This is a transcript from our podcast episode with Byron Katie about meditation and The Work.

Axel Wennhall
Hi and welcome to the podcast “Meditera Mera”, which in direct translation means “Meditate more”. This is a podcast made by the Swedish meditation app Mindfully and produced by Gustav Nord and me Axel Wennhall. We’re currently in Stockholm and are just about to call our next guest Byron Katie to talk to her about the work and questioning our thoughts. Welcome! Byron Katie is an American spiritual teacher. In 1986, at the bottom of a ten-year spiral into depression and self-loathing, Byron Katie woke up one morning in a state of joy. She realized that, when she believed her stressful thoughts, she suffered, but when she questioned them, she didn’t suffer. Her process of self-inquiry, which she calls “The Work”, consists of four questions and a turnaround, which is a way of experiencing the opposite of what you believe. Byron Katie has been bringing the work to millions of people for more than 30 years. Her books include the bestselling “Loving What Is”, “A Thousand Names for Joy” and “A Mind at Home with Itself”. In this episode, we’re going to explore how we can inquire and question our thoughts. How can we use the work to release suffering? How can we relate to our minds more skillfully? And what advice do Byron Katie have for all of us who wants to live an awake and compassionate life? A warm welcome to the podcast, Katie.

Byron Katie
Thank you.

Axel Wennhall
This summer, I read your book, Loving What Is, and that was actually, I’ve heard your name so many times, but it was the first time I kind of came across your teaching or your way to speak about life, really. And in the book, and I understand that those who follow you or have listened to you, they know a little bit about your story. But despite reading it in the book, I’m still curious, what happened when you kind of had your awakening or your moment of clarity? What happened back then?

Byron Katie
Well, I was asleep on the floor after years of suffering. And I was sleeping on the floor, Axel, because I actually didn’t believe I even deserved a bed to sleep in. So my esteem was very low, my self-esteem. So as I lay sleeping, one morning, a cockroach, a bug, crawled over my foot, over my ankle. And I opened my eyes. From that deep sleep, I opened my eyes. And before the ego could identify, I saw what created the world. And it looked like this. No ego. And in front of me, with my eyes open, was a window, was light, actual light. And then the ego named it window. And I witnessed that. And then I saw this blank space, and the ego named it two words, a wall. And then a ceiling. And then it just moved very quickly. It’s just like, I, I am on the floor. I woke up, and I began to laugh. I saw literally how my world was born. So each of us, every morning, you can test it for yourself. You’re asleep, you’re not dreaming. And then you wake up, but you don’t know it, even though your eyes may be open. You don’t know it until the ego names it. I, I am. I am awake. I have to pee. I’m late for work. I want my coffee. I want, I need, I should hurry. I shouldn’t move so fast. I should, I should, I. And that goes on until we pass out at night. So how am I going to, how can I possibly share this? Because people are saying, what happened to you and all of this? And my children didn’t recognize me. It’s like their mother in this body, but they didn’t recognize what was living there completely. The shift was, I dented, I. So I learned, and I call it love, I learned to live in this world, to do what they do, to say what they say, to walk in the world, and to open my arms to this experience I call Earth School. So how do I share this? Well, it’s nothing I could tell. I tried. I tried. What happened to you? Nothing. I saw the light. It was so simple. And you don’t exist. And the world doesn’t exist. I mean, not a lot of use. Not a lot of use. And so I learned that if someone says, where are you going? Well, rather than saying, I don’t know. I mean, I could be walking from the kitchen to the bedroom. Where are you going? I don’t know. I could be out on the streets. Where are you going? I don’t know. It wasn’t okay. People are not, they’re fearful of a don’t know mind. And rightfully so. We have things here like amnesia and that kind of thing. But awakeness is don’t know. And the excitement of being, being in that don’t know. So how do I introduce people to it?

Okänd
I can’t.

