Tag: relationships

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How do you live your turnarounds?

Iloveme
they love me, I love me, I love them living the turnarounds is….exciting

In the past several years, doing The Work regularly, I’ve become super interested in the Living Turnarounds.

You might wonder what I’m talking about?

When we do The Work….the four questions, followed by finding turnarounds, or opposites, to the concepts we’re questioning….

….we often find turnarounds that “clunk” (as one lovely participant put it in the spring retreat this past weekend).

It’s like the turnaround makes you take palm and hit forehead.

For example: I once did The Work (many times in fact) on a very dear friend who reacted abruptly to something she thought I did that wasn’t accurate.

While the thing she reacted to wasn’t actually true….I still deeply investigated “she doesn’t care about me” because of what happened.

When I said out loud the first turnaround I saw clearly “I didn’t care about her” I sat for a few minutes thinking, nope, I definitely cared very much about her!

But I knew to keep sitting with it, and find even the smallest example, to open up my mind (for my own benefit, not because I “should”).

As I waited, I began to realize; Oh. I listened to her talk on the phone for long periods of time without saying “I need to hang up now” and secretly resenting the length of time I was in the conversation. I never told her I don’t like to hang out in bars or buy exotic drinks. I was occasionally jealous of her fortune, and the fact she didn’t have to work for a living.

I didn’t exactly have kind, compassionate, loving thoughts towards her at all times. I wasn’t honest. I judged her and never brought up my irritations–which in real friendship is hard, but deeply valuable and connecting when you can sort through it.

These were all ways I didn’t care. I secretly harbored many unpleasant thoughts about her.

Dang. I was not truly caring about the friendship, not really steppin’ up to an honest, genuine connection. And I had been doing it a long time, maybe most of the so-called friendship.

Another turnaround I found in my work on that friend was of course “I didn’t care about myself”.

Again palm to forehead.

Clunk.

Why didn’t I speak up for what I really wanted, or say NO if I didn’t want to go to that loud, brightly-lit bar or to spend precious money on fancy hors d’oeuvres?!

Which brings me back to this experience of looking closely at the Living Turnarounds.

If I lived my life, actually caring for myself, or feeling the way she DID care for me instead of being so sure she didn’t….

….what would it look like?

I began to notice when I didn’t say “no” or speak up. I began to include my own desires and wants and preferences in activities, with respect and love for myself (whatever this ‘self’ was).

Instead of ignoring when I wanted to say “no” to an invitation in order to be pleasing to someone else and not shake any feathers, I said “no”. I started feeling a sense of trust for myself, like I would take care of me without guilt, without hurting anyone else, without pretending anything.

Instead of believing someone didn’t care about me, I realized they might care enormously. I felt the sense of them caring. It was warm, kind….even somehow recognizable.

Of course they care. How very dear, tender and loving they are. Even if they seem confused or do things I learned were supposed to mean “they don’t care”….

….I could imagine the turnaround. I could feel how it was just a possible, even more probable, that they DID care (even my old friend)!

Slowly I lived the turnaround. And it grew bigger.

It’s been a little here, a little there. Speaking up just a little more, and a little more. Sharing my inner heart. Noticing when I haven’t responded to a request quite right and saying something then. Or maybe I have a question for someone in order to understand what my own answer is. Or I decide to spend time with someone face-to-face so we’re on the same page and learn about each other.

There hasn’t been a major turning point, as I’ve lived this new turnaround of caring about myself, caring about others, feeling the care people have for me, and trusting there’s a wonderful solution that works (if there’s a conflict) however long it takes.

This Living Turnaround is nothing super dramatic. I don’t have a story to share like “one day I said NO and everyone dropped their jaw in shock and from that point forward, I was the president of the United States”.

Ha ha!

But little by little, as this turnaround has come alive, whatever I am appears to be much more honest, speaking the truth when I know it, honoring whatever’s true inside me with loving kindness.

“Realization has no value until it’s lived.” ~ Byron Katie in 1000 Names For Joy

If you want to move closer into living your turnarounds, the ones that “clunk” (feel true and right for you) then spend a little time feeling in your body what they might be like, each day.

Ask yourself what you would do, how you would walk, how you would talk, what you would say, how you would live, if this turnaround were just as true or truer, than your original stressful belief.

The best news of all?

You don’t even have to believe it 100%.

Everyone and everything cares about me. I care for every part of myself. I care for everyone and everything.

What would it be like, today, to live this turnaround and act like it was true?

Pretty awesome.

Much love,

Grace

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Whose business are you in? If it’s not your own, you’re lonely.

This weekend the 3 day (we include all day Friday) annual Spring Retreat has been underway.

This retreat, like all of them, is a council of wise folks gathering to contemplate reality, to investigate stories that feel painful, to dig in to uncover hidden stressful beliefs….and of course take them through inquiry.

On Saturday night, it seems our tradition on these 3-day retreats in The Work is to have potluck dinner together.

I looked around the huge grand kitchen table at one point during the meal, after our inquiry together for two days, and was so inspired by the beauty, sharing, joy, and great love I felt for each and every person present.

I haven’t always felt connected to everything and everyone in my environment.

I usually felt DIS-connected from everything and everyone, to be honest.

Even though, as I felt the dis-connection and alienation from everyone and everything, and felt very separate from just about everyone and everything…..

…..I was also wondering constantly what everyone and everything was thinking, doing, and feeling, and hoping no one would be mean to me or hurt me, or that nothing horrible would happen.

My general thought was that people are a bit scary, and the world was definitely full of frightening possibilities. You had to be careful.

There is a principle Byron Katie shares fairly often when facilitating people in their work. The “Whose Business?” Principle.

She’ll ask the question as someone explores a situation: “Whose business are you in?”

There are three choices for your answer:

1) I’m in my own business

2) I’m in someone else’s business (and it’s not my business)

3) I’m in God’s business (also not my business)

So for example….I have a stressful belief that my child should not have broken his wrist.

I wasn’t there when he did, I rushed to the hospital emergency room.

My heart is racing, I’m terrified, I’m worried about him, I believe he needs his mom ASAP. I’m driving like a maniac, my hands gripping the wheel.

