How The Work Technique Transforms Judgments into Personal Liberation

Often, when we are practicing Byron Katie’s The Work technique, filling out our judgment worksheet about someone and asking the questions and reversals the method teaches us, one of the biggest surprises is realizing our own responsibility in the situation.

But this responsibility does not come with guilt. On the contrary, we replace the "C" of guilt with the "C" of curiosity — curiosity to see the situation from different angles. It’s not about justifying what the other person did, but about embracing the peace of someone who looks at themselves and acknowledges: “Oops, I was wrong here too. Oops, here I also had a moment of unconsciousness, a moment when I lacked emotional intelligence, resilience, reasoning, or a better way to handle the situation.”

In that moment, we also realize something essential: just as we, the other person involved in the situation also lacked awareness, tools, or sufficient discernment. They did what their thoughts and their internal programming told them to do — just like we have done in other occasions.

This recognition is liberating. It does not exempt anyone from responsibility, but it allows us to stop wasting our energy pointing fingers, judging, criticizing, or reliving, in our mind, heart, and body, the painful moments of the past. Instead, we return to the situation with a wise perspective, interested in learning, making more conscious decisions, and avoiding the repetition of old patterns. With clarity, we realize that if something similar happens again, we now know how to react differently, breaking free from programmed, repetitive, inherited, or learned behaviors throughout our lives.

It’s from this space — where each person’s inner wisdom can bloom — that we renew our relationship with our inner dialogue. A dialogue that stops focusing on self-criticism and starts focusing on learning and resolution. When we step out of the victim role, which we often innocently sit in for years, we experience true liberation.

This is one of the transformations that I believe The Work of Byron Katie has brought into my life, to many of my clients, and to the participants in our Sky Mind urban retreats.

If you feel that there are spaces within you calling for growth, evolution, and self-awareness, we have the perfect place for you to roll up your sleeves and dive wholeheartedly into new practices.

Welcome to Sky Mind: not just a retreat, but a lifestyle.

Shirayam

Upcoming in-person events in Brazil:

Lages SC March 21, 22, and 23

São José do Rio Preto SP

March 28, 29, and 30

April 3 to 6 in Belo Horizonte

September 13 to 20: Mallorca Island, Spain

Links at www.shirayam.com