Relationship Troubles? "You're Just Not That Into You!"

(Note: This book review is over a year old and was never published. I put it here to encourage you to read Byron Katie's unsung second book. Very different stylistically from Loving What Is,it is nonetheless extremely powerful. I found myself on every page and could hardly talk to anyone for a couple of weeks, so aware was I of dishonesty and manipulation in my actions and communications, romantic and otherwise. —CS)


I Need Your Love—Is That True?
How to Stop Seeking Love, Approval, and Appreciation
and Start Finding Them Instead

by Byron Katie
written with Michael Katz
Harmony Books, April 2005 , 288 pages, $24.00

While reading Byron Katie's new book, I was reminded of a Hindu teaching story about a monk who yearned for a vision of the Divine Mother. For many years he prayed, worshiped and performed so many austerities that he became self-realized and forgot about his quest. It was only then that the deity finally revealed herself to the monk, who regarded this miracle with the same peaceful equanimity in which he had been living for some time. Already merged in her supreme love, he no longer needed to see the Goddess' form. Why, then, did she wait so long to appear? She didn't; she was always there. Until the monk came to know his own divine nature, he was unable to see her.

Similarly, in the provocatively titled I Need Your Love—Is That True?—a book of revelations cleverly disguised as a relationship guide—Byron Katie writes: "Without the stressful thoughts that separate us from one another, there is only one mind, and it's everywhere. Bodies can't be connected....There's no point in trying, because you're already connected. You can only connect with yourself and find that out."

Not too many relationship experts will ask you to question the very existence of your partner; it's not the kind of strategy that sells self-help books. But in a sense, that's exactly what Byron Katie, author of the best-seller Loving What Is, proposes in her latest offering. And why not? If the endless proliferation of psycho-spiritual guides is any indication, no one else has succeeded in providing us with a proven formula for having a happy life and finding the perfect partner. Furthermore, Katie is famous for saying that she doesn't have the answers at all, just the questions. Therein lies the difference: self-realization—emphasis on "self"—is a much easier way of relating to others than manipulation, people-pleasing or isolation.

In fact, we don't relate to people, Byron Katie tells us, but to our thoughts about them...and it is our thoughts with which we manipulate ourselves when we try to impress, attract, seduce and control. With Katie's simple process of self-inquiry, called The Work, we question what we believe about others in order to get what we have always wanted...from ourselves.

"My mother didn't love me." "My girlfriend shouldn't leave me." "My husband wants too much sex." Thoughts like these depress us and keep us jumping through hoops to please others; we end up making war, not love when we don't get the desired results. Ironically, Katie points out, the struggle to win people over (or to bend them to our will) makes it nearly impossible to experience the love and support we most want, not just in romance but all relationships—familial, convivial and professional.

Katie's first book, Loving What Is (Harmony Books 2002) is an eye-opening guide to self-knowledge through The Work, a sequence of four simple life-changing questions followed by a thought-reversal technique called a "turnaround." (The Work is so simple, in fact, that our complexity-loving minds find it easy to dismiss.) I Need Your Love–Is That True? stands on the shoulders of Loving What Is by applying Katie's self-inquiry technique to the stress-inducing beliefs we hold dear about the people to whom we are closest. Through real-life examples of people doing inquiry on their objections about their loved ones, Katie shows us how we live when we dwell in a world of unfulfilled needs, wants and shoulds...while pointing us towards a way out of that hell.

For the willing, using Katie's process can rock your world...but even just reading her pronouncements can stop the mind dead in its "I know" tracks. Katie has a way of sneaking in the Great Truths of the Ages when speaking of the most mundane things, such as whether or not husbands and children should pick up their socks. If you read I Need Your Love with an open mind—whether or not you do The Work or play with the easy and enjoyable exercises sprinkled throughout the book—you may find yourself questioning everything you've ever said, every move you've ever made to secure love, approval and appreciation from lovers and other strangers.

That's one of those Great Truths that are so easy to miss when we're focused on the socks on the floor (or on money, sex, or your favorite "need-want-should"): our loved ones are strangers. They have to be, because they are our projection in the moment, and the projection changes based on whether or not we are pleased with it. On every page of I Need Your Love, Katie demonstrates how questioning our most stressful projections (we get to keep the peaceful ones) results in knowing our partners (and ourselves) as we never have nor could before. (Think of the Goddess vision.)

If this sounds like spiritual woo-woo, the proof is in the process and its founder. I Need Your Love—Is That True? is based on Katie's own experience—and that of hundreds of thousands of people who use The Work—of meeting thoughts with understanding. Katie's life story, briefly recounted in the book's introduction, is compelling: marriage and family life, successful business, all's well...followed by many years of crippling bed-ridden depression, addictions, agoraphobia, rage, paranoia, hitting bottom and then a depth-charge when Katie realized she no longer had to attach to every dictate and opinion of the mind...that finding one's own truth is the end of suffering. Katie's "moment of clarity" as she calls it sounds a lot like the Buddha's awakening, but it happened in a Mojave desert backwater to a woman with no religion, teacher or interest in psychology...in the midst of a familiar-sounding American life story. And, as Katie experienced, your teacher is the one you're living with. That s/he doesn't give you love, approval and appreciation is part of the divine teaching. "People go to India to find a guru," Katie says, "but you don't have to....Your partner will give you everything you need for your own freedom."

