After welcoming people, I relaxed in the sunken garden, finding some more of that precious time to myself. I needed it. In the subsequent supervision (with Karaj, Dev, Priya, Michelle, Shona, Simran and me), Karaj challenged Priya about her attitude. He told her he gives people every opportunity and then cuts them off. I related it to the relationships I’d had in which I had given everything I had to give and then walked away (with a clear conscience). Priya understood this because she had done the same with her last boyfriend. This allowed Karaj to show her that at last she’d had an insight into the situation she is in. Either she sorts herself out or she will be cut off once Karaj has given all he has to give.
We took a break but things didn’t end there for Priya. She thanked me for the memo I sorted out this morning and gave her in the supervision. I thought it strange, as all I had done had printed it. It felt incongruent and I assumed she was practising acknowledging people. So I asked her how it had felt to acknowledge me. She felt nothing so I pressed her further about why she had thanked me. It emerged that she thought I had typed it this morning. I found this odd because she had been there last night when Karaj dictated the memo and I typed. Amazing. I informed Karaj of this and Priya was challenged and fined. Even though it was her work that was being done and she was present, she was absent. Typical.
I helped Michelle finish her letter to her dad. (I’d originally had to offer my help even though she was grateful for it.) It was good to be involved in this because I have been through the same process. Plus, it was support for me on my journey. Michelle was rocking while I was typing. I asked her if she was in pain and she said, ‘no’. Then she thought about it and said, ‘yes’. Again, amazing.
In the session after lunch, I talked about the three examples of verbalisation from this morning – two with Priya and one with Michelle – and how so much was highlighted just from the communication of a simple feeling; a feeling I had noticed each time because it took me out of my balanced state. Karaj: ‘I’m glad you’re back to verbalising, because you’ve been going down since Australia and you haven’t been able to feel what I’ve been saying.’ I also talked about the addiction to emotions I used to have with my relationships, and how neither of my parents did anything to help me grow. My mother mothered me and my father competed with me. No-one offered me an alternative way (of living).
Dev and I supported Simran when his sons called him, by just being with him as he spoke. He was nervous and could not relax enough to be with them fully. When he hung up I waited for him to talk about the call and tell us how his sons were. Nothing. Unbelievable. I challenged him that here was an opportunity to talk. Moreover, here was a chance to talk about his sons, and he said fuck all. Idiot. I chatted first to Dev and then to Karaj about Simran and his call to the boys. He had been like a child when he spoke to their mother, and he did not talk to the boys about anything really. He also did not thank them for their father’s day cards. There was nothing from him.
People left, I rested for a few hours, and ended the day reading my appraisals from 26 April – 3 May 2001: Good discipline with the exercises. I was protecting myself. [Note: Watch what happened first thing tomorrow morning. I forgot all about protecting myself even though it had been the last thought on my mind before I went to sleep!!]
Summary: Good verbalising. The more I talk, the sharper I am; and the sharper I am, the more I talk. Don’t forget: think of myself, focus on myself.