Sometimes Shifts Are Almost Imperceptible
When you do The Work, are you comparing your answers to some ideal?
Take Question 4 for example: “Who would you be without that thought?” Do you think the “right” answer is, “I would feel free!” Or, “I would feel peaceful”?
Does this prevent you from making a more subtle and more genuine observation?
Here’s One Reader’s Experience, Especially When Working with Trauma
“My Question 4 answer was ‘I would be awash with pain, confusion, ups and downs like white water swirling.’ So clearly, my Question 4 answer is not the typical ‘I’m free!’ kind of answer, but rather a gradual increment from 10 out of 10 on the pain scale to 9 out of 10, and it is a relief to me. Sometimes I feel nothing: numb, angry, like a WALL in my Question 3. So, instead, when flowing pain (water images), feelings (vs. numb), come in, that is a WIN for me, and I feel relief that I can feel something. There is movement. I’m not frozen in anger like a wall, like the past 20 years. I get to grieve. I come out of traumatic ‘freeze’ mode which comes before fight or flight.”
This Experience Is So Valuable to Read
Because it reminds me that comparing my answers to any “ideal” is the opposite of self-inquiry. If my genuine answer to Question 4 is “pain,” then why dismiss it? Why not just report it? And simply compare it to my answer to question three?
It may be demonstrating the difference in pain between a 10 and a 9 (on a scale of 1 to 10), which is huge!
Who says the answer to Question 4 has to be zero pain?
Have a great week,
Todd
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“You are always the one you’re working with. It’s your truth, not ours, that will set you free.” — Byron Katie, Loving What Is
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