Is it Really True?
How inquiry and self-compassion can free you from painful thoughts and reactivity.
We’ve all been there, stuck in our thoughts, feeling imprisoned by some painful belief and going over it again and again in our mind. While suffering is an unavoidable part of life, the thoughts we believe about what happens to us can make our suffering so much worse. Whatever we’re feeling, when we attach a thought to it, the feeling becomes more fixed and we are more likely to react in unproductive ways.
By turning to inquiry and practicing self-compassion, we can free ourselves from the control our thoughts have over us and respond more effectively in challenging times. The following are several practices for working with painful thoughts so that we can be more present to what actually is.
Stay with the simple feeling.
Jennifer Welwood, a spiritual teacher I worked with for many years, makes the distinction between “simple human suffering” and “neurotic suffering.” Simple human suffering is caused by the “simple human feelings” we all have, like grief, loss, sadness and vulnerability. Neurotic suffering is the suffering that stems from the unnecessary ways we energize and add to our simple human feelings with thought or story.
For example, if we feel lonely, instead of just experiencing our simple human loneliness, we might add the story, “There’s something wrong with me.” If we’re experiencing grief, we think, “I should be over this by now.” When we experience vulnerability, we add thoughts like, “I need to cut myself off to feel safe,” or “I should be stronger.”
Simple human feelings that could be quite manageable on their own can become unbearable when we energize them in this way.
Recently, in a conflict with my teenage daughter, I realized that the unnecessary thoughts I was adding were “I’m a bad mother,” and “We’re doomed to the same painful relationship my mom and I had.” Such added thoughts cause stress, making us more likely to be reactive and can wind up perpetuating painful dynamics.
The thing about simple human feelings is that we all feel them and for the average person, they always eventually pass like weather systems. But they become solid and fixed when we unnecessarily energize them with thought. Then we can get stuck and react in all sorts of irrational and unhelpful ways.
We can interrupt this pattern by pausing and asking ourselves, “What are the simple human feelings in this situation?” and, “What unnecessary thoughts or stories am I adding?” Then, take time to just be present with the pure feelings free from the thoughts.
When I investigated in this way after the conflict with my daughter, I could see that the simple human feelings I was experiencing were sadness, longing to feel connection with her, and fear. While the simple human feelings energized with the story “I’m bad” and “We’re doomed,” felt unbearable, the feelings on their own were manageable. They didn’t go away, but their intensity diffused. I could experience other feelings like hopefulness and calm. I touched into the heartache from my childhood and felt compassion for myself, my daughter and my own mother. Guided by this compassion and my longing for connection, my daughter and I were able to resolve the situation peacefully and leave it feeling more connected.
When we are conscious of the thoughts that are driving our reactivity we are able to connect with something more true than the story. It makes space for a more layered range of feelings to arise and allows us to respond in ways that are more aligned with our deeper longings.
Take a compassion break.
Self-Compassion expert and author of Fierce Self-Compassion, Kristin Neff writes, “When we open to the reality of what is, even if we don’t like what is, it helps almost immediately.” This is because we’re not causing added stress by resisting reality or overly energizing our experience with story, both of which take up a lot of energy and make our experiences feel like bigger catastrophes than they really are.
However, even when we remove the thoughts, we are still left with the simple human feelings, which can be difficult to sit with and just “allow.” Neff suggests offering ourselves “tender self compassion,” which entails “comforting ourselves, reassuring ourselves that we aren’t alone, and being present with our pain.” She has designed an exercise she calls a “Self-Compassion Break.”
Taking a Self Compassion break entails pausing in the midst of an emotionally distressing situation and acknowledging that what you’re experiencing is a moment of suffering. This is bringing a quality of mindfulness to the situation.
Next, Neff suggests you say to yourself, “Suffering is a part of life.” This allows us to recognize that it is part of our shared humanity to experience suffering. We’re not alone. (Welwood’s phrasing, “simple human feelings” has a similar effect of normalizing the emotions).
After acknowledging that this is a moment of suffering and that suffering is a part of life, Neff encourages placing a hand over your heart and saying “May I be kind to myself.” Alternatively, you can ask yourself, “What do I need to hear right now to express kindness to myself?” and offer yourself whatever message comes to mind.
This exercise includes the three key elements of self-compassion that Neff identifies: mindfulness, common humanity and kindness. According to Neff, people who exhibit this kind of self-compassion are less likely to fixate on their thoughts because they make space for their feelings without judging or suppressing them.
Investigate the thoughts
While both of these approaches can help us get some distance from our thoughts and find peace, often, the same painful thoughts come up again and again. In such cases, it can be beneficial to really investigate the thoughts we’re believing to loosen their grip on us.
In her book, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life, Byron Katie shares a simple and profound inquiry process for questioning our thoughts she calls “The Work.” It consists of four questions and a step called a “Turnaround.”
After identifying a painful thought, the first two questions invite you to ask simply, “Is it true?” And, “Can you absolutely know that it’s true?” We might first answer yes, we really believe that the thought is true. But can we absolutely claim to know that any thought is true? Katie invites us to look honestly at the situation and see what else might be true.
The next two questions invite reflection on how believing the thought impacts your life.
Question three is, “How do you react, what happens when you believe that thought?” And question four is, “Who would you be without that thought?” Take time with these questions. Really close your eyes and see yourself in the situation and notice how the thought makes you react. Then, imagine yourself in the situation without the thought. How would you act differently? What would be possible?
The final step, the “turnaround,” entails looking for opposites of the original thought. Turning the original thought around allows you to see that the new thoughts you come up with are at least as possible if not more possible than the original thought you were fixating on. The point is not to replace the original thought with a new thought, but to see that our thoughts have no inherent validity.
Recently, a client of mine was unhappy in a relationship but felt trapped because she was believing the thought, “It’s bad and unkind to leave a partner.” Her turnarounds were, “It’s not bad and unkind to leave a partner.” “It’s neither kind nor unkind to leave a partner.” And, finally, “It is good and kind to leave a partner” (i.e. if you no longer love them anymore). Interestingly, once free from the thought that leaving her partner meant she was bad and unkind, she no longer felt trapped in the relationship. Realizing she was free to go if she chose created space for more creative problem solving around the issues she and her partner were facing.
As Katie argues, thoughts themselves are harmless, the harm comes from believing that the thoughts we have are true,
“Attaching to a thought means believing that it’s true, without inquiring… Thoughts just appear. They come out of nothing and go back to nothing, like clouds moving across the empty sky. They come to pass, not to stay. There is no harm in them until we attach to them as if they were true.”
By identifying our simple human feelings, meeting them with compassion and investigating our thoughts, we can free ourselves from painful beliefs that keep us stuck and live more honestly and openly in the present moment. When we do this, things become more fluid, a wider range of possibilities become available, and we have more time and energy for the things that bring us fulfillment and joy.