When you are Focusing, it helps to develop your capacity for awareness.
This deepens and enriches your Focusing and brings lasting change into your life…. You can find your awareness in your mind, in your heart or in your belly. You can look for it where it is most accessible, in external sensory awareness, or internal awareness.
stress
When does having an active dialogue with an inner voice become a waste of time?
There are many factors that can get in the way of a fruitful inner dialogue, and I will address some of them here.
1. If the dialogue is based solely in your head and in your thoughts, and not taking account of what’s happening as a body-based inner process. Your body knows more that you are consciously aware of, so if you take time to pause and listen carefully, in those quiet moments something new can come to you…
What does it mean to take care of yourself?
How many times do we say to each other, ‘take care’, or ‘take good care of yourself’, or ‘look after yourself’, usually as a way of saying goodbye?
Do we really take care of ourselves? Do you?
What often stops us is lack of time, or perhaps an unwillingness to slow down, pause and listen, and take the action that is needed.
Sometimes we may not listen because we don’t want to hear what our body tells us.
Coronavirus – is there a gift in the crisis?
Coronavirus is like a world illness. Any illness is a time to stop and reflect; a period of enforced change.
I can’t just carry on as I usually do; I have to let go, pause, surrender. When I emerge from the illness, I am changed somehow. There has been a process of letting go.
I can pick up the threads of my old life, but it’s different now.
I see this time as a process of change for the world, and we are being affected by it.
Slow down
How often do we take the time to slow down, pause, and really listen to how it feels inside?
Time seems to change in a Focusing session. People often say how quickly the time seems to go. It’s almost like stretching out time, so you can see more clearly.
When I find something difficult in my Focusing, I go to a soothing peaceful place.
A Focuser says: ‘Sometimes when I find something difficult in my Focusing, I go to a soothing peaceful place with a calm peaceful lake and I feel much better.’
There is nothing wrong with doing this.
…This enables you to give your friendly, non-judgemental attention to whatever is difficult.
As long as you don’t stop there…
What is resistance and what can I do about it?
I often hear people saying they have a resistance to something. They try to struggle with it and get past it, so that they can do what they really want to do.
Perhaps you have experienced something like this. You want to take an action but something in you seems to be resisting it, or preventing you from doing it…
Living with things that don’t change
The life situation you are facing is still the same, and you may be getting desperate because you can’t make it change by Focusing on it.
It can make a big difference if instead of trying to force it to change, you focus on changing your relationship to it. You can start by recognising that it is there; it has been that way for a long time, maybe as long as you can remember, or maybe you remember when it started, as in the case of a serious illness or mental health difficulty. You can start by bringing a sense of kindness and friendliness towards yourself who is struggling or suffering in this particular way.
Focusing with climate change and other world events
How can we live with the distress caused by climate change, Brexit and other major world events; with climate change being the biggest challenge to us all?
…My experience is that I have lived with the anguish and distress all my life. It’s under the surface much of the time. Periodically I turn towards it, and simply listen….
What comes is how much sadness and pain is there. Something in me finds it unbearable…
As well as hopelessness, I also sensed and recognised the enormous hopefulness I feel…
Don’t just focus on the problem
A Focuser says, ‘Sometimes if I Focus on the problem, it just gets worse. Maybe it’s best if I don’t think about it. How does Focusing help?’
It’s true that when you Focus on a problem, it can seem to get worse. This is what I call intensification. What is happening is that when you bring your attention to something, you become more acutely aware of the pain it is carrying.
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