"What could anyone call me that I couldn't find at some time in my life? If you say one single thing that I have the urge to defend, that thing is the very pearl waiting inside me to be discovered."

Katie's Work is a surgery and in I Need Your Love—Is That True? she dispenses with the anesthesia and wastes no time in asking us, "Do you believe everything you think?" As anyone who has ever lain awake at night knows, we don't even think our own thoughts; they're rather like the CNN ticker, always going, ever-changing, about the lover, the wife's lover, the boss, George W. Bush, Uncle Bill. Believing our thoughts may give us the illusion of being right, but at what price? And while the mind loves to be right, it also loves to be understood. This is why Katie's written inquiry method (visit www.thework.com online for a complete overview)—in which you privately sound off on your partner, on paper, in order to learn about yourself—can change your life if you let it, but it is not for the squeamish. It is for those who are ready to know the truth.

What is the worst that could happen if you follow Katie's lead? "Won't I become complacent?" you may ask, or "What if my partner leaves?" One of the remarkable things about I Need Your Love is the way Katie addresses every possible objection to merciless mental investigation, honest communication and living authentically in relationship. In one of the more radical passages, she says:

I can close my eyes and see my husband in the arms of a woman loving him, and I want that if it's what he wants, and I also see my life without him and how full that would be. I always have an abundance of love in my life. Everyone does. There is never a shortage and never too much.

Sometimes Katie asks us to do what seems unimaginable...for example, to picture how life might actually be better if our children died. "Be a traitor to misery," she says. "There's nothing macabre about this. The point is to break the grip of a fearful belief." We make pronouncements all the time about how we cannot go on...how we can't take anymore...and when we believe this, it becomes our reality. "Is that true?" Katie asks, inviting us to get very literal and realistic. "Are you still breathing?"

As for criticism, Katie says, it's a gift...and if it hurts, they're right. "What could anyone call me that I couldn't find at some time in my life?" she asks. "If you say one single thing that I have the urge to defend, that thing is the very pearl waiting inside me to be discovered."

However, Katie never condones staying in an unhappy or abusive union; she simply suggests ending it as a sane person. "Whether you stay in or leave a relationship, there are always two ways to do it," Katie writes. "One way is in peace, with love; the other is at war, with anger and blame." Which do you prefer?

Simply put, I Need Your Love—Is That True? is for people who don't follow The Rules, don't live on Mars or Venus and who prefer being themselves to using sales techniques for winning friends and influencing people. Katie's Work takes the drama and mystery out of living happily on a planet populated with apparent others; it results in a kinder, gentler way to exist, sans neediness and insecurity, deception-free. In the end, as the fabled monk discovered, mature and authentic relating is all about you, and that doesn't mean that your God or Goddess won't come. "When you have that sweet relationship with yourself," Katie tells us, "your partner is an added pleasure. It's over-the-top grace."

©2005 by Carol L. Skolnick; all rights reserved.

The Other Great Depression, and Why You Need to Deal with It

Depression on Wall Street (the mental kind) was featured recently on the front page of the Sunday Business section of the New York Times. The article cited a 2000 study which concluded that 23% of a small sampling of male brokers and traders at the top Wall Street brokerage firms admitted to suffering from clinical depression, in contrast to 7% of the national average. Keeping in mind that this is before the economy and the stock market took a major tumble, before 9-11, before all those investor arbitration cases and the revelations of corporate corruption on a grand scale came to light. It's not difficult to imagine that, in these uncertain times, the percentages could be way higher.

What has this got to do with you and your business? Plenty. Because change on Wall Street affects all business, including those of the entrepreneurial, small business owner and independent professional. The pressure that's on for them is on for us as well, and that can lead to symptoms of depression. And we all know what an unhappy workforce leads to: attrition, absenteeism. poor morale, poor productivity, escalating costs and reduced revenues.

If yours is a large company with an EAP program, help is there for those who reach out for it...and many, feeling ashamed or stigmatized by depression, will never reach out. If yours is a small concern without such resources. what can you do for your employees and for yourself?

1. Acknowledge that there are issues. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, as Freud pointed out. Sometimes things simply are not going well. The economy may be "recovering" and at the same time, it isn't what it used to be. Our retirement accounts have lost a third of their worth on average, there is no such thing as job security, and many people continue to be out of work or are underemployed, earning minimum wage in a world where $6.00 will barely cover the cost of a take-out sandwich. Saying that everything's okay and that the dilligent will prosper isn't everyone's reality; we may as well face it and see what we can do here and now.

