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Getting A Felt Sense #4: Felt Sense of Situations
Do your situations leave a residue?
Dr. Kathy McGuire, Director Week Two |
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Newcomers, Print and Practice!!!!!
This is your Getting A Felt Sense exercise for this four weeks. Print it out, keep it handy, and try it whenever you have time...I will also send a "reminder" copy by email every week...YOU CAN TRY IT IMMEDIATELY WHEN THE EMAIL COMES! a MOMENT TO RELAX AND CHECK INSIDE!
E-Newsletter Archives!!!!
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Do your situations leave a felt "residue" behind?
Have you noticed that real-world situations, interactions can leave behind a "residue" of "something-more-than-words"? Our bodily knowing, our intuitive sensing, lives in the situation and can "pick up" aspects that affect us without giving us words. We might have to pay attention to the "intuitive feel" left behind a while just to be able to say we feel "anxious," or "Something is not right here" or "What is being said doesn't match the feeling being generated" or "I want to get out of here!" or "This is not safe." Even getting this far, any words at all, may take a first step of Getting A Felt Sense of a Situation," paying attention to the "whole thing," the larger "intuitive feel" under the initial wordless emotional reaction.
Intuitive Focusing is made exactly for going further to find words for exactly what is going on in such situations. Finding words allows you to take action to change the situation, because now you know what the problem is.
By taking a moment to sit down, "clear a space" inside, and ask an open-ended questions, like, "What is this all about?", and, instead of answering with the already-known in your head, waiting at least a minute for "the feel of the whole thing" to form, you can begin to find words and images and, eventually, the "Ahah!," the relief of knowing consciously what your body has been carrying "unconsciously." Now, you can take action steps to change the situation, clarify the interaction.
Kathy's three experiences (there are so many!):
So, I share my experiences of Felt Sensing of A Situation:
These are three situations that left a strange feeling behind, a "felt underbelly" that was a "More" in my body after these situations:
#1. My daughter-in-law, after three stressful weeks of semi-labor, was finally admitted to the hospital with decision to induce labor, 75% chance of a Caesarean section. I woke at 4:30AM, wanting to know what was happening. But, I didn't want to call and wake she or my son at the hospital or her grandma, my sources for information. And I didn't think they would call to wake me unless something dramatic, birth or C-Section happened....but I was soon up and pacing with anxiety.
Rationally, I told myself this was ridiculous. Logically, I knew they would have called me if there was any real news to report. But, I felt cut off. I couldn't stop being anxious.
Finally, I decided to do "Getting the Felt Sense of a Situation": I started doing some Emotional Freedom meridian tapping tapping in the middle of my forehead, between the eyes This actually immediately broke through the anxiety into a teariness. What a relief already (I'd rather feel anything than anxiety, a kind of spinning "inability to feel below it").
The words: "This is out of my control.This 'not knowing what will happen' is freaking me out." Led to deeper sensing about the whole larger "issue" of life not being "in control." It was actually soothing to connect with this larger, universal, "not knowing," this universal angst -- but, also, it held less foreboding about this actual specific situation of awaiting birth.
Doing the exercise consciously led me to realize how often I do use "Focusing upon the Felt Sense of a Situation" to get through a week!
I will just name the other two situations where I found myself stopping to "focus into," "sit with" a "residue" of bodily feeling left from an interaction:
#2. was the "feel" left by an indirect message given by the garage repairing my damaged auto tire (I found the words"ominous" as I sensed into the bodily discomfort left in me after the conversation). I decided I had to call back and clarify, rather than suffer this "ominous feeling" any longer.
#3. was a more like a "sheer emotion," a kind of ongoing depression/shut down/giving up feeling which only days later I traced to an interaction where I felt that "Thinking" and "Feeling" in the Jungian sense (see this article) were clashing, and that Feeling was losing, in a subtle, hard-to-define way. Being able to name this led to a release of the background feeling of depression and inaction and an idea for action steps.
