The Inner Work

Hard to do, I mean. The reading is easy.

Nearly every student I have ever had arrived carrying some version of feeling lost. A lack of direction, a sense of not quite belonging anywhere. Those feelings come from losing touch with who you actually are, and once that goes, what you want in life goes with it. So the first job in this area is finding your way back to the real one. The one under the hard shell, the marshmallow inside, as I call it.

Then the rest. Fear, which is mostly False Evidence Appearing Real. Denial, which is a mask we forget we put on. Letting go, which is the thing everybody says and almost nobody explains. The difference between helping someone and rescuing them, which will save you years. Hate, which is drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die. And life lessons, which start as a whisper, get louder if you ignore them, and by the time they are thermonuclear you should have listened a long time ago.

There is a lot of me in these pieces. I have done every one of these lessons the slow way, and hindsight is greasy walls. You cannot climb back up to the moment you were in. You can only see it clearly looking back, and then hand what you saw to someone who is still down there.

That is what this area is for.

The pieces in this area

There are nineteen pages here. The first seven follow the order above, and the first one is where I would start.

Finding the Real You is about the hard shell and the marshmallow inside it. How the shell got built, why the conditioning feels like your own idea, and the picture of having been hacked. It asks who you are, anyway, and gives five exercises for finding your way back, from the journal of happy times to silent contemplation. It ends with just being yourself, and why your abilities follow.

Fear starts with False Evidence Appearing Real. It separates the fear worth listening to, the train coming down the tracks, from the false kind, and looks at what the false kind costs you and why people stay with the devil they know. It asks what a fear is protecting, gives the one question that loosens the grip, which is what is the actual evidence, and lists a few things that help, EFT and the Three Source Rule among them.

Denial is the mask that hides you from you. Why everyone around you can see it, why we put it on, and my mother, a psychic who denied her own abilities. It covers how selective exposure keeps denial going, and the quickest way out, which is being open to questioning what you believe.

Letting Go is the emotional side of letting go; the meditation side is on the Letting Go and Control page. The two monks at the river, how the people who hurt you still own you while you hold on, naming what you feel, and triggers. Then letting go of your own past, the sand mandala, and opening a fist one finger at a time.

Helping or Rescuing begins with what I got wrong when I first started out. The approach I use now, which is offer once, wait to be asked, give tools and match the effort. It explains why waiting is the kind thing, what rescuing costs you and your battery, why you cannot complete someone else's circle, and what helping looks like.

Hate is the poison you drink yourself. Why it is poison, where it sits next to love, naming it precisely, finding the trigger, and forgiveness as something you do for you. It closes with the methods that help when it will not shift.

Life Lessons follows the whisper as it grows into a tap, a knock, a slammed door and finally thermonuclear. Lessons as a circle you only break when you get the lesson, repeating the level like a video game, the curve balls that come out of nowhere, and hindsight as a trap with greasy walls.

Other People's Words, Thoughts and Deeds is about trying to be liked by everyone, which cannot be done. Your street, your suburb and your city, where the need comes from, what their words are really about, and coming back to yourself.

The Five by Five Journal is the path I give for just being. The five aspects, why it feels hard, building the journal, going deeper and reading the map it makes.

What Is Your Identity? starts with the big three questions. The list, why labels belong to the costume, what happens when a label is lost, and finding what stays.

Expectations, the Biggest Lie is about the conditioning we come to believe was our own idea. Where expectations come from, the four kinds, the thought patterns behind them, and putting them down, including in spiritual work.

Realisations and Epiphanies looks at the light bulb moment. Why it has usually come a thousand times before, why it matters, the sun on the other side of the planet, and what to do after the moment.

You Become What You Think About asks what the theme of your thoughts is. Energy follows thought, being the observer, the two questions, and shifting the theme gently.

Do You Know Your Own Mind? is about the form your thoughts take: words, images, feelings or knowing. It covers why that matters, how to find out, and telling guidance from thought.

What Would You Do If You Knew You Could Not Fail asks you to write the list before you read on. Why the list stays in a drawer, people who kept going, failing as part of the agreement, and starting with one.

The Happiness Journal asks where happiness comes from and whether you have it. The challenge, keeping it private, working across all five aspects, and how it differs from Memory Energy.

What Is Important starts with the easy version of the question and then the hard one. How we lose sight of it, what happens when the curve ball comes, and why it pays to find out before you need to.

The Dark Night of the Soul is the stretch nobody puts on the brochure. Where the phrase comes from, what it feels like, why it happens, what helps, and a plain request to talk to someone.

The Ego closes the area. What the word means, what the ego is and is not, how it shows up, the spiritual ego, and working with it.

Where to begin

Start with the marshmallow. Every page after it is easier once you have let a little of the real you be seen.

Be gentle with yourself while you do this. We came here to be flawed, and we will leave flawed. If you are still alive, you are still learning, and the lessons are there for you.

You will be your own teacher in this. Only you know what you are carrying.

If you would like this read against your own chart, my readings are here.

The pieces in this area