IntroductionByron Kathleen Reid, a businesswoman and mother
living in the high desert of southern California,
became severely depressed while in her thirties.
Over a ten-year period her depression deepened,
and Katie (as she is called) spent almost two years
rarely able to leave her bed, obsessing over suicide.
Then one morning, from the depths of despair,
she experienced a life-changing realization.
Katie saw that when she believed that something
should be different than it is (“My husband should
love me more,” “My children should appreciate
me,”) she suffered, and that when she didn’t
believe these thoughts, she felt peace. She realized
that what had been causing her depression was not
the world around her, but the beliefs she had
about the world around her. In a flash of
insight Katie saw that our attempt to find happiness was
backward — instead of hopelessly trying to change
the world to match our thoughts about how it
“should” be, we can question these thoughts and,
by meeting reality as it is, experience unimaginable
freedom and joy. Katie developed a simple yet
powerful method of inquiry, called The Work, that
helped make this transformation practical.
As a result, a bed-ridden, suicidal woman became
filled with love for everything life brings.
Katie’s insight into the mind is consistent with
leading-edge research in cognitive psychology, and
The Work has been compared to the Socratic dialogue,
Buddhist teachings, and 12-step programs.
But Katie developed her method without any
knowledge of religion or psychology. The Work is
based purely on one woman’s direct experience of
how suffering is created and ended. It is astonishingly
simple, accessible to people of all ages and
backgrounds, and requires nothing more than a
pen and paper and an open mind. Katie saw right
away that giving people her insights or answers was
of little value — instead, she offers a process that
can give people their own insights and answers. The
first people exposed to her Work reported that the
experience had transformed their lives, and she
soon began receiving invitations to teach the
process publicly.
Since 1986, Katie has introduced The Work to
hundreds of thousands of people in over thirty
countries around the world.
-An Excerpt from
Loving What Is, by Byron Katie
You may download the free .pdf file at
http://www.thework.com/pdf/LovingWhatIsExcerptRev.pdf