Byron Katie
Okay, so how, how might I respond? It was crazy to me that people would believe that they don’t know what I know. Everyone does. I hold no awareness that we all don’t hold. But the ego takes the space. I, I am, I’m awake. I need to. So how do I teach that? Let’s see. An example might be my husband at the time. He’s since deceased. But he would say I was agoraphobic before the work found me. I was, I was just terrified just to walk out of the house. I was, I was very obese, very, very sick of mind. Just, you know, couldn’t leave the house, just. So when the work found me, he’d say, he was very worried about me. For example, I’d walk out the door and he’d say, where are you going? Just frightened for me. And I would say, I don’t know. It was a truth. And I would walk. And actually, it’s amazing to meet the world without a past or future. Hmm. And I refer to it as a friendly universe. People would say hi, and they didn’t even know me. And people would say, can I help you? If I would just maybe I’d be in a circumstance that didn’t look natural to them. Like I’m sitting against a wall somewhere with tears in my eyes of just pure joy. And they might say, do you need help? Is there someone you want me to call? Are you okay? I mean, and that’s why I was crying. This is a friendly universe. Everyone cares. Everyone cares. So, um, it was coming back into the world was, um, to be at home in this world where people didn’t fear for me or fear me. I just gave everything to them in reverse because I knew that no one is more enlightened than another. They’re simply believing their thoughts. So I learned to ask people, you know, like, um, where do you get this freedom? And I would, you know, it’s not fair. You’re free. I’m not. And I would say, write that down, write that down. And then I would just sit and it’s like, you’re not free. Is it true? You’re not free. So now, as we’re moving into what you offer the world, which is meditation and exercise and stillness, self-reflection that we meet in the silence. And people, someone might say, I’m in terrible trouble. And I would say, is it true? You’re in terrible trouble, knowing that they had the answer. And then notice how you react when you believe the thought you’re in terrible trouble. Notice those images of past, future in your head. Notice the illusion. Past, future, past, future, notice. And I love that, Axel, because they’re witnessing the cause of their suffering. Not the world, but the world imagined. And then I’d ask that last question, who are you? What would you be without the thought, it’s a terrible world? And then after response, if they need a little help, you know, I’m always internal, so I can meet that. And then I invite them to turn it around, find opposites. It’s a terrible world. It’s a wonderful world. Well, test it. You’re believing it’s a terrible one. You could be right, but test it. It’s a wonderful world. Open your mind. Just give me one example. It’s a wonderful world. And they can do it. And I say, well, that’s one. Give me one more. They can do it. It may take a while. Some of us are so suicidal, confused, terrified. At times, even in that state, we can do it. It’s a wonderful world. Give me one more. Give me one more. Until finally, you know, we ourselves are the answer. We hold the answers equally if we just get still. So the work is, as you can see, is four questions. And then we meet it with opposites. And we’re testing it. And we’re our own test tube. This is no one teaching us to be free. It’s us sitting in ourselves. And if you only ask yourself the question, like, something terrible is going to happen, is it true? Something terrible is going to happen? And you just sit in it and you open your mind. The answer to all four questions and the turnarounds are within that one question, is it true? I’ve just kind of given it, is it true? I’ve just given it a little staircase, a little help along the way on that internal journey.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, because when I listen to you now, and also when I read your book, I like the word, instead of awakening, I like the word, like the phrase, it’s a moment of clarity. But when I hear you now, it’s this moment of clarity that can be quite short for many of us. We can get glimpses when we meditate or have a shift that comes. And usually the experience is that it also passes away. But now when I listen to you, it seems that it’s been with you since that morning when you were lying on the floor, to one extent. And so I’m a bit curious, like for you personally, how did the kind of the work, how did it come to you? Did it come with the question, is this true? And then you kind of developed it to help people.

