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Conversations with Briana: Holding Space (Video)

In this video, Briana shares and expands a bit on the three most essential suggestions for Holding Space, which is one of the most vital and beautiful gifts you can give another person.

Put your own thoughts and feelings aside, and be fully present for their experience.
Withhold judgement and just listen.
Allow their process to be what it is without trying to fix it.

If you have a desire to hold space for your friends, family, clients, coworkers, etc…these three practices will get you well on your way to creating a safe space for them to find their own healing.

Watch the video below to learn more.

Do you have experience with or suggestions for holding space for others? Share in the comments below!

13 thoughts on “Conversations with Briana: Holding Space (Video)”

01 / 30/ 18 | Renae

Hi, Briana. I’m new to “the woo” so I appreciated this video on what “holding space” means. The phrase just seemed to come out of nowhere! Thanks for clarifying things for me.

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1. 01 / 31/ 18 | Briana Borten
  
  I’m so happy I could help!
  
  Reply
01 / 30/ 18 | Jenn

Beautifully explained..

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1. 01 / 31/ 18 | Briana Borten
  
  ❤ Thank You
  
  Reply
01 / 31/ 18 | Stephanie

Hi Briana, thanks for this video. I am always looking to improve my ability to hold space. I have a question–I have situations where I just want to hold space, but the other person wants to tell a story and get my reassurance or agreement that they are “right”. How do I hold space and stay in integrity in those moments?

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1. 01 / 31/ 18 | Briana Borten
  
  This is such a great question. The best that we can do in those moments is just to reflect what we’re hearing to them with compassion and love. “It sounds like your super upset about this situation.” “I hear that your feelings got hurt.”
  
  Sometimes someone just needs to hear that their being heard and seen before they can pick themselves out of their story.
  
  Reply
01 / 31/ 18 | Exie

Thank you so much for that. I could never explain this. This is what I try to do for others but have not had that reciprocated. Now I can share this video and help others. ❤️🙏

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1. 01 / 31/ 18 | Briana Borten
  
  Thank you for sharing.
  
  Reply
01 / 31/ 18 | Donna Marie McGargill

Thank you once again for your goodness and ways of sharing! Deeply grateful!

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1. 01 / 31/ 18 | Briana Borten
  
  Thank you, Donna! ❤
  
  Reply
01 / 31/ 18 | Robin Dermake

thank you so much for these treasured words of widsom…just this morning was in touch with someone whom, suprisingly to me, is in need of love, support and guidance…going to put these three holding space ideas into action in hopes of helping him…love & light

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1. 01 / 31/ 18 | Briana Borten
  
  Thank you for sharing your light. Please let me know how it goes.
  
  Reply
01 / 31/ 18 | Joanne

Thank you this was beautifully said. It is so clear. My question is the same as Stephanie’s . I look forward to your reply.

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In this first example, we’re looking at the intersection of desire and fear with that of being in control versus out of control. Wanting control is a primary human motivator. A great many of our upsets can be traced to an underlying fear of being out of control. But pursuing control may amplify the belief that we’re not in control. This can be a tricky catch-22 to work with. So if you have a strong desire to be in control (upper right quadrant), you’d do well to address yourself to the fear of being out of control (lower left). These are easy for most people to access. Can you think of a situation that arouses the fear of being out of control? Holding that in mind, what happens in your body? Can you feel some physical unease? What happens if you don’t resist that feeling? What happens if you even invite it to be felt with your whole being, willingly allowing it spread over you? And what happens when you imagine opening yourself, like opening a closed fist that contains a butterfly, and let it peacefully depart? If this process diminished the intensity of the feeling, but not completely, try doing it several times in succession. For more on this form of body-centered releasing, check out our book, Freedom. Less obvious – but not uncommon – is the fear of being in control (lower right quadrant). If you’re in control, does that mean whatever happens is your fault? Maybe being in control feels like too much responsibility. If control issues are significant for you, I encourage you to do the process described in the last paragraph with the idea of situation in which you are in control. What comes up? Last, there’s the desire to be out of control (lower left quadrant). Though this may seem totally foreign to someone who’s rigidly clenching around every aspect of life, there’s always a hidden part that yearns for the relief of being out of control. Anyone who’s ever been to a college party at the end of finals has witnessed plenty of desire to be out of control. Try visiting with all four quadrants and journaling about how each state exists in you. You might also have fun with the following variation – desire and fear of independence versus dependence.

