Owning My Own Journey

Coffee time was brief this morning (half hour) but included important lessons. We reviewed the disharmonies of our previous day. Pat: Hard to remember what I did yesterday. I can see that in pattern I ask myself, “Pat, did you do enough yesterday?” whereas from a deeper place I ask myself, “Pat, were you really there enough?”

Pat: I took a lot of time emailing my teacher – something that administratively could have been handled in 2 minutes, but in consciousness, watching all that was arising in me as I took in my teacher’s words, watching my reactionary patterns, then calmly and sensibly responding, trying to truly communicate clearly and effectively, without patterned behavior – well that took considerable time AND was definitely worth it in my growth process. Very rich.

Gary: Sounds to me like you were taking ownership of your journey. The same thing happens to me with my Pathwork helper Moira, or my Hakomi counselor Ed, or other teachers. I notice what I hesitate to say, what I don’t want to feel when working with them, etc. and in feeling into all of this there is growth for me. This is even true when reading and working with Pathwork lectures. It is my journey, not theirs. My teachers and counselors are there to reflect back to me what they see, offering their observations and intuitions about what could be going on in me and doing so with fresh eyes, deeply rooted in their own experiences of their respective paths and their learning from other students or counselees. But no more than that. What I do with their reflections, even insights from Pathwork lectures, is up to me – taking in what fits, letting go what may not fit or what may not fit just yet, or what I am simply not yet able to comprehend about myself.

Pat: That’s a good perspective. This is what I am doing with all my teachers: I am taking ownership of my own journey. It is good to remember that point of ultimate self-responsibility.

A journey shared in love, Gary