Byron Katie
I saw on the floor, it’s a window. Is it true? And in this world, yes, but in my world on the floor, no. But the ego has it, it’s, it’s like it’s, it names, it finds a name, and that’s what separates a something from a nothing with an image. Like if I say the word lemon right now, you just saw a lemon in your mind. And it’s nothing. Now I’m going to say another word and don’t find a picture for it. Don’t do it. Just hear it and don’t put an image on it. Banana. You saw it. That’s how the ego works. So we think of, we say the word, we think the word, and then there’s an image, and that’s, we believe that that’s really something. And as a meditator, you know, that’s nothing. It’s an illusion. What is an illusion? The picture’s in our head. The ego names it. And that creates apparent reality to the believer. So that’s what I found on the floor. I saw light.

Okänd
I saw.

Byron Katie
And then the word light. And then the word window. So the ego names everything. And it separates everything out because prior to that, there was nothing. There was. It was like this. A kind of awareness. And that’s something I can give definition to or name to other than awareness. But out of that window, ceiling, eye, world, it had babies. So what the work does, self-inquiry, is it deletes. It deletes awareness. And this can be very. It deletes identity. And that can be really scary for people. But I find, and I’m guessing, that most people have had moments of clarity, just like I had on the floor. But if you take that moment of clarity yourself and you witness the thought that brought you out of that state, and you can go back and do that, you can go back in that state and identify what thought brought you out. And then it just had babies. I, I am, the like, I, I, you know, there was an I, C, light, I, with me, the I came later. But it had to identify first. And that identification, you know, we name ego.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, it’s interesting how.

Byron Katie
No ego, no world.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, how deep it kind of runs in our identification with the ego. And when I read your book, I laughed when I read that your religion before waking up was, you should pick up your socks.

Byron Katie
Yeah, yeah, the children should pick up their socks.

Axel Wennhall
I resonated with that, even though I have my own versions of it. And it’s just. And that kind of when I read it, it just, it was nice because it made me laugh at my own identification with believing the thoughts. And I think that’s one of the most refreshing things that awakening up process can do that we can start to actually laugh about it sometimes and not taking it too serious.

Byron Katie
Oh, my goodness, yes. You know, because that was the first sound out of its mouth on the floor was laughter. I saw how the world is created. And it’s like I got the joke because that is not the world. It’s a state of mind.

Axel Wennhall
But also, I mean, I work with meditation. I’ve been having this podcast for several years, been meditating every day for years, and still I get trapped by the illusion. And I think that’s very common for us human beings to be trapped.

Byron Katie
Well, when I say banana, you see the image, but it’s nothing until the ego names it. And that’s it. Boom, that’s life. So that gives everyone the experience I had on the floor. Like when you were two, three years old and someone said, it’s a tree, until you believe that what you see, that name on it, just like I was on the floor, before that, it’s not a tree for you. It’s a tree for your parents or your siblings. Or but it’s not a tree to you until the moment you believe it. The moment you believe it, that’s your first tree. You could be five years old, two years old. You could be, you know, like in a room where where they kept you in a nursery until you were like five years old and you don’t know what a tree is. You know, you look at it, but you don’t know. But when name marries object, that is identity. That is, I see a tree. Hmm.

Axel Wennhall
How do you, because I have a daughter that’s two years now and, and her process right now is to name a lot of things or that’s where she is at her development stage. So, so this kind of naming and identification with objects, it seems like, I mean, we, we all do it and it’s a natural human development process. And then it seems that we can also kind of wake up from that when we become older. But do you see any, any skillful ways to not be so identified with the eye from a younger age or do you see that that’s just how it is?

Byron Katie
The cure is love. It’s like she could say tree, daddy tree, but you still don’t know if she believes it or not. And you say, yes, yes, that’s a tree, that’s a tree. Look at the tree. And, and she’s listening, she sees the way, the way. There’s validation. And, you know, I, I’ve got some years here in this. You know, you’re in me, you’re not outside, so I’m only talking to myself and but, um, I don’t know if a two year old believes it or not, even though they say tree. I don’t know if they’ve attached yet or not. My job is to love them and support them and, and live this, this, the gift of this experience to the fullest. And the only thing that would set me back from the gift I experienced on the floor is to deny that, that there’s anything less than beautiful in this world. And there’s a lot of proof in this world that there are really ugly things. And in this world there appear to be, but I question it and I look to myself and I change what I can.

