Our body, face and voice reflect our habits, emotions, thoughts and lifestyle. Our innermost thoughts, neuromuscular tensions, and habits form, in large part the shape of our bodies and the topography of our faces. If our bodies become weak, toxic, stiff or achy then we lack the free and focused attention that enables us to tune in to more refined levels of existence.A quote from a great man I knew years ago:
| Butch Artichoker of Lakota Sioux |
| "... one person wants to deal with the emotional cause of the illness and the other person is afraid to deal with the emotional cause. I've learned over a long period of time that when it comes to healing there is an emotional basis to the illness or to the condition. And when people fail to look into and try to heal the emotional cause, it is very difficult to heal the effect, the physical condition." |
The want of now: New age public relations has done an incredible job with creating a society of thinkers. People are exploring vast inner dimensions as they think of abundance, manifestation and the now. Living in the now doesn't mean doing as you please, rather it means understanding the paradoxes in life and how doing as you wish all the time can limit you where discipline and restraint can refine and free you.Getting what you want will leave you feeling unfulfilled. We will explore how this ties into the dynamics of the mind and body. Nothing in this world is a gift. Whatever must be learned must be learned the hard way. The body is not independent of the mind, the mind being a buzz word for states of consciousness. We have to realize that consciousness is not in the mind and body, the mind and body are in consciousness.When you let go only now will exist, not by thinking but by action.
Control: We attempt to control every aspect of our life from our self to children and others. Where is the success of this? Who is happier from it? The more you try to control the more you distort how you interpret reality. I say try to control, because trying is not natural. Nothing in nature tries. You cannot control anything, as most people display they cannot even control themselves or their emotions. The physical world is always moving. People try to grasp and control aspects of a life that is an existence of constant change. When you want to get control of change, it is difficult. The more you squeeze to contain water the less of it you actually grasp.But in order to have control you have to give it up. When we don't interfere with the natural flow of feelings and emotions, with events and circumstances we become capable of understanding their function and purpose and our place. So we become less attached and more aware of the process to direct our feelings to a place of stability and strength. After all strength is using your thoughts, actions and beliefs when you need it most.
The Hope trap: Desires, even for healing are often the same methods that brought on the problems we face. And problems are simply challenges we do not learn from. Just be still, with no desire for anything more or better, because once you get rid of the illusion of a better you will not suffer your life. Be absolutely hopeless, because hope is nothing but a new name for desire. Hope is a beautiful name for desire, dressed up and appealing to us. It is a fantasy that lacks accountability. There is no future, so drop all ambition, only this moment exists.
Power of words: You words have power, in old days words were seen as a form of magick. Take a moment to think about what words have done, think of Christ, Buddha, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, even of Hitler. All these people did great things with words. Please understand great does not mean good or bad. It simply demonstrates the power of the words, or in actuality, the powerful relationship our associations have to words. This is why words like hope, try, struggle, strife, suffering, wish, etc. all have to do with you not being a part of the answer you seek. You may want the answer to come from outside of you, but this cannot be. You got yourself into whatever situation you encounter, be realistic and seek to undo what has been done through education, responsibility and self awareness. Any hope, prayer, or voodoo to undo what you do to yourself is simply not being accountable for yourself.
Understanding the natural self: Accepting ourselves is accepting our body. Not the passing phase of sensations related to pain or pleasure, but the act of existence. If we begin to lose contact with our physical nature with the more earthly aspects then we lose touch with our higher aspects as well. The body functions best when we live in alignment with the natural laws of diet, exercise, breathing, stretching, rest, relaxation, posture and balance. The bio machine that is your body must not be dragged through extremities of over work and over taxing without having proper time to restore.
