Wondering how to listen to parts that are stunned and heartbroken? Read on…
Dear Reader:
Last week I wrote about how to listen to anxious parts.
This week, unfortunately, I need to write about listening to parts that are stunned and heartbroken.
I don’t want to assume that’s how you feel. I honor and respect that your feelings are what they are, wherever you are and whatever you value.
I am, however, having a hard time today. And I was helped so much by getting an email from Cassandra Loerke, a lovely person who has studied Inner Relationship Focusing with me.
With her permission, I’m going to share with you what Cassandra wrote to me about doing Focusing with her feelings this morning.
She started by closing her eyes and sensing inside. She could feel something in her that was like a caged animal, churning desperately in search of a way out.
She said: “I am here with you. I sense how terrified and desperate you feel right now.” And the animal stopped, still and listening.
So she said to it: “May I ask what you are not wanting to happen?”
The answer came:
Chaos, suffering, harm.
She let it know she heard it. And then she asked: “And what do you want to happen?”
The answer:
Love. I want Love to happen. Where the lion lays down with the lamb. Where the sun shines down on everyone. Where we discover that within each of our hearts there is a place where heaven lives and perhaps, because the chaos is so bad, we are impelled to choose Love at last.
She invited the sense of how that would feel in her body. The feeling came, and it felt like Home. It’s been here all along. We never left.
No matter what you are feeling today, I invite you to bring this gentle process to yourself. And see what comes. There is more to us than the suffering… there is also the wanted feeling. And being present with what hurts is the way to get there.
My heart is with you all.