Axel Wennhall
So one, one other thing.

Byron Katie
There’s no downside to earth other than what we’re thinking and believing. This is truly, um, the experience and opportunity to wake up to reality, to our true natures, which is you know that, that four letter word, a gift by nature. You know, when you think negatively, you know you’re off, you feel it, think, feel at half. That’s the order of creation that I learned on the floor. And we’re not the thinker, you know, just, just, um, like I say, banana, you didn’t see a banana on purpose. We’re not the thinkers, we’re not the doers. This is, um, life is a state of mind.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, it’s, um, I’m reflecting a bit on what you just said, and it is a kind of radical statement to say that there’s, and please let me know if I misunderstood you, but it’s a kind of radical statement to say that everything in the world is beauty. I, I kind of, it’s interesting, my, my first kind of thought when you said it was that I, I can see it, but I can also see that so much suffering, like creating suffering that exists in the world, people who hurt each other, people who are actually in, in, in pain, that it comes from us, believing our thoughts, that that’s the kind of the source. And, but at the same time, that’s also part of reality that that kind of pain and hurt exists.

Byron Katie
Yes. Yes. And we all know that from experience. They feel like to have, I think against my true nature, I, the images show up, you know, the ego comes into play, the illusion and the experience is emotional, and emotional, you know, I refer to it sometimes as, um, an alarm clock going off, that I’m, I’m in a dream that needs to be identified and questioned, move from my head to paper where it’s stable, so it can’t just move all over the place and ego controlled, but to write it down and and to question it where it’s there in black and white and movably right there and question it and stay with it. Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
So perhaps we should just go through the four steps. So you said before, the first question is, is it true?

Byron Katie
It’s what I’m believing. True. Like it’s a banana. Okay. You saw a banana in your head. Okay. There are bananas in the world. Is it true? Can you really know that it’s true there? Can you yourself? Yeah. Your mother says so. Yeah. The world says so. The advertising says so. And now don’t you want to know for yourself? There are bananas in the world. Is it true? Meditate in that. Can you really know? Can you yourself really know that it’s true? There are bananas in the world.

Axel Wennhall
And here my kind of answer to that is if I’m inquiring as a concept, as a banana, as like what is a banana really? Then the answer is no. But if I go to my rational mind and say, well, yes, I just had a banana, I ate it, I know there’s a banana here. Okay.

Byron Katie
So your proof, where’s your proof? It’s in the past. So your ego offers up all the proof, shows you eating one yesterday, shows you eating one last summer, shows you eating one as a child, shows other people eating bananas, and it’s yellow, and maybe it has some dark stripes on it. And that’s the illusion. That’s your proof. Nothing is your proof. This is very personal work. Because people would say you’re in denial. But this is very personal work. And that’s your only proof. It’s in your head and that is. You can’t take it, you can’t eat it, you can’t touch it. It’s an illusion.

Axel Wennhall
So I will play along now with you and say, okay, well, but I actually have a banana here. In my hand.

Byron Katie
Okay. So you have a banana in your hand. It’s a banana. Is it true? Where’s your proof?

Axel Wennhall
I get you.

Byron Katie
I get you. Okay. Because you see, you see in your mind’s eye a banana from the past. And you look, you compare nothing, which is the banana in your head. It’s that’s an illusion with the banana on the table. And so that’s your proof that the banana in your hand is a banana. So you see this cup I’m holding up?

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, I see it.

Byron Katie
It’s my teacup. Okay. So you see it in your mind’s eye now? Mm hmm.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, yeah.

Byron Katie
You don’t see the cup. I moved it. So you can only see an image of the cup.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah.

