by Dawn Groves

Byron Katie Reid is a homegrown American sage. Emerging from Barstow, Calif., a nondescript town on the edge of the Mojave Desert, this elegant, utterly original grandmother has traveled the globe, changing the lives of hundreds of thousands of individuals through her system of inquiry, known simply as The Work.
   In 1986, at the age of 43, Katie (everyone calls her by her middle name) was an agoraphobic suburban mom unable to leave her bedroom, consumed by rage and despair. In a last-ditch effort to prevent suicide, she checked herself into a halfway house for eating disorders, the only treatment program her insurance would cover. One morning she opened her eyes as she lay on the floor—she felt too unworthy to sleep in a bed—and it wasn't she that woke up. 
   “All my rage, all the thoughts that had been troubling me, my whole world, the whole world, was gone. At the same time, laughter welled up from my depths and just poured out.”
   Katie refers to that staggering moment as "getting a little clarity." In one fell swoop, she suddenly understood that the human race's effort to find happiness was all backwards. Instead of attempting to change the world into what our thoughts tell us it's supposed to be, we can question those very thoughts and meet reality directly as it is. The result is unimaginable freedom and joy. 
   "I often use the word story to talk about thoughts, or sequences of thoughts, that we convince ourselves are real,” she says. The story may be about the past, the present, or the future; it may be about what things should be, what they could be, or why they are. Stories appear in our minds hundreds of times a day—when someone gets up without a word and walks out of the room, when someone doesn't smile or doesn't return a phone call. Stories are the untested, uninvestigated theories that tell us what all these things mean. We don't even realize they're just theories.”
   Katie postulates that when we believe our thoughts (stories) without investigating them, we remain trapped in an unsatisfying dream world that blocks the beauty, kindness, and joy of reality. We're confused. We suffer. Dismantling this prison of unquestioned thinking is surprisingly simple. Katie’s technique, The Work, consists of four questions you ask yourself whenever a thought gives you stress:

   Is it true?
   Can you absolutely know that it's true?
   How do you react when you believe that thought?
   Who would you be without the thought?
  
   After answering the four questions, Katie then asks you to do a turnaround, which is a way of experiencing the opposite of what you believe. Take, for example, the thought, "My husband doesn't listen to me:" One turnaround is, "My husband does listen to me.” Other turnarounds are, "I don't listen to me” and "I don't listen to my husband.” Once you find a turnaround, you are asked to find at least three genuine examples of where it is true in your life.
   The Work dismantles the entrenched quality of a stressful belief. It breathes a little air into it, lightening it up. Eventually, the thought can drop away, eliminating another hindrance to happiness and freedom.
  
Dawn Groves: Katie, I’ve been listening to the audio version of your book, A Thousand Names for Joy, as I tool around in my van. You've been my driving companion for some time now.

Byron Katie: That's a wonderful image, the two of us, friends talking together in the van.

Groves: In A Thousand Names for Joy, you talk about being in constant meditation.

Katie: Being in constant meditation simply means you're noticing your mind. So it’s mind noticing itself. People who have a lot of practice working with the four questions and the turnaround get to experience those questions alive inside of them. They might think the thought that something terrible is going to happen, for example. But before the thought can complete itself, it's already met by the question. "Can I absolutely know that's true?" The thought has no reason to complete itself. And it drops. And in that space, it leaves what is real, rather than what is imagined.
   For people who've done The Work for a while, life becomes freely lived, fearlessly lived. It's lived out of the heart, because that's the nature of everything. It's kind; it doesn't worry; it simply loves what is, because it's reality. It’s a wonderful thing when the present comes alive. With no other reference, neither past nor future, how could your nature not he loving?
   To get back to meditation, we notice what happens to the body when we believe those stressful thoughts. Every time a concept appears, we have the four questions available. But people can't just sit in stillness all day. Our birthright is freedom; we deserve to be free, not set aside with silence as a preference. When we're sitting, watching mind, and then meeting mind with these questions—oh my goodness—we come to see that even mind doesn't exist. Well, that's incredible fun. How brilliant the image or reflection of your true nature! So to meditate is a very good thing, to identify the thoughts appearing. But when we apply the questions to those thoughts, then we are enlightened!

Groves: In A Thousand Names for Joy, I enjoyed how you referred to enlightenment as a moment-to-moment experience. One moment you may realize the true nature of reality, and the next moment you may forget it. Somehow it makes enlightenment more approachable.

Katie: It is! No one is permanently enlightened: that would be the story of a future. There's only enlightenment in the moment. Do you believe a stressful thought? Then you're confused. Do you realize that the thought isn't true? Then you're enlightened to it; its as simple as that. And when you see through one stressful thought, you can never believe it again. It’s like imagining there is a snake in front of you, and then you realize it's just a rope. When you realize it's a rope, you'll never be able to see it as a snake again. All problems in the world are ropes. There's no exception. Until we understand that, were really opposing what is. We see the problem as something being done to us or something out of order, or a mistake. That's not my experience.

Groves: As I practice questioning my stressful thoughts, I become awake to the possibility of freedom. It's very exciting. But it's also difficult because the thoughts are stubborn.

Katie: To do The Work, you sit and imagine your life exactly the way you have already lived it, without changing anything at all, except for that thought. Look at that same life, only without the thought. It's so radical. Your mind educates you. It actually changes what you perceive as your future. In your mind, your past creates your future; your past gives you the material to mentally project a future. So when you sit in the fourth question, "Who would you be without that thought?" seeing the same life only without the thought, your past is changed and your future is changed in that moment—radically changed. You get a glimpse of two ways to live that life; one that is stressful and one that is not. And mind is affected by that. It begins to wake up.

