by Natti Ronel
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I have crystallized and presented the twelve tools of the Graceway in the course of training, lectures, group-meetings that I have led and still lead, private meetings, and also in my research and academic writing. As a written book, the Graceway has been designed to flow freely, as if this was training or a special workshop, so that in a sense, it’s as if I’m speaking to a group, and instead of saying it out loud, I’ve written down what I have to say. This is why I have chosen to write in the plural form -- “we.” This book is constructed like a series of group meetings, providing the reader with training in the Graceway. This style of writing enables me to keep the personal and informal atmosphere, the direct and intimate feeling, to stress the feasibility of things, and to exhibit a wide range of exercises that the way shows us, those that happen in groups, and those practiced in private.
The Graceway seeks to create simplicity amid the complexity of life. Accordingly, I have tried to maintain simplicity as much as possible in the way of presenting the twelve tools. The tools themselves, which represent practical simplicity, are composed of a number of viewpoints which together constitute a tool. Different tools are joined together in a way that creates a developing web of possibilities to implement. When we read and re-read the description of each of the tools, and we combine different tools according to our relevant needs, the simplicity becomes clear. For this reason, it is best to use the book as a manual of self-help and instruction, and after a first reading, to read it again according to relevance and changing needs. The book invites a dialogue, between us and ourselves and between ourselves and the way; the conversation is manifested by our attempt to live the tools in practice, each thing in its time. The way is accumulated life experience, not just a theory, and in that spirit, we hope for a successful journey.
The Tools of Change
Knowing that grace is a way of life is a basic tool of change.
Let’s begin with a moment of silence. A moment’s silence offers a marvelous way of focusing, and it also creates separation between what has gone before and what is yet to come. We try to leave behind us all that isn’t quiet, listening in silence to the quiet that rises from within. … Thank you.
The Twelve Tools
Abstinence
Just for Today
The Serenity Prayer
Gratitude
Distinguishing Facts
Being Positive
Finding in Ourselves
Truth Only
Choosing in Advance
Correcting Errors
Promoting Good
Living the Spirit
In the Prologue I introduced the concept of the Graceway and referred to its sources. The expression “tools of change” is borrowed from the Twelve-step program of AA and NA groups, in which the members learn a number of tools that can help them cope with challenges in their lives. The definition and the conceptualization of “the twelve tools” are the origin of the Graceway, and the number is certainly not accidental; it gestures towards the Twelve-step program and shares a link with it. Some of the tools are original and are presented here for the first time; they emanated from the sources that I have already introduced, adding to the day-to-day wisdom of NA and AA.
The concept of “tools” points to practicality in action, to pragmatism. The emphasis is on implementation, even on a small scale, which enables us to acquire new expertise and apply it to our lives. The tools express a certain perception of the world, and the means to implement this perception of the world in our lives, amid the daily routine. The tools provide us with methods and practices of change, some of them very specific and some of them broader. They point to changes that anyone can make. The changes proposed are mostly behavioral, in the broadest sense of the word behavior, which includes internal speech -- what we think and tell ourselves. Nevertheless, the tools are aimed at supporting changes in thoughts and feelings.
Change, as introduced in the Graceway through an approach called “task-method,” begins with behavioral implementation, including internal speech. The original step program also constitutes an example of task-method. The hypothesis of task-method is that in the course of performing a task, such as, for example, presenting the twelve tools, something happens to us. We change something in our behavior or situation. We change in a manner that seems to be artificial, apparently only external, and yet it penetrates inside. Task-method is an approach that sometimes opposes and sometimes complements the approach known as “insight-method.” Insight-method claims that what is needed in order for us to change and be changed is to attain a profound insight into our situation, the causes that led us into the situation that we want to change, and then the change will take place on the basis of the insight that we have acquired. With insight-method, we attempt to reach a deep awareness of understanding, which can create a sense of catharsis and liberation, to be followed by the change that is wanted. With task-methods, on the other hand, we create, define, and propose a task that can be performed, so that in the process of performance we will feel ourselves changing. We first complete the task, and the change within us follows.
The two methods -- one that insists that there is a need for deep insight and spontaneous change will come from this, while the other claims there is a need for change without first gaining insight -- complement each other with their differing emphases. Their suitability for us depends on the specific situation that we are in. For example, task-method is particularly important when what is needed is a substantial and rapid change. Performance of a simple task, as is suggested by some of the tools to be described hereafter, creates and motivates change in the experience of the person and leads to changes in consciousness. Often, in order that the change will be firmly grounded, the support of insightful experience is required. There are also cases in which we are not prepared or we are unable to change something or to sustain the change, up to the point where we attain the appropriate insight, and insight becomes an important part of beginning the change. There are other possibilities. We are, after all, complex creatures, different and changing.
