This is an interview article with Christine.
Christine’s responses are highlighted in Yellow.

This time, we spoke with Christine, a Ho’oponopono instructor.
Christine has been practicing Ho’oponopono since 1998 and has been doing cleaning for nearly 30 years. She shares this:
“The beautiful thing about Ho’oponopono is that it constantly reminds us to ‘look within.’ The moment we choose to take responsibility for our inner experience instead of blaming what is outside, we can cut our connection to suffering and reclaim our freedom.”

<Ho’oponopono Teaches Us to First Look Within>

── Christine, I’m so happy to meet you today. As I was preparing for this interview, I realized that you began Ho’oponopono in 1998. What was it that first brought you to Ho’oponopono at that time?

It really felt like a coincidence. A friend invited me, saying, “Do you want to go to a class?” I didn’t even know what kind of event it was, but I decided to go anyway.

I received a flyer, and rather than the meaning of the words written on it, I was drawn to their rhythm and sound. Intuitively, I felt, “This is something special.”

I then drove 2 hours to attend Dr. Hew Len’s class, drove another 2 hours back the next day, and immediately signed up for the weekend Ho’oponopono class.
From that point until today, I have continued practicing Ho’oponopono.

── When we encounter something new, there is always some kind of doorway or turning point.
For me, my encounter with Ho’oponopono came through a book.

At that time, I was struggling financially and couldn’t see a future for my career. When I saw the book, I picked it up thinking, “Maybe this explains an easy way to become rich.”

But through the practice, the greatest gift I received was not a “secret” about money.
It was the transformation from someone who believed they were a victim into someone who takes responsibility for their life and reclaims their inner power.

I learned that even if we cannot change the outer world, we can take 100% responsibility for our own experience.

So I’d like to ask you, Christine: after taking your first Ho’oponopono class, what was the greatest gift for you?

What impacted me most deeply was the constant awareness that everything happening in my life is about me.

For example, when I feel pressure at work or tension while looking at bills, what I am really facing is not the “external situation,” but myself.

Ho’oponopono has many beautiful aspects.
One of them is how gently it guides us to turn our attention inward and begin taking responsibility for our own experience.

We can choose to let go of memories.
Before trying to figure out how to “solve” a problem, we first return within and restore balance.

Ho’oponopono is not asking us to turn away from problems or pressure, nor to run from them.
Rather, it invites us to acknowledge our experience honestly: “This feels uncomfortable,” “I am feeling stressed right now.”

We look at what we are feeling and ask, “This is my experience right now. May I let it go?”

Instead of avoiding, denying, or blaming others by saying “It’s your fault,” Ho’oponopono helps us realize that these experiences come from our memories.
The person or situation in front of us is connected to us through memory.

When we sever that connection through cleaning, we become free.

If we continue to cling to victim memories, the problem will always be something “someone else created,” and we remain a “victim.”

But when we pause, take a breath, and choose to say the cleaning words instead of arguing with our memories, we reclaim our power and return to being someone who takes responsibility for themselves.

Taking responsibility also means returning to a place of caring for ourselves.

Even though it may look like we are saying “I’m sorry” to the outside, in truth, we are saying “I’m sorry” to ourselves.
The Ho’oponopono process is a process of caring for ourselves, of beginning to love ourselves again, a process of returning to love.

By letting go of memories in this way, we are able to experience love.

<Cleaning Layer Upon Layer of Memories>

── Christine, thank you for such a beautiful sharing.

Earlier, you said that one of the appeals of Ho’oponopono is that it reminds us to look within and take responsibility for our experience.
However, for people who have just begun practicing, Ho’oponopono can sometimes feel like a magic wand.

For example, when unpleasant emotions or painful experiences arise, they may expect, “If I do cleaning, this feeling should disappear.”
But even after cleaning, the emotion may still remain, or it may return again and again.

At that point, some people start to feel, “Maybe Ho’oponopono doesn’t work.”