Whose business am I in?

My child’s business.

His life included a broken wrist….(twice). His reality appears to involve broken wrists, and I notice he hasn’t been all that upset, he’s felt well-cared for, and his life is completely OK despite these broken bones and incidents. They’ve mended. He’s fine.

When I’m freaking out, and my wrists are perfectly healthy, I’m in his business emotionally. I’m over there, worrying about him and imagining he’s suffering terribly, and no one is home with me driving safely on the road to him at the hospital. I abandoned myself to spend time in his business, sweating bullets instead of clearly and calmly doing what needs to be done without more added stress (like a potential speeding ticket).

What is God’s business?

Earthquakes, typhoons, day time, night time, sun, moon, rock, tree, wrists getting mended, the body doing what it does, death, birth, clouds, aging, plants, the whole of reality.

When I’m in God’s business, the same results occur as when I’m in my kid’s business.

I’m lonely. No one here with me. Upset with God. Putting a lot of suggestions in the Suggestion Box, and they don’t seem to be getting answered, either. (God is so remote sometimes, jeez).

Being in my business is the only sane position, the only principle that actually works. The most stress-free position.

Being in my own business, I’m seated here in my own life, feeling the force of being here now, surrendered to what is NOT my business.

Not lonely.

I looked around on Saturday night, sitting at a table with fascinating, interesting, beautiful people who are all very interested in questioning their stressful thinking and waking up to whatever is really true for themselves. I smile with the joy of it all. I feel very much a part of the group, the life force all buzzing together, sharing together. I am not lonely. I’m so fascinated by everything in this room, and every person.

But here’s the funny thing….the more I do The Work and question what I fear, what I’m against, what I dislike, how I am separate, all the stressful thoughts…..

…..the more I find that I’m not even sure there is ANY business I can actually truly, freely, be in. Not even “my” own.

What if every single thing I could encounter in my life is the business of something that is not purely all me? What if nothing is my business?

Just saying.

Much love, Grace

P.S. Next 3 Day Retreat Sept 16-18, 2016. Kenmore, WA.

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Are your thoughts about people (or money) a sacred religion devoted to pain?

Can't Stop Stressful Thinking? Do The Work
if you suffer from believing, you can question your thinking and change your relationships. Hell to Peace.

There’s an amazing group assembled for Relationship Hell To Heaven TeleCourse starting today 9 am Pacific. I can take 2 more people. We meet 90 minutes every Wednesday for 6 weeks. Write to me if you really want to do this, even if you don’t have the full fee and we can sort out a way you can join.

Sometimes this kind of idea….”sorting out a way you can join”….makes people squirm.

Thoughts about money and conversations about money come to mind.

What does sorting out mean? I’ll have to admit I don’t have enough money. I’ll have to say it out loud. I’ll be ashamed. I’ll offend the person who’s asking for a fee (in this case, moi).

Or the reverse. I’ll need to ask for money. I’ll have to say what the regular fee is out loud. I’ll make other people uncomfortable if they don’t have the funds. I’ll turn people away, or turn people off. They’ll think poorly of me, they’ll think I’m selfish or hoggish, they’ll think I’m hoity toity (I love this word, it comes from a verb meaning “to play or pretend” and some say from the French “haut toit” meaning high roof).

I once went to a workshop on money. An entire weekend, starting on Friday night, ending Sunday late afternoon.

There were many exercises and the facilitator was superb. I knew upon registering, going in, that the fee was sliding scale and we would be able to set our own amount at the end of the workshop, and offer the payment when it was over.

I had NO IDEA it would make me so uncomfortable.

On Sunday afternoon, after the full workshop was over, we had to decide what we wanted to give the facilitator, who had traveled from afar to give this program.

I hardly had any money and the whole reason I came was because, well A) I obviously had a problem with money because it was not in my life in much quantity, and B) I thought I could get away with hardly paying a dime and feel fine about it, since there was no set fee.

I was wracked with confusion, guilt, and worry about having No Fee. It was too much freedom. Too much meaning was put into the amount.

What it boiled down to was, I had No Idea what would make the teacher happy. I was used to making the teacher happy, I wanted to make the teacher happy, I didn’t know how to make myself happy.

I finally, uncomfortably, picked an amount that sounded like a “normal” workshop fee amount and wrote a check for $250. It was almost all that was in my savings at the time, but I was too embarrassed to pay less. The workshop was incredibly helpful and I wanted to show this in my fee.

Wow, that last hour deciding what to pay was worth the entire program in itself. Every stressful belief, every painful thought about having enough, or not having enough, came roaring to the surface as we all got to sit quietly, take out our checkbooks, and give honorably.

(Now, when I offer my money telecourse, I do the same thing. LOL.)

But you know, this pain and angst and torturous back-and-forth and “sorting out a way you can join” or “sorting” out the thoughts about money in any situation involving it, is not just about money.

It’s about Relationship.

I noticed, I did the exact same thing when in relationship with others, in many variations. I wondered if they would be pleased. I worried I wouldn’t get or keep what I needed. I watched to see if they would hurt me with words or betray or abandon or insult me. I worried I would accidentally insult them or stick my foot in my mouth. I felt very careful. I had judgements and criticisms.

I felt afraid.

I noticed fear in all forms appearing in my thoughts about others.

How do I get close, how do I feel connected, but not intrude or overstep? How do I speak authentically, but not insult. How do I take in what others say, but only the good stuff (the critical stuff seems to hurt)?

What a huge project. Exhausting.

If you notice there is someone, or several people in your life, with whom you have a tentative, or careful, or troubling, or anger-inducing relationship….

….then write down all those conflicting thoughts and see what words you’re using, and begin to study them.

Take them through The Work, the Four Questions.

How can you live, what does it feel like, how can you be fulfilled, enough, whole, OK, supported, here, receiving, giving, exchanging conversation and love and energy (money or otherwise) in a balanced amount, just right for you in this moment today, with everyone and everything?

How can you be you?