2. Let your people know that it is not a weakness to seek help but rather a strength, a path to improvement. Be approachable and available to employees and their issues, and cultivate an atmosphere of trust and support in your workplace. Everyone flies off the handle, grieves, feels overwhelmed at one time or another. Don't punish people for being human; help them to find the balance they need in order to do their jobs.

3. Become more self-aware through the process of self-inquiry. You may be having your own crippling thoughts about the future of your business and your career. You needn't allow your thoughts to run you ragged; meet them with some understanding question them. It's hard to be a mentor and set an example if you aren't walking the walk. We've all been waiting for just one open and available CEO to show the rest of us the way; are you the one?

4. Don't be afraid to ask for help yourself. To become an analyst, therapists must first undergo analysis. Most of the corporate coaches of my acquaintance also work with a coach. If business is really getting you down, you may want to enlist the help of a professional...and don't overlook the help that is always there, in the form of your workforce. If you can be upfront withyour people about your own needs, you'll convey that mindset to your employees...and they may extend you the same courtesy.

5. Finally, understand what depression is. It need not be a crippling disease. It's not something to be ashamed of, to hide or to stuff down. Depression is simply confusion, a temporary block on the road to the truth. When we work with our thoughts, our lives change...and changes in business cannot help but follow.

Here is the best book I've ever read about the nature of depression:
Depression: The Way Out of Your Prison by Dorothy Rowe

And here's the process that hsa helped me many thousands of others worldwide move past the roadblocks of depression:
Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life by Byron Katie with Stephen Mitchell.

©2006 by Carol L. Skolnick. All rights reserved.

***

A Taste of Transformational Inquiry in the Workplace

1. What are some stressful thoughts you are having about your business or your job in relation to the economy? Write them down. Don't be afraid of inviting "negativity"...if you have already entertained these thoughts, actually dealing with them won't make it worse and might make it a whole lot better.

Some examples of stressful workplace thoughts:

"I won't have enough money."
"We're going down the drain."
"Our workforce (our leadership, our sales team, etc.) is too weak."
"I mustn't let anyone know how I'm really feeling."
"If I express my concerns, I'll lose my position."
"Things will never get better."

2. Hold each of your beliefs against the four questions of self-inquiry:
*Is it true?
*Can you absolutely know that it's true?
*How do you react when you think that thought?
*Who would you be without this thought?

Then, turn the thought around. What is the opposite? Can this new statement be just as true, or truer? Provide evidence for this, at least three examples. For instance: the opposite of "I won't have enough money" is "I will have enough money." Three ways in which this could be just as true: 1. I cannot know the future. 2. I have enough money in this moment, and it could be that we need to trim expenses so that this continues to be true for me. 3. I can find new ways to generate revenue (list some ideas). Another example of a turnaround: "Our leadership is too weak." "I am too weak." How have I not stepped up to the plate, given my best effort, backed down, avoided, or been out of my integrity on the job? How have I not done what I want the C-suite to do?

3. Don't wait for a crisis. You can head off certain office problems at the pass by cultivating self-awareness in yourself and your employees. Arrange for a trained facilitator to visit your workplace and train your department, your team, your entire workforce (or even just you) in the fundamentals of Transformational Inquiry

©2006 by Carol L. Skolnick.

Authenticity Is the Killer App

As a hands-on type rather than a theorist, I don't study many books by business gurus. There is, however, one title on my business bookshelf that deeply speaks to me. It's called LOVE IS THE KILLER APP: How to Win Business and Influence Friends (Crown Business, 2002). The author, Tim Sanders, defines "biz love" as the sharing of your knowledge, your networks and -- this is not a typo -- your compassion, in order to promote growth in others.

How is love good for business? In his book, Sanders talks about the importance of social contracts in a business setting (we none of us work in a vacuum, after all) and how these contracts -- empathetic relationships -- create value. When you create this value, you become one of those people (Sanders calls them "lovecats") to whom others turn as someone with great insights, generosity and as a source of good information.

Sanders says that we have a choice; to see others in terms of fear-based boundaries, or as partners. And for this partnership to flourish, personal authenticity is essential.

We have seen in recent years how the barracuda mentality has been the downfall of many a business. Greed, pyramid schemes, arrogant disregard for the law: clearly the old eat-or-be-eaten business paradigms are no longer working...especially since, in our information age, you can't hide the truth for long.

However, most of us are experts at hiding our own truth from ourselves, because we haven't known how not to. We experience stressful relationships with clients, coworkers, authority figures, subordinates, the competition and most especially our own fearful thoughts about work because we have not questioned the contents of our minds. We believe what we think.

What is at the core of your business's operational decisions? "Making money" would be the answer for most of us. That's the easy answer. What's behind that? "Must beat the competition." "Profits over people." "If we don't ________, we won't survive."

How does this translate to social contracts? "He'll get business we should have gotten." "She's not pulling her weight." "He doesn't know how to set priorities." "They're taking advantage of me." No love here; lots of stress though. And there's stress because these are stories: horror stories. Stories with no proof. Stories about a nonexistent future based on theories about "proof" from the past.

