Sunday, March 30, 2008
Begin with the Body
The body doesn’t lie because the body doesn’t know how to lie. The body experiences life directly without judging it good, bad or indifferent. Because we have been conditioned and often traumatized out of responding, in a natural and immediate fashion, to the events in our lives, there is a need to become reacquainted with the many dialects of the body’s language.
It has always seemed absurd to me that our body, which is in fact the “home” of whatever it is that animates us; call it spirit, soul, consciousness or ego, gets short shrift when it comes to interest and attention.
How do we speak to the body? The more important question is, how do we listen to the body? Hands-on practitioners of various healing modalities each have their own unique way of listening to the patient or client’s body. Cranial Sacral manipulation in particular requires a deep listening; a particular stillness on the part of the practitioner, in order to “tune in” to the subtle movements of the body. Massage therapy, osteopathy, chiropractic, physiotherapy all have languages that once learned enables the practitioner to hear what the body wants and needs to heal itself. But what of simple listening - we know when we need to eat, to sleep, to wake up, to attend to basic bodily functions, but what of the need to dance, to be still, to float in water, and perhaps more importantly, explore the minutiae of sensation throughout the body. Our culture discourages displays of emotion as clearly as it discourages sensuality; a true living in the world of the senses and feelings. That sort of living is regarded as indulgent, self-absorbed, weak.
The body has unlimited voices: dance, touch, “gut reaction”, even disease is often a great shout to the conscious mind that a crucial aspect of the being needs to be heard, acknowledged and addressed.
If we ask: how fully do we taste what we put in our mouths, how widely do we see, visually invite and accept; how deeply do we receive a touch, how fully engaged are we when we touch another, and how much breath do we allow to penetrate into our lungs and blood, the answers may offer an insight in to the relationship we have with our very existence here on the planet.
Massage is just one of the ways in which we can reconnect to our physical being. In Osho Rebalancing training we were trained equally in how to receive touch as we were in the techniques involved in the giving of a massage. How to prepare and be present; to offer ourselves to the experience. Rather than be a passive receptacle to someone else’s manoeuvres we learned to be alive and responsive; to invite a dialogue, which is only sometimes verbal.
In order to begin to heal the traumas inflicted on our bodies and psyches introducing a healthy, therapeutic touch and inviting a direct and honest response is needed. A touch that not only acknowledges the wounds but encourages expression and assists the recipient in feeling the full spectrum of response; from the pain of the original wound to the rich pleasure that can be released through the entire body when the pain is freed.
In Pune, where I trained, all the courses and trainings were experiential, and every day began with Dynamic meditation at 6 am. Dynamic meditation is a cathartic breathing, sounding, pounding process that brings one to the point of sudden stillness. Many of Osho’s meditations involve unleashing accumulated noise and disturbances in the mind and emotions through intense movement, breathing and often sound, in order to “throw out” all that keeps us from our own sweet silence. By shaking up the crust of busyness and chatter that accumulates throughout the day we make space for stillness and watchfulness. As with many techniques, disciplines and practices tremendous effort is needed to bring one to the place where effort is not only not needed it is an impediment to transformation.
So, we need to shake ourselves up, because we have spent far too much time and energy repressing what we feel, superimposing some idea of how we should be on top of what we actually are, and deeming ourselves acceptable only if we comply to some external standard. So here’s the big risk I am suggesting… shake it up, stir it up, dance, sing, shout, breathe, rock and roll, look in a mirror, tell the truth, see what rises to the top… let it be whatever it is…
By intense exertion we invite the authentic to arise. We get out of the way, in effect, so that our ideas don’t interfere with reality. For most of us from early childhood our breath is constricted, becomes shallow. For many; dare I say most, there is tension even when sleeping, our hands clenched into fists.
What I have been working with/on/for most of my life is the body - through dance, active meditation, Reichian emotional body work, massage, lovemaking, birthing... everything - my lens has been focused on the body as teacher, as portal, as metaphor... through direct experience I learn the world.