“I work with four and five year old children who suffer from believing the same concepts that adults believe. These concepts are sacred religions; we’re completely devoted to them. ‘People should come,’ ‘people should go,’ ‘people should understand me’, ‘I’m too this’, ‘You’re too that’, ‘my wife shouldn’t lie’, my children should appreciate me’, my husband doesn’t love me’, ‘my mother would be much happier if she saw things the way I do.’ Whatever story we’re attached to, that’s where our devotion is. There’s no room for God in it.” ~ Byron Katie in 1000 Names For Joy

If you want to join the course that starts today at 9 am Pacific, you can move quick, or listen to the recordings if you miss out. RegisterHERE. Or like I said, write to me if you really want to do this work and don’t have the fee. It is my privilege to work with you, if you want to do The Work.

Much love,

Grace

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Did you get ditched? (Or, did you do the ditching?)

If you’d like to join the online meetup for anyone, beginner to experienced, we’ll all dial in tomorrow and do The Work.

I’ll guide you through filling out a worksheet on your judgments on any situation bringing you disturbance, then we’ll work on one thought from start to finish. Click HERE to join tomorrow morning. It’s a good sampling of this work if you’re considering joining theRelationships 6 week teleclass that starts Wednesday morning! You can participate, or just listen.

Speaking of relationships.

goodbye
who would you be if you make peace with the story of goodbye?

Somewhere along the way in my history and practice of doing The Work, I noticed a thought that continuously came to the surface about other people.

If they criticized me, or confronted me, or challenged me, or disagreed strongly with me, I felt a terror within of potential abandonment.

Sometimes an incredibly fast reaction to this fear occurred almost immediately. Anger. If they abandon me….fine. They aren’t worth it either, they’re the jerk, they screwed up, good riddance, etc. I ditch them! Take that!

Such a great word “ditch” I noticed. I think I started speaking it, withothers kids, maybe around 3rd grade.

“Let’s ditch him!”

Weird how it showed up that way in our language. It didn’t mean anything horribly wrong. We’d be acting it out more like a hide and seek game.

And yet….how awful, sometimes, to be the one ditched.

What does it conjure up in the mind? I picture someone getting thrown in a ditch and buried at the side of a road, rather than in a graveyard. The poorest kind of abandonment and lack of caring. A sense of being discarded and worthless. No funeral. No acknowledgement. No connection. Treated like garbage.

Ouch.

I notice, I think it’s true.

I think it’s true that sets of people can ditch other sets of people (war) and families can leave families (what happened to my ancestors immigrating from Sweden and Ireland) and relationships can suddenly, or not-so-suddenly end, and people can die.

I know how I react when a friendship has disappeared and someone I cared deeply about stopped speaking to me or, I stopped speaking to someone I cared about (yes, I’ve done it). I know what it’s like to have people I love so much die.

It feels heart-breaking.

But who would I be without the story that the heart is actually severed in two? Who would I be without the story of being ditched? Who would I be without the story that heart-break is terrible and to be avoided at all costs, or even CAN be avoided?

Who would you be without the story that heart-break is impossible to live through, or that when you’ve ditched someone or they’ve ditched you, you can’t live a joyful, meaningful, engaged life and go on?

Turning the thought around: I am not ditched by my friend, I did not ditch that man I once knew. I ditched myself. Ditching hasn’t happened.

How could this be just as true, or truer? What are some examples?

I notice I’m here, alive in this temporary moment. I remember the people with care and attention and love who I no longer see regularly in person. Life has gone on after others are no longer present, they’ve left, or have even died. I have new friends in my life, constantly.

I will be gone someday too.

Does that mean I’m ditching planet earth?

Ha ha….not at all.

As if “I” could be even doing that anyway, in the first place.

I would be simply moving on, following the way of it, moving with the universe. I’d be someone with a heart broken over and over again, but somehow it was OK anyway.

Because I’m here, right now.

“When you inner dependency on form is gone, the general conditions of your life, the outer forms, tend to improve greatly. Things, people, or conditions that you thought you needed for your happiness now come to you with no struggle or effort on your part, and you are free to enjoy or appreciate them–while they last….Even if everything were to collapse and crumble all around you, you would still feel a deep inner core of peace. You may not be happy, but you will be at peace.” ~ Eckhart Tolle

Right now, I notice, if I want to make contact with someone I haven’t connected with in a very long time…or I have thoughts about being ditched or ditching someone else…I can actually make it right, without expectation for anything happening next.

I can write a letter to that someone and let them know they were not worthless or discarded, if this is appropriate and wise. I can write to family members or ancestors even when they are no longer alive and send the letter to them through fire (burning it). I can sit still and feel the deep inner core of life within me and acknowledge the peace.

I can feel the presence of Reality, the Universe, or God handling all of this without my approval, and notice no matter how much ditching I’ve imagined has happened, something mysterious is still here anyway, and life is going on.

In fact, I am surrounded by things in this moment: chair, desk, lamp, carpet, humming sound of heater turning on, light, window, cup, sign, phone.

Nothing is absent in this moment. Even my stories. But I don’t have to act like they’re absolutely true and I need to do something about them based on terror or avoidance.

Not right now. I’ve got inquiry.

Then, movement and action can be born out of my stories based on love, and wisdom, instead.

Much love,

Grace

Inquiry Call Tomorrow:

 Find A Local Number In Your Area (multiple countries)

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First Tuesday Online Meetup With Grace

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deep divers inquiry–why does it work?

Today I’m headed to the distant reaches north of Ottawa, to a cold (snow flurries recently reported) remote area to participate in Orphan Wisdom School with the good Stephen Jenkinson.

I’ll be taking my trusty laptop and sharing with you some of what happens there for me, especially when it comes to the power of self-inquiry and being on this beautiful and crazy planet. Who knows what will happen. Stay tuned!

********
Grace Bell facilitating – notice the new gamer headphones, extremely hip. My game is inquiry, apparently.

During the past year, I’ve been doing more and more mini retreats, something I offered for the first time several years ago: a short intense half-day session doing The Work with a small group.

People come from all walks of life, and I’ve offered them online and in person.

This format morphed into mini-retreats-for-one, where a client and I meet for three hours whether in person or on facetime or skype or facebook video call. The amount of time feels luxurious and incredibly powerful and helpful.

