 |
Detailed description of focusing steps
|
|
|
|
Detailed description of focusing steps
It would be good if you could have someone read you the instructions one by one, with roughly the times indicated between (or a minute or so between, it need not be exact). In the silences between, both of you try to do what the instructions say.
It is somewhat harder to focus by oneself, but if there is no one to do it with, try them now, by yourself. (People differ, too. Perhaps for you it is easier alone. )
Promise yourself (and everyone else you do it with) that there is no agreement to talk about what you find during focusing. You decide later if you want to say anything from it, and if so, what. In this way, each person focusing can be private and meet the feelings that are there without being concerned about what anyone else will think.
If you stop now and try the focusing instructions, then the more detailed descripting of each step in the following pages may clarify whatever you found confusing. Focusing is not the words or concepts written in the instructions, but the actual process you go through when you do it. So, you can't just read the instructions and know what they are about, or what specific things you will need cleared up. Even if you are familiar with this kind of process, try out this specific one.
Focusing instructions
This is going to be just to yourself. What I will ask you to do will be silent, just to yourself. Take a moment just to relax …
(5 seconds)
All right - now, just to yourself, inside you, I would like you to pay attention to a very special part of you… Pay attention to that part where you usually feel sad, glad, or scared.
(5 seconds)
Pay attention to that area in you and see how you are now.
See what comes to you when you ask yourself, " How am I now? " " How do I feel? " " What is the main thing for me right now? "
Let it come, in whatever way it comes to you, and see how it is.
(30 seconds or less)
If, among the things that you have just thought of, there was a major personal problem which felt important, continue with it. Otherwise, select a meaningful personal problem to think about. Make sure you have chosen some personal problem of real importance in your life. Choose the thing which seems most meaningful to you.
(10 seconds)
1. Of course, there are many parts to that one thing you are thinking about - too many to think of each one alone. But, you can feel all of these things together. Pay attention there where you usually feel things, and in there you can get a sense of what all of the problem feels like. Let yourself feel all of that.
(30 seconds or less)
2. As you pay attention to the whole feeling of it, you may find that one special feeling comes up. Let yourself pay attention to that one feeling. Let words or an image come from that feeling.
(1 minute)
|
|
|
3. Keep following one feeling. Don't let it be just words or pictures - wait and let words or pictures come from the feeling.
(1 minute)
4. If this one feeling changes, or moves, let it do that. Whatever it does, follow the feeling and pay attention to it.
(1 minute)
5. Now take what is fresh, or new, in the feel of it now… and go very easy.
Just as you feel, try to find some new words or pictures to capture what your present feeling is all about. There doesn't have to be anything that you didn't know before. New words are best but old words might fit just as well. As long as you now find words or pictures to say what is fresh to you now.
(1 minute)
6. If the words or pictures that you now have make some fresh difference, see what that is. Let the words or pictures change until they feel just right in capturing your feelings.
(1 minute)
Now I will give you a little while to use in any way you want to, and then we will stop.
Step 1
Letting " all that" come home to one is something like this: have you ever, during a period when you had some trouble, found that you woke up in the morning just fine, and then, a few seconds later, you would remember the trouble? The whole thing just rolls in on you? It's a little like that, but less unpleasant because you are directing it. You are letting the whole thing come home to you, to sense what that feels like.
Often, we no sooner think of a difficulty we have, then we begin thinking and telling ourselves what we tell ourselves each time. It ought to be this and that way, or it's all because of such and such, we ought to try to be or do so and so. This is our understanding of the problem. Much of what we understand is probably quite true. However, if our understanding were all that helpful, we wouldn't have the problem anymore!
Instead of going the steps of thought, letting it all come home to you as a felt whole allows a felt step to happen (instead of a thought step). Usually a single specific " feel" will stand out almost as soon as you let yourself feel the whole thing.
To do that, one names the whole thing some phrase (“that whole thing, " for example), and one asks, " What does that whole thing feel like? " Then one keeps quiet and allows oneself to feel it.
If you could not do that before, try it now.
If you cannot get a feel of the whole thing, see the following parts; we give more instructions about it later.
|
|
|
