“Why are you still in this quandary?”
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Heidi writes: “What if there is a stuck place that can’t make a decision one way or another, and there is very much a bias toward one of those, and so it’s hard to be grounded in Presence in order to listen to both ‘sides’. In addition to the biased part, I’ve identified a very angry and rageful part that says, ‘Why the F are you still in this quandary? What is wrong with you?’ Is it possible to simply acknowledge and say hello to all these layers of parts resting over the do-I or don’t-I parts and go directly to those and focus on them?”
Dear Heidi,
It’s an interesting question, this one about how to do Focusing with decisions. As you know, we’ll need to acknowledge each of the parts that are operating, in order to really be in Presence.
Your question, though, is whether we need to spend MORE time, beyond just acknowledging, with the various parts that are “about” the decision, rather than being with the “do-I or don’t-I” of the decision itself.
So this question itself is an interesting one. It seems to come from a part that wants to hurry to make the decision, that has a hard time not having the decision made. “Do I have to listen to other parts, can’t I just get to the decision?”
In my phone class on decisions, we spend time with four parts. First we identify the two parts of us pulling for the different sides of the decision: to leave or not to leave, to go back to school or keep working, to marry him or show him the door, etc. And there may be other options… but mainly there are two that need to be identified and acknowledged.
Then we spend time with two other parts that are about the decision.
The first is the part that doesn’t want to make the decision. It could have all kinds of reasons, and we’d like to spend time getting to know it, and listening to what it is worried about and what it wants for us.
The second part that is about the decision is the one that is impatient for us to make this decision faster. It often uses the methods of insult and criticism: “What’s wrong with you that you can’t get this decided?” As we know very well, this kind of method keeps the stuck system in place–and springs from fear.
“What if there is a stuck place that can’t make a decision?”
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Now we can notice something else very interesting in Heidi’s question: “What if there is a stuck place that can’t make a decision?” The word “stuck” is already a judgment–this sentence is already spoken from the point of view of the part that is impatient.
I think we’ll find that true whenever we use the word “stuck” about our inner experience: This word is used by a part of us that wants things to get moving. It’s not how we would speak in a state of Presence.
Presence, remember, is that inner state or ability to simply be with whatever arises. In Presence we have no opinions about good or bad, right or wrong, we are simply there, listening and sensing. We want to know how it is, and to hold gentle awareness there, just sensing how it is right now.
From there, true forward movement can come.
So the answer to Heidi’s question is that spending time with the part that is impatient to make the decision, and also spending time with the part that “can’t” (doesn’t want to) make the decision, is exactly what we need to do. Everything about the decision itself is wrapped up in there, in the tangle that can sort itself out when we listen from Presence.
There is “treasure” in there, in what each of those parts is wanting for me. AND when we go on to the decision itself–the part that wants to leave and the part that wants to stay, for example–there will be treasure there too.
Decisions are rich sources of treasure AND to find it we need Presence!