Week 3: Finding Focus

Finding You, Finding Me 

By Tara Acharya 

When I set on a journey to find you 

I found standing at the door was me 

And when I asked if you resembled me 

The smiling answer was, 'do you resemble me' I stood there for the moment eternal 

The journey began through the dark tunnel 

Towards the glowing spark that I called you 

Which now I realized was me 

The journey ended from where it began 

From finding you to finding me

Perspective 

Last week, we returned to practice in everything we did. We learned to bring our awareness-of-our awareness into our bodies by asking three critical questions: What am I feeling? Where do I feel it? What does it need or want? We learned this was the practice of “coming into the body” and interoception, interception, and tracking. This in turn allowed us to notice the story in our head and how our perception of our situation changes. As we learn to move down this somatic trailhead we gain access to Self and learn to become more Self resourced.  

When we did this, we became more aware of our everyday challenges, tests, triggers, and traumas that inspire protective parts of ourselves that manage and hijack our lives, relationships, goals, and dreams. This is a considerable accomplishment that must be celebrated. Seriously, give yourself a double high-five over your head right now and feel it in your body. We will learn this practice in week 9 called "celebration." No wonder, right?! - you are allowed to laugh at that. The practice of celebration will empower you later in your embodied leadership journey. 

This is the turning point from the purpose phase to the power. We will be learning to take our power back from these protective parts and turning toward the generative practice of embodied leadership. This is a process of learning to find and care for these parts and then integrating new stretch behaviors that only our embodied Self has the creativity and courage to find. This is why the second stage of our seasonal process is called POWER. This is when we start to realize that the challenges in our lives are our curriculum, and we each have our own. These challenges, tests, and triggers guide us to find places inside our bodies that need our care and attention. 

This week, we are learning to find access points, called trailheads, to do this more profound work.

To let go of what's holding us back from growth and development, we must learn to find "trailheads" and learn how to "unblend" from these protective parts when we notice them. This is the learning objective this week. Do you see how each stage of this process builds toward you becoming a fully resourced leader who can transmute pain into purpose and presence? 

These parts are rooted in our bodies and nervous systems, and they react to the environment not as it is but as past experiences have shaped them. When we begin to be able to notice these sensational moments and to unblend from physical sensation in the body and the story in our head that they trigger, we discover they are, in fact, trailheads that open into a path for deeper exploration and growth. We need a container in our life with the environmental qualities to allow us to do this deeper exploration and learn how to listen to what these parts need and want. That's what happens in our 1:1 and group containers. 

If you had trouble accessing the embodied qualities of your Self in week one or unblending and finding trailheads this week, know you are not alone, and I want you to notice something fundamental and natural about this process. As you step in to "be with" these parts in the group or during the flow of your default life, you will need your light; this is the beautiful, awe-inspiring part of this work. The Self stands out in relationship to these loud, cranky, workaholic, anxious, sissy, avoidant, addictive, pour me, judgmental, tough guy, mean dude parts.

The second thing I want you to notice is the constructive outcome from "emotional contagion" or "resonance" you will receive when you come to the group, work with me 1:1, or meet with leaders in this program outside of the group. Some people will have access to their Self more than others. Heck, I do my best to show up fully and completely open for you, but sometimes, people in the group are able to access a state of being that helps me find what my parts need. This is the power of the group. Contagion works constructively through a process of resonance and co-regulation. This is another value of this program: you are getting access to the direct experience of the embodied energy in the group and bringing that way of being back out into your life. As stated in No-Bad Parts, page 141.

"...Contagion (otherwise known as resonance). Protector parts are contagious in the sense that when one member of a system (particularly the leader) blends with a protector part, it often activates the protector of others, and the culture of the organization becomes permeated with that protective energy. Correspondingly, Self-led people bring out the Selves of those around them. As when one vibrating tuning fork sets off another one at a distance, the presence of Self in a system helps protectors relax and elicits Self throughout the organization."

This week, we want to use what our body tells us by noticing tension to target focus areas for deeper exploration and growth in the next stage of the process. This means we want to look for "sensational" moments of anxiety, stress, disconnection, confusion, anger, frustration, joy, bliss, annoyance, or any moment that feels sensational and meaningful or has activated a protective part of ourselves.

This means, in the flow of your default life, I want you to be able to perform the following behavioral recipe: 

Trigger Happens = NOTICE SENSATIONAL MOMENT BY NOTICING TENSION IN THE BODY. 

Your Response Goes Inward = "Wow, What am I feeling? Where do I feel it? What does it need or want? 

Then label it and log it = "Hey, this is a trailhead that I want to remember and/or continue unblending and say, "A part of me is __________." 