Byron Katie
So what is this that I’m holding up now? Is this the same cup I held up before? So you see the proof? Mm hmm. An image of an old cup. I mean, of the cup. The first time I held it up, you see that image. And then you compare it with this. And so you’re living in the past. You cannot see this cup. You can only see. And it’s not just this cup. You wouldn’t even know it’s a cup without the illusion running. So that’s what that’s what it’s like to be human. It’s to wake up to that reality.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah.

Byron Katie
And oh, sweetheart, the greatest gift. You have a two year old. You get to see her new all the days of her life. Oh, she’s ageless in you. And that is such a gift. You can see her for who she is. And you see those images of when she was little and when she was born and and her yesterday and the day before. And you get that joy. It’s just not her. And if something were to happen to your daughter, she lives in you. And that’s what self-inquiry is all about. It’s, for example, my children in my world, they can’t die to me. You know, for all I know, all three of them are dead right now. I just don’t have the news yet. They live in me just like that cup.

Axel Wennhall
So with the work, with the two questions, is it true? Can you really know it’s true? I like the way that you played with me with the cup and the banana to kind of highlight, to see through our concepts.

Byron Katie
And your daughter the same.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

Byron Katie
And your daughter was your proof. That’s not much. I mean, in fact, it’s less than something. It’s nothing. It’s an illusion.

Axel Wennhall
But thinking about the banana doesn’t really create that much suffering to me, at least right now in my life. So perhaps we could take more of a statement. I don’t know what to do with my life, I think is a pretty common.

Byron Katie
So you don’t know what to do with your life. Is it true? You don’t know what to do with your life. Is it true? Can you really know that it’s true? You don’t know. What about this? You need to know what to do with your life. Does that one feel okay with you?

Axel Wennhall
Yeah, sure. And now I used it as an example, even though I can definitely relate to that questions from time to time when confusion arises, even if it’s not really present in my life right now. I’m too busy with my daughter and my other son.

Byron Katie
So you don’t need to know what to do with your life. They have a plan for you.

Axel Wennhall
I don’t have time to think. But I just wanted also to to go through the four steps for for the listener so they could also put their own questions in when we talk about is it true? Can we really know? Is it true? And then what was the third question that you helped people with?

Byron Katie
So you need to know what to do with your life. Is it true? And then you meditate in that and the ego says, well, yeah, you better know. Yeah, if you don’t know that, you know you’re gonna lose all the security you do have. You definitely need to know what to do. Well, thank you for sharing ego. And get back to the question. I need to know what to do. Is it true? How do I react? What happens? How do you react? What happens when you believe the thought you need to know what to do? Notice the images of past future. Notice the emotional. Notice how much of your physical body is affected emotionally when you think the thought I need to know what to do. And you just don’t know what to do. And you’re believing the thought I need to know what to do. Then we look at how we live when we believe the thought I need to know what to do. I compare myself to others. They all look like they know what to do. They all look so. So ego’s favorite food is comparison. It loves comparison and guilt. So how do I react? I compare my life with theirs. And it’s the ego when I say I, I ego. It is comparing my life to theirs and I’m always falling short. They’re wiser, smarter. There’s something wrong with me. How do I react when I think the thought I need to know what to do? You see the images? Are you sitting in it?

Axel Wennhall
Believing those kind of thoughts comes with a contraction. It comes with a contraction. It comes with a tension. It comes with a. And it’s the illusion is so strong because it feels in our bodies like the. That’s I think that’s where the the really tricky part because it it feels.

Byron Katie
So it feels that way because you’re seeing images. The ego doesn’t even be aware of.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah.

Byron Katie
The ego is like, oh, my experience on the floor without the the thoughts. Without the images, like the images have to be named for it to be the illusion of life. So there are to see those images of what you fear when you’re feeling those emotions, you know the images are there. It’s ego’s play. It’s walls, ceiling, floor. But it is you stranded, you being fearful, you not having a job or you being fired or you, you know, for each of it, it’s, it’s, you know, it’s, it’s our own. It’s our egos are made to order. Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
So when we believe the thoughts, there is suffering. I think that’s pretty obvious for all of us.