Groves: What happens when the thought keeps coming back? Is this process something you have to practice?

Katie: Well, yes. I don't call it The Work for nothing. (Laughs.) You may question a thought and think you still believe it. Your mind will tell you that you do. Then something dramatic happens in your life and you wonder why you're not upset. And you have the thought, I'm supposed to be upset right now, but I’m not. What's going on? When you finally track it back, you realize it was something that you did The Work on two weeks ago, yesterday, a month ago.
   You see, when you use the four questions and the turnaround, you have no idea what you're undoing. Let's say you work on your mother and you're still stuck, but the relationship you have with your dear husband and children radically shifts. You just can't know what's being undone. A particular motive to undo something wouldn’t work with this process. You can't direct the outcome. It has to be a pure thing. You're doing it for freedom, for peace. You're questioning what you believe for the love of peace.

Groves: So it has a spreading effect and you don't know where it's going to spread.

Katie: Yes. And let me tell you, it spreads at warp speed. I was very sick and I was in a hurry, so it had to be simple. It had to be deadly to the ego. After one cell understands, all your cells understand. None of them can believe any longer what you believed. It's a whole new identity. It ultimately gives everyone a radically different identity. This is not a little thing, doing The Work.

Groves: What happens on the other side of it?

Katie: Love is what happens. The connection happens. We're moving back to our natural state. We're leaving the dinosaur age where the mind's been kept in a cage. Now it's free to create. To make the entire planet green, to end all wars. Or not. That's the power of clarity.

Groves: I read the story about your house being robbed. Your response was very interesting. You said your life was simpler now.

Katie: Yes, what a relief. What a blessing. They didn't take enough. And I thought, well, why not? (Laughs.)

Groves: What about store owners who have to deal with shoplifters taking things of value?

Katie: They don't have to deal with it. They can close the store or find better people to guard it. If the store owner wants that store to support the mortgage and send the children to school, then a system is necessary to support the doors staying open. But it isn't required. Nobody has to do anything. We're free.

Groves: So how does a person look at somebody who's done them wrong? Who has stolen from their store, for example?

Katie: Of course thieves will steal. Look at the thoughts they believe. They have to do it. They are simply guilty of believing their thoughts. If I believed what they believed, I'd steal, too. We can lock them up, but when they are freed, if they still believe those thoughts, they're going to steal again. They'll just be trickier about getting caught.

Groves: But how does the store owner deal with somebody who's doing them harm? How can they still be open and forgiving?

Katie: You realize there was never anything to forgive, and that's what The Work makes evident. It has all just been a misunderstanding within you. I would say to the thief, "Sweetheart, this must be very painful. Did you have the thought that you might get caught stealing when you took the item?" 
   I'd say, “Are you comfortable now? I'm calling the police. Is there any way I can help you?" And I'll be ready to help that person until the authorities come. I would let that person know that I understand what stealing is because I've done it myself. And I'd advise a visit to my website (www.thework.com) to question the beliefs that brought the thief into the store in the first place. 
   These people believe they haven't got enough. They think, “My children need shoes” or “My girlfriend is going to leave me if I don't take this to her. I can't afford this magazine but I need to read it.” All these beliefs surround what they did. How can they not steal? They have to. 
   If you attack back, then you have robbed yourself of your own peace. So who is the real thief? It's you. It's always you. That leaves only one to work on. Reform one thief in the world: you.

Groves: Let's talk about the concept of visualization. People like to visualize success in their projects or businesses. Does your work incorporate this kind of process?

Katie: No, The Work is not about trying to change reality or trying to control the future. Quite the opposite. Instead of visualizing, my suggestion is to pay attention to what you're doing moment to moment. I would question anything that makes you angry or sad or afraid. For example, say you're looking at your business and thinking about what you want to earn next year. All the thoughts that come up saying it's not possible—you might do The Work on those. And then you follow what's in front of you when those thoughts no longer control your behavior. It all becomes available when you question any thought that feels stressful.

Groves: But it does take practice.

Katie: Well, you know, we either believe our thoughts or we question them, there's no other choice. If we believe them, our lives are lived through them and—like the thief—we continue to do what we've always done, and we continue to be at the mercy of our stressful thoughts. When we question our thoughts, we give ourselves a choice. You've heard the advice, "Just choose something different." Well, we can't choose something different if we haven’t questioned our thoughts. If we continue to believe our thoughts, we can't help but choose the things we've always chosen. 
   What is more empowering? "I shouldn't have lost my job" or "I lost my job; what can I do now?" We can know reality is good just as it is, because when we argue with it, we experience tension and frustration. We don't feel natural or balanced. When we stop arguing and opposing reality, action becomes simple, fluid, kind, and fearless.
   We ended our conversation with Katie telling me another interviewer just walked through the door. My impression was that she would gladly continue talking to me but, clearly, our interview was over because the next interviewer was present. Katie trusts reality completely.

Katie encourages readers to visit her website www.thework.com for forms and helpful guidelines to make dissecting stressful thoughts easier. A good start is filling out the Judge-Your-Neighbor Worksheet as honestly as possible. Then use the One-Belief-at-a Time Worksheet to work each belief through the series of four questions. Writing it out is especially useful because your mind has difficulty being objective when everything remains inside your head.

Dawn Groves specializes in stress-reduction trainings for colleges and businesses throughout the U.S. and Canada. Her latest book is Stress Reduction for Busy People (New World Library).

  
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