It's all in how you look at it

Recently I experienced a very challenging situation. (At least it seemed so to me.) I'd been asked to speak on a very controversial topic at a large conference in another city.

Wanting to share the material but also feeling anxious, I researched and prepared my presentation over many months. Travel arrangements solidified, and all seemed to be moving ahead.

But a few days before the conference, the chairman reported that its accrediting body had withdrawn physician Continuing Medical Education units.

Why? It turned out that the accreditation committee objected to certain presentations, including mine. Removing educational credit from the conference could severely discourage attendance.

This threw me into a tailspin. What to do? Shock, hurt, anger and fear roiled inside me; what kind of reception would there be for our talks? I briefly described the situation to Mabel Katz.

"Good for you!" she exclaimed.

"Good for me?! What are you talking about? I'm suffering, here!" my inner thoughts screamed. But I also listened carefully. Mabel's comment echoed Dr. Ihaleakala Hew Len's on other occasions.

Are they insensitive? Not hearing me? Neither.

Mabel and Dr. Hew Len were only reminding me that I'm 100% responsible for all that appears in my life.

In ho'oponopono, every seeming "problem" is an opportunity to release from our inner databank the unconscious memories that manifest through outer events.

This is as much true for what we think we see in others as it is the emotions inside ourselves. After all, our perceptions are only collections of neurological information, which our cognitive brain interprets. Interpretations are as varied as we are -- or as varied as the memories we've collected over eons of time.

An analogy might be files on your computer's hard drive that aren't being used. Until they're opened, you may not realize they're present. Outer "problems" are like those files being clicked into action. Programs and operations are unleashed, sometimes wreaking havoc. We can decide either to experience all the contents, or simply delete the files. It all depends on how we interpret their usefulness. But without being alerted to their existence, we wouldn't have opportunity to decide.

So, "Good for me", indeed! I now had an opportunity to practice "cleaning" these memories showing up. To do this, I could use "I love you", "Thank you", or any other ho'oponopono cleaning 'tool' that I'm led to use.

Ho'oponopono also describes a complete connection between the part of me that holds these memories (Unihipili), the part that decides what to do with them (Uhane), and another part (Aumakua) that's always in direct synch with Divinity. I don't even have to understand the entire issue to start the cleaning process; in fact, I most likely cannot. It's layered, tangled, and knotted over generations and shared by countless others. What a relief that, through using my tools, I can invite Divinity to help release (or "clean") all this "muck" from me.

Ho'oponopono also holds that when one person releases such memories, they also come off everyone else. We can reduce our collective pile this way.

I chose to work with my ho'oponopono tools on this situation, and 'clean'. Surprisingly, my initially chaotic and stormy emotions calmed enough for me to make another decision.

I could have simply withdrawn my talk. But I decided to attend the conference despite the CME issue anyway. It seemed that if even one person got the information s/he paid for, my trip would be worthwhile. Another surprise: the audience responded very positively to us and our talks, even those to which the CME accreditors objected.

I'm thankful for these results so far, and wondering what the next "opportunity" will be. How do YOU see life? Full of problems, or opportunities? It's quite surprising to find that problems can actually set us all free.

If you'd like to learn more about this unusual -- but freeing -- way of viewing life, please consider signing up for Mabel Katz's conference calls or attending an event with the Foundation of I.