"Who would you be without your story?"
- Byron Katie
- Byron Katie
The Work
Wow, The Work is an awesome tool. Most tools to increase your happiness advice you to change your thoughts or stop thinking all together. This is very different. The Work is one of the few tools were you actually question your thoughts; it’s about undoing thoughts rather than adding new ones. Byron Katie is the creator of this life changing process.
The Work is all about self-inquiry and consists of four questions and a turnaround. All that’s required is a pen, some paper and an open mind. Through this process, anyone can learn to trace unhappiness to its source and eliminate it there. You start by identifying a belief or thought that causes you anxiety or unhappiness. You are encouraged to choose something which feels important that someone else does or did. When alone, one writes down their response, and with another person one speaks their answers aloud.
The Work is all about self-inquiry and consists of four questions and a turnaround. All that’s required is a pen, some paper and an open mind. Through this process, anyone can learn to trace unhappiness to its source and eliminate it there. You start by identifying a belief or thought that causes you anxiety or unhappiness. You are encouraged to choose something which feels important that someone else does or did. When alone, one writes down their response, and with another person one speaks their answers aloud.
How The Work Began
Byron Katie became severely depressed in her early thirties. For almost a decade she spiraled down into depression, rage, self-loathing, and constant thoughts of suicide; for the last two years she was often unable to leave her bedroom.
Then one morning in February 1986, she experienced a life-changing realization. There are various names for an experience like this. Katie calls it "waking up to reality."
In that instant of no-time, she says,
I discovered that when I believed my thoughts, I suffered, but that when I didn’t believe them, I didn’t suffer, and that this is true for every human being. Freedom is as simple as that. I found that suffering is optional. I found a joy within me that has never disappeared, not for a single moment. That joy is in everyone, always.
She realized that what had been causing her depression was not the world around her, but the beliefs she'd had about the world. Instead of hopelessly trying to change the world to match her thoughts about how it should be, she could question these thoughts and, by meeting reality as it is, experience unimaginable freedom and joy. As a result, a bedridden, suicidal woman was instantly filled with love for everything life brings.
Katie's process of self-inquiry, called The Work, didn't develop from this experience; she says that it woke up with her, as her, that February morning in 1986. The first people who did The Work reported that it had transformed their lives, and she soon began receiving invitations to teach the process publicly.
Source: http://www.thework.com/about.asp
Byron Katie became severely depressed in her early thirties. For almost a decade she spiraled down into depression, rage, self-loathing, and constant thoughts of suicide; for the last two years she was often unable to leave her bedroom.
Then one morning in February 1986, she experienced a life-changing realization. There are various names for an experience like this. Katie calls it "waking up to reality."
In that instant of no-time, she says,
I discovered that when I believed my thoughts, I suffered, but that when I didn’t believe them, I didn’t suffer, and that this is true for every human being. Freedom is as simple as that. I found that suffering is optional. I found a joy within me that has never disappeared, not for a single moment. That joy is in everyone, always.
She realized that what had been causing her depression was not the world around her, but the beliefs she'd had about the world. Instead of hopelessly trying to change the world to match her thoughts about how it should be, she could question these thoughts and, by meeting reality as it is, experience unimaginable freedom and joy. As a result, a bedridden, suicidal woman was instantly filled with love for everything life brings.
Katie's process of self-inquiry, called The Work, didn't develop from this experience; she says that it woke up with her, as her, that February morning in 1986. The first people who did The Work reported that it had transformed their lives, and she soon began receiving invitations to teach the process publicly.
Source: http://www.thework.com/about.asp
Why do the Work?
People who do The Work as an ongoing practice report life-changing results:
· Alleviation of depression: Find resolution, and even happiness, in situations that were once debilitating.
· Decreased stress: Learn how to live with less anxiety or fear.
· Improved relationships: Experience deeper connection and intimacy with your partner, your parents, your children, your friends, and yourself.
· Reduced anger: Understand what makes you angry and resentful, and become less reactive, less often, with less intensity.
· Increased mental clarity: Live and work more intelligently and effectively, with integrity.
· More energy: Experience a new sense of ongoing vigor and well-being.
· More peace: Discover how to become "a lover of what is."
Source: http://www.thework.com/thework.asp
People who do The Work as an ongoing practice report life-changing results:
· Alleviation of depression: Find resolution, and even happiness, in situations that were once debilitating.
· Decreased stress: Learn how to live with less anxiety or fear.
· Improved relationships: Experience deeper connection and intimacy with your partner, your parents, your children, your friends, and yourself.
· Reduced anger: Understand what makes you angry and resentful, and become less reactive, less often, with less intensity.
· Increased mental clarity: Live and work more intelligently and effectively, with integrity.
· More energy: Experience a new sense of ongoing vigor and well-being.
· More peace: Discover how to become "a lover of what is."
Source: http://www.thework.com/thework.asp
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Start Now:
1. Judge Your Neighbor
For thousands of years we’ve been told not to judge, but we still do it all the time—how our friends should act, whom our children should care about, what our parents should feel, do, or say. In The Work, rather than suppress these judgments, we use them as starting points for self-realization. By letting the judging mind have its life on paper, we discover through the mirror of those around us what we haven't yet realized about ourselves.
