Scary Part or Scared Part?
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Arno writes: I am writing you about a passage in your article "Relationship=distance+connection".
Client: "There’s a well of grief in my stomach. It’s very intense."
Therapist: "You’re aware of an intense well of grief in your stomach."
Client: "It’s scary."
Therapist: "See if it would be OK to acknowledge the part of you that’s scared and just be with that feeling."
"The strange thing here is that whereas the client experiences a feeling that scares her, the therapists asks her to acknowledge the part that is scared. Is this on purpose? Is it a mistake? Have I misunderstood either ‘scary’ or ‘scared’?
"It seems to me that if the client would really acknowledge the part that is scared *instead of* the scary part, the scary part might feel abandoned (or do you assume that the scary part is, in fact, scared?). If I were guiding a focuser who was scared by a feeling I would first suggest her to acknowledge the scaring feeling and if that is not possible I would suggest her to contact the part that resists after which she might be able to acknowledge the scary part."
Dear Arno,
Thanks for your question and the opportunity to clarify this interesting issue, which is one of the central points of the article you’re reading.
Our excerpt starts with the client being in touch with an experience in her stomach that she calls "a well of grief." The next question for a Focusing process is, Will she be able to be with it?
Now she calls it "intense," which raises the question even more. Sometimes people have a hard time being with intense experiences. Or, to say this another way, the part of her that calls it "intense" is the part of her that may not be able to just be with it.
This becomes even clearer in the next thing she says: "It’s scary." Whether or not she says the words, "I’m having a hard time being with this," it’s clear that she is having a hard time.
Traditionally in Focusing as I helped to teach it in the 80s, we would have her find a more comfortable distance from this "scary" experience. But in the early 90s I began to question "distancing" techniques. Too often, it seemed to me, helping a Focuser set something out was missing something important. A feeling was being acted on instead of being acknowledged.
I wrote that paper, "Relationship equals Distance plus Connection," to make the point that "relationship techniques" serve the same purpose as "distancing techniques," without the disadvantages.
Turning Toward One Part Without Leaving the Other
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When someone says, "It’s scary" about an inner experience, they are not really describing that experience at all. In our example, the experience has already been described as a well of grief. "Scary" isn’t really about that, it’s about "me"– "I’m scared."
There’s an experience there that needs to be acknowledged, and as long as the client is saying, "It’s scary," she’s not acknowledging the "I’m scared" inside her.
You make an important point, Arno, when you are concerned about the "scary" part (in this case, the well of grief) being abandoned. Of course we don’t want that.
But we also don’t want the Focuser to try to keep company with it while finding it "scary." Truly, that would be just as much an abandonment. It’s company from a state of Presence–fearless, accepting, spacious, curious–that our felt experiences yearn for, and that brings real change.
So by inviting the Focuser to turn toward a part of her that is scared, and acknowledging that, we are really benefiting the first part, the one called "scary," as well.
Of course we will expect that, having spent time with a part of her that’s scared to be with the well of grief, she will soon enough be able to come back to the well of grief itself, and to come back with a solider sense of Presence and a greater ability to listen to and sense what is there. There will be more to it, "well of grief" is only the first description. That "more" will emerge because the Focuser is able to acknowledge all the parts, the initial feeling, and the feeling about the feeling.