I have observed one thing again and again - that people are terrified of the body; its mortality, its pain, even its pleasure. Because of the fear we stay trapped inside a very small world. And the body is our invitation to life, is it not? What better way to experience life than through the body which is our home, our vehicle, our gift from existence. Everywhere people are trying to tame, control, or ignore their bodies, and damn those bodies, they keep coming up with ways to complain, don't they??
What I have found is that when one moves - whether it is dance or running or yoga or making love, or jumping up and down - if it is done with total presence, the mind clears of its own and what lies in wait can surface - all that had been stuffed or ignored or dismissed bubbles to the surface... sometimes this is emotion, sometimes a brilliant idea... but not, I note, the stuff of logic... more outside of the box, as it were. But most are reluctant to give themselves over to anything totally... the ego will then be lost and the gap is too frightening, or they instinctively know that they will encounter a rage or grief that they have successfully held at bay... But by risking all of this we come into contact with ourselves in a more authentic way... We need to pay attention to what IS, not what we superimpose on the world as reality... We have to take the risk of finding out that our lens on the world may be coloured or obscured. We have to risk feeling pain. We have all known pain - from a burned finger to a broken heart, so it isn't that we cannot bear it, it's that we would rather avoid reopening our wounds. But the thing is: we have never truly and directly been present for life‘s plats du jour. We dodge and stuff down and react before the full weight of any given experience has landed upon us.
We are each our own planet - places that are scorched, frozen, airless and desolate, lush, barren; all of it - within our own shells, there it is. One way of knowing this directly is by moving. Moving the body and moving inward.
By exerting effort through movement the mind is engaged sufficiently to not interfere with what may be stirred up. If one directs their true focus; that dispassionate eye, upon the process and the experience of dance or shaking then all that has been tucked away has space to surface.
In this way movement of the body is a portal to consciousness, because the deeper the relationship with the body the more still is the mind - no static, as it were. The mind’s noise is quietened and one is brought into present time - into meditation in real time. It may sound simple, but like any spiritual disciplines it requires practice.
In the workshops I put out the invitation to experience being outside of the mind's ideas of what is and what was ... to stir the pot and explore what arises... Unless we venture in we stay trapped inside the fear of, not the knowledge of...
It has always seemed absurd to me that our body, which is in fact the “home” of whatever it is that animates us; call it spirit, soul, consciousness or ego, gets short shrift when it comes to interest and attention.
How do we speak to the body? The more important question is, how do we listen to the body? Hands-on practitioners of various healing modalities each have their own unique way of listening to the patient or client’s body. Cranial Sacral manipulation in particular requires a deep listening; a particular stillness on the part of the practitioner, in order to “tune in” to the subtle movements of the body. Massage therapy, osteopathy, chiropractic, physiotherapy all have languages that once learned enables the practitioner to hear what the body wants and needs to heal itself. But what of simple listening - we know when we need to eat, to sleep, to wake up, to attend to basic bodily functions, but what of the need to dance, to be still, to float in water, and perhaps more importantly, explore the minutiae of sensation throughout the body. Our culture discourages displays of emotion as clearly as it discourages sensuality; a true living in the world of the senses and feelings. That sort of living is regarded as indulgent, self-absorbed, weak.
The body has unlimited voices: dance, touch, “gut reaction”, even disease is often a great shout to the conscious mind that a crucial aspect of the being needs to be heard, acknowledged and addressed.
If we ask: how fully do we taste what we put in our mouths, how widely do we see, visually invite and accept; how deeply do we receive a touch, how fully engaged are we when we touch another, and how much breath do we allow to penetrate into our lungs and blood, the answers may offer an insight in to the relationship we have with our very existence here on the planet.
Massage is just one of the ways in which we can reconnect to our physical being. In Osho Rebalancing training we were trained equally in how to receive touch as we were in the techniques involved in the giving of a massage. How to prepare and be present; to offer ourselves to the experience. Rather than be a passive receptacle to someone else’s manoeuvres we learned to be alive and responsive; to invite a dialogue, which is only sometimes verbal.
