Just One Look Forum Archives

Hi Everyone

I've been doing the looking since November last year, have been listening to the podcasts, and following you all on the forum. Thank you so much to John, Carla, and everyone involved in this work. Just being able to read your stories and know that I'm not alone in this has helped me through some tough times.

Fortunately I don't have a long history of spiritual understanding...I'm in my fourth year of Chinese Medicine school studying to be an acupuncturist and I stumbled upon upon the whole biissed out in love with everyone and everything my first term of taking qigong (a chinese form of energy cultivation)... I just thought I was going to school to learn how to put needles in people. I'll spare you the details but the gist of it is that I played around with a lot of different ideas, banged my head against more than one wall, and finally stumbled upon John and his teachings last year. What a relief. Thank you to all you long term spiritual seekers....every time I consider learning some new meditation technique I think of you all and your reports that nothing worked but this and I go for a walk instead.

So where am I at with the looking? Well the angst that I have felt since I was a teenager has disappeared. I don't have fantasies about killing myself anymore. My relationships have improved considerably mostly because I'm not too afraid to articulate my feelings and thoughts to others. I stopped smoking and drink a lot less alcohol than I used to...this also has to do with being in a health related profession. I'm engage in activities that feel right instead of doing what I think I should be doing or doing what everyone else is. I feel mine and everyone else's feelings and moods much more intensely but I'm more ok with it.

What hasn't changed? Well I still have the same problems, but I'm able to handle them much more smoothly. I'm going through a very tough period with a friend where some of my not so pretty stuff is coming to the surface and I may lose the friendship because of it. I've been watching the sick, reactive mechanisms come into play in this relationship over and over again and I feel that things are finally starting to shift. I just spent the last week in a pretty acute state of anxiety so I listened to the podcasts, read the posts, did the looking, and was honest with the person that I'm having issues with and poof! this evening the anxiety disappeared. Will it come back? Maybe but I know that I can handle whatever comes up because I know it can't hurt or help me.

I'm hoping to be able to incorporate the looking into my practice as an acupuncturist. I'm in a school clinic setting right now and feel somewhat limited to what I can and cannot do there. I find acupuncture to be a beautiful way to help manage symptom relief, but I'm not sure that it will ever get to the root of the problem. Many claim that it can but the looking seems to be a much simpler way to get there.

Anyway thanks for listening.

Natalie

Hi Natalie

Your sharing is very familiar to my experience so thanks a lot.

I've been a 'body worker' most of my life including shiatsu, massage, reiki, and now cranio-sacral etc. In my experience there seemed to be a kind of 'holiness' around these techniques. The movement of energy or perhaps like in Reiki the chanelling of 'divine' energy. Acupuncture really helped me with allergies etc. And it does produce a deep relaxation in my nervous system.

Somehow this became the goal, to achieve deeper and deeper states of relaxation.

All of these techniques are very helpful yes in relaxing the body and so reducing the overall feelings of anxiety for a time and like a drug you need more and more sessions to maintain well-being. The way to be free of this anxiety once and for all was the looking and the certainty that i am always aware of myself.

I find the suggestion to look very well received in a session since the person is already sharing about their anxiety etc. So I'll usually share what I now know. The cause of the anxiety is the fear and the solution is to look at yourself,I don't concern myself too much with their understanding of this as I think just making the suggestion is enough.

Well just a few thoughts, nice to see you here.

Maureen

Maureen and Natalie,

Even though body techniques like Reiki and Acupuncture are treating symptoms of the alienation from life, I find them very helpful on many levels. (I have been teaching Reiki for 13 years and I just took 12 treatments of acupuncture for my back pain.) Basically when the mind is crazy, emotions are high or the body is in pain our attention is captured more forcefully. After a period of crazy and pain, relaxation can open a window where a suggestion to turn our attention inward may be heeded. Even after we are on the way to recovery, bodywork type of treatments can help clear our systems of toxic stress and aid in recovery. The only drawback is when one believes any of these energy techniques are sufficient to remove the fear of life itself. Lera Jane

Hi Natalie,

Just wanted to say welcome! I'm glad you're here--as a long-term spiritual seeker, I'm happy that you're using my example and going for a walk instead of wasting your time with the gazillionth different technique!

I was intrigued to hear you say that you've quit smoking and started drinking less since you started the looking--I'm not a smoker, but I have noticed over the past few months that I've almost quit drinking completely. I wasn't ever a heavy drinker, but suddenly a glass of wine with dinner every night just doesn't seem appealing. It's always interesting to hear someone else experiencing a similar "side effect"...

At any rate, welcome to the forums!

Take care,

Ansley

To Maureen--

Thanks for you perspective. I'm curious as to how you approach the looking with your clients? Do you do the mindfulness meditation and guide them through the process of looking at themselves, give them information about John's website, ect..? When someone is coming to me because their back hurts I'm not sure how to broach the subject...I guess I'll have to work that out and bring it up when there is an opening and it feels appropriate.

Yes I agree there is a 'holiness' that does surround the world of energy medicine. Someone jokingly called it 'enlightenment at the end of a needle'. There was a period of time where I was buying into an idea that I was somehow 'special' and more in touch than the average person. I still notice the ways in which I can be arrogant and feel superior but I'm able to check myself much more quickly. I find that the more the structures break down the more naturally I'm able to access my intuition and creativity and bring that into my acupuncture and shiatsu treatments. Not because I'm special but because I'm so much more engage in my life. The natural intelligence that Johns talks about seems to be more in the foreground and all the chatter has started to become background noise. I don't know if that makes any sense?

To Lera Jane--

I have definitely used acupuncture and massage to calm down my nervous system when I'm in an acute state of stress. It seems to interrupt the reactive nervous system response and 'open a window' as you say. I'm humbled and amazed on a daily basis by this medicine.... I see people who've had chronic pain for years and after 6-12 treatments their pain is significantly reduced. I stick needles in people and I have no idea why it works and I don't need to know why. The looking has helped me get over the incessant need to know. So yes as wonderful as all these techniques are they are not going to cure the fear of life and to sell them as a solution would be dishonest.

To Ansley--

Thanks for your warm welcome. The decrease in drinking was an interesting side effect. I think I've always used alcohol as a way to cope with life--to numb out my social anxiety. As I started becoming more comfortable in my own skin the less I needed the numbing effects of alcohol. I also noticed that having a drink when I go out to dinner was just a habit and I started asking myself if I really actually wanted a drink--sometimes yes but most of the time no. Like you said it just doesn't seem appealing.

Natalie

Hi again girls. Sorry I missed these posts but now really interesting to read your responses.

I just want to say it can a bit tricky to direct people to the looking at themselves as the natural desire to just feel better and be free of symptoms is so strong as it was for me. I tend to use a lot of what I've learned about control over the beam of attention( John's talks about this lately in the period of recovery are so helpful too). I've always used the focus on the breath as the focal point of attention and even that seems impossible for many but usually I very simply just add on the suggestion to look at this feeling of me. The effects of the looking take there course naturally and I encourage sharing about healing and relaxation from this perspective and less about this or that symptom.

I see too there was always in me a subtle tension about wanting people to feel better and I was somehow responsable for helping this to happen. All fear based in this persona. Wow, go figure. Another one bites the dust.

love

maureen