This coming weekend, a group will be gathering with a focus of Living Turnarounds.
What does this mean?
Well, since you’re aware of The Work, you’ll know that the very last step of questioning your thoughts is to turn them around.
As in….finding the very opposite, and not using it like an affirmation (unless this brings you joy) but instead sitting with each turnaround, no matter how weird it feels or sounds, and considering in this world of duality how it could be as true, or truer.
Sometimes the Turnarounds bring remarkable ah-ha’s, lightbulbs, awareness of what you DO have power to change, in a really loving and excited way.
Maybe you even discover where you need to make amends, to another person, or to yourself, so you bring the past to a close and you can stop regurgitating it, stop thinking about it constantly, stop trying to make it right….because you’ve done your best, and it’s now over.
When I was going through a separation and divorce, I did The Work fairly frequently on the thoughts I was experiencing that produced enormous fear about my life in the future.
I can’t do this alone, I’m abandoned, I’m lost, I’m a failure, I’m worthy of being left, I’m not able to earn enough money, I did it wrong, I’m lonely.
As I did The Work on this over time, day after day (I did The Work about three times a day during that period over ten years ago) I would find turnarounds that “clicked”.
Sometimes they scared me.
They looked like this: I can do this alone, I’m set free, I’m found, I’m a success, I’m worthy of being enjoyed, I’m able to earn enough money, I did it right, I’m connected.
I had to concentrate with my mind to find examples of each turnaround.
How could they be just as true, or truer, than my original stressful thought?
It might have felt shaky and not very confident, but I would get a different feeling inside my body, at a very deep level, as I found the turnarounds to be just as true. Why not?
Then I would consider, as I felt the new, alive, excited, fearless, thrilled, relaxed or more stable awareness within….
….how would I live this?
What could I do, say, be, think, feel, in order to live this turnaround?
What would it look like?
How would I go through my day, with the new awareness, the new feeling, living a turnaround that I was safe, creative, and able? That maybe this was an exciting changing time of wonder and joy? That I could earn enough to support myself on my own?
I signed up for a Qigong class. I took a women’s workshop on human sexuality. I enrolled in a program on women’s empowerment and joy. A friend told me about something called Ecstatic Dance where you could dance however you like without talking to anyone (I went).
I invited people I knew who were musicians over to sing together like I had done long ago (lots of piano and guitar playing and singing in my past, and I hadn’t done it for years) and called it Sing Thing. I began applying for jobs and figured out where I have something to offer, even though I had not been working full time for ten years.
My life began to blossom, to become more than it had ever been prior to this “terrible” thing called the process of divorce.
Who would YOU be without your story?
This is not a matter, I found, of making a list and “doing” it. Like setting goals you think you “should” achieve or do.
These new joys came to me because of inquiring into my deepest, most painful thoughts about what was happening….the worst that was happening.
And then feeling what it was actually like to live in this body without that thought.
There are some wonderful questions you can contemplate to help you find barriers to living the life you want, your immunity to change, the inner reasons you don’t “live” the way you think would bring you peace.
When I investigated….
….*Ping*….the idea would come to talk to a friend about energy and physical movement, and I’d be led down a road with tiny sweet breadcrumbs to “I know someone who teaches a class starting next week, you’d fit right in”.
“When we stop opposing reality, action becomes simple, fluid, kind, and fearless.” ~ Byron Katie
This coming Sunday is the first Living Turnarounds group October 23rd 3-6 pm northeast Seattle in Goldilocks Cottage (my house). Sign up here or hit reply to let me know you’ll be here this weekend. We’ll meet once a month through June 2017. There are some people coming from far distances, and not everyone attending this Sunday can plan on being present for every session, so that’s the way of it. If you can only come one at a time, you’re welcome. You can pay as you go.
We’ll do The Work on what stands between you and living a simple, fluid, kind and fearless life, in any area you truly desire.
Much love,
Grace