Escaping Self-Persecution

In this example of a nightmare life script that is a lot of fun. When you directly look at and listen to your worst fears they get smaller. You see how silly and absurd they really are.

What are three fundamental life issues that you are dealing with now in your life?

1. Waking up to the luminosity and emptiness of life

2. Experiencing joyful absurdity more

3. Experiencing this moment as unlimited abundance

Imagine you are on your deathbed, looking back over your life. Imagine all your dreams have come true. What do you see when you look back? How has your life unfolded?

My work is spread all over the world. I have over one hundred trained teachers who are training other teachers. It’s being used in families on all continents – even families of penguins on Antarctica (just kidding). Many people have internalized the work and made it their own so that it is not even associated with me or Dream Yoga or Integral Deep Listening. It is so commonplace they think they developed it themselves. I think that’s hilarious – the way it should be, since it never belonged to me in the first place. Claudia has beaten all odds and stayed healthy to the age of 106; I am still lively at 117, but ready to pass the baton to my many friends, co-creators, and students. I can’t wait to come back into a family that will raise me in this work so I can continue it!

Now imagine that you are on your deathbed, looking back over your life. Imagine that NONE of your dreams have come true; in fact, all of your fears have come to pass. What happened? How do you feel?

Everybody thinks my work is ridiculous and it is widely and profoundly ignored. Claudia has left me. Since I can’t speak enough German, I limp back to the U.S. where I am unable to make enough. I develop such a painful condition that I can’t exercise and gain 230 pounds. I’m throwing up all the time. My hair falls out. I’m alone. I’ve got bad breath and I stink. Even dogs walk on the other side of the street when they see me. I am totally depressed and anxious since I’m a weak, helpless, broke failure.

If those feelings had a color (or colors), what would it be?

Dog shit brown.

Imagine that color filling the space in front of you so that it has depth, height, width, and aliveness.

Now watch that color swirl, congeal, and condense into a shape. Don’t make it take a shape, just watch it and say the first thing that you see or that comes to your mind: An animal? Object? Plant? What?

A machine that extrudes shit. It’s pumping it out like mad all around me wherever I go and on me as well. I stink.

Now remember how as a child you liked to pretend you were a teacher or a doctor? It’s easy and fun for you to imagine that you are this or that character in your dream and answer some questions I ask, saying the first thing that comes to your mind. If you wait too long to answer, that’s not the character answering – that’s YOU trying to figure out the right thing to say!

Shit producing machine, would you please tell me about yourself and what you are doing?

I am big and ugly pitted metal, like a funnel with a long tube. I’m full of shit and I’m joyfully extruding it everywhere, like a demented pogo stick, hopping around Joseph, and especially having fun covering him with it.

What do you like most about yourself? What are your strengths?

I am very lively! I love my job! I love life! I love tormenting Joseph! And I love producing all this shit that people hate and that is absolutely good for nothing!

What do you dislike most about yourself? Do you have weaknesses? What are they?

No, I think I do a very good, thorough job. I seem to do a magical job of taking air and sky and turning it into an infinite amount of shit. I never run out of energy to do it!!! Fun!

Shit producing machine, you are in this person’s life experience, correct? They created you, right?_____ Shit producing machine, what aspect of this person do you represent or most closely personify?

The persecutor. The part of himself that likes to beat up on himself and enjoys it!

Shit producing machine, if you could be anywhere you wanted to be and take any form you desired, would you change? If so, how?

No, I think Joseph needs me to stay motivated. Besides, I have great fun tormenting him.

(Continue, answering as the transformed object, if it chose to change.)

(Character), how would you score yourself 0-10, in confidence, compassion, wisdom, acceptance, peace of mind, and witnessing? Why?

Confidence: 10 Hey, I am indestructible and am happy! I’m WAY confident!

Compassion: 0 What’s that? In fact, I don’t believe in that stuff. It creates laziness and lack of motivation.

Wisdom: 10 I think I am very wise. I definitely know what’s best for Joseph: to be reminded of how shitty he is and how shitty life is.

Acceptance: 10 I am EXTREMELY accepting! Do YOU accept dog shit everywhere? Would you be happy with YOURSELF producing infinite amounts of dog shit??

Inner Peace: 3 I’m not anxious, but I keep moving and active. I don’t like that peaceful garbage. Too lazy.

Witnessing: 10 I like to watch Joseph labor under all that shit!

(Character,) if you scored tens in all six of these qualities, would you be different? If so, how?

Hmmmm,…I don’t want to change. If I were 10 in Inner Peace and Compassion I definitely wouldn’t be a shit extruding machine. I’d probably just be the sky, which is dull and boring.

How would the life of the person who created you be different if he naturally scored high in all six of these qualities all the time?

I wouldn’t like that. I would have no power over him. That wouldn’t be good, because he needs me to torment him to motivate him to grow.

If you could live the life of the person who created you for him, how would you live it differently?

Well, I’m not at all tormented. I wouldn’t allow anything to torment me. Not anyone, not any thought, not any feeling. I would be so vigilant not to allow that to happen that it wouldn’t even get started. Maybe I couldn’t change the world from extruding shit, but I could certainly choose whether or not I felt tormented by it, and I would choose not to be.

If you could live this person’s waking life for him/her today, would you handle his/her three life issues differently? If so, how?

1. Regarding waking up to the luminosity and emptiness of life, I would be the sky. It’s both of those things.

2. Regarding experiencing joyful absurdity, I think staying me is good. I have a lot of fun! And there’s a lot of reality to me. Pretending I don’t exist is retarded.

3. Experiencing this moment as unlimited abundance: I would be both me and the sky, since the sky is unlimited and my shit and my ability to produce it is unlimited. So you have an abundance of the good, the bad, and the ugly. That’s reality.

What three life issues would you focus on if you were in charge of his life?

Those three are excellent. I couldn’t agree more.

In what life situations would it be most beneficial for this person to imagine that they are you and act as you would?

Only when he wants more of those three qualities that are his life issues. Only when he wants to stop persecuting himself. When he realizes he’s persecuting himself, he could do MUCH worse than to think of me and imagine he is me!

Why do you think that you are in this person’s life?

To help him not take himself, his problems, his fears so seriously.

What do you think about this person’s nightmare?

It’s boring. It’s melodrama. Can’t he think up anything more creatively tragic than that?

What do you think about this person’s good dream?

Why not? It’s a GOOD good dream! I don’t see anything impractical or impossible about it! I like it!

How is this person most likely to ignore what you are saying to them?

Oh, he’d rather stay worried and in drama, persecuting himself than have fun. Life is serious, you know? And that’s fine with me, because then I get to have my FUN!!!!

What would you recommend that they do about that?

Wake up, realize what he’s doing, and become the sky! Then be me and enjoy producing shit!

I think this person created this nightmare because

He likes scaring himself!

What have you heard yourself say?

I think I need to persecute myself to motivate myself to grow and do my work. It’s bullshit. Well, actually, dog shit. I need to be the dog shit producing machine so I can laugh at what I am doing to myself. I need to become the sky so I can experience abundance and luminosity.

If this experience were a wake-up call from your soul, what do you think it would be saying to you?

Love yourself! Don’t take yourself or your life seriously! Trust me! You’ll have more energy and more fun and be more likely to accomplish your dream, which is a very, very good one!

Feb 24, 2010