In Facilitating The Work, I expressed Three Components of a Facilitator or Helpful Human Being [or even friend] I find necessary for assisting us in doing The Work. These essentials are : Compassion, Humility, and Clarity. I find these qualities necessary for progress and success in Inquiry because I have had experience with philosophy, religion, psychology or other "change our thought" or "change our lives" processes with people who talked a great talk while having a crooked walk. In other words they lacked integrity. Their external words conveyed in public were not aligned with their internal Spirit [as it manifested externally] in private. Highly Sensitive People seem to have a natural advantage in this area, due to their empathy.
In this post I am going to express Three Components I find necessary for being the one who is performing The Work. Now these are the biggies because we approach The Work ourselves, for ourselves, for benefit of ourselves, and to change our lives for the better. It is not necessary for a teacher to assist us with The Work so the "Facilitating the Work" post can be overlooked or ignored altogether. But because we are the ones doing The Work for and to our own selves, I do believe it to be so important that we clutch, cling, and grasp to the following three qualities as we step into Inquiry.
H.O.W. do we do it?
1.] Honesty - As I approach Inquiry I first have to be willing to take my stressful thoughts to inquiry & then I have to be open-minded enough to find the examples; find the turnarounds. And this is all based in honesty. If I do not desire for my pain and suffering to end and if I refuse to be open-minded, yet I go into The Work, that's not being honest with myself. If I am sick with disease [or dis-ease as I approach The Work] and am suffering, if I am not open-minded enough to consider that a Doctor might be able to help me, or if I am not willing to go in to see the Doctor, or willing to share my symptoms or honest enough to share my real symptoms, or willing to take the medicine, did I really want to be healed? Maybe I really did. But maybe I didn't feel like getting in the car or waiting in the office or spending money on the medicine and I don't trust Doctors anyway. I'll just wait it out. :)
2.] Open-Mindedness - Being open-minded, I have found, comes differently to personalities. I know skeptics who have been beaten into open-mindedness due to pain and I know naturally open-minded personalities. So whichever you are, as long as you approach with open-mindedness it just may work.
3.] Willingness -Willingness is an action. As Katie would say, "War belongs on paper" and "The Work stops when you stop answering the questions." Are you willing to write it down? Are you willing to carry through? Being Honest and Open-minded is of little use if I am not Willing.
That's it. That's how I approach the work and H.O.W. I find it invaluable. Now when I first approached Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life
I was angry. Oh yes. I was not finished being a victim and my reasons for suffering were legitimate. [Legitimate suffering I just said, and it brought a smile to my face. I love my memories.] And for this reason, I would never thrust upon a person these four questions without their HOW. (As it would also break the 3 Components for Facilitators - Compassion, Humility, and Clarity - I believe in.) But what did work for me when was I was ready was the attitude of Honesty, Open-Mindedness, and Willingness. These three qualities were taught to me through 12 step programs and I have grown universally friendly with using these qualities when approaching anything that happens in my life, including The Work.