Cognitive change is an executive task with challenging action, sometimes even more challenging than behavioral change. Cognitive change can come about before attainment of insight -- we train ourselves to change our thoughts with the performance of mental tasks that the tools will show us and without waiting for insight to create mental change. When intentional thought begins to change, something happens to us. The pattern of mental, emotional, and behavioral habits starts to crack and our being starts to move in the direction which we intended. Since the change is intentional (cognitive), it includes the development of appropriate insight, and this is another example of the two systems coalescing: cognitive change leads to a development of cognitive insight which allows a continuation of overall change.
Here are two examples which will clarify this idea. In all the examples in this book, the names are invented, and every detail which could identify the person has been substantially changed, so that nobody, including the individuals themselves, should be able to identify the people. Any resemblance to real people is coincidental.
The first example is that of Katya, who contacted me one Tuesday, some years ago, asking to make an appointment. She told me she was bulimic and was making herself sick. The vomiting always came after a binge of compulsive eating. We arranged a meeting for Friday of that week. But the short phone conversation had been so sincere that I got somewhat carried away and suggested to her she should refrain from throwing up until our meeting. She agreed. I was quite sure that she would vomit before the meeting, and then we would have a starting-point for collaborative work, with her failure to restrain herself and the insight that we might attain as a result. But she surprised herself and me -- she abstained from vomiting completely for those four days. This was especially surprising for her, something new. It turned out that all she needed was to hear someb
ody suggesting in a decisive manner that she should refrain from deliberate vomiting, and she did so. Obviously, the suspension of vomiting was the beginning of in-depth personal work and overall change, but the achievement of abstaining from vomiting opened her eyes and mind to new possibilities. Some years after we stopped meeting, when we had the opportunity for a casual conversation, she was still “clean” in this respect, in addition to other changes in her life.
The second example is that of Maya, who also suffered from bulimia and from repetitive binges of compulsive eating. Maya was addicted to eating, especially sweet things and pastries, but making herself sick after an eating binge was also compulsive from her point of view. Eating gave her pleasure, the sensation of drugging herself with a powerful “narcotic,” and the vomiting did something to ease her conscience, troubled by her excessive consumption. Together, they created an uncontrollable cycle which repeated itself every few days. Before she came to me for a consultation, she was trying some other treatment that helped her for a bit, until the behavior would reappear. I suggested she go to meetings of OA (Overeaters Anonymous). She went, but she couldn’t really connect with their method. I suggested to her all the tools I knew and she really did try to implement them, but then she returned to her pattern of binge-eating and vomiting.
A few weeks passed, during which she began to make some progress, but Maya continued to regress back to her pattern of binge-eating and vomiting. At one of our meetings, when she was rather down on herself, she explained the chain of events leading up to her latest episode and also some of the previous episodes, revealing to us a pattern that repeated itself with her. All of the binges, at least in recent years, came after something happened that reminded her of her family -- an innocent family visit to her parents, a phone conversation with her mother or her sister, or something similar. Sometimes, a conversation with her boyfriend about her mother was enough to start the internal process that would end with binge-eating. We saw together that Maya had a need to gain approval, especially that of her mother, but also of her father. This need was pitted against the feeling of powerlessness that she felt when she encountered criticism from them, and it seemed to Maya that they were always criticizing her. The insight of her powerlessness against her desire to earn the family’s approval was very significant, and it led us to propose a simple task -- temporary separation from her family. From all of them. No visits, no meetings, no conversations with them, and preferably, no conversations about them. I suggested she should make the break with their consent, and that she should explain to them that this was a part of a personal and important process in her emotional development, without going into details and without any arguments. Establishing a fact. We hoped they would understand, but essentially, their understanding was less important than the process of change. The profound insight that Maya attained was the basis for the creation of a sharp and clear change. Maya refrained from all contact with her family, as was suggested to her, and as “a small side issue,” she discovered that she also gave up vomiting. Completely. There were still eating binges from time to time, but with reduced intensity and without the torment that had driven her to induce vomiting. A few long weeks after the self-cleansing and the separation from her family, Maya made contact made with them again, and the reconstructed relationship seemed completely different to her. In addition, she maintained her abstinence from vomiting.
There are many other such examples -- in a broad range of contexts, not only eating disorders -- showing how, on the one hand, the performance of a behavioral task can lead to insight, and on the other hand, how insight can bring about behavioral change. Also possible are cases in which insight brings about no behavioral change, or behavioral changes lead to no insight. If we must choose, it seems to me that most of us prefer sustained behavioral change, even if there is no insight, over profound insight that doesn’t lead to the behavioral change that was wanted. Attainment of change in a given situation is an emphatic aim of the Graceway, and the twelve tools are directed towards it.
Before we go into the tools themselves in depth, let me share a few more words about them in general. The tools will be presented hereafter according to a certain order, with appropriate logic, starting with the tools which, when implemented, create immediate change in our lives and help to reduce distress, then moving on to the tools which are part of a broad-perspective way of life. We begin with small changes and continue with profound changes. There is logic in the order in which the tools will be presented, but in time of need, the order can be changed. In general, it is preferable to keep an open mind when we enter the process of change or offer advice to someone else.
As we shall see, some of the tools describe certain behaviors, while others describe internal speech or a manner of behavior, but under the external cover of difference, there is a similar intention. The tools express an idea, or a series of ideas, including basic assumptions about human nature, about our potential for change and development, about pain and how to free ourselves from its consequences, and even about the possibility of attaining quiet and pleasant happiness and love that grows. The focus of the tools and the Graceway is usually the “how?” and the “why?” -- how we live our lives, how and why do we do the things that we do and especially “how to change?” -- ensuring that change toward the direction that we want will be possible at any moment, in any situation or place. “How” and “why” influence our concrete choices at a certain moment, the “what” that we choose. Our manner of action and the depth of our intentions and motivations direct the actual content of the change.
All the tools are directed towards similar ideas which emanate from a certain world-view of the Graceway. As we progress with the presentation of the tools, the world-view of the Graceway will become clearer and sharper. Its defining characteristic is that implementation of the tools is supposed to be flexible and gentle and that it should bring relief. If implementation is hard or difficult, heavy or oppressive, bringing no relief, then it’s possible we have strayed from the path. The way and the tools propose and create in us an intense inner struggle. A challenging struggle, which usually exists even before we set out on the way. The implementation of the tools changes its direction a little, and sometimes it seems it is strengthening and sharpening the struggle. Sometimes this is very frustrating and painful, but still, there is hope, along with a feeling that there is a point to our struggle. It is a self-struggle of liberation from oppression, sometimes liberation from oppression that is heavy and very long-lasting.
The Twelve-step program includes an apt expression: “In the spirit of a loving God.” Everything that we do -- including the struggle against ourselves which sometimes seems to us completely demented -- we do it “in the spirit of a loving God.” This is an expression that points to a very basic “how”, perhaps the most basic that we have. On the deeper perception of God as love in which there is no compulsion or rigidity, which is central to the way, we shall have more to say in due course.
Let’s take another short moment of silence. We shall leave behind all opinions, ideas and feelings, and focus on silence, listen to it. In the midst of silence, it will be easier to remember, to understand, and to experience what is said.
TOOL 1
Abstinence
To abstain completely from harmful behavior is a positive and challenging action.
Let’s start with a brief moment of silence. We listen to the silence. We have already said it has a very special sound. With a little exercise and practice, we can hear the silence, and then proportions change. It’s possible to listen to what is said out of the silence and understand in a profound and intuitive way. … Thank you.
I first heard the idea that it is possible to listen to silence from Shlomo Kalo, who called the experience of paying attention to silence, “Wakeful stillness.” He urged us to pay heed to it and to live it, beyond the tumult of everyday life. Eckhart Tolle also recommends personal experience of this form of lis
tening. In Hindu philosophy, there is a special place for listening to silence, and in the Bible, it is written, “And after the fire a still small voice. And when Elijah heard it…” (1 Kings, chap. xix, vv.12-13). In other words, Elijah heard the stillness in which was the voice of God.
The first tool that we’ll discuss is abstinence. I have decided to present this as the first tool, because however we look at the road ahead of us, abstinence constitutes a basic tool of change without which no progress can be made. It is this that facilitates the beginning of the process of change, and also sustains the changes that have been made; without it there is no real change. There may be declarations, intentions, aspirations and perhaps even decisions, but without abstinence, there will not be a real change that you feel and live. Abstinence is the practical basis of a program of change and a way of life. In every spiritual path, there exists some association with abstinence. In the Jewish sources, for example it is said simply: “There is a small organ in man which satisfies him in his hunger but makes him hunger when satisfied” (Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Sanhedrin, Folio 107). The meaning of this could be that whatever we strongly desire should be starved, in order to experience real satisfaction. In the Gospel according to Thomas, it is written, “If you do not fast from the world, [ i.e. abstain] you will not find the Kingdom.” What kind of abstinence, from what, for what, when and how much? Good questions, and we hope to give an answer to them very soon.