This is a major dynamic in kids and adolescents, and it’s not helped by the fact that parents often give mixed messages. On the one hand, we may be telling our kids to stay attached to the family, don’t try to get your needs met by your inept peers, and keep coming to us for support and advice. On the other, we’re telling them to grow up, do more things for themselves, get themselves ready for school, figure out their homework, and navigate new situations with minimal guidance. When we see them shifting their attachment from the family to their peers, we often mistake this for independence, when they’ve actually become dependent on peers for approval and direction. It's probably easy for them to access the desire to be independent, even if it’s scary, because our society puts so much value on it. If we can help them recognize the other three quadrants, it may help to neutralize some of the inner and outer forces, and allow them to be accepting of where they are and comfortable with striking a balance. Of course these dynamics don’t necessarily end when adolescence does. We may find ourselves struggling with the dimensions of dependence and independence in our adult relationships, and when handicapped, ill, or elderly. Exploration and peacemaking with these states may support a peaceful resolution. Be well, Peter P.S. If you find this exploration interesting, perhaps you’d enjoy guiding others through processes like these. Check out the Dragontree Coaching Program. In the advanced Illuminator training, we go even deeper into these processes. [post_title] => Meeting the Part of Yourself That Wants to Be Out of Control [post_excerpt] => [post_status] => publish [comment_status] => open [ping_status] => open [post_password] => [post_name] => meeting-the-part-of-yourself-that-wants-to-be-out-of-control [to_ping] => [pinged] => [post_modified] => 2022-02-24 23:28:41 [post_modified_gmt] => 2022-02-24 23:28:41 [post_content_filtered] => [post_parent] => 0 [guid] => https://thedragontree.com/?p=8572 [menu_order] => 0 [post_type] => post [post_mime_type] => [comment_count] => 0 [filter] => raw [webinar_id] => 0 ) [2] => WP_Post Object ( [ID] => 8548 [post_author] => 3 [post_date] => 2022-03-06 06:00:06 [post_date_gmt] => 2022-03-06 06:00:06 [post_content] => One of the main ways that we get stuck or fail to reach our potential is through persistent psychological patterns. Some would say they’re not just psychological, but psycho-spiritual, or even karmic. Perhaps they’re an expression of what are called samskaras in Vedic thought – ruts or imprints that we’re prone to fall into over and over. The tendency to think and act in a certain way can be difficult to break, even if we know it’s not serving us. Often these patterns are founded in stories and beliefs in which we have a one-sided view, and the single-sidedness gives them a stronger charge that tends to make them more enduring. Here are some examples: I am a victim. I mess everything up. I never have enough money. People are selfish. I’m not disciplined enough to live to my potential. Happiness doesn’t last. Life is scary. Part of why these stories won’t die is because of our inability to see more than one perspective. Often we put ourselves in a certain role, with the opposing role played (usually in our mind) by some adversary, which could be a parent, partner, enemy, God, the whole world, some imagined “lucky person,” or even another aspect of ourselves. We can get invested in playing the bad guy, the hero, the spiritual one, the rebel, the starving artist, or the martyr. This may cause us to suppress aspects of ourselves that don’t align with this role, which serves to perpetuate the one-sidedness of our position. The exaggerated dynamic it sets up is like sitting at the outermost point on a seesaw; we’re bound to get carried way up and down by our emotions. Coming from a Chinese Medicine background, I’m inclined to see this condition as an imbalance of yin and yang. It’s a denial of our wholeness and a limitation on our health and power. Recognizing that we contain both sides of each coin is important and useful work, and it’s a primary theme in many healing modalities. It’s part of the integration of our shadow aspect (a term coined by Carl Jung to describe the parts of ourselves we deny, suppress, or are unconscious of). It’s an essential part of The Work developed by Byron Katie for challenging our thoughts. This process consists of asking questions to determine whether a given thought is true and how you’re affected by believing it, after which you “turn it around” to see how opposing viewpoints are equally true. For users of our body-centered releasing workbook, Freedom, we recommend taking a charged issue or scenario and, after working on it with your usual position, see what comes up when you “try on” the opposing position. Releasing the pattern from both sides promotes a more complete resolution. Similarly, Leslie Temple Thurston teaches that when we identify the polarized aspects of our stories and then figure out what their opposites are, we discover that both sides are within us (and our adversaries). This recognition shifts our position from the outermost edge of the seesaw to the center fulcrum – what Temple Thurston calls the neutral witness state – and the story falls apart. To take this deeper, we can examine the interaction of two sets of opposing charges, which creates four perspectives. Temple Thurston calls this working with “squares.” The mind is rarely in the throes of just one duality. Beyond the charge of the two sides of a story, there is an additional dimension of polarization which is the basic push-pull of attraction and repulsion, also experienced as like/dislike, desire/fear, or attachment/rejection. By examining a pattern through all four sides of these interacting charges, we can achieve an even more complete neutralization.

I’ve depicted the basic format in this graphic. Take one duality, which I refer to as yin and yang here, and cross it with the duality of desire/fear to produce four states. Here I refer to the states as desire for yin, desire for yang, fear of yin, and fear of yang. This will all make more sense when we plug in an example to replace yin and yang here:

You may also be interested in:

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Get Through Your Blocks By Seeing All Four Sides of the Coin

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Conversations with Briana: Holding Space (Video)

13 thoughts on “Conversations with Briana: Holding Space (Video)”

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