You have to lose to win: Like quicksand, when the body begins to stiffen and become restricted, the more you continue the same routines the more damage will you do. To get out of the quicksand you have to relax and stop moving. Emotional tension, most of which you are unaware of will begin to close off parts of the body and limit mobility, flexibility, blood and lymph flow. What do I mean by unaware of the body? Consider the great tasks your body undertakes daily; think of your cell production, digestion, hear beat, the amazing function of your liver and organs, even when you cut yourself and your body (not your ego) knows how to heal it. Now realize, the body has wisdom and every time we overwork ourselves we are going against the body. In the mind we create duality, the body and mind become opposites and naturally we suffer. As it is, the problem began in consciousness and in consciousness only can it be resolved.
"The cure of the part should not be attempted without treatment of the whole." -(Plato)
Resolve: There are no cures.. to anything. There is no starting or stopping, only doing. Often the resolve to problems in the body start with a shift in the ego, the basic self and its attachments and desires for perfection, over achievement and obsessive compulsiveness. We begin to think our resolve or remedy lies in whatever we feel finally works to help us. This is a lie perpetuated by the ego. You may have found a remedy, but like herbs, medicines, and medical practices, remedies help symptoms but never touch the causes of those symptoms.
- The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them.- Albert Einstein
Let your body be your coach: Listen to your body, stop the internal dialogue and listen. Don't resist how you feel, accept that it is not realistic to always feel energetic and willing. The body knows itself better than we can comprehend. People have yet to learn to be one with their own body as they haul it through endless cycles of routine and struggle for certain attainment, thinking they are teaching and conditioning their body when the truth is your body, which is a part of the evolutionary process- in direct contact with universal wisdom, is teaching you. But you will suffer the body, mind and life as long as you ignore the lessons your body and life are teaching you. When you are tired slow down, when you are hungry eat, when you are thirsty, drink. Don't be compulsory, listen to your body not your mind. This is enlightenment.
Pain and suffering are not the same: Having once said this to a Kung-fu teacher his response was " You are a masochist!" . But there is truth in my phrasing. Pain is an objective function of your nervous system. Mental, emotional or 'Suffering' are your subjective creations based on your meanings and interpretations. Every time you become angry, nothing outside of you has to do with that feeling. It is hard wiring through choices and perception.Suffering is attachment, so what are we attaching to?
Its all connected: It is obvious that your health is comprised of your thoughts, attitude, diet, mind state, actions, and lifestyle. So when one thing becomes out of balance, the other aspects still being directly entangled are also involved. All physical pain has an emotional, chemical, dietary and mental basis. A victim of rape may through muscle memory have flashbacks if put into a posture she might have experienced during the ordeal. The limitations in the body are only held by the mind, the mind in every cell of the body that are not separate. If you were no longer consciously present in your body, where is the pain and limitations in the body? Where is the person or ego to say " ow" or " that hurts?" What are we holding onto, and what is it we cannot let go of that we have to seek ways to resolve in the body. Relationships, self image, beliefs- all these things have a deep relationship to posture, habit, movement, tension and openness in the body. Are you willing to explore the emotional basis of physical limitations? " We are emotions and emotions are us, consider that every aspect of digestion, every sphincter that opens and closes, every group of cells that comes in for nourishment and then moves out to heal something , are all under the influence of the molecules of emotion." - Candace Pert, Ph.D
Mindful Exercise: Most people exercise, but they are not enjoying or experiencing the process, they are only trying to reach the end result. And the payout is menial as ultimately most people only work hard so they can admire their own reflection and be admired by others. This is a very real co-dependency, a result of low self worth. And it reveals itself as an addiction when people become unstable, unhappy or neurotic if they cannot work out. Mindful exercise is in effect moving meditation. Dan Millman wrote "meditation in action is different from doing it. do do there is a doer, a self conscious 'someone' performing. But when you meditate an action, you've already released attachment to outcomes. There's no 'you' left to do it. In forgetting yourself, you become what you do. So your action is free, spontaneous, without ambition, inhibition or fear." See my blog on True Meditation for a story about attachment to expectations, such as the exercises and self image.
The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.
Albert Einstein
The healing process: In many cases we look to others and feedback from so called experts when we 'suffer' the pain of the body. We want to know how long it will last, when will it end and how we can speed up the process. We do not seek to explore why we have become this way, investigate and penetrate the everyday habits of our thinking and actions in relationship to our state of mind and body. The healing process is a journey, and it will be as broad a road to travel as you are willing to walk. And it is your particular experience, not anyone elses and not something others can describe to you. It has never been walked before, it is unique as you are. The more you close your mind off to the details and individuality of your particular path the less you will learn from it. Some people want the suffering they experience to go away asap. They don't want to learn why it happened, they just want relief. Not wanting to know is being an enabler to your own ignorance. Eventually the problem will arise again if someone else remedies the symptoms for you. Because you did not learn its mechanics and do not know how to detect and resolve its growth. I would never wish for what some consider miraculous healing, I would never wish to 'be healed' and robbed of the enlightenment that is the reason I exist this way. I would never want to miss a moment of my life, particularly how to heal myself through my own awareness.
Living without time: Time is experienced in the mind and you are the master of your time. Where are you rushing to? So many people want to heal now, they will keep exploring avenue after avenue until they almost give up. Experience shows that slow and steady win the race, that if we can have a gentle and patient approach to healing we will have less stress and absorb and release more of what is necessary for our growth.
Go with the flow: We must at some point learn to accept that life presents highs and lows. Though we often choose to lean our emotions on the outcome of circumstances so we can determine what is right and wrong in life. But does that make it so? No. Everything we perceive in our lives that generate feelings are based purely on perspective. I'll say that again- purely on perspective. Because we cannot see where the road takes us, or how certain events will help us move forward, even though they seem bad at the moment. So what we get out of what we experience is what we choose to see. But either way, the road that is underfoot exists because of our own doing. If you want proof of that look back and see the footsteps you have made to take yourself there. Ther is no arbiter of your fate but yourself.
Self Compassion: As ancient observations have shown, the soft overcomes the hard. Observing nature we see how soft can over come hard such as water shaping rocks and land. Using this perspective we see how our ultimate strengths can be our greatest weakness. We need balance to function optimally.We must learn to be compassionate and gentle with ourselves, especially where healing is required. Remember to be gentle to yourself...it took awhile to amass toxins, stress and tension, do not try to rush them out in an instant or it can cause unnecessary healing stresses.
This is your journey: Don't worry that something may work for someone else and not for you. Stop magnifying the negative. The desire to speed things up retards your natural growth and healing. How do you expect change when you focus on the same things? How do you want become aware how to resolve your own problems when you focus on someone else? Your situation is yours and yours alone. Even if others share the same symptoms it is in no way the same. Often our self image and drive for accomplishment is on a comparative basis. We feel good about ourselves because we know we are not in bad shape. To identify bad shape we have to hold in consciousness the attributes of 'bad shape'. Eventually it comes down to particular characteristics. You are incapable of defining these characteristics without people, the same way you cannot define how I walk without including the ground and scenery in which I walk on. You may not bring up the ground or earth but it is deeply involved with your description. We indirectly look down on those ' bad shape' or 'worse off' characteristics and find ourselves through comparing. We are programming ourselves to find happiness by looking down on others. This is called shameful joy. But more so it is a form of leaning, of dependency on others to feel validated. Comparing is weakness, it is imbalance and from the mind it eventually manifests in the body. Since the mind is in every cell of the body, the body follows the brain waves and chemistry of the motherboard, of the brain. Don't compare, stand firmly on the ground and get a sense of self without needing to do anything.
Your mind makes it real: Universal laws of vibration and resonance 'attraction' give you more of what you focus on. The universe or life does not deal in good and bad as you do. Those are your views, the outcroppings of your experiences that help define limits and boundaries based on your sensory perception. If you focus on the suffering in your life, even if you physically feel it, then you will encounter more of it. If you focus and magnify the process of healing and change then you will experience the same. This is not magick, this is actually biochemical. Focusing on change instigates change in your body. Your brain chemistry changes and you produce more endorphins, fibroblasts, growth hormones and peptides that give your body the requirements for longevity. Give the body a task and it will adapt to it, within reason of course.
The power of visualization: Science and psychology have shown the relationship between our imagination or "self image" and our happiness. We now know that we can release powerful chemicals in the body and even aid the body in healing simply through visualization. If you are to technically define reality as it is perceived and filtered in the brain, you might be surprised that there is no difference between your imagination and what you believe to be the physical world. To use creative visualization you have to change how you feel and perceive your thoughts. Learn the difference between half conscious fantasies and a cultivated imagination. One technique I learned years ago which helps with this is called journeying. We take time to sit with our eyes closed and be in control of where our imagination goes. You can discover places within yourself that bring about feelings, sensation or even insight. These "worlds" as they are called can become places of power where phenomenon happens. The mind can let go, and we can connect with our true self; the inner guide that is the source of our natural knowing and understanding. Look at your self in the mirror and tell your saliva glands to fill your mouth with saliva. How did that go? Now, close your eyes and focus very hard on the saltiest food you can think of. If your concentration is strong you should have produced saliva. To some, the imagination is like day dreaming and while day dreaming does have its place, it does not have the power & thrust of vivid mental pictures that have been written, produced and directed by your mind with you as the star. Imagination is the ability to create an idea or mental picture in your mind. In creative visualization, you use your imagination to create a clear image of a goal. Science has discovered that the human brain does not know the difference between what it sees in its environment and what it remembers. The same activity is happening in the brain, at all times a matter of fact. This is how the eyes filter the the images we see before us and shape them into recognizable patterns- a result of our associative memory. Take a moment to think about a time in your life where the thought of a future event excited and enlivened you. Think about how you felt, how you went through that day and felt more aware, more alive and happy. What if that desire was unfulfilled? Where do the feelings go? Nothing gave you those feelings, they were already inside of you. Though it seems to the contrary, we are not dependent on outer circumstances to generate feelings. The conscious mind believes people and situations make us feel, but this is not true. Your outer circumstances are complimentary to your inner circumstances.
Principles and laws: *The physical universe is energy: The physical world we live in is composed of sub-atomic levels, seemingly solid matter is seen smaller and smaller particles within particles, which eventually turn out to be just pure energy.
*Energy is magnetic: An immutable law of energy states that energy of a certain quality or vibration tends to attract energy of a similar quality & vibration. Thought and feeling have their own magnetic energy which attracts energy of a similar nature.
*Form follows idea:To create, thought comes first. Philosophically speaking, if we are to believe that God or a divine force created all of life, this God had to think of us first. Thought is the ground floor of being and the connecting force in consciousness. Understand that thoughts held long in consciousness pass into the subconscious where you will begin to open to and manifest situations in your life that resonate with your held thoughts.
*The law of radiation & attraction: This is the principle that whatever you put into the universe will be reflected back to you. As you sow so shall you reap. What this means from a practical standpoint is that we always attract into our lives whatever we think. Whether we fear something, hate something or love something we will experience what the mind holds in focus the most. Are you paying attention to what you life gives you daily?
*The law of subjective attention: The brain is a dual instrument & in its functioning is divided into objective and subjective or subconscious phases. The objective attunes with the external world, while the subjective is the seat of all manifestations. The more you plant seeds in your subconscious, the more these seeds with turn from thoughts to physical situations in your life.
When we realize we are in the driver seat and responsible for our own emotions, we can begin being creative and learn to discipline our minds to create outcomes in our lives. The association you might have to the word "create" might be a little out of date, keep in mind to create through visualization one must actually go with the flow, surrender and work with governing universal laws. There are principles to creative responsibility.