The number of people taking this option has exponentially increased, maybe because it’s such a sweet deep dive. It’s amazing to have the time available to really go beyond the traditional once per week 50 minute sessions in many healing professions (this way isn’t always ideal for everyone).

I wanted to make sure you knew this was an option for you. If you’re concerned with anxiety, eating issues, a really difficult relationship (or lack of one) or trouble at your job, career, a co-worker, it can be awesome to sit with your mind and a facilitator for 3 whole hours.

What I didn’t expect was that people who chose this format for meeting….would want to come back two weeks later for another mini retreat. As long as I have room and space, I’ll do this for the significantly smaller fee than the usual rate for solo sessions (3 hours for mini retreats right now = $225).

So why is this way working, I wondered?

I didn’t even think I had enough 3-hour chunks in my schedule to find space, but they keep appearing to open up just right, for example for a condensed version of inquiry on weekends, or evenings when it’s only 5 pm my time, but 10 am for the inquirer in their time zone.

And why is it working for the inquirers who love to take the time and space to work this mini-retreat way?

I see these five reasons why:

1) there is time for the inquirer to express the presenting “problem” which is a person, situation, condition, a feeling they don’t like about their lives….so they feel heard.

2) with a few questions and further investigation, a MORE critical or worrisome or frightening problem often appears. A childhood memory comes forth, a moment with a parent, or a very stressful time in life with change. These come into focus….like we’re detecting the true source of the trouble, the proof or evidence of suffering they’ve carried with them sometimes for years.

3) The inquirer gets to contemplate and meditate on the Judge Your Neighbor questions very deeply (not the way we usually do things on our own, at least I sure didn’t). When these beliefs are identified, then you’ve got your direction. I do the writing for the inquirers, they sit still and give all their attention to simply answering the questions, nothing more required. (If you want to see the Judge Your Neighbor worksheet questions, they’re right here).

4) We inquire into stressful belief(s) using the four questions. We relax and take a short break if needed part way through for just 5 – 10 minutes (or not). We let The Work run the session.

5) The inquirer is left with clear Next Steps. Other situations or scenes to explore and investigate. We’ve taken time to start at the surface, and then look into the fog, clearing out the cloud cover and finding it’s safe to go deeper.

Another way to spend more time slowing down to discover what really disturbs you is to take a small class with others. Meeting once a week for 6 or 8 sessions is such an awesome way to anchor your time in inquiry (and spend less, but also learn from hearing other peoples’ inquiry work).

Whichever way you enter inquiry, I personally think the mind finds it too slow.

Can’t this go faster? Can’t I just get a quick one-sentence answer to life? Can’t someone tell me how to calm down and chill?

Well….maybe that’d be nice….but not really, no.

It just doesn’t work the “fast” way. You don’t really want it super fast, anyway–you want the truth, not some quick answer, right?

Really, the only way I ever found to enter peace was to look into what caused me, personally (it seemed) to move OUT of peace.

I had to tell and question my story, to respect my story, to honor my story for being like a two year old. I had to give it the time it deserved because it was the only one I had.

As I look back at myself doing The Work, and all the incredible inquirers who appear in my life for facilitation….what I see is we all have to start at the very beginning (like Maria in the Sound of Music). We look at the difficult, stressful stories of suffering we’ve been living out, sometimes for our entire lives.

But now, we get to wonder….is it true?

“So in the beginning, to deeply inquire about anything, you have to care about it. You have to care enough to allow it to get inside that shell. What do you really care about? What pulls you into here and now, this minute? What is the most important thing to you? For real inquiry, it is important to be asking about something you sincerely care about. The question needs to be personal, not about a spiritual teaching or something that’s outside of your experience. It needs to be something that’s coming from the inside.” ~ Adyashanti

Are you ready to join a small group or have your own one-to-one solo session(s)? If so, I’d love to work with you. It’s the greatest honor I have in my life….exploring what we truly, honestly care about and finding out what’s actually true, for ourselves.

Much love,

Grace

P.S. Relationship Hell To Heaven is a 6 week telecourse starting Weds, May 4th. We meet 9-10:30 am Pacific Time, and all you need to begin is a willingness to clearly notice what your stressful story is about ANY relationship in your life (mom, dad, brother, sister, neighbor, spouse, boss) and dig into the beliefs you have about that person without editing yourself. What an awesome place to do it, in a telegroup. You’ll start to feel less embarrassed about your thoughts, you’ll be inspired by others, you might even feel normal, and free, and discover solutions you haven’t thought of before. Register here. Join me in the Peace Movement.

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left out on the dance floor helps to end the dream (the nightmare)

leftout
what is really unbearable here? separation…..or Unity with everything?

Yesterday in Year of Inquiry people read their worksheets at the beginning of our call, as always (and as I also say to everyone….if you don’t have a worksheet, you are ALWAYS still welcome).

Scenes of being left out emerged, or fear of criticism.

I rotate people in to take turns offering the thought to question, and the woman whose turn it was shared her situation with us.

A moment when she’s watching her partner express love and openness…..and it’s not to her.

The speedy quick lightening bolt of “I am left out” arises, almost without words.

The mind is so quick in its assessments, isn’t it?

I have one of those moments, from the past, and I still remember it vividly, it was so fascinating….

I was loving getting to know a man who I found very unusual, quirky and adorable. It was mid-life and after divorce and something about this man was very different and not the typical type of guy I had been attracted to in the past.

He was the facilitator/instructor of a dance I started attending. For a long time, I participated and noticed him and honestly, found it quite wonderful that he didn’t approach me, look at me, or try to dance with me. (I was very inward in a rather exciting, moving, wild way and dancing without words and without obligation facilitated this inward movement of change brilliantly).

The moment I remember so vividly was after this new man in my life had become a companion for a few months.

I was no longer so inward and quiet at that point. I had been attending almost a year, twice a week. I had made some new friends, pretty amazing and friendly people, and found myself finally breathing more deeply in this different chapter of my life.

