The Seasons of the Body

The blahs this week. Darker skies at night and I am tired in my bones, even with enough sleep. My body is tired and restless at the same time, in anticipation of some shift of the seasons.

I resist its knowing: the way it would feel to crawl into bed early with a book, to feel my tiredness held and soothed. Instead, I push with the activity of a summer that is leaving; it will be replaced by decaying autumn. Eventually I succumb.

Our bodies know the seasons and live them; I feel mine slowing down, looking around, wanting more contemplation, stillness and rest. My body is a part of the natural world, knows its way through the rhythms and ebbs of energy, of light and dark.

How does the season of the fall live in our bodies, take us as physical selves into the point of passage from one stage to the next? Fall is harvest too: the reaping of lessons, the gathering of what we've sown. Our arms can be open to receive.

My body is pliant, soft and open and tired, restful, vulnerable.

What does your body right now teach you about the season of fall? What wisdom of the seasons does it bring to you to contemplate or to live, slowing down for long enough to let it in?

The Spirituality of the Body

How do you know when you are in the presence of something greater than yourself--something holy, divine, inspiring? Religious philosophers have called it the 'numinous,' the 'mystery.' Its presence can feel like a moment of clarity or calm or like a flush of heat, a quickening of the pulse. Mystics have been deeply stilled by it or pulled into spasms of energy or chanting. Whatever it is, it is a powerful place when we feel it.

But this is my point exactly: we feel it. As physical beings, even the holy moves through us in grounded and physical ways that we experience in our bodies. A feeling of bliss can still be catalogued as a change in our breath, a sense of lightness, an expansion in the chest.

So often we have separated the spiritual from the physical, believing they exist in two separate realms. But actually, they are necessarily intertwined, just as they are in us as human beings. When a spiritual or mystical experience of the divine comes to us, it also must move through the nuances and languages of the body.

I think the two worlds are becoming more connected--spirituality and the body--in terms of how we conceive of and articulate what it means to live a spiritual life. Today, practices like mindfulness and yoga that seek to understand and listen to the wisdom of the body are gaining in popularity. Even centering prayer, out of the Catholic tradition, borrows much of its technique from meditation practices involving the breath and the following of sensation. It may be that our body, separated for so long from the world of spirituality, is in fact our greatest guide into it.

Often I will ask clients to trace their feelings or discomfort inward toward the body, particularly when an issue is coming up strongly or feeling unresolved for them. As we move into those depths of sensation--a tightness here or a feeling of energy there--feelings and awarenesses get accessed. 'What do you feel when you stay with that constriction in your chest?' I might ask. And out of that might come a fear or anxiety the client had been unaware of in their conscious life, the knowing of which releases her to look at it and heal it so it no longer stands in her way.

If we could learn to look at the pains, sensations and constrictions in our body as spiritual teachers, we might hold our relationship to our body in a totally different light. Instead of trying to escape unwanted body sensations or issues or tame them in order to 'get to' our spiritual work, we might instead see our bodies as the very place where that deep spiritual work can happen. What would change in your relationship with your body if you trusted that listening to its language might bring some of your truest learning and surrender?

Too often we see the issues with our bodies--whether its weight, pain or injury--as inconveniences to be subdued and erased. But this other way of thinking about the body asks us to assume they have a lesson for us, something kind and knowing that's trying to be said. We might ask: what spiritual lesson does this issue with my body force me to face? What might I have to learn about myself if I chose to listen and surrender rather than resisting it?

Just this day, try on this way of thinking and ask if there's anything going on with your body that calls you into a spiritual lesson or practice. Chronic pain, for example, can be one of the greatest teachers of how to live in the present moment; there may be no other way through it. Overweight may move us to making choices around self-care or even to sitting with the pain caused by our attachment to the thoughts and opinions of others. What is your lesson?

Once you sense it, see how it would feel in your body if that issue were cleared away and get a sense of walking in your body in that new feeling. Thank it for giving you the message about what needed to be changed within and ask it if it might join you in releasing the lesson and moving into a new future. Our bodies are willing partners in our transformation; its as if they too are waiting for us to discover it in order to open them more fully to life.

Finding Peace Through the Body

How does it feel in your body when you are open, surrendered, relaxed? How do you know you're in that state? What's your breathing like? Your posture? The feeling around your head, neck, shoulders? Your vision?

The reason why I ask is I'm starting to think more and more about the choice we have over how we walk in the world day-to-day. Do we want to be stressed out, tight and reactive; or would we prefer kindness, openness and breath? We mostly don't think we have a choice. When we're reactive, we believe our thoughts are real, and they--consequently--create our physical state. We're angry at someone and our body becomes congested by shallow breathing, tightness and a low-level of pain. Or we're stressed about something at work and our thinking sends messages to our body that there's never enough time, we'll never get it done. Our bodies take in the energy of the thoughts and go into 'fight or flight' mode, ramping