Byron Katie
Images and the ego believes onto those images. Just like it’s a banana. Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
And after contemplating and seeing our experience becomes when we believe a thought.

Byron Katie
Because you describe the emotional really well.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah.

Byron Katie
You can’t experience those emotional, the emotional if you’re not mesmerized by the images in your head of past future. There’s got to be the images or what you’re believing has no power. It has to have like images and name. Like if you’re your little two year old daughter and she’s never seen a cup before, she doesn’t know what it is.

Axel Wennhall
No. So seeing these emotions coming up and seeing how believing our thoughts create suffering, it’s, I mean, it’s a part of what we kind of experience in meditation when we sit down and become quiet. But then you also have this fourth step, which I, when I think about it, it’s the release. It’s the kind of, ah, that’s where also a sense of freedom comes in from the contraction.

Byron Katie
It’s because you are free of the cause of the contraction.

Axel Wennhall
So, and the fourth question is the turnaround. Would you just please to elaborate a little bit on the turnaround?

Byron Katie
I need to know what to do. I don’t need to know what to do. Okay. So how might that be true? Meditate in that. I don’t need to know what to do. Okay. Test it right now. You’re breathing. You’re not the doer. I don’t need to know what to do. Your heart is beating. You’re not the doer. You just moved your head and you didn’t plan it. Notice where your hands are right now. You’re not the doer. Notice you smiled. You didn’t think, I think I’ll, I, I need to smile now. I need to know what to do. No, there’s something beautiful going on other than we’re thinking something other than what we’re thinking and believing. There is something beautiful going on without exception, and the ego, that illusion, would differ, would bring us into Earth school. We were here to understand and wake up to reality, which is immovable, immovable without all of it. And I saw it in you when I said, notice where your hands are, for example. And when there was this joy you did nothing for other than you noticed. There’s something incredible going on. I’m looking at my hand right now. It’s like, how weird. Who would plan that? What would plan that? It’s mesmerizing. I don’t need to know what to do. If I planned one word I was going to say with you, I would shut my computer down before I would do that to you or me. Or I might just laugh and say, like I used to do, something to come out of my mouth and I’d say, oh, never mind, forget it, not true. And just, just noticing the difference between authentic and inauthentic. That’s meditation with, with, it’s a waking, living, surprise. A state of mind free of, um, free of ego.

Okänd
Hmm.

Byron Katie
Ego meaning those images and the words that the ego places on the images.

Axel Wennhall
Yeah. And my experience is that my world is not free of ego, but I can see my ego and I can meet it with acceptance. With understanding, with awareness. And also realize that sometimes I can’t. And meet that with acceptance as well. That’s where I am at. That’s my reality.

Byron Katie
Yeah. Well, I don’t see you accepting anything that, that you don’t accept. Give me an example of what you don’t accept. Hmm.

Axel Wennhall
I think one, one thing, um, that, um, I’m having a harder time to allow to be as it is, is internal conflicts. When, where different parts kind of are in conflict. I can also see that kind of unpleasant emotions when they arise, I can sometimes go in conflict with that and try to kind of push them away. Or not embrace them fully.

Byron Katie
Okay. So imagine a lemon. You see it now. Imagine biting into that big juicy lemon. Imagine biting into it right now.

Axel Wennhall
I do.

Byron Katie
Did you feel the, the physical experience?

Axel Wennhall
Sort of. Yeah.

Byron Katie
In your mouth, it kind of watered or something.

Axel Wennhall
Hmm. A bit sour.

