Chapter 30 Seeing Myself for the First Time — from my book Changes

Chapter 30

Seeing Myself for the First Time

In each class at Trackerschool, one of the first things we are instructed to do is find our sit area.  We are sent out onto the landscape to wander for a bit and find a secluded place, away from everyone else, free from seeing any man made structures, and establish it as our sit area for the week of class.

Tom said that our sit area has a boundary that will be apparent to us as we sit, and there will be a favorite horizon that we face.  We are to let ourselves be led there and feel like it is calling to us and welcoming us.

Every morning we would be sent to our sit areas for about 20 minutes before being called back in for lecture or other exercises.

We are always instructed to relax in our sit areas, and let ourselves slow to the rhythm of the earth; get out of our heads; and enjoy the beauty around us.

Once I overheard Tom say that if he were ever to create a religion, it would be the religion of the sit area.  That is how important he considered time spent in the sit area to be.  Tom encouraged us all to continue with the habit of the daily morning and even evening “sit” once we go home, even if it simply to be out on our porch or in our yard.

One of the most important exercises I did in my sit area is called focusing.  Tom called it Focusing because there is a book called Focusing that goes into the basic exercise.  If I am remembering correctly, Tom said that Grandfather called it Inner Vision.

Tom instructed us in many different ways Grandfather Stalking Wolf used inner vision.  Here, I will share the most basic exercise Tom taught us the first time I learned it.

Go out to your sit area, away from everyone.  Sit there for about 10 minutes and just let yourself relax and enjoy the natural world around you.  Then, when you are feeling relaxed, ask yourself, in the most loving, non judgmental way, “How am I feeling?” Then surrender to nothingness, paying attention to the first thing that comes to you.

If the first thing that comes up is, “I’m fine,” Tom told us not to accept it.  Say to yourself, “No…  How am I really feeling:”  Don’t settle for “I’m fine” as an answer.

Again, surrender to nothingness and see what comes up first.

Once you have a feeling come up, tell yourself, “ That’s good to know,” and write that feeling down.  Then ask yourself, “Why am I feeling this way?”  Surrender to nothingness and let the answer emerge.  Tell yourself, with love and kindness, and non judgement, “That’s good to know.”  And write the answer down.

Once your first feeling has emerged and is on paper, move that feeling out of yourself and set it to the side and say to yourself, “Ok, aside from that, How am I feeling?”  Surrender to the answer.  Say to yourself, “That’s good to know.”  Write it down.  Then ask, “Why am I feeling this way?”  Surrender.  “That’s good to know.”  Write the answer down.

Once your second feeling, and why, has come up and is written down, take it out of yourself and set it aside by the first feeling.

Then say to yourself, “Ok, now, aside from those, How am I feeling:”

This process is repeated over and over.  You might end up with a page full of feelings and reasons, or just a handful.  Each person is different,.

This can be a challenging exercise.

Once we have our feelings on paper, Tom has us look through the list and ask ourselves, “Which feeling is the strongest or most important?”

One will stand out to you.

We circle the one that stands out and put a #1 by it.

Then we say to ourselves, “Aside from that one, which is the most important?”

Another one will stand out.

Circle it and put a #2 by it.

Continue on in this way.

This exercise can really surprise you because typically all your feelings are overlapping each other, sometimes hiding each other in a mish mash of swirling feelings.  By finding out which ones are the strongest or most important, understanding yourself will be much easier.  You may find that feelings hidden deep inside will be stronger than the feelings on the surface.

That is the complete exercise and application we were given that first time I received it.  I learned more ways to use focusing, or inner vision, as I took more classes at Trackerschool, which I will share later.

Now I will tell you why this exercise became so important to me from the start.

As I did this exercise, bringing up and setting aside one feeling after another, I certainly was surprised at the things I found buried within the mix of feelings.  I also found it more and more difficult to pay attention to what I was doing.  As I got deeper into my feelings, I would finish writing down my answers then forget what I was doing.  I had to really force myself to look further, because I could hardly believe there would be anything else to find.

I made myself keep going though.  I had 45 minutes and I wasn’t going to waste any of it.  After all, these week long classes were not cheap and I wanted to get as much value out of them as I could.  So I kept asking and surrendering.

Finally I saw a column of white light, with what looked like silver glitter slowly floating up and down within the light, that went up and down the center of my body, and went beyond me above and below, like it was connecting me to everything else.

Hanging off this column of light were three huge dead logs, limbless, dried and whited with age.  As I wondered what those logs were doing there, I was told they represented my deeds in life.  One log was all the things I had done with my family.  One log represented everything I had done in service at church.  And one log represented all the rest including everything I had done in school.

I thought it strange that those things were represented by old dead logs.  I mean, weren’t those things the most important things in my life?

Then I saw myself as a powerful warrior who had no fear.  I was beautiful and strong, standing in the air.  I was shocked to see myself this way!  I had no idea I was strong and fearless like that.  I had been so full of fear about so many things.  I had been feeling so hopeless and helpless and depressed, for years, decades even.

I broke down crying, bawling, blubbering, and I couldn’t stop.  I was blown away in a good way.  I was overcome with the beauty of what I was seeing and feeling.  I just laid there silently crying, in my sit area until Tom called us in, and still, l couldn’t stop crying.

When I walked into class and took my seat, I was still crying.  Tom looked at me and said, “It’s about time you got rid of that shit.”

I didn’t think he realized why I was crying, because to me, my crying was for amazement and joy and…I don’t even know what.  But now I wonder … maybe he did understand.

Another person in class told me they saw a sparkling river.

When I told Tom what I saw and why I was crying, he said I saw my interpretation of what was there.

Tom told us that the spirit world speaks to us through our filters and shows us what we personally can understand and interpret.  That is why we are the only ones who can interpret our own dreams.