Exploration: "...and that means..."
Sometimes when we notice we are confused, or thinking a lot about something, or we have a strong emotion, there is more going on under the surface than we can see right away. Yet, we might not know what that “more” is.
One way to tease out other layers of what is swirling around inside of us: start with what happened and then add the phrase, “and that means…” , then complete it several times quickly without thinking about it much. Just say or write down whatever comes to mind when you complete it a number of times. You can also notice if there are emotions connected to those sentence completions.
For example,
“My wife didn’t do what I asked…”
and that means…
“I’m not important to her”
“she doesn’t love me as much I love her”
“she’s started to lose interest in me”
“I won’t get what I need”
“I’ll be overwhelmed”
“she’s not very interested in me”
and so on.
Some emotions that might be uncovered in these sentence completions:
Hopelessness, fear, sadness, neediness, anxiety, comfortlessness, longing…
When we see what comes up, can we just sit quietly with the feelings and let them in, even a little?
How does this connect with ‘storylines’? Sometimes the ‘what it means’ points us to our stories about the events more clearly than we are otherwise able to see, and helps us uncover stories and emotions we are not fully aware of.
“The thing that upsets people is not what happens, but what they think it means.” Epictetus
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