Fill in a Judge-Your-Neighbor Worksheet. You can download one below:
1. Judge Your Neighbor
For thousands of years we’ve been told not to judge, but we still do it all the time—how our friends should act, whom our children should care about, what our parents should feel, do, or say. In The Work, rather than suppress these judgments, we use them as starting points for self-realization. By letting the judging mind have its life on paper, we discover through the mirror of those around us what we haven't yet realized about ourselves.
Fill in a Judge-Your-Neighbor Worksheet. You can download one below:
| judgeyourneighbor.pdf |
2. Ask the 4 Questions
Investigate each of your statements from the Judge-Your-Neighbor Worksheet using the four questions and the turnaround below.
It’s about awareness, not about trying to change your thoughts. Ask the questions, then take your time, go inside, and wait for the deeper answers to surface. Download the blue sheet for use as a facilitation guide.
Investigate each of your statements from the Judge-Your-Neighbor Worksheet using the four questions and the turnaround below.
It’s about awareness, not about trying to change your thoughts. Ask the questions, then take your time, go inside, and wait for the deeper answers to surface. Download the blue sheet for use as a facilitation guide.
| facilitationguide.pdf |
1) Is it true?
2) Can you absolutely know that it's true?
3) How do you react, what happens, when you believe that thought?
4) Who would you be without the thought?
2) Can you absolutely know that it's true?
3) How do you react, what happens, when you believe that thought?
4) Who would you be without the thought?
3. Turn it Around
Each turnaround is an opportunity to experience the opposite of your original statement and see what you and the person you've judged have in common.
A statement can be turned around to the opposite, to the other, and to the self (and sometimes to "my thinking," wherever that applies). Find a minimum of three genuine, specific examples in your life where each turnaround is true.
Be creative with the turnarounds. They are revelations, showing you previously unseen aspects of yourself reflected back through others. Once you've found a turnaround, go inside and let yourself feel it.
Source:http://www.thework.com/thework.asp
Each turnaround is an opportunity to experience the opposite of your original statement and see what you and the person you've judged have in common.
A statement can be turned around to the opposite, to the other, and to the self (and sometimes to "my thinking," wherever that applies). Find a minimum of three genuine, specific examples in your life where each turnaround is true.
Be creative with the turnarounds. They are revelations, showing you previously unseen aspects of yourself reflected back through others. Once you've found a turnaround, go inside and let yourself feel it.
Source:http://www.thework.com/thework.asp
Examples of Turnarounds:
· "He should understand me" turns around to:
- He shouldn't understand me. (This is reality.)
- I should understand him.
- I should understand myself.
· "I need him to be kind to me" turns around to:
- I don't need him to be kind to me.
- I need me to be kind to him. (Can I live it?)
- I need me to be kind to myself.
· "He is unloving to me" turns around to:
- He is loving to me. (To the best of his ability)
- I am unloving to him. (Can I find it?)
- I am unloving to me (When I don't inquire.)
· "Paul shouldn't shout at me" turns around to:
- Paul should shout at me. (Obviously: In reality, he does sometimes. Am I listening?)
- I shouldn't shout at Paul.
- I shouldn't shout at me.
(In my head, am I playing over and over again Paul's shouting? Who's more merciful, Paul who shouted once, or me who replayed it a 100 times?)
Source:http://www.thework.com/thework.asp
Embracing Reality
After you have turned around the judgments in your answers to numbers 1 through 5 on the worksheet (asking if they are as true or truer), turn number 6 around using "I am willing ..." and "I look forward to ..."
For example, "I don't ever want to experience an argument with Paul" turns around to "I am willing to experience an argument with Paul" and "I look forward to experiencing an argument with Paul." Why would you look forward to it?
Number 6 is about fully embracing all of mind and life without fear, and being open to reality. If you experience an argument with Paul again, good. If it hurts, you can put your thoughts on paper and investigate them. Uncomfortable feelings are merely the reminders that we've attached to something that may not be true for us. They let us know that it's time to do The Work.
Until you can see the enemy as a friend, your Work is not done. This doesn't mean you must invite him to dinner. Friendship is an internal experience. You may never see him again, you may even divorce him, but as you think about him are you feeling stress or peace?
In my experience, it takes only one person to have a successful relationship. I like to say I have the perfect marriage, and I can't really know what kind of marriage my husband has (though he tells me he's happy too).
Source:http://www.thework.com/thework.asp
After you have turned around the judgments in your answers to numbers 1 through 5 on the worksheet (asking if they are as true or truer), turn number 6 around using "I am willing ..." and "I look forward to ..."
For example, "I don't ever want to experience an argument with Paul" turns around to "I am willing to experience an argument with Paul" and "I look forward to experiencing an argument with Paul." Why would you look forward to it?
Number 6 is about fully embracing all of mind and life without fear, and being open to reality. If you experience an argument with Paul again, good. If it hurts, you can put your thoughts on paper and investigate them. Uncomfortable feelings are merely the reminders that we've attached to something that may not be true for us. They let us know that it's time to do The Work.
Until you can see the enemy as a friend, your Work is not done. This doesn't mean you must invite him to dinner. Friendship is an internal experience. You may never see him again, you may even divorce him, but as you think about him are you feeling stress or peace?
In my experience, it takes only one person to have a successful relationship. I like to say I have the perfect marriage, and I can't really know what kind of marriage my husband has (though he tells me he's happy too).
Source:http://www.thework.com/thework.asp
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