What's the "I" thought under these business decisions? "I need more money." "I need this job." "If this doesn't work out, I won't have _____, I'll lose ______, I'll have to _______." Can you really know that these thoughts are true? How do you live your life -- and run your business -- when you act our of fear rather than out of love?

Sanders does not address self-love in his book, and that's something a lot of us don't address. We innocently act out of the need for self-preservation, and this precludes the authenticity necessary for those good social contracts at work to flourish. For me, the most loving act I can do is to question my stressful thoughts, in life and in work. I notice I'm more "there" for people -- and saner about my business -- when I do. Authenticity begins at home. So does love. And then that love is free to express itself everywhere.

© 2006 by Carol L. Skolnick. All rights reserved.

*******************
Authenticity and "Biz Love"

Here are some common fears about being authentic in business...about being open, empathetic, boundariless...about embracing "biz love" in the workplace:

We'll be ridiculed.
We'll be taken advantage of.
We won't be respected.
We won't be "winners."
We'll "give away the store."
You can't run a business on trust.
Our kindness won't be reciprocated and that means...

What are your beliefs about "biz love?" What is the worst that could happen if you shared what you know...if you shared your contacts...if you allowed yourself to love your competitors? (Jealousy, it is said, is the conjoined twin of love.)

"There is war in the business world." Turned around: "There is war in my world." Where are you a barracuda in business? How has it served? What do you have now that you believe you would not have if you became a "lovecat?"

©2006 by Carol L. Skolnick. All rights reserved.

For more about Carol and working with the process of The Work of Byron Katie, visit Clear Life Solutions.

What We Really Want from Coaching

If you have been in business for some time, chances are good that you have worked with a business or personal coach or know someone who has. Many people hire a coach to help them get what they want: More money. More work-life balance. The competitive edge. The job of their dreams. A healthier body.

Others turn to coaching because they are not sure of what they really want. They think they should want to be a success in business but they notice they're not motivated...or they think they have a book in them but they don't know how to get it on paper. (That's me!)

What do coaches provide? Pretty much what an athletic coach does: they are there to help you clarify your goals and galvanize your talents so that you can "win."

However, having too many expectations of the coaching experience can send both client and coach down a very windy road. Awhile back, I joined "the world's premiere coaching organization" hoping to pick up some pointers. What I received was a lesson in overwhelm. The organization's website, its many newsletters and many, many teleseminars and self-study eCourse offerings provide information about business-building, skills enhancement, training and certification, even coach-themed greeting cards. (Oh yeah, and some tips for working with clients too.) Then there are the seminars and study groups, covering everything from how to balance your life and work to how to live a raw foods lifestyle. One could spend a lifetime (and several bank accounts) navigating this site and its hundreds of coaching niche experts.

On the other hand, my very positive experience with a wonderful coach went something like this: she first probed me with thoughtful, pointed questions about my skills, interests and desires. Once goals were established, she suggested some strategies to help me implement the changes I wanted. She was also "on call" while I found my way, acting as my sounding board and my champion. This helped me get moving on my writing and my facilitation practice, as well as to let go of other projects that weren't serving me.

Some coaches will hold the client accountable, point out blind spots and resistances, and push the client to move through them. My coach uses The Work of Byron Katie as one of her coaching tools. She knows that one of the best ways to empower an individual is to gently guide them to their own truhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifth so that they can be accountable to themselves, recognize their own "gremlins," and let themselves be guided instead of pushed. (If this sounds attractive, check her out: Melanie Keveles, )

What is it that we truly seek from coaching? I suspect if we went deeply enough, we'd all come up with the same answer: freedom. What imprisons us are our concepts of what freedom is and how we're going to get it. We have believed that freedom is going to result from having the material success, the free time, the great business partner, the perfect life partner, the buff bod, the world's cooperation.

Is that true?

Let's say we want more money. So we get it. Are we fulfilled now? After all, there's always more money to get.

And if we lose the money, then what? Perhaps we realize at some point that money isn't everything. Now we go all out to "make a difference" and get love, approval, and appreciation from our peers. We've been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, or won a humanitarian award. The thrill of that lasts for about five minutes.

So now we write a book, it gets published, it makes the bestseller list, we give seminars on it, we're not making big bucks but we're busy. And we're not quite completely fulfilled yet.

So what's next? Pilates. New spouse. Adopt an entire orphanage. New business venture with exciting, energetic, rich backers. These are all wonderful things to do. And do you notice how it never ends? That's because we have defined "freedom" as "having enough of something."

What if the opposite were true? What if freedom from our thoughts about what we want and need were the true freedom? That's the realization that honest inquiry brings to the freedom-seeker; something that consulting, rah-rah and self improvement regimens alone can never provide.

This doesn't mean we will stagnate or that we won't have what we want. But we may go about getting what we want without all the "shoulds," all the stress, all the drama.

Isn't this is what we really want from coaching?

© 2006 by Carol L. Skolnick. All rights reserved.

