"It is not the other, but our relationship to history, to the disabling messages of our dependent past, that is imprisoning.” (James Hollis, PhD)
I am determined to move past the limitations of my history… the stories I tell myself from events and experiences that have happened to me and around me… (all the ‘yesterdays’ of my life).
Recently, I have been working on self-compassion relating to my body. In-keeping with that, I took an opportunity to scan myself from head to foot, listing all the things I love and all the things I ‘do not like’. Next in the process, I was led to follow a compassionate or a self-loving dialogue, to listen to the wounded parts of myself, and to love myself through it. Cool!
Immediately following that exercise, I was reading the section on bravery in James Hollis’ book, Living an Examined Life. The conversation that ensued led to remarking on Hollis’ passion around creating a life path guided by the inner-self (‘the Soul’).
How do we know the ‘inner’ from the ‘outer’? By tuning in to our body sensations, feelings and instincts.
Now, imagine a person who is afflicted with self-loathing for their body. I am going to guess that this sort of attitude might suppress the subtleties of the ‘still small voice’ of their Soul. How can we hear the wisdom of the inner compass when our mind is busy with condemning? How can we feel our body’s messaging system when we are frozen under the weight of self-recrimination?
I know from personal experience that my body tightens under the fear of disapproval, or from a lack of security. Is this tightness saying, “You are going the wrong way”, or is the tension simply a defence maneuver, that is bracing me for the possible disapproval of others?
Here is my proposal:
The first step toward ‘a life well-lived’, a life that feels worth loving, begins with appreciating the miracle of humanity. That includes our physical forms in all their diversity. Without love and self-acceptance in every way, we will stay lost in the noise and distractions (and, boy oh boy, is our culture good at noise and distractions!)
Let’s get quiet for a moment together and step into contemplation… .
Our bodies are incredible! We can observe the nuances of locomotion, digestion, assimilation, elimination… and we can write and re-write theories of what we see… but we don’t really know the full ‘how or what’. Consider the phenomenon of sloughing off our ‘baby suits’ in the gradual, but insistent, process that eventually brings us to adulthood. WOW!
Each body also has a mind filled with personality, driving each step of every day in its own unique way. So many people! So many minds! Each one different. That’s a bloody miracle, I say!
And … in the contemplation of all this, am I going to look at myself and say, “Oh, the Universe screwed up when It birthed me”? Blasphemy!!
So, yes, let’s get quiet and still, away from distractions, and just listen. Put your hand to your heart and feel the rhythm of your beating life force. Feel the surge of air when you breathe… in and out. Be still. Ask your heart… “What is mine to do?” (It knows… but will you listen to the answer?)
Wisdom lies with the one who listens, trusts, and follows. In his book, Dr. Hollis describes bravery as ‘the action we take after we have gleaned some insight’. He writes, “Having potentially come to consciousness, to have embraced insight as to what a dilemma is really about, one then has to find the courage to live it in the real world, with all its punitive powers, and to do so over time in the face of opposition, both external and internal.”
Many do hear their inner voice, but still fall back into line with the conditioning of their past and the pressures of the world around them. I say, listen inside and follow. Brilliance is forward moving. Life is creative… there is possibility… something new, always. Living in routine is not a life. It is stagnation… a kind of dying.
So, here we are together in big self-love 💕. We listen, and learn to follow our hearts. We don’t need to worry about the resistance within or without, because we have each other. I have found you, and you have found me. We are helping one another in creating something magically new.
When we are brave, we are self-assured. Knowing we are not alone on this journey gives me the courage to endure… to ‘keep on keeping on’. How about you?
PLANT the SEED
CLICK HERE FOR AN AUDIO AFFIRMATION: https://youtu.be/CrVQBR-0XQ0