On the freeform dance floor, everyone dances however they want, moving towards and away from other dancers, dancing alone, joining others mid-song, following the flow of your own movement without instructions, rules, or steps.

It’s a brave and strange experience, but then….not brave at all–just you being you, moving in a body.

I loved it.

One night, this flash of a moment, I looked across the dance floor to see my new companion dancing closely with a woman.

The music stopped, with a pause of silence before the next song soon began, but they did not part from a close embrace, foreheads touching. When the next tune began, they continued to hold still, close, together.

Suddenly a zap of adrenaline surged through my whole body.

I’m left out.

This means….

It’s almost without words, it’s so fast.

But it means something terrible, in that kind of moment. It means I’m abandoned, I’m lost and untethered, this is threatening in some way. That’s what the body is saying it means, as I feel the fear of zapping anxiety run through me.

The Work is about not ignoring this, or pretending it doesn’t matter. The Work is not about acting like you don’t care what you’re looking at disturbs you, or giving yourself a pep talk about how it’s not what you think and all is well and this is not a problem and you better not show you’re so insecure and already acting like you own him so get your act together.

That’s one of the things I love about The Work.

The Work says “tell me everything, everything, everything about that moment.”

That’s step one….allowing everything to come into consciousness that frightens you about a moment in time, and what you’re believing that causes you torture and pain.

I was left out.

Is it true?

Yes.

I’m not in that pairing over there. I’m over here, on the outside of the circle, on the fringes. Alone. Abandoned.

Are you sure???

Who would you be without the belief you are left out? Who would you be, how would it feel inside the body, without the notion that I am not included in something and I should be?

Whoooosh.

I’m back inside my body, without the belief I’m left out.

My arms move, my eyes take in lights, motions, dancers, colors, legs, arms, peoples’ feet, floor. The energy pulsates inside me. I hear music, flutes, drums, cello, horn, tambourine. I see so many other teeth smiling, eyes laughing, faces expressing all around me.

And over there, this new man I adore is in a tender pose, kind and connected with another human being on the dance floor, unafraid to show public closeness to someone else right in front of me. He is free, I am free.

Turning the thought around: I am not including him, I am not including myself.

I am filled with resistance to what I see, I am assuming it means something about me (it didn’t) and how I won’t get enough love, attention, connection. Or something dangerous, called abandonment or loss, might happen.

The turnaround continues, endlessly, to be true: I am included.

I am part of a human family celebrating to music on a dance floor. Together we are all sharing. I dance with others, including both men and women. It’s absolutely beautiful.

I am included in breathing the air, in sweating and drinking delicious water, in being here, body on dance floor….body on planet earth.

With this particular man, he is one of the happiest human beings I know, not seeking and grabbing for contact from others (or me) but very content within himself. He loves dancing with men and women, with strangers and friends. He moves with joy. He trusts himself. He is not intent on being worried about what I think (that’s my job). He has deep integrity, and loves honest talk.

I included myself later by being very honest, sharing with him that I had seen him hugging another and felt a surge of fear, and we had a fabulous conversation about intimacy, physicality, contact in dance, closeness, touch….

….and everything we’d ever learned about it and what we wanted to un-learn.

“Most people want to keep dreaming that they are special, unique, and separate, more than they want to wake up to the perfect unity of an Unknown which leaves no room for any separation from the whole….To the ego such uncontaminated love is unbearable in its intimacy. When there are no clear separating boundaries and nothing to gain the ego becomes disinterested, angry, or frightened. In a love where there is no other, there is nowhere to hide, no one to control, and nothing to gain.” ~ Adyashanti

As I do The Work, I see the fine, exciting, and mysterious dance of relationship I have with anyone reveal itself as….amazing, startling, uncontaminated love.
No one is required to do anything to keep me happy.
Except, well….me.

Much love, Grace

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Finding Your Way In Between The Thoughts…Not Fighting Them

fightinganimals06
Meet no resistance, do The Work

Uh oh.

One of my best friends in the world who lives in another country is in the middle of a break up of a long-term relationship.

We hear about these things happening all the time.

People bickering, spending thousands on lawyers, he did this, she did that, this is mine, that’s not yours, he’s insane, she’s wrong.

The couple involved are both basically incredibly, deeply, fundamentally shaken and hurt. They’re feeling guilty, confused, shocked, and angry to the core.

Funny how this goes, and it’s so opposite to the first budding romantic excitement of a brand new love.

This was a person you once decided to buy property with, or have children with, or share a kitchen and bathroom with….

….and now you hate them.

Kind of weird, right?

What the heck happened?

Often, it’s small things that happen over time, and how people communicate what they really feel (or don’t communicate), and stories that build up….than can definitely be questioned (but never were).

I’ve worked with couples from time to time when they call for sessions doing The Work together.

People read their worksheets to each other, with all the most blistering and childish beliefs written down about the other person (the stuff we’d normally never say out loud).

Both people have to be really willing to hear difficult things from the other person, take it in, and feel it and hold it as something to learn from.

I find, many people would love to be able to do this, but they can’t.

(Only, of course, they can….maybe just not yet).

They don’t know how to NOT feel defensive, put up a wall, cut the other person off in anger, take things very personally.

My friend, who knows The Work and is super willing to question her own thinking was so angry at her partner she was half-crying half-yelling in her voicemail.

Sometimes, we just break down.

It’s kinda normal, really. Maybe even the breaking down, breaking apart…..breaking…..isn’t so bad after all.

But here’s something I thought after listening to her, calling her back and talking awhile.

I hung up the phone, and I felt a little sad myself.

“They’re both acting like total babies.”

I could feel this feeling of YUCK inside my own chest.

Thoughts like….I want nothing to do with this ridiculous juvenile behavior. They should get a grip. People are mad.

And then, I realized….my own thoughts of being against them fighting were similar to them actually fighting.

Sigh.

Time for The Work.

They should stop fighting.

Is it true?

Yes, damn right they should stop. Did I tell you about how they got together in the first place so many years ago and how there was already some concern, and…..

…..Oh. I almost forgot.

I was answering the question.

Right.

Is it absolutely true they should stop fighting?

Um….YEAH.

How do you react when you believe they should stop, and they don’t?