Grief Isn't Love

Sometimes when I set out to self-facilitate a session of transformational inquiry (download the "Judge-Your-Neighbor" worksheet at thework.com), it's because I'm feeling stressed in the moment about a specific situation or person. At other times it just comes to me to work on something that isn't in my face at the moment...a ghost of an old story that seems to be lingering in ways I'm not entirely clear about.

I'm preparing to move from New York to California and in an attempt to lighten my load, I've been sorting and tossing through many years' accumulation of belongings. Just before the new year, while going through some old notebooks, I came across a page of thoughts about my maternal grandfather, who died when I was 10. I loved him very much and his passing was difficult for me. I think about family often during holiday times and it seemed appropriate to do The Work on this beloved one during this time of new beginnings and intentions of peace.

My grandfather and I were very close. I was his youngest grandchild and he seemed to favor me. When my grandfather -- whom I called Zayde -- suffered a stroke, our extended family life changed radically because he was very much the glue that held us together. Photographs of my grandparents' 50th anniversary party portray stoic or resigned adults and the subdued, sad little faces of my eight-year-old self and my not-much-older cousins. There is nothing celebratory about those pictures.

When Zayde died two years later, my parents were having problems with each other while also in the middle of moving to a new home; they weren't answering most of my letters from summer camp and they didn't let me know my grandfather had passed. By the time they came on Visiting Day and told me, the funeral had already happened. I was furious with them and from that time onward I shut down to them. My belief for many years was, "There's no one left to love me." (Many of our most punitive thoughts take hold when we are very young.)

I wrote about Zayde: that I was sad and angry with him because he left me alone and unloved. For so many years I had not been aware of that anger, which I directed towards my parents and myself instead. I went back to the place of being 10 and saw what I did to myself for 37 years, holding this belief as the truth...how I lived a life out of loss and depression and believed it would be that way forever.

One of the insights I received from working on this belief came from the turnaround, "There's no one left to love him." From this I see that grief is not the least bit loving. It blinded me to what was wonderful and beautiful about my grandfather, even after the stroke when he was weakened and seemed not to recognize his grandchildren, couldn't speak, couldn't move much without help and often wept.

What I'm remembering now about that time is that he allowed people to help him, that he was vulnerable and could express his feelings in tears (he used to shout before!), that he could still read the Yiddish newspaper (not the English one though) and that he and my grandmother did celebrate 50 years of marriage in spite of none of us feeling festive.

I remember how he gentled into his age and condition, not fighting it. Wizened in size, he sat in a chair in the living room with sheets wrapped around him and under him, a pillow propping his back. Thinking back, he was quiet and smiley and small and skinny, a Jewish Gandhi. If I hadn't been so self-centered it might have been very sweet to be in his company that way. He and I had never conversed much to begin with -- he had a thick accent and I didn't understand a word he said! I used to sit in his lap and he'd stroke my hair. If I'd known better, after his stroke I could have held him instead of recoiling from kissing the paralyzed side of his face.

I used to believe that if I didn't grieve it meant I didn't care, that I was a cold person...so I became very good at grieving. I have excelled in mourning failed relationships and missed opportunities. That doesn't feel like love to me.

Grief isn't love. At long last and at the perfect time, it is good to know this.

© 2005 by Carol L. Skolnick. All rights reserved.

How to Inquire Yourself into...Success?

A few years ago, I was talking about my business with my friend and mentor, "Infoguru Marketing" creator Robert Middleton, who works with independent professionals (check out his generous, and complimentary, informational offerings at actionplan.com). Robert suggested that I start packaging my services to offer more value to my clients as well as to earn more money. "What if your absolute minimum price to any client were $500?" he asked...at which point I literally fell off my chair.

At the time I only offered group workshops and individual sessions of The Work of Byron Katie, the self-inquiry process I facilitate. The workshops are attractively priced in order to allow many people to attend and get a taste of what I offer. A number of attendees go on to hire me privately after experiencing group facilitation with me. However, I had come to the (insane) conclusion that no one should work with me for more than three sessions, since the work I was doing was designed to foster skills that clients would ultimately use on their own.

$500 is not a huge amount of money; many life and business coaches get that much per month from each client they work with, often for years. "But I'm not a coach, or a therapist," I reasoned, "I am an educator. And as such, I am not doing my job if someone still needs me after three sessions."

Translation: "I'm not worthy."

Over the past couple of years I've worked with clients who are dissatisfied with their careers. They aren't making the amount of money they'd like to, they aren't attracting the kinds of clients they'd like to work with, they don't feel fulfilled. What is stopping them? They provide excuses, as I did. Nine times out of ten, when we scratch an excuse (I call excuses "yeahbuts" and "whatifs"), we uncover an underlying belief about unworthiness.

Feelings of unworthiness affect our emotional well-being as well as our business, even for those of us who are incredibly successful. I remember watching a Barbara Walters interview with Barbra Streisand years ago, when Streisand was about to embark on a concert tour where tickets cost upwards of $1000. On a TV show broadcast to millions of people all over the world, Streisand admitted to feeling devastated by her mother's cutting question: "Who would spend $1000 to see you?"

