that I played the “wrong” version of a song for everyone during a meditative exercise. The version I played was more boisterous and not as soft and contemplative.
And then the awareness….next time perhaps I will play the version I find more slow and gentle, and this time it was important to play THIS version.
Because that’s what happened.
I don’t even need to know why or how it happened the way it did. I don’t need to put any meaning on it. Or tell myself I should have remembered the “better” version or that I’m too disorganized.
Even if I have a commentary running like this, I know it’s not true. It’s a chatterbox running in the corner. It’s the mind, doing what it does: offering up ideas, analyzing, seeking improvement, taking command, staying busy (it thinks it needs to).
Last step, after the Four Questions: We turn our thoughts around and look at them again.
The way it went with that person was OK. Even perfect.
Could this be just as true, or truer?
It’s certainly more fun to wonder this.
Perhaps the drinking husband, the school drop-out, the dismissive brother, the critical sister, the judgmental mother, the beautiful son no longer in his body….
….perhaps the way it went had an unimaginable benefit.
Perhaps we shouldn’t toy with it mentally to the extent we want to toy with it. Perhaps there are very good reasons for it going the way it’s gone.
Turning it around again: Could my thinking be off? Could I be the distant one, the addicted one (to my thoughts), the one who died, the one who criticized, the one who judged?
Didn’t I do all these things to others, and to myself?
“You can’t let go of a stressful thought, because you didn’t create it in the first place. A thought just appears. You’re not doing it. You can’t let go of what you have no control over. Once you’ve questioned the thought, you don’t let go of it, it lets go of you.” ~ Byron Katie
Thank you everyone who questions their stressful thinking with me. The adventure is thrilling. The gratitude is deep.
(Last I heard there were three spots left in the Breitenbush Retreat, another opportunity for immersion in The Work June 13-17 in Oregon. If you’d like to soak in inquiry and see what happens, join us).
But even if you never go to a retreat, you can do this work today.
All it takes is sitting down, with pen and paper, a quiet segment of time….and your answers to the four questions.
Much love,
Grace
June 3rd East West Books on healing eating issues with self-inquiry 1-4 pm. Also June 10th last half-day retreat of the year Living Inquiries Group 2-6 pm (last one of the year).
Still 6 spots for Breitenbush Retreat in luscious Oregon June 21-25 where you truly, deeply unplug and cleanse. Cleanse physically with spectacular vegetarian organic meals, dark quiet nights of rest, the old growth forest air, mineral springs for soaking.
In only one month, everyone in the new 
Last night the Thursday Year Of Inquiry group spent time investigating our topic this month. We’re in our last month of being together for an entire year, doing The Work.