“I was thinking that by Focusing I was being selfish”
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Last week I wrote about how Focusing can support productive action, rather than being just “navel-gazing,” the opposite of action. I heard from several of you in response, and of course this leads to new questions, one of which I’ll address this week.
Patricia wrote: “Thanks so much for this wonderful tip. It comes to my life exactly at a moment in which I was feeling down thinking that by Focusing I was being selfish – having discovered for some time now things in myself that I didn’t know, enjoying being with myself, but at the same time needing to make decisions about a career movement. The tendency to think that we are not in action sometimes pushes us to make decisions to take action on the wrong areas. Maybe I should focus on that part of me that is pushing me to take an action instead of waiting to hear what my body tells me?”
Dear Patricia:
At times it can be hard to trust the Focusing process to lead to forward movement. There are a couple of reasons for that.
One: It’s very common to have an impatient part that wants forward movement NOW… it doesn’t want anything that feels like more delay. This is a part of us that would rather do SOMETHING, even if it’s the wrong thing, rather than what feels like doing nothing.
So yes, absolutely, if you can feel a part of you pushing to take action, feeling impatient with delay, by all means Focus with it, turn toward it and say hello to it and listen to what it’s worried about. That will probably feel quite different from being pushed by it from outside your awareness.
And two, the other reason it can be hard to trust Focusing to lead to forward movement, is that sometimes it actually CAN’T be trusted!
(I bet you didn’t think I was going to say that!)
That’s because even Focusing can be used by a part of us to hide from what it is afraid of. So it’s not Focusing exactly that can’t be trusted, but a sort of almost-Focusing process in which returning again and again to inner awareness is being used by a part of us to avoid movement and action.
When We Use Focusing to Avoid Action… and What to Do Instead
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Just because a part of us can use Focusing to avoid taking action doesn’t mean that Focusing is to blame! A part of me can also use napping to avoid action… that doesn’t mean that napping is the problem.
But what can one do? Can Focusing help deal with a part that uses Focusing to avoid action? Yes!
The way to detect that something like this is happening is by noticing if you feel stuck or frustrated somewhere in your life. If there is any part of you saying, “I should be doing ___” or “I want to be doing _____” and the doing isn’t happening, that is a place for Focusing.
But not just ANY Focusing. There is a special kind of “focused” Focusing that can help us resolve this kind of impasse. Let me give an example.
Let’s say I am thinking and feeling that I really need to get started writing my next book. And I notice that I’ve been having that thought/feeling for weeks, yet I’m not doing it. So I sit down to Focus with this invitation: “I’d like to get in touch with the part of me that’s not wanting to start writing.”
What comes: an uneasy sort of feeling in my stomach… and I acknowledge it… I sit with it and listen to it… it’s something about not being sure who the book will be for. Am I writing for the general public or for healing professionals? I check with the uneasy feeling. “Is that it?”
That’s part of it… and there’s more, and I will keep listening.
It’s clear to me that THIS Focusing is along the lines of forward movement. Once I have begun to hear the part of me that hesitates to take this action, then the way to action opens up. THIS Focusing is not being used to avoid action.
So Focusing from Presence, “true” Focusing, Focusing that acknowledges but doesn’t identify with what’s here, that is Focusing that is aligned with action, and will open a space for forward movement that feels right to the whole being.