Bring these sensational moments back to the group to explore in an embodied practice session with the group to witness you. When you do this, you integrate this behavior into your default response pattern and increase the likelihood of it becoming automatic in the wild of your default life. You also create the opportunity for other people to see how to do this. 

When you bring this moment back to group and/or our 1:1 sessions, we are, in fact, learning to "conjure," which means to bring it back or to drop into it again on and in our bodies. What is different in this context is that we are in a container where your embodied Self-energy and the embodied Self-energy of the group can assist you in accessing more creative, compassionate, courageous, and confident responses that we will be learning to make into embodied stretches in week 4. Embodied stretches are complete behavior response patterns that we co-actively create to step into discomfort and overcome challenges in heart-open ways in our life. What I am describing here points to what we will focus on during the next phase of the program, the Power phase.

If you are feeling confused, overwhelmed, or behind right now, use this as a moment to practice. Find that part of your body by using the tools we've outlined. DO IT NOW. Take a deep breath. Drop into your body. Ask the three questions we learned. Find a part of you that is currently present and what it needs, and practice giving it what it needs. Bring this experience to the group. 

Especially if this is your third group, there is one final thing to point out: every group is the same process. Every group is an opportunity to arrive, set agreements, ground, and check in. Then, we use the space we've created to learn to do this work fully embodied and in the open with the other people "witnessing." 

Witnessing leaders in the container of the group is an active process. I want you to ask yourself, "What am I feeling? Where do I feel it? What does it need or want? While witnessing leaders check in inside our group. This group is a container with specific environmental qualities that allow your "Bodymind" and sense of "Bodyfulness" to reach states of being that are, by nature, unsafe to your protective parts outside of the group. Witnessing allows your bodymind to see a glimpse of a world beyond what your protective parts can see. This glimpse is what I believe triggers a person's transformation and leadership development by enrolling and directly experiencing "something to experience" inside the containers we create together in this program. This is real, beautiful, raw, challenging, and inspiring, creative work of becoming a whole person. After 15 seasons of this process, I am still appreciating it more and more, and you only need 2 to get a sense of what I am pointing to.

The first time you move through this process, you are likely navigating, using your head to understand what is happening in your body, group, and life. The second time, you are wayfinding, using the tools you've discovered to find your way toward your innate sense of Self-Leadership. This is what it means to enter the process of becoming an embodied leader. When you graduate after 6 months, you will have tools to overcome challenges in ways that allow you to become the fully resourced leader of your life and relationships. If used and practiced, these tools will allow you to bring your vision to life from a place of service and connection to everyone and everything. 

I look forward to seeing you in the group!

Learning Objective: 

Discover that the problems in your life are your curriculum. Learn how to target trailheads to begin the process of unblending from protective parts. Begin to practice responding consciously to protective patterns to perform embodied Leadership in the wild! 

Embodied Practice: 

First Season: Define 1 to 3 zones of your life where you want to shift or change how you respond to challenges, tests, trauma, or triggers that come up in your daily life. 

Second Season: Find sensational moments and trailheads, and practice unblending from parts. 

This week, we are priming ourselves to use our newfound awareness of our awareness to practice "finding trailheads" and "unblending" in the default flow of your life and relationships. 

This week, we are priming ourselves to use our newfound awareness of our awareness to practice "finding trailheads" and "unblending" in the default flow of your life and relationships.

Allowing your body to guide your focus areas: See if you can change where you want to focus your attention based on what your body has brought to your awareness in weeks 1 and 2. 

Bonus points if you can do this in or around the focus areas you've targeted in your Leadership assessment. This is a sign of tapping into your sense of embodied leadership. When our protective parts run the show, we want and think we need different things than our embodied Self needs. This is often a sign of allowing this work to become an integrated practice. 

The ability to notice, label, and remember sensational moments from your week as "trailheads" for deeper exploration later in the group. The ability to practice "unblending" during the flow of your default life, saying, "A part of me is ___________."

Journal Questions: 

1 . Describe three trailheads you found this week and the time, location, and what was happening. 

2. Describe your vision of the outcomes, aspirations, and intentions you have in your three focus areas. 

3. What recurring challenges, tests, or triggers are you noticing from your week of returning to practice? 

4. What are you aware you don't want to work on (This is an act of noticing avoidance; by noticing it, you are not committing to doing anything about it)?

5. What is working well in your life right now? 

6. Learning review: Reflect on this past month in the program. What surprised you? What key takeaways will you remember or use most in the future?

“Letter To Self” Work-Statement + Share and reflect on your experience in the community chat.