In order to begin to heal the traumas inflicted on our bodies and psyches introducing a healthy, therapeutic touch and inviting a direct and honest response is needed. A touch that not only acknowledges the wounds but encourages expression and assists the recipient in feeling the full spectrum of response; from the pain of the original wound to the rich pleasure that can be released through the entire body when the pain is freed.
In Pune, where I trained, all the courses and trainings were experiential, and every day began with Dynamic meditation at 6 am. Dynamic meditation is a cathartic breathing, sounding, pounding process that brings one to the point of sudden stillness. Many of Osho’s meditations involve unleashing accumulated noise and disturbances in the mind and emotions through intense movement, breathing and often sound, in order to “throw out” all that keeps us from our own sweet silence. By shaking up the crust of busyness and chatter that accumulates throughout the day we make space for stillness and watchfulness. As with many techniques, disciplines and practices tremendous effort is needed to bring one to the place where effort is not only not needed it is an impediment to transformation.
So, we need to shake ourselves up, because we have spent far too much time and energy repressing what we feel, superimposing some idea of how we should be on top of what we actually are, and deeming ourselves acceptable only if we comply to some external standard. So here’s the big risk I am suggesting… shake it up, stir it up, dance, sing, shout, breathe, rock and roll, look in a mirror, tell the truth, see what rises to the top… let it be whatever it is…
By intense exertion we invite the authentic to arise. We get out of the way, in effect, so that our ideas don’t interfere with reality. For most of us from early childhood our breath is constricted, becomes shallow. For many; dare I say most, there is tension even when sleeping, our hands clenched into fists.
What I have been working with/on/for most of my life is the body - through dance, active meditation, Reichian emotional body work, massage, lovemaking, birthing... everything - my lens has been focused on the body as teacher, as portal, as metaphor... through direct experience I learn the world.
I have observed one thing again and again - that people are terrified of the body; its mortality, its pain, even its pleasure. Because of the fear we stay trapped inside a very small world. And the body is our invitation to life, is it not? What better way to experience life than through the body which is our home, our vehicle, our gift from existence. Everywhere people are trying to tame, control, or ignore their bodies, and damn those bodies, they keep coming up with ways to complain, don't they??
What I have found is that when one moves - whether it is dance or running or yoga or making love, or jumping up and down - if it is done with total presence, the mind clears of its own and what lies in wait can surface - all that had been stuffed or ignored or dismissed bubbles to the surface... sometimes this is emotion, sometimes a brilliant idea... but not, I note, the stuff of logic... more outside of the box, as it were. But most are reluctant to give themselves over to anything totally... the ego will then be lost and the gap is too frightening, or they instinctively know that they will encounter a rage or grief that they have successfully held at bay... But by risking all of this we come into contact with ourselves in a more authentic way... We need to pay attention to what IS, not what we superimpose on the world as reality... We have to take the risk of finding out that our lens on the world may be coloured or obscured. We have to risk feeling pain. We have all known pain - from a burned finger to a broken heart, so it isn't that we cannot bear it, it's that we would rather avoid reopening our wounds. But the thing is: we have never truly and directly been present for life‘s plats du jour. We dodge and stuff down and react before the full weight of any given experience has landed upon us.
We are each our own planet - places that are scorched, frozen, airless and desolate, lush, barren; all of it - within our own shells, there it is. One way of knowing this directly is by moving. Moving the body and moving inward.
By exerting effort through movement the mind is engaged sufficiently to not interfere with what may be stirred up. If one directs their true focus; that dispassionate eye, upon the process and the experience of dance or shaking then all that has been tucked away has space to surface.
In this way movement of the body is a portal to consciousness, because the deeper the relationship with the body the more still is the mind - no static, as it were. The mind’s noise is quietened and one is brought into present time - into meditation in real time. It may sound simple, but like any spiritual disciplines it requires practice.
In the workshops I put out the invitation to experience being outside of the mind's ideas of what is and what was ... to stir the pot and explore what arises... Unless we venture in we stay trapped inside the fear of, not the knowledge of...
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