Hundreds of Barbra's fans would, and did, pay that much, and gladly; clearly she's worthy. Why, then, would this question throw a wealthy megastar into publicly confessed self-doubt? Because if they say it, and it hurts, they're right -- but only according to us. "No one can hurt me," Byron Katie says. "That's my job. I do that."

Because I believed I wasn't worthy, my business had to follow the dictates of my mind. I couldn't see clients beyond three sessions because that would have meant, in my convoluted thinking, that I had failed them. What if a client wanted and needed six sessions, or 12, or twice a week for three years? Obviously, they would have had to take their business elsewhere. So, subconsciously, I was banishing my clients and giving my business away to people who had no such self-limiting beliefs.

When I examined my beliefs about my business, I discovered that in attaching to my feelings of unworthiness, I was entirely in my clients' business, deciding for them what they needed and predetermining how much they thought my services were worth. I could never really empower them because I wasn't considering their individual needs. At the same time, I was ignoring my own need to earn a decent living in the name of "shouldn'ts" and "shoulds," "yeahbuts" and "whatifs."

Unquestioned, feelings of unworthiness can run our careers and our lives. Met with understanding through self-inquiry, our fears, doubts and resistances reveal wonderful information about the real world, and its real possibilities for us and our work.

How do you limit yourself with beliefs about your worthiness? Here is an example of self-inquiry on one such belief.

Belief: No one will pay me a minimum of $500.

Is that true? Honestly, I don't know; I haven't tried it in this business yet!

Can you know your clients would be better off if they paid you less? No.

Can you know they'd be better off if they had fewer sessions with you? No. Some people need years of therapy to deal with their issues, for example...and some need just a few visits. Some people take three weeks to heal from surgery, some take three months. One person can learn how to fix a car over a weekend, another requires a six-month course in auto mechanics.

Can you absolutely know that it's true that no one will pay you a minimum of $500? No. As a freelance copywriter I never touched a job for less than $500, no matter how small the assignment, and most of my assignments were in the four figure range. People will pay me handsomely for that, why not for this?

How do you treat your clients when you believe they won't pay you a minimum of $500? I want to impress them with how quick and efficient my services are, how immediately life-changing. I don't gauge their needs and concerns individually; I lump them together as generic "people." I'm entirely in their business, deciding how many sessions they "should" have and what they can afford. I judge them (and myself) if they don't "get it" in three sessions. I don't share my gifts with them; I don't honor their individual processes. I live in fear of their rejection; if I say, "I charge $500," and they say no, it means I charge too much, they can do better elsewhere, they don't value my product, they are stupid, they are cheapskates, etc.

How do you treat yourself? As a spiritual martyr who has to live on a certain amount of money and never aspire to more because this work is my "calling" rather than my business. As a result, I play very small.

What's the worst thing that could happen if you no longer believed this thought? I'd have no clients.
Can you know that? No. Could the opposite be true? Definitely.

Does this thought bring you peace or stress? Stress.

Who would you be without this thought? Clearer about the value I offer my clients. Creative about other services I can provide to them to support them. More available to people, a listener. I would be a sharer of information, not a people-pleaser. I would not feel the need to apologize for my fees. I would trust (and therefore empower) my clients to make their own decisions and take care of their own needs. I would be more connected to my clients and to the people I meet each day who ask me about my business.

I would be worthy.

Turn-arounds: Someone will pay me a minimum of $500. It is truer; some have; knowing better than I what is best for them, they have insisted on more sessions in spite of my "policy" against it. Other clients who have worked with me for only a few sessions have sent me referrals, and so have indirectly paid me more than my "minimum."

Everyone will pay me a minimum of $500. Yes; if this is my minimum price, everyone who works with me will pay it!

I will not pay myself a minimum of $500. Truer. Id I think I don't deserve it, I'll never charge anyone this amount.

My thinking will not pay me a minimum of $500. Yes; even if I actually earn it, until I know this is perfect for my path and that of my clients, I can't accept this money as my due. Case in point: Barbra Streisand, earning $1000 per concert ticket, but believing that her mother's question, "Who would pay $1000 to see you?" (and really, it was only a question) meant she was unworthy.


© 2005 by Carol L. Skolnick. All rights reserved.

Are We Evolving, Devolving, or Simply Revolving?

"Don't push yourself beyond your evolution." --Byron Katie

"The evolution of human consciousness" is the soup du jour for pundits of all stripes. New-agers, clergy, educators, business leaders, and even politicians have been addressing this topic for some time now. Most notably, The Dalai Lama tells us we are becoming more conscious, even as he instructs us in ways we must become "higher," through compassionate action and nonviolence. If we are to believe His Holiness when he spoke on the Great Lawn of New York's Central Park in the fall of 2003, war is an outdated concept: in order to be compassionate we must care for the earth, and when we hurt another we hurt ourselves. 65,000 people cheered him on when he claimed that we as a people are evolving and becoming more compassionate. But are we?