I remember my two kids fighting. I believed this thought. I remember my neighbors fighting about a loud dog. I believed this thought. I remember my grandpa and dad fighting about money and respect. I believed this thought.

And what about the wars in the world?

I believe this thought.

How do I react?

Upset, very sad. Wanting to get away from it all, get away from the human race. It’s depressing.

So who would you be without this belief, that people should stop fighting?

Wait, what?

What d’ya mean, without that thought? Are you saying….it’s OK for them to be fighting! You must be crazy!!

No. This isn’t saying you find it OK, acceptable, good, kind, happy, beneficial.

Not at all.

But without the thought screaming in my mind, without the bracing within my body against this thing called “fighting” I definitely relax a moment.

I think about these people who are fighting, and I want to understand, to connect, to listen.

I don’t tell them what to do, I don’t give speeches, I may or may not be super involved (my friend, after all, lives a long way away).

There’s a space of silence or a pause between thoughts, between words.

I notice, in reality, there is fighting. Always has been. Maybe always will be, who knows. I saw dogs fighting yesterday on the bike trail. Fighting, and fires, and fireworks, and huge waves crashing, and volcanoes erupting HAPPEN in this reality.

I also notice, in reality, there is NO fighting in this moment in my environment. It is very quiet, my daughter is reading at the table, my husband is on his computer, there’s a hum of a motor outside, I can hear rain pattering on the kitchen window.

Turning the thought around:

They shouldn’t stop fighting. They should keep on fighting, until they don’t. I should stop fighting in my own head, about their fighting. I should stop fighting myself. I should stop fighting my own thinking.

Ooh. Nice little pussy cat thoughts (like tweety bird)….you aren’t so lionishly terrifying after all, are you?

If you look at a pile of thoughts….there’s nothing there.

Ha ha!

And silence holds it all.

“It has nothing to do with effort. Just turn away, look between the thoughts, rather than at the thoughts. When you happen to walk in a crowd, you do not fight every man you meet, you just find your way between. When you fight, you invite a fight. But when you do not resist, you meet no resistance. When you refuse to play the game, you are out of it.” ~ Nisargadatta Maharaj in I Am That

Much love, Grace

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Cut your heart out without anesthesia

an ouchy story, worth questioning---are you sure it's true?
an ouchy story, worth questioning—are you sure it’s true?

The other day the Year of Inquiry group had a powerful investigation of primary love relationships.

The kind where people choose to commit, marry, move in together, share resources.

The initial idea offered up for inquiry, so very stressful:

Relationships hurt.

I love the way Big General Ideas can lead to powerful deep contemplation on your own personal belief-system.

That’s why I always have a “topic” in Year of Inquiry.

Because, if you’re not sure where to begin around what bothers you i in your life, you can often find Big General Situations you find distressing, uncomfortable, or horrifying.

They’re happening right now, in the news, right?

So the other day, we were looking at relationships in general.

Have you ever thought “this relationship is so painful”.

About ANY relationship you’ve had in your life?

You’d almost be strange if you didn’t have that thought.

The mind LOVES generalizations.

It loves to have one experience….THAT relationship….and begin to find proof of all the other relationships that also hurt.

Like Romeo and Juliet for example. They sure were screwed up in a tragedy of errors, weren’t they?

(See how we can get started on that story over there, not the one right here, in our own heart?)

Thoughts will start floating through, or zapping at you like lightening bolts.

  • All love relationships suck.
  • Love stories are all fairy tales.
  • Those who get married never stay together (and people should stay together).
  • All teenagers are hard to live with.
  • In-laws are torturous.
  • Mothers are HUGELY stressful. They influence us so greatly. So do dad’s (if they were around….they should have been by the way).
  • Friends betray you. Or don’t have enough time. Can only do so much.
  • Bosses are so often difficult, and co-workers, because you HAVE to deal with them daily in order to go to your job, which you depend on to survive.
  • Siblings compete with you. They’ll ditch you in a second.

I could go on.

Do you see how everything I just wrote, having to do with relating to others, has a big wide grand all-time statement in it about life with other people?

Mind loves this kind of general prejudice.

Here’s what I’ve noticed within myself:

Something happens where I felt pain. My heart broke. I felt grief, agony, sadness, loss. I felt frustration, anger. Maybe I couldn’t ask for what I wanted, or get it. Maybe I felt the desperation of someone I cared about going downhill, fast. Maybe I couldn’t get my basic needs met, for example, as a kid…..or right now, in my current life.

But then my mind tries to gather it all together and make a conclusion.

My thinking (always a few beats AFTER the experience has already happened) makes an observation, then holds it up against other situations that are almost exactly the same (or close) and says….

….You need to stay away from “x” (person’s name).

Then just to be safe, the mind also says to not only stay away from that person who hurt you, but also ALL OTHER PEOPLE LIKE them.

So you can be prepared.

Not that there’s anything wrong with being prepared….but you already ARE prepared, and you didn’t even ask for it.

It just happened that way.

You experienced what you did, by humans bumping up into each other, and you got prepared by being thrown in the pool. Your heart was broken. The people who reared you were in huge pain and suffering and knew no other way themselves.

Your thoughts will say….

Must. Be. Very. Careful.

And then if you even smell a whiff of that “kind” of person again, you’re outta here!

That “kind of person” who hurt you in the past, this is what they are like and I know it:

They have no regard for others…..yeah, that’s right! They vote Republican. Or Democrat. They have long hair. They smoke. They go to that kind of place on Sundays. They live in this kind of area. They dress in those kinds of clothes. They go to this kind of school. They say these kinds of words.

But the thing is….

….if you keep your thoughts hugely general like this, you won’t really ever get to the inner inquiry. Or it will be trickier potentially.

Nothing’s impossible, but you may want to follow the simple directions and slow what you’re picturing way, way, way down and look at just one thing that’s frightening you very closely.

So you ponder what troubles you about humanity, about human relationships.

So you derail the GENERAL category movement that the mind loves so much.

“The mind loves general…it doesn’t have to land.” ~ Byron Katie at 2008 – 2009 New Year’s Cleanse.

