How to Know What Belief to Question – Part 1

What Byron Katie’s says is that we should just work with whatever belief arises in that moment. There is no need to seek after beliefs to work with; there is no need to use complex forms of Psychoanalysis; no need to analyse painful experiences from the past. We don't need to read books which tell us what is right, wrong, good or bad; we don't need to read books to find the right principles that other people say we should live according to. In this way, we are able to do away with an entire bookcase full of books that attempt to tell us how we should live our lives. This gives us a great deal more independence and potentially saves us a lot of wasted time and money.

If people become self-empowered (more like God-empowered) they are no longer under the control of spiritual gurus, Psychologists, therapists, advisors and church pastors. There is a great deal of freedom and empowerment to be found by doing The Work.

The modus operandi of The Work is the concept that contraction around a thought is what causes negative thoughts and feelings, and in fact, suffering in general. Byron Katie says that confusion is the only suffering. Katie often says, “If I think you are the problem – I am insane”. This reminds me of a quote from William Shakespeare’s Hamlet: There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. The biggest criticisms of The Work is that it is too simple and that it condones wrong behaviour. But it is not about determining what is good, bad, right, wrong, fair or unfair. Inquiry is simply a means of questioning the attachment to a thought – knowing that it is this attachment to a thought that causes stress and overall dysfunction in life.