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Difficulty getting inside and alternate focusing instructions
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If you're one of the people who say (or if you work with people who say), " Get inside myself, what does that mean? Where is this ’inside myself? ' What do people do, when they just sit there silently and alone? I wouldn't know what to do with myself if I wasn’t doing something. How do you do nothing? I couldn't sit still that long. " Or if you’ve tried focusing instructions and they don't work for you. Nothing happens…
Then you're one of the people for whom this is meant.
Some people do not know that there is a place inside themselves that they can turn to when alone, with no help from anyone else. In this place, one is in privacy and much can go on. No one else can know in any detail about what goes on unless you decide to tell them about it. Looking at someone from the outside, you can't see if they have an inside space or not. It's not something you could see or point to like another person or an object or facial expression.
Because this is true, a lot of people don't know about it. How would they know it's there, if no-one ever told them and they never discovered it on their own? We don’t get taught or even told about it much by parents or teachers. Some people seem to have it, from the time they are very young, and maybe never lose it. They're the people who are likely to have spent lots of time alone as kids and they can remember and tell you how they made up stories and had imaginary playmates and a whole world of fantasy, thinking and feeling that they did all inside themselves, alone. They always knew there was a whole vast world inside. In fact, sometimes that world feels more real or at least more accessible to them than the outside one of other people and school and things. They usually also know that inside can be an all right place to be; they are familiar with how it is inside, what their territory is like. They've been over and around in it a lot. The Standard Focusing instructions mostly presuppose this inner knowing.
People for whom this way of being is foreign, first can be told that there is such a way of being inside, and, in case it sounds odd and slightly frightening, it's a good idea to say that a lot of people have it and that it usually makes experience richer to have it.
For people whose living has mostly gone on in interactions (acting towards others and reacting to them) the first experiences of having this alone dimension may feel blank and anxious (“What can I do next? ”). But they needn't. For these people the interpersonal function of feelings, words, behavior, tend to be primary in their experience. And, because so much of interaction is verbal, words are often very important to them. So, working with their own use of words can be an unanxious entry for them into their private, internal process.
A next step is to get the person to say a sentence or two about a concern they have, something of importance to them. This can be said aloud or to oneself. Then ask them, " Do you feel something when you say those words? Do those words refer to something? Can you feel what it is that you meant, what you were referring to when you said those words? Don't tell me! THAT thing you can feel is a direct referent. It's inside, private, and it's yours. You can go to it whenever you would like. It's between you and you and doesn't depend on anyone else being there. "
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This gives one the experience that there is something more than the interactive impact of their words. Once the interactive function is separated out (" Don't tell me" ), the non-selfevidentness of words can begin to be experienced. The words refer to something besides themselves or another person's reactions to them. One isn't just the words they say, and the reactions they elicit from others.
For some people, it is easy to start focusing with feelings or a definite felt something they can sense. The hard thing for them is to let some words (articulations) form out of that something.
But for others, the ones this is meant for, the problem is to get the something. Words are easily there. The thing to learn is how to get to whatever it is that the words refer to beyond themselves - to have the concrete experience that the words are JUST words - that they do refer to a something that isn't quite exhausted or caught by them.
Some people have to learn that you can TALK about the something - that there are words that can relate to it and express and change it. For others, it's learning there is a something that the words refer to.
In order to let the something form for any particular words, one needs to take the words and hold them still - hold them in conscious focus. Don’t let them move on to the next words. KEEP them in front of oneself. After telling this to the person
you're working with (or yourself), the instructions should then point to the fact that the words they're holding refer to something. Attention should be redirected from the words to the something, e. g., “What do those four words MEAN to you when you say them? Don’t tell me what they mean in OTHER words. Capture the something that they meant. Point towards it with your attention… That there… that you just sensed that made the words. That is the something. It got said in those four words, but IT isn't the words. That's the thing to stay in touch with in-between every set of words. " In other words, don't let the person give you any more words, until he has sensed the something. Stop the flow of words. Choose any words to begin with. Then don't let the person (or yourself) say anything more. Keep telling them there is something in-between the first words and the ones they now want to tell you.
Here are some differences between an alternate set and the standard focusing instructions, that help people with this problem.
Begin with a phrase, or set of words. Get the person to isolate ONE set of words, and then stick with them. This is rather than start with the something as in focusing instructions.
This might happen by starting instructions something like, " If I were to ask you what's most important in your life right now (or what's got you most hung up, or what makes you hurt most right now, or what troubles you most now), what phrase or sentence would you tell me? What words would you say? Settle on one sentence that gets it best and then hang onto that sentence. "
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Next, give a clear instruction that the person is to work with that sentence, and no other words are to be allowed for the next minutes. If their minds go off to other words, they should bring their attention back to the selected sentence.
Next, call attention to the “something, " the " felt sense". “Now, see if you can feel what it is you meant when you said those words. Do those words refer to anything? Are they just words, or do they refer to something? Just let yourself feel THAT. That is the something that your words when you say them come out of and refer to, but usually you are not aware of it and just go from words to words, without noticing that step in-between. It will help you be in touch with yourself and form better words, if you will remember to sense that something in-between the words. Now, go into and feel that something again. (It feels sort of like being hit by a wave, or stumbling into a thick block, or running up against something. )"
Once they get this something (felt sense), then you can let them go on to the next step, " Now, out of that feeling, do some other, new words come? "
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