So consider as you narrow down your list of proof for why those relationships hurt….

….the relationships who have hurt YOU.

Just you.

Those are the ones you want to focus on.

If you have someone in your life who is suffering, and it makes you super crazy nervous because it seems like they’re going down in flames….

….where have YOU gone down in flames?

What makes you so nervous about that person being that way?

What are you trying to avoid?

What is it you never want to go through again?

That friend who is going through divorce? Why does it really bother you? What’s the worst that could happen…..for YOU?

Or that brother who is in a new relationship that in your opinion is lousy?

Why? What’s the actual problem, for you personally?

Picture your worst case scenario.

Picture it, for your own sake.

Get specific.

This is YOUR life and YOUR inquiry we’re talking about, not someone else’s.

Instead of generalizing all over the canyons and valleys and spouting off what would be best for other people, notice what fear is sparked inside of you, what you’re afraid of, when you see something you fear.

Then….you’re on to your own story.

Which is the one that counts.

Today, as you consider what you don’t like about other peoples’ experience out there…..

…..let yourself see why not.

Then you can really truly inquire in a way that makes a difference, for you.

And when you do THAT….

….wow.

Look out.

“At first, inquiry may seem more than you can handle; you may feel as if it is cutting your heart open without anesthesia….You are still identifying as a you, and you begin to see that you yourself are all the people you found unkind, brutal, stupid, crazy, greedy, despicable, and this is so painful that sometimes you don’t think you can bear it. As it keeps inquiring, the mind continues to understand that it is its only enemy and that the world is entirely its projection, that it is alone, that there is no other, and that this is absolute.” ~ Byron Katie in 1000 Names for Joy pg. 233

Keep going.

It is not more than you can handle, to feel and see the terrible situations “out there”.

They are a part of you, of us.

Find your enemy. Question it.

You can bear it. You can.

Much love, Grace

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Feeling Stuck when you need to say “no” to someone?

darkness
bad things can happen if you say “no”….are you sure?

Wow, another meetup! Saturday, November 21st 2-4 pm in Seattle at Goldilocks Cottage.

Good time of year to do The Work even more, right?

Also, last chance to join Eating Peace the powerful online program that begins tomorrow to address inner angst and lack of peace when it comes to consuming. Eating Peace is 12 weeks of Tuesday Presentations and Wednesdays in The Work. We always meet from 9-10:30 am Pacific Time (both days). Everything is recorded if you need to miss.

This is the last time I’ll offer Eating Peace at this fee. When you join, you get access to Eating Peace for life, every time I offer it. Yes, you read that correctly.

*******

Yesterday I was talking with a dear friend.

About his need to say “no” to his parents.

He’s a young adult in his mid-twenties, but as I spoke with him, I thought….

….his age probably doesn’t really matter, not really.

His parents were asking him lots of questions about his life, his career, his goals, his intentions, his direction.

But I’ve talked with plenty of older adults who still thought their parents were nosey, or asked too much, or requested too much information.

If it’s not parents, you might still relate to someone in your life peppering you with questions, or inviting you over, or wanting to spend time, or suggesting you see this movie, or buy that good deal, or get a job at their place of employment.

I once had someone in a class I offered come up at every single break and ask me questions.

I started wanting to duck out the back door.

She should leave me alone!

This is what the young man thought about his parents.

We laugh in the movies about this kind of character who doesn’t get the hint and comes over at awkward hours, or calls at the crack of dawn, or barges into our office when the door was shut with a Do Not Disturb hanging in broad daylight.

What is UP with that person?

Can’t they see I’m trying to have some silence, take a break, get some down time?

What is wrong with them that they would have so many questions?

(I love how the mind will decide something is wrong…with them…because they have questions you don’t want to answer).

What if you could hold on to yourself, as couples therapist David Schnarch so famously puts it….

….no matter WHAT that person is doing, saying, asking, or acting like?

One way to get to your truth, is to see why it is you don’t want to tell it.

So….why don’t you want to tell the truth?

The truth that you don’t feel like talking right now, you don’t want to have a conversation until later, you don’t want to go to that movie, your answer is “no”?

I can’t say “no”! They’ll get hurt, disappointed! They’ll call me two-faced, or someone who isn’t clear. They’ll be upset. They’ll say I led them on. They’ll criticize me for changing my mind. They’ll be so disappointed!

A great way to work with this kind of anxious thinking, about what will happen if you simply tell the truth and tell them your answer, is to imagine it really happens.

Ugh.

They ARE hurt.

They ARE mad.

They HATE you.

Is it true?

Are you sure it’s true?

How do you react when you believe you MUST avoid hurting someone’s feelings in any way possible, or disappointing them, or concerning them?

How do you react when you believe you CAN hurt their feelings?

Careful.

So careful, you might not even know how you feel about something anymore, yourself.

So careful you might feel you have no preferences, you’re completely easy-going, and it’s a terrible risk to reveal you disagree or want to say no to someone you love.

Terrified of the results, the rejection.

I used to be like this.

Honestly, I still get surprised by peoples’ requests sometimes. I don’t have an answer right away all the time.

But it used to take me so long, I would feel stuck in a vice of indecision.

All to avoid that terrible “no” which would then “hurt” this other person.

Who would you be without the belief that the person who has asked you for something will be upset if you say “no”?

Who would you be without the belief that if they DO act upset, you were wrong, bad or a horrible person? Or that you’ll be rejected?

Wow.

You mean….not knowing what the outcome would be, just going with my honest answer?

Holy moly.

It’s so much freedom, and as I said, so different from the way I lived in the past, I still find it odd at times.

Not trying to manipulate any outcome…..including the outcome that seems “kind” which is that they are happy, not disappointed, not hurt, and comfortable?

Wow again.

I turn the thought around: I can’t hurt their feelings with my answer. I can hurt my own feelings, by believing I have the power to hurt theirs. They can hurt my feelings with their responses (when I believe they need to like me, or be happy).

The young man I was speaking with reminded me of a poem.

What if freedom is the greatest movement of all, inside yourself, inside others?

Free to be exactly as you are, without dreading what will happen next.