Even in this time of war and economic uncertainty, the popular author and modern mystic Eckhart Tolle opines that the entire planet is waking up...and that our current craziness is merely a symptom as the intensity of resistance personally and collectively gets triggered.

Then there are those who have something to sell to the highly-evolved or evolution wannabes. They certainly would have us believe in an evolution revolution. (I won't name names, but folks who exploit "indigo" children and write books about "cultural creatives" come to mind.)

Where's the proof of this evolution?

We can argue that in the United States, we have championed civil rights in the last century, yet we have failed to abolish discrimination in our own backyard, not to mention slavery elsewhere in the world. People the world over have become more aware of dwindling natural resources but we continue to deplete and destroy them in the name of progress. In response to terrorism many of the worlds' citizens are committing hate crimes while waving our nations' flags. We wage war while paying lip service to eventual peace and equality...while companies in which our leaders have large interest clean up the collateral damage and rake in the profits.

Of course, these are cheap and easy targets to shoot at from the safety of my little soap box. It is also very easy to make feel-good statements about the evolution of the human spirit. What is more difficult than taking potshots or spouting affirmations is to look within and see where each of us, personally, is evolving...or not.

If I point fingers outward and speak self-righteously about the unconsciousness of world leaders and mob mentality, how does this help? In the end, I am left with stressful thoughts about a world that's a mess. This isn't evolved behavior. If I speak from a mountaintop, and I don't live there, whom do I serve?

Looking inward, I must ask myself where I hate, where I treat people unequally, where I take what doesn't belong to me, where I lie, where I promote wars great and small, against others and against myself. To do this as a gentle noticing, without self-flagellating, is key. We don't need to wage any more war, within or without.

In short, whether or not humanity is evolving is none of my business. Am I evolving? Only when I see the truth of my own evolution (or lack thereof) can I begin to make a difference by acting sanely...to be the peace I want to see in the world, as Gandhi advised...to live the reversals in which St. Francis instructed us so long ago..."Where there is hatred, let me sow love."

Evolution is seeing that what we thought needed changing "out there" was just a case of mistaken identity.

©2004 by Carol L. Skolnick. All rights reserved.

Article about teaching processes in business settings posted at Noumenon website

I'm honored to announce that my article entitled "You Don't Need Another Process, You Need Results" has been posted at the website of Dr. Kriben Pillay, an expert in organizational processes. Dr. Pillay has been instrumental in moving Byron Katie's work in South Africa and has sponsored two of her tours there. He is the author of the book Radical Work and publishes the Noumenon Journal.

The article URL is
http://www.noumenon.co.za/Carol_Skolnick_Article.htm

This piece previously appeared in the latest issue of PEACEtalks: the Newsletter for Self-inquiry in Business.

Transforming Shirkers to Workers: A Self-inquiry Approach

On the rare occasions that Dave fulfills his responsibilities in a timely manner, it's even more rare that he'll let you, his manager, know about it. He seems reluctant to take on new assignments, and he does not like rules. Clearly, Dave marches to a different drummer. It would be easy to label him a shirker and try to transfer him, demote him or fire him altogether.

You've known Dave for some time and he wasn't always this way. But things have changed at the office; downsizing, reorgs, and increased demands from senior management mean you're all expected to do more with less. As a manager or supervisor with direct reports, you're obligated to speak to Dave about the problem, particularly if it's performance assessment time. Rather than have a confrontational meeting where you present him with a list of no-no's, it might serve both of you to question your beliefs about Dave first.

Download the "Judge-Your-Neighbor Worksheet" from my website. Per the instructions, put your thoughts about Dave on paper. "I am disappointed in Dave because..." "Dave should/shouldn't..." "I need Dave to..." "Dave is..." Don't be kind, be critical, judgmental, even petty; inwardly this is what you are doing anyway, and no one will see this.

Your thoughts might look like this:

"Dave does not know the meaning of responsibility."
"Dave is not a team player."
"I want Dave to realize times are tough and we all have to do things we don't want to."
"I want Dave to stop reading e-mail at his desk."
"I need Dave to do his share."
"Dave should grow the hell up."
"Dave should not expect the team to cover for him."
"Dave should not leave at 5 on the dot every night."
"Dave should floss after lunch." (Why not? Even if this has nothing directly to do with his job, that's what you noticed, so write it down.)
"Dave is lazy, dishonest, and will never get anywhere in business."
"I don't ever want to deal with another shiftless employee."

Some who are new to this form of self-inquiry will feel relief at this point. Others will feel overwhelmed and exhausted. That's fine; go easy on yourself. Let the worksheet sit for a day if you need to. Then look at it again and perform self-facilitation of The Work. Choose the statements around which you experience the most stress or those which have the most "charge" for you, and ask yourself the four questions:

1. Is it true?
2. Can I absolutely know that it's true?
3. How do I react when I think this thought?
4. Who would I be without this thought?