So I’d like to ask: how can we shift our perspective from “trying to erase something” to seeing Ho’oponopono as a process for looking within?

Everything you just described is something I have experienced myself.

Every day, various emotions arise for me.
I feel down, irritated, or exhausted from overthinking.

In those moments, I suddenly remember, “Ah, I have another path: choosing inspiration from Divinity.”

The thought “Ho’oponopono isn’t working” or “I’m not getting better yet” is also the voice of memory.

We always have a choice.

We can open the cleaning process so that perfect ideas and energy from Divinity can come and heal us.
Or we can cling to the memory that says “Ho’oponopono doesn’t work” and remain inside its replay.

Morrnah shared a wonderful metaphor with us.
She said it’s like riding a bicycle.

You have a bicycle, you inflate the tires, and you start riding while doing cleaning.
Then, along the way, you hit a stone and fall into a muddy puddle.

What do you do then?
Do you sit there in the mud?
Or do you stand up, lift the bicycle, and start moving forward again?

In this example, the moment you fall into the mud is the moment you get caught in memory.
And that’s okay. As human beings, we sometimes fall into memory.

But as we practice Ho’oponopono, we begin to notice:
“Ah, memory is playing again.”

Even if it looks like the same problem or feels like the same emotion, it is not exactly the same.
Each time we do cleaning, a new opportunity appears.

And each time, we can choose again.
We can choose cleaning and activate the process of releasing memory.

Sometimes it doesn’t feel like cleaning is “working.”
Sometimes it seems as if we are seeing the same problem every day.

But please remember this:
We are cleaning layer upon layer of memories.

Even if nothing seems to have changed on the surface, every time we do cleaning, we are not the same person we were before.

Each day, we are given a new opportunity to let go of memory.

There was a time when I was cleaning back pain.
One day in the process, the pain suddenly disappeared, and eventually I even forgot that I had ever had that pain.

The work of Ho’oponopono is very subtle and gentle, and it gives each of us exactly what we need at the perfect timing.

What is right and what is perfect in any situation can only be calculated by Divinity.

Within cleaning, we don’t need to calculate anything.
We simply begin the process and take responsibility for our experience.

Sometimes people wonder, “Does taking responsibility mean that I am at fault?”

No, it does not.

In Ho’oponopono, taking responsibility means acknowledging this:

“I am having this experience right now. I am feeling this problem. And I choose to clean with it.”

<How to Clean Physical Pain>

── Thank you so much. I was completely drawn in by your words.

One participant shared that they have been suffering from back pain for many years, don’t know the cause, and don’t know how to do cleaning for it.
I would love to hear about your experience with cleaning back pain.

Why does this kind of pain arise, and how does Ho’oponopono approach it?

Thank you. When pain appears in the back, it is a sign that memory has surfaced.
It’s as if the Unihipili is waving a small red flag, saying, “Look, here is a memory you can let go of.”

We tend to want to analyze why the pain is happening.
We try to identify the cause.

But when I practice Ho’oponopono, I say this to myself:
“Let me love this back pain.”

And I say to the pain I am feeling right now, “I love you.”

When I can love the pain, I am no longer fighting it.
Instead, I am saying:

Thank you.
Thank you for appearing.
Thank you for giving me the chance to choose to let go.

Through this process, the pain begins to soften and dissolve.

Even if the pain returns, I continue cleaning.
I love the pain again, say “I love you,” “thank you,” or use other cleaning tools.

In my experience, some conditions or symptoms disappear quickly through cleaning.
Others take time.

I have experienced both.
That is because it depends on how many layers of memory remain behind that pain and how much needs to be released.

Every time we do cleaning, memory is being released.
But no one knows how many layers of memory are piled up inside us, or how many memories are waiting to be freed.

── Thank you, Christine.
Participants often ask questions about their own illnesses or those of their family members.
And as you shared today, no matter what the condition is, it gives us an opportunity to release memory, doesn’t it?