Give it a try.

“…The night will give you a horizon
further than you can see.
You must learn one thing.
The world was made to be free in.
Give up all the other worlds
except the one to which you belong.
Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn
anything or anyone 
that does not bring you alive
is too small for you.”
~ David Whyte from his poem Sweet Darkness

Much love, Grace

 

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Question other’s lack of appreciation, and become….priceless

alone
Spared from the desire for love, approval and appreciation….you are the act of appreciation itself

Yesterday the Year of Inquiry group looked at a thought that is so repetitive within the human psyche, it’s rather stunning:

That person does not appreciate me.

How do you know?

There are so many ways we know….where to begin?!!

I see them hugging someone else, not me. I hear about them eating lunch with another friend, they’ve never invited me before. I overhear them talking about how brilliant someone is, and they’ve never said anything like this about me. I see them kissing someone else, and I thought we were in an exclusive romance. 

I watch them leaning towards someone from across the room, and I think they don’t appear that interested when talking to me. They don’t call me back. They don’t ask my opinion. They say “no” to me. They don’t give me money. They stare at their screen, instead of me. They engage in addiction, even though I asked them to stop. I don’t get a raise.They don’t clean up. They don’t touch me. They don’t say they love me. They never reply to my emails. 

I could go on and on with what I’ve thought or heard from others, or seen in the movies.

People get so disturbed by the evidence of non-appreciation.

It’s almost overwhelming, and infinite.

But let’s look a little closer at this belief, this feeling of not being appreciated.

I once was getting to know a man. He was a friend and a romantic interest.

We talked like friends. Many hours on the phone for several months.

One day he told me about his plans to go to a summer festival where he would stay in a cabin with old friends, some acquaintances. He lived very far away from me, and I was neither invited nor would I have been able to attend–it had not crossed my mind as something I even wanted to do, honestly.

I had been on the phone with him during his drive into the mountains of somewhere in sunny California, on his way to the festival.

As usual for this early, fun, get-to-know-you stage of the relationship, we were laughing and flirting and telling stories about ourselves. He described the landscape.

He said “I’m about to go into territory where I think there’s no cell service, so if I don’t……”

Cut.

Silence.

LOL.

I looked forward to the likely call we would have on Monday, when he got back home and back into cell zone.

Little did I know…..

“I have something to tell you about the weekend….it’s crazy!” he said like a friend who’s excited to tell some weird and interesting, and awesome news.

“I had sex with someone, and I don’t even know her name! Isn’t that so funny and wild?!?”

(Tires screeching in my head…..followed by a huge gigantic CRASH sound).

Pause. Pause. I was catching my breath, holding it.

I uttered a weak “oh, ha ha, yeah…..crazy.”

He then launched into the story of the noticing this woman, the meeting, the connection, and the path to actual sex and how that all unfolded.

Like a girlfriend telling me about her liaison with a man for the first time, in a way she might have felt as liberating and wild, and new, and fun.

But my stomach was sick.

“Ooops, I gotta go!” I hung up the phone, reeling.

Fortunately, I knew exactly what to do.

The Work.

I had asked for my world, as far as relationships went, to be turned upside down. My old stodgy stories from, oh probably the year 1705 (and a few centuries earlier) were so full of pain and stress, and ownership, and false expectations, and lack of clarity, power, or love….

….that on the heels of divorce, I knew I wanted these stories to dissolve.

I knew they weren’t true as ideas, but obviously not in my heart and body.

They provided only suffering, and they came from some weird history that no longer made any sense (or maybe never did).

I called all my friends who could facilitate the Work, and asked them for appointments for that entire Monday and Tuesday. I called in sick to my job. Because my mind WAS sick.

I believed that man, as a new interesting friend of MINE, should want to be sexual with me and only me.

How ridiculous.

Now, stay with me here. Because this does not mean I am not interested deeply in monogamy and care and attention of a primary relationship. I’m in one now, like that. So far, I love a whole lot about the current relationship I appear to be in, and it feels wonderful and easy and very kind.

But who would I be without that thought that when someone doesn’t want this, they’re not appreciating ME?

Without the belief that it means I am being rejected as they want what they want?

At first, all I could do was to see and imagine how I would be, in that very situation, without the belief.

I couldn’t really feel it.

I could imagine a different person, like the lady next door, who didn’t care about this guy and all the dreamy ideas of being together (sigh) and how SHE might feel.

She wouldn’t be feeling like she lost something, or recognized something awful. She wouldn’t feel rejected, disappointed, unworthy, alone.

As I contemplated my work, and felt the dagger punch in my stomach subside….

….I began to use my mind and my imagination for ease, for wondering

Rather than self-torture.

Who would I be without the belief that his behavior means anything about my behavior? Without the thought this means I am unappreciated?

Wow.

Wow.

Isn’t this what I actually asked for?

Isn’t this what I wanted…..to feel freedom to come and go as I pleased and want everyone else to do the same?

Don’t I want this in every kind of relationship, not just romantic love or sexual relationships?

Clients, family, children, parents, neighbors…..can I be in deep connection with them, no matter what they do or don’t do?

Wouldn’t I want everyone to follow their heart’s desire?

I mean….they have to appreciate ME….really?

I suddenly realized it wasn’t true.

At all.

Wow. The relaxation I felt at not needing to be appreciated, at not needing to be accepted, invited, wanted, hired, cared about…..

….even though it feels tentative at times, don’t get me wrong (and then I do The Work, or ask for what I really want like a hug or a conversation).

I could see in that experience that what was truer, honestly truer, was that he should NOT appreciate me, when he’s busy appreciating someone else.

I should appreciate myself, always.

I should appreciate HIM (I did and still do, he taught me to let go and then ask for what I truly, deeply wanted and cared about at that time).

That experience led me to fading out on all those long-distance conversations that lasted hours….

….and come back to myself, in the present, without any thoughts about what would happen in the future.

Appreciation right now.

It’s worth giving up a dream for. In a very, very good way.

“If I had a prayer, it would be ‘God, spare me from seeking love, approval, or appreciation. Amen’. ” ~ Byron Katie

Much love, Grace