Byron Katie
Yeah. Okay. And that’s what you’re up against. That’s that lemon was pure imagination. It was the ego hearing the word, offering up the image, leading you to believe there are lemons in past, future, and in reality. And I’m not saying they don’t in this world, but we can see a lemon and be awake to it. We can’t see the lemon. We can only see images of eating a lemon, seeing a lemon on lemon, lemon, lemon. And it’s, those aren’t real lemons. That’s imagination, gruning. And without that, you look at a lemon, you wouldn’t know what it is. So in earth, that’s a beautiful thing. You know, it anchors us here. And, and that’s, that’s okay. But good to be awake to it. So that when you meet hell, meaning people lose their jobs, their livelihoods, they lose people to death, to disease. And, you know, all of that, it’s, life is a gift. And the only way to understand that is to understand the cause of suffering. And here’s why it frees us up to hold people and to do all that we can to bring them back into a state of, of, you know, the absence of, the absence of suffering, and at the same time, respecting what they’re suffering. We see states of mind, even physical pain is either remembered or anticipated. And as a meditator, that’ll, you know, I can leave you with having some fun with that one. Mm hmm. Mm.

Axel Wennhall
I had one other question that I, that it was very useful for me to read in your book was staying in your own business. And you point out that we can discover free kind of business in the world. It’s either mine, it’s yours, and you call it God, and I translated it to reality.

Byron Katie
Yeah, free kind of business in the world, my business, your business, and then God or reality, whatever name the listener would put on, you know, reality. So when I am mentally in your business, I’m leaving myself. I’m into what I can’t know. So to come home to my own business is to be able literally to hear you, connect with you without trying to change you, to be present with you, to understand, to be a listener without trying to interrupt you or change you. It’s a precious gift not to be in your business, but to be in my own, which is the only place I can really be of support and help to myself and others. So if I’m in your business, I’m imagining how you feel and I frighten me. I imagine the pain you’re in. I don’t know what pain you’re in, even if you’re screaming. I don’t know what your pain is. I don’t have the power to feel your pain. I can imagine pure ego. Imagine what your pain is. But that is not your pain. That’s my own. That is entirely self-centered. How do I react when you’re in pain and I’m imagining your pain? Now, there are two of us in pain. But one of them is authentic and one’s not. And the inauthentic one is mine. Could I be without the thought, I can feel your pain. Would I be without the thought, I know your pain. Listening, connected, present, learning, which is really important if I want to help you. Not what I think you’re feeling, but your experience of it. And when I’m in, like, my daughter’s business or one of my children’s business, as I said in the book, then she’s over there with her. I’m over there with her and there’s no one here for me. That’s a lack of presence. So to understand and be awake to just that simple thing, my business, your business, God’s business, just to understand that keeps us present and gives us a life of what I like to term as how can I help? You know, I don’t know how this feels to you, Axel, but it’s just all about just noticing. And when we’re in pain, understanding how to identify the thoughts we’re thinking that causes all the pain that we’re experiencing. To identify what we’re thinking and believing and to move it from our heads to paper. And then self-inquiry, question it. Because what we’re believing, you know, we could be wrong. And the work is the litmus test for, for, that give us ultimately an authentic life.

Axel Wennhall
That seems like a good way to end.

Byron Katie
Yeah.

Axel Wennhall
Thank you so much.

Byron Katie
I just appreciate how you are, who you are, and your work in this world and two hours of meditation. I mean, two years of meditation. It certainly shows. Thank you.

Axel Wennhall
Thank you. And thank you for all your work we are doing. It’s Is It True? Has been just that simple question. It’s been so useful. Bring it with me all day. So thank you and be well.

Byron Katie
Well, other than what I’m thinking and believing, I’m well. You know, that’s a nice place to leave us also. Other than what we’re thinking and believing, life is good.

Axel Wennhall
Thank you for listening to Meditera Mera with Byron Katie. We hope you have been inspired by our conversation. The world needs more people who questions their thoughts. So if this talk has resonated with you, please share it to your friends. And if there’s anything we will bring with us from our conversation with Katie, is it to ask the question, Is this thought true? Take care and be well.