I assumed the "reality therapy" in Byron Katie’s book "Loving What Is" would have the same benefits and limitations as Ken Key’s "Handbook to Higher Consciousness," Albert Ellis’ "Rational Emotive Therapy" and William Glasser’s "Choice Theory." All help strong willed intellectuals get their thinking straight.
Katie provides help for the more emotional and irresolute by inviting us up front to fill out a "Judge-Your-Neighbor" worksheet and loose our mind to come to our senses.
Katie says four simple questions called "The Work" allowed her painful thoughts to let go of her. She was severely depressed for 10 years when she suddenly woke up without the concept of a self in 1986. She calls the experience waking up to reality and has introduced The Work to hundreds of thousands of people in workshops, businesses, schools, prisons, and hospitals around the world. She denies being "enlightened" and says, "I know the difference between what hurts and doesn’t."
Examples of The Work in her books show how the inquiry enables workshop participants to accept what is, be more peaceful and loving and become more clear, kind and fearless. A number of turnaround questions also enable people to discover The Work’s power to find clarity and the energy to act.
Katie says that when we argue with reality we lose 100% of the time. It’s not the problem that causes suffering, it’s our thinking about the problem.
Katie’s inquiry reveals where our thinking isn’t true , and how our concepts and judgments distort reality. When we believe our thoughts instead of what is really true for us, we suffer. Our pain is nature’s alarm that we are attached to our thoughts.
People who practice The Work often say it is not something they do—it is doing them. Their minds notice the stressful thoughts without conscious intention.
The Work can be done with a facilitator or alone with a piece of paper and pen.Byron says without a story, without an enemy, action is spontaneous, clear and infinitely kind. Her other helpful quotes include:
Without the story we are successful wherever we are.
Our attachment is our religion.
Everything we are defending against is the truth.
Let love not anger or fear be the motivator.
When we are in our right mind we realize that we live in paradise and we haven’t noticed.
Alcoholics were drunk with their thinking before they were drunk with their drinking.
Our enemies can guide us to the truth about us.
Once we see the truth the thought lets go of us.
The advice we give to others turns out to be advice for ourselves, not others.
Until our insights come to life in action they are not fully ours.
We become a wise teacher when we become a student of ourselves.
The Work is about noticing our thoughts, not changing them. When we work with our thinking, the doing naturally follows.
The three part inquiry asks:
Fill out a Judge-Your-Neighbor worksheet
Who angers or saddens of disappoints you? What is it about them that you don’t like?
How do you want them to change?
What is it that they should or should not do, think of feel?
What do you need from them?
What do you think of them? Make a list?
Ask yourself the four questions about each part:
- Is it true ?
- Can you know absolutely that it’s true ?
- How do you react when you think that thought?
- Who would you be without that thought? Can I see a reason to drop that thought? Please don’t drop the thought. Can I find one stress free reason to keep the thought?
(Example: My husband should listen to me.)
Turn the judgment around to yourself. I should listen to me.
Turn it around to the other. I should listen to my husband.
Turn it around to the opposite. My husband shouldn’t listen to me.
I am willing to… I look forward to…
Six questions when a story is hard to find:
I’m sad, disappointed, ashamed, embarrassed, afraid, irritated, and angry because ______and it means _________.
I want _____.
They or I should _____.
I need _______.
They or I judge ______.
Never again _______.
Turn the questions around to see what is true for you:
