Most suffering is not the situation, it is an unquestioned thought about it.
The Work holds one stressful thought up to four plain questions, then turns it around until the grip loosens.
You do not argue with it; you look at it honestly, and the tension lets go.
Catch one stressful thought and put it in a single plain sentence, the way it actually sounds in your head. “He should respect me.” “I need her to understand.” Short and specific beats noble and vague.
Example the thought you catch might be “She doesn’t listen to me.” That is enough to work with.
Look at the thought and ask the simplest question there is.
Is it true?
Yes or no.
There is no correct answer here, only your honest one.
If it is no for you, you can move straight to the turnaround.
Example you sit with “She doesn’t listen to me.” The honest answer that surfaces is yes, it feels completely true.
Now the harder version.
Can you be one hundred percent certain, beyond any doubt?
Most of the thoughts that run our lives cannot honestly survive this one.
Example one hundred percent certain, beyond all doubt? No. You cannot really know what she heard, or what goes on in her head.
Notice what the thought does to you.
What you feel, how you treat the other person, how you treat yourself, where it sits in your body.
Do not fix anything yet, just watch it work.
Example believing it, you go cold and clipped, you rehearse the argument, the chest tightens, and you stop listening to her too.
Same situation, same person, but for a moment you simply cannot think that thought.
Who are you standing there?
This is usually where the air comes back into the room.
Example same kitchen, same person, but without the thought you are just someone talking to someone you love.
Lighter, curious instead of armed.
This is the part that drains the tension. Flip the thought to its opposite, back onto yourself, and onto the other person. “He should respect me” becomes “He should not respect me,” “I should respect me,” “I should respect him.” For each turn, find a few real examples where it is as true as the original, or truer.
You are not forcing a happy thought, you are loosening a grip.
Example “She doesn’t listen to me” becomes “I don’t listen to me,” “I don’t listen to her,” and “She does listen to me.” Each turn has its own real evidence.
Nothing here asks you to lie to yourself or pretend the hard thing is fine.
You meet a thought with honest questions, look at who you are without it, and turn it around until it softens.
The situation may not move, but your grip on it does, and the grip was usually where the suffering lived.
Byron Katie created The Work and still runs it live on Zoom, by donation.
Bring one stressful thought, sit in the four questions with her, and let the turnaround do the rest.
The Work is the method of Byron Katie.
The four questions and the turnaround are hers; the words here are my own retelling.
Go to the source to do it properly.