Teacher: … Now I like you to seat down on the floor, legs straight, and go fully forward to touch your toe, … and be there with the breath; Just let the body hang down with the breath, and put your attention on first the breath, then the diaphragm and then in the belly as much as you can but don’t go past the place where you feel the first inhibition. Don’t try to go past that. […] Now, sustained in this place and letting the body hang there start another intension to be aware of the pulling of the inter-vertebral spaces between the vertebrae and the movement there; Very infinitesimal movements that are happening there. You’re not pushing anything. Like in yoga, when we come to the place of the maximum stretch and then you just hang there. We explore. Then, we will introduce the slightest bit of push to stretch but we ease it up immediately. You may alternate between the breath awareness and the awareness of the spinal column. The breath must come in to that place where you feel the beginning of your being in your inhaling … and the exhale is a release. So, this is what we call a dialogue with the body. … Yeah, well this is all. You just do this a couple of times a day. Maybe once or twice at work or first thing in the morning and last thing at night. Use it as the starting point to begin this dialogue between your various realms.
* * *
Today I felt stiff stretching towards the toes and witnessed critical thoughts regarding my lack of exercise since cold weather came. I managed to focus really well on my breathing and not so well on my spine. I became aware of a sense of relaxation that came with the breath… Well, that’s all I got – which isn’t so satisfying. I will dismiss this last thought.
* * *
I started to feel relaxation in my head consistently. I can’t seem to feel my spine. It’s like it’s not there … like it doesn’t even exist. When I focus on it feels like a back door is opening in my body. The abdomen area felt hard again, as if I had a little ball in my stomach. So, can you see the spine opening? No. Not yet.
Tyson interrupted my exercise. He wanted to know what was I doing hanging my head down like that. I told him I was talking to my body. He laughed.
* * *
My breathing is getting deeper for certain. I noticed that my once strongly felt fear of hyperventilation is all gone now. When did this happen and how?
Today I followed my breath really well. I felt the air going from my nostrils past the thoracic cavity, past my diaphragm, bubbling up into the superior abdominal area and finally entering deep into the inferior pelvic. This question fluttered by: What controls the suction of the air into the body? It seems all so easy, but what is that that sucks the air in?
The air moving inside my body seemed to have an oval trajectory; On inhale, I sense it filling the front area of my body and then going down into the pelvis, while on exhale, the air circles from the pelvis up towards my back before exiting through my nose.
I couldn’t tell if I was feeling my spine or I was only imagining that I was.
There seems to be an increase in my awareness of its minute expansion when I inhale; And growing awareness of its connection to the mind and my state. I find it amazing how the breath, the spine and the mind are so inter-connected!
* * *
My breathing exercise felt very calming tonight. The air appeared to go easily into my body on inhale and then return into my head on exhale, circle around the skull and exit through the center of my forehead. With that, came a feeling of deep pleasure inside my head, and surrounding my mind. Like soaking in rose petals … very attractive head sensation. It felt so good I managed to ignore the kids that were poking fun at me all throughout the exercise.
My back felt a little stiff but couldn’t tell if the spine did as well. I thought the stiffness was because of my recently increased physical exercise. I felt a vibration again on my shoulder blades.
* * *
I attempted to do the breathing exercise in bed (Doh!) instead of the floor but immediately realized how different that felt in the body. I moved to the floor.
I couldn’t focus very well at the beginning and I realized that my body was carrying some sort of internal agitation. I assigned that cause to a mild cold that was interfering with my breathing. Soon as I clarified that to myself, I managed to relax the “agitation” through the conscious breathing. I observed how this relaxation task I gave myself was easier once I focused on the sensations of the air immediately entering the nostrils. My breathing went deep but did not feel completely satisfying. My body wanted me to breathe faster than usual. Something was different … maybe the cold, maybe not enough sleep, maybe the moon influence? The spine felt stiff. I wondered if it was because of the yoga class? I don’t know what is happening with the spine… It’s like it isn’t there except as a hologram.
* * *
Today, I consciously shifted my focus into my spine, realizing I still don’t feel it much. Then, suddenly a thought came to change the name of the exercise from “breathing exercise” into “spine exercise”. I felt an instant difference as if I accessed a different brain processor! I started feeling the spine. Ha? It felt very, very light and gelatinous, as if made of gel and weep cream. OK, very interesting. And the breath was still there, only with subdued awareness. The feeling then became that I was exhaling through my spine right into my mind sending the air out through the crown area (not the forehead anymore).