If it really drives you crazy that Dave leaves at 5 PM when there's a deadline, start with that. Dave should not leave at 5. Is it true? What is the reality of it,? He does leave at 5. That's what's true...and this does not mean that you won't ask him to stay later. But for right now, can you absolutely know that it's true that he ought not leave at 5 PM when there's work to be done? Can you know you'd be happier and that he'd be better off if he did what you wanted? It might be that if you insisted he stay till 6, he'd spend that entire time on the phone or the internet anyway, unless you stood over him. Do you want to stand over him until 6 PM?

How do you react when you think the thought, "Dave should not leave at 5," and you believe it? What goes through your mind at the sight of his empty cubicle at 5:15? Where do your thoughts travel? How do you treat him when he arrives in the morning? When you hand him an assignment? How do you speak about Dave to other team members as a result of thinking this thought? And have you even asked him to stay later?

Where is your proof that it's better to stay past 5? What are your beliefs about that? Are people who work longer hours more committed, more productive? Does his early leave-taking mean that Dave hates his job and has no respect for you? Make a list.

Who would you be without thttp://beta.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifhe thought, "Dave should not leave at 5?" You might be someone less apprehensive about giving a performance review...someone more willing to ask your employees for what you want...a manager who includes your direct reports in your vision for the company or the department. You might be the team player you wanted Dave to be.

Turn the thought around: "Dave should leave at 5." He should because he does...for now. If you can question your thoughts before confronting Dave and meet as a collaborator towards common goals instead of as a disapointment and a burden, there's no telling how he'll respond to that courtesy. He might even return the favor.

(For more about The Work in your profession, visit Clear Life Solutions and subscribe to the Transformational Inquiry newsletter to receive your free report on inquiry in the workplace.)

©2004 by Carol L. Skolnick. All rights reserved.

The Work of B.K. Diet—Made You Look!

Have you noticed how America's self-help gurus are turning to the world of diet and health? Dr. Phil seems to be dedicating his entireshow this year to weight loss, not to mention his publishing schedule. "Life Makeovers" coach Cheryl Richardson has teamed up with her health and fitness expert husband to pen a new book about why people don't lose weight. There's even—I kid you not—a Mars-Venus diet, peddled by John Gray. (What's next? Fat Women Who Should Run With the Wolves? The Four Agreements Diet? The Power of Be Thin Now? The Prayer of Flabez?)

So I thought I'd beat Byron Katie to the punch and introduce The Work Diet.

There are always new diets on the market because of two factors: 1) many people are unhappy with their bodies, and 2) as a species, we don't like to diet and have trouble sticking to eating plans, so we're looking for the one that's tailor-made for us (in other words, easy and with immediate, tangible results).

Notice the words, "are unhappy," "don't like," and "have trouble." These are thoughts that have nothing to do with the body or even dieting. If we were clear, we could be happy and beautiful at 800 pounds, and at the same time, no diet would pose a problem.

But none of us are living on the mountaintop just now, so let's get real. Let's say you weigh 20 lbs. more than the weight charts call "normal." You can't button the top button of your jeans. Your blood pressure is through the roof, and your doctor says it's because you're too fat. In addition, your partner wants to break up with you because s/he's no longer attracted to you.

You are too fat, is it true?

Well, yes, we think, and here's all the proof: the numbers, the pants, the blood pressure, the disgusted partner.

It's time for The Work Diet, but don't run to the health food store just yet; all that's needed for now is a writing implement, a piece of paper and four questions.

With the education of the inquiry, we begin to see exactly what we've been "eating" all our lives—and what's been eating us—when we think the thought "too fat." For one thing, digits on a scale or a tapemeasure become a basis for self-hatred and an arbiter of attractiveness; we believe a number is bad without ever having "asked us." What of physical symptoms? High blood pressure turns us into a bad person who made ourself sick...so now we're sick and we're wounding ourselves too. And our partner? A disgusted spouse means we really must be disgusting. (That sure motivates me to lose weight, how about you? NOT.)

Then there's the regimen: if you follow it you're "good," if you "cheat" you're "bad." Innocent foods become either "legal" or "the devil." If you lose weight, then diets work, you had willpower, you did well, you're golden...and if you stayed the same or gained a pound or two, diets never work for you, you have a bad metabolism, you are out of control, you don't deserve to live. You may notice that these thoughts have nothing to do with food. Without a story, food is what is and you ate what you ate.

What are your can'ts, won'ts, nevers, shouldn'ts and shoulds about matters of weight loss and weight gain, body size and eating? Discovering and investigating underlying beliefs about food, diets, and the body might reveal that foods, dieting, and our bodies were never the problem. How do we know? Because of the way we change when our thoughts change. With the thought, "I'm too fat," stress and the behavior that comes of it: racing to lower that number on the scale, or racing to the fridge in a fit of "what's the use." Without the thought, peace...and that does not mean that you will not eat properly, exercise, and take care of yourself.

We can weigh 20 extra pounds in heaven or in hell; we can also get "buff" right here in the paradise of reality or down in the depths of the purgatory of thoughts that don't serve.

Here's to thinner thinking!

©2004 by Carol L. Skolnick. All rights reserved.