“There is nothing either good nor bad, but thinking makes it so”
~ William Shakespeare
What’s the common denominator in everything that holds us back or moves us forward – our thinking.
It’s said we have about 60,000 thoughts each day and not only are the vast majority of them negative in nature but also incredibly repetitive.
Have you ever wondered if those thoughts are actually true or where they come from?
The mind’s job is to continually prove that everything we hear growing up about how the world and us in it should be is true. Just like a recording, playing over and over, never to be changed or questioned.
And that’s all fine … until your world doesn’t match what you were taught to believe!
Anytime we believe something should be different than what it is, the result is always stress.
This is where Byron Katie’s Work comes in.
What The Work is…
The Work is a process of internal inquiry, leading to personal insights and self-realization, unraveling the stories that keep you from being at peace with everything in life?
Byron Katie has found “Whenever we experience a stressful feeling – anything from mild discomfort to intense sorrow, rage or despair – we can be certain that there is a specific thought causing our reaction, whether or not we are conscious of it.”
With this simple yet profound self-inquiry, we begin to notice and hear the thoughts that live in our mind. By slowing down, we can discover the beliefs running our lives, creating stress, unhappiness and fear. They are frequently judgments about other people, ourselves and how the world should be different than it is. Once identified, we can take these thoughts to inquiry and discover for ourselves what is really true. This truth is where our peace lies.
My experience of The Work is that it is both meditation and training for the mind. Gradually mind becomes more trusting that what it is perceiving as stressful is not actually true despite it seeming so real.
The Work compliments any spiritual practice, therapy or healing modality.
What The Work isn’t…
The Work isn’t about trying to get rid of a belief or going into denial or trying to change our minds, rationalize our way out, replace negative thoughts with a spiritual concept or attempt to believe something different. There are no positive affirmations, rewriting of how we want things to be, or even an intention to fix ones self or someone else.
Good for your health too!
Research in epigenetics reveals that how we perceive our environment determines the expression of our genes. Perception is the primary mechanism that controls our biology and therefore inaccurate perceptions will inaccurately run that biology, which can lead to dysfunction and disease. This is why thought becomes a prominent contributor to the state of health we experience. Anytime we believe something should be different than what it is, the result is always stress. Highly recognized stem cell biologist, Bruce Lipton PhD, regards meditation and changing perceptions and beliefs about life, to be the most important things we can do for our health.
Here’s a video, created by my talented niece Cat Olejko, from a workshop in Australia January, 2015.
