A Conversation with Byron Katie

I am honored to present this powerful conversation with teacher, author, and speaker Byron Katie. This conversation was one of my favorite ever! Truth, transformation and choice are the themes for our talk.

Katie has one job: to show people how to stop suffering. In 1986, at the bottom of a ten-year spiral into depression, rage, and self-loathing, Katie woke up one morning to a state of constant joy that has never left her. She realized that when she believed her stressful thoughts, she suffered, but that when she questioned them, she didn’t suffer—and that this is true for every human being.

In our conversation, Katie talks about how her transformative process can help us move beyond fear and bring us back to joy and truth in the present moment. We discuss the power of reframing the stories we constantly tell ourselves—from feelings about our body image, to how we perceive the relationships in our lives, to our judgments about other people.

Katie calls her method of self-inquiry “The Work”—a simple and profound process that anyone can do. The Work consists of four questions and “turnarounds,” which offer a way of experiencing the opposite of what you believe. When you question a thought, you discover choices beyond suffering.

For over 25 years, she has taught The Work to millions of people all over the world, at prisons, hospitals, churches, corporations, shelters for domestic violence survivors, schools, weekend intensives, and at her nine-day School for The Work.

Byron Katie’s six books include the bestselling Loving What Is, I Need Your Love—Is That True?, and A Thousand Names for Joy. For more information, visit thework.com.

What you’ll hear:

2:26    Katie’s Moment of Truth
4:06    The Power of Self-Inquiry and Curiosity
7:00    Katie Walks Kelly Through The Work
18:20  Shifting Your Beliefs About Others
22:36  Moving Past Old Toxic Patterns
23:45  How Do We Stay in the Present Moment?
26:40  Using The Work on Body Image
31:00  “Are You the Love of Your Life?”
34:40  Coming to Terms with the Suffering of the World
39:00  What We Think and Believe Is the Cause of All Suffering