That is just three of many times during the week that I automatically turned to "Focusing into the Feel of a Situation" because I had an uncomfortable "residue" left from a real-world situation. |
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Pre-Focusing Practice B. Getting A Felt Sense #4: "Finding the Felt Senses of A Situation" (from Complete Focusing Instructions) Week Two of four weeks of practice
Remember, especially at the beginning, time those "1 minute" pauses. You will be amazed at how long a minute is, how seldom we ever pause for a whole minute!!! And it is exactly in the PAUSE that the Creative Edge comes. |
4. The "Felt Sense," The "Intuitive Feel" of a Situation-Allow 15 to 20 minutes
In this exercise, you are going through a first round of Intuitive Focusing, looking for The Creative Edge, the something-new-that-is-more-than-words about an actual situation during the week that felt unfinished.Although you may have gone around and around in your head, trying to find a solution, to figure out what happened that was strange, now you will set aside that left-brain problem solving and consult your "right-brain wisdom, the bodily "intuitive feel" of "that whole thing." First, we use a Relaxation exercise as a way of clearing some space inside for Focusing, then we look for "the intuitive feel," the "bodily-felt sense" of the situation:
---Let's start with The Counting Meditation for initial Relaxation:
---First, stretch---and relax, stretch---and relax, stretch---and relax----30 sec.
---Now, begin noticing your breathing, just noticing the breath going in---and out---in---and out---30 sec.
---Now, on each exhale, count starting with "1" and continuing, on each exhale, until you reach "9"---1---2---3---4---5---6---7---8---9
2 minutes
---If you lose track, just start counting over again with "1". When you get to "9," start over and count to "9" one more time---
2 minutes
---Spend a few minutes coming to a peaceful place inside, noticing your breathing---
2 minutes
---Now, bring to mind an incident or a situation from the past week which feels unfinished, left behind an uncomfortable or confusing feeling---
2 minutes
---Set aside all your ready-made words or images, and try to get a fresh "intuitive feel" for how you felt in that situation, paying attention to the center of your body, around the heart/chest area---
1 minute
---Try to find some words or an image to describe the "intuitive feel" of it, The Creative Edge before words---
1 minute
---Keep checking until the words or image are just right.
1 minute
---Ask yourself, "What's that about for me?" and wait for a felt sense, an "intuitive feel" that is more than words, to form---
1 minute
---Find some words or an image to capture that "intuitive sense". You are letting your body's Wisdom tell you about the situation, instead of answering with everything you already know.
1 minute
---When you are ready, come slowly back into the room.
If you wanted to continue with another round of Focusing, you would simply ask again, "And why is this important to me?", wait to see what comes as an "intuitive feel," look for words or an image that are "just right," checking and resonating until something shifts inside. You can find full Focusing Instructions at Focusing: Find Out What Is Bothering You. |
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You can read about and subscribe to Creative Edge Practice here. You can read about and subscribe to Creative Edge Collaborators here.Hope to see you in these two unique e-groups. Yahoo Groups is very safe, and we have had no spam problems.
Dr. McGuire's Blog
"Ultimate Self-Help" is Dr.McGuire's blog (just click on this link right now or at the link at the top of the home page at Creative Edge Focusing).If you find the Creative Edge Focusing website overwhelming, the blog is a good way to get introduced to various parts of it a little bit at a time.
You can look under Categories in the right sidebar to find archives under selected topics such as Individual Difference Measures like the MBTI and Enneagram, Collaborative Edge Sexuality, Intuitive Eating, collaboration, creativity, and innovation in business, etc.,etc., and you can offer comments in return! Many of the blogs are reprints of these articles, so this is one way to introduce friends/colleagues to Creative Edge Focusing (TM) and this e-course.
E-Newsletter Archives
Past Creative Edge Focusing (TM) e-newsletters are now available in Creative Edge Focusing archive. You could email this link to friends to interest them in this "Email Focusing Course." There is also a link from the website in the menu under Free Resources. |
More Help and Support: Online e-group, Audio Tapes, Teachers
Remember, it can be much easier to learn Intuitive Focusing in the company of a Focused Listener. You can learn all about Focusing Listening, and find resources and teachers, at the website for Creative Edge Focusing
If you order our Self-Help Package, you can listen on audio CD Intuitive Focusing: Disk One , Track 12, "The Felt Sense of a Situation," with Dr, McGuire's peaceful voice to keep you company -- and help you stay on track!!
And many of these exercises are in the Spanish version of the manual, Focusing En Comunidad. Order from our Store Self-Help Manuals, CDs, DVD.
Kathy McGuire, Director | |
| About Creative Edge Focusing
Located by Beaver Lake in Rogers, AR, our goal is to support people in the practice of listening/focusing skills, throughout the world, and for personal growth, interpersonal conflict resolution, and creative individual and group problem solving. |
Disclaimer: The instructions in Creative Edge Newsletters are offered purely as self-help skills. In providing them, Dr. McGuire is not engaged in rendering psychological, financial, legal, or other professional services. If expert assistance or counseling is needed, the services of a competent professional should be sought. | |
| Creative Edge Focusing (TM)
Dr. Kathy McGuire
Director | |
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