Sounds very interesting. I'm always looking for exercises for myself as well
as my one-on-one clients. I'll keep in touch about my experience with PW.
Thanks Thomas!
Sandy Batts
tmasthenes13 <TomBuoyed@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Is anyone familiar with Proprioceptive Writing? I'm sending a suggestion to
our facilitator training group in Los Angeles (led by the indomitable Edward
"Fast Eddie" Zawidowski, who's finally gotten over his jet lag from Germany to
lead this motley crew for these first 3 weeknds in January.)
I thought I would share it on CT because of its value as an excellent
concentration exercise for Constellation work.
Thomas
____________________________________
In the last 3 weeks, Annalea and I have been practicing on a daily basis a
form of process writing called "Proprioceptive Writing," as developed 30 years
ago by Linda Metcalf and Toby Simon, then both English and writing teachers at
Pratt Institute in Brooklyn.
The process involves putting on Baroque music, lighting a candle, listening
to the voice of your body-mind thinking and then writing down what you hear for
25 minutes. Here's the website http://www.pwriting.org/
The book is called:
WRITING THE MIND ALIVE
The Proprioceptive Method for Finding Your Authentic Voice.
by Linda Trichter Metcalf and Tobin Simon
Ballantine Books, NY, 2002
The writing can be done individually or even better with couples or in a
group, and we find it absolutely spot on for developing and --- even more
importantly ---trusting the Voice to speak the right statements that need to be
spoken in a Constellation.
Since all constellation work derives from the Proprioceptive senses of the
representatives, i.e. inwardly perceiving emotions and somatic states, then
Proprioceptive Writing (PW) might be called Constellation Writing since it is
tuning in to the same soul stuff. I even refer to PW as doing "Constellations
of the Mind"
The three rules of PW are:
1. Write what you hear.
2. Listen to what you write
3. Ask the Proprioceptive Question (PQ)
The PQ is critical because it allows you to reflect on your thinking. Its
form is "What do I mean by ___________." you fill in the blank with a word or
phrase that you have written and which may be troubling to you, or charged with
some kind of deeper emotion.
This PQ in writing to me is the equivalent of the question asked by a
Facilitator to a Representative, e.g. "How does the Father feel?" The
Representative is being asked to reflect on his/her somatic state/emotion and
to express that feeling to the facilitator.
Similarly, if I were doing a Write ("a Write" is the term used to designate
whatever writing you complete in the 25 minute period), and let's say I was
hearing thoughts about my father and writing them down. But the point is not to
express the thoughts as in "stream of consciousness" writing, but actually to
interrupt the flow of thinking by asking the PQ. Let me give you an example:
"And I remember back when I was 9 years old when my father didn't come home
that night and my mother was so worried that she broke a glass in the sink and
cut her finger really badly and my younger sister suddenly went hysterical at
the sight of all Mama's blood and then the phone rang and it was the police and
I freaked out and ran out of the house. What do I mean by 'freaked out'? I mean
the feeling that I couldn't take it any more, that I had to get away, that my
life was ending because my father might be dead and what will happen to me and
I knew at that moment that my life would never be the same again and I never
got over that night. What do I mean by 'never got over'? I mean my father was
OK. He was just in a minor accident, but that night I knew that someday both my
parents would die and so would I and that experience changed me forever. I
could never be a little boy again. I had to grow up. What do I mean by 'grow
up'? . . . "
I hope that captures some of the flavor of PW. To me, asking the PQ is very
similar to the experience I've had so many times as a representative when the
facilitator brings in a new person or element and asks me how I feel now. "Has
anything changed for you since I brought in this new element?" Whatever was my
previous flow or track of feeling is suddenly shifted by the new element and
then I have to find words to express the new feelings or somatics.
For our little group, I could see us doing a group Write first thing in the
mornings, Saturday and/or Sunday, even before Check-in. The only hardware it
requires is: pens, paper, candles, our CD player with lots of Bach, Handel,
Vivaldi, Corelli, Mozart, etc., and our infamous and alarming stopwatch.
With 25 minutes for the Write itself and an optional reading out loud of
several Writes afterwards, we could fit it all into a 45 minute time period.
Check it out and see what you think. On second thought, hear what you think
and let us know. See you Saturday morn!
Thomas.
_____________________________________
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