After the spine exercise, I went into the sunshine spot in front of the window and proceeded with drinking water while analyzing the complex movements my body was performing in order to accomplish that drinking; The awesome unconscious coordination between breathing the air and swallowing the water. My spine holding me vertical and balanced, my skin embracing the sunlight. I thought “Hey, what an amazing difference from switching one word!”. I made a note of it and postponed the deeper analysis of this phenomena for another time.
* * *
An idea popped into my mind and today I explored a variation to the exercise. I did the exercise while attempting listening outside. The challenge I gave myself was that I listen well while at the same time, I pay attention to the breathing, the diaphragm and the spine. It worked well, I think! The breathing awareness felt slightly less focused and the overall feeling was of greater beingness. I was also keeping track of the increasing missing sensation and its expansion inside my body. I felt wonder: “How does that work scientifically? The missing sensation? How does it work at cellular level?”
[…]
Witnessing
Teacher: See, by continually identifying with, … “this is part of me” you create more pain and suffering; One of the main tools of The Fourth Way is de-identifying: ‘They are only thoughts, they are only feelings they are not me”, do not impute all these thoughts and feelings to be you. Those are all errors for which we pay quite dearly through all the generations that were gone before us and will come after us.
Student: So, dissociate from this?
Teacher: Yes. “This is not me!” is a very powerful affirmation. “These are only thoughts or habits that exist in some neurons firing off and creating all this, and I have nothing to do with that, it’s all just old stuff that’s no longer good and I have no identity with it” … and it’s like you’re taking out your sword and off with its head – if this vision helps than use it or create something that works for you that has the same power of absoluteness. See, these are the steps in the Fourth Way lineage; We can only de-identify when we self remember. And the self remembering is that I am a sovereign being with choice. I’m not any of these ephemeral events that happen in consciousness. They are just like the weather out there. And this gets modified later when you start developing self disciplines that serve the growth and expression of the being of the true self … which is The Work.
Student: And that’s where witnessing is so pivotal.
Teacher: Absolutely. Exactly. Witnessing is another word for awareness and awareness is a quality of being. And in those moments we are the being that is witnessing that.
Student: Right now I think that there is something that don’t care enough about me.
Teacher: Yeah, you see, those are the thoughts that are malignant.
* * *
(Similar to the Conscious Breathing here I will enter descriptions of instances of my work on growing the witness … A possible way to invite insight into this tool may be the following example:)
I see this woman entering the room. She ignores my loud crying and snot, and invites me to join their trip to a mystery place … to pick morsels. “What are morsels?” Never mind, I decide to go. I watch us walk to the car, I watch us step inside, move away the stuff from the seats. I watch myself looking through the window at the frozen rain pelting the trees. I listen to my breath and my in-and-out-loud-cry, the whole way. My breath tends to be shallow. I tell my mind to tell my breath to get deeper and relax into being.
Later, we stop. In the middle of the green frozen forest, we stop. We step out of the car and we each pick a direction to look for morsels. I don’t look for morsels, I can’t see. My vision is covered with tears. And the light is not good.
I feel deep grief and anger … “This is not me” – comes into the mind like a light. I start seeing how my thoughts are spiraling “What have I lost? Now, truly, which part of me have I lost? What hole is this? Which I?” … “This is not me” – I remind myself again and take a deep breath. I become aware in of the presence of a desire to indulge in the feeling of hurt.” Some questions come for a visit, tail wagging friendly at me. The hurt mechanism indulges further: “I don’t want to think. I just want to feel and cry until is nothing left of feeling and crying. I love you – I hate you. I loveyouIhateyou. I loveyooooouuIhateyouuuuuu.”
So, I allow the crying and enfold that wounded child. Over and over again as the energy hits my chest, I allow myself to cry loud. Thought: “… like a broken mirror in the middle of all those happy pictures.”
At times I remember “This is not me” … I am not this. I am the one who’s walking by, smiling by, taking in the forest and the snowy rain. And just dancing around like a whirling dervish inside the dazzling green light.
I smile and wave “Hi” to the crying one… She continues to cry. She dramatizes everything. She says “… You see, it’s hard to tell you what I lost today … I think, I lost my ethereal babies to the ephemeral ones and perhaps my whole Eternity for just the Moment. Oh, I lost … I lost everything.”
I start feeling the bones inside my frozen feet, inside my frozen socks, inside my frozen shoes. Hurting. “OUCH! Go back to the car” … There. The self-caring now feels real.
And so I return to the comfort and care of warmth. Three of us in the car and no morsels. We go back to The Mill. The body relaxes. I ask for help from the woman bside me. She speaks things that make sense to both my mind and my heart and I manage to listen. I feel gratitude arising. I start seeing the people passing by, their smiles, the beauty of life on this snow-rainy day. I feel my heart beating open and big and beautiful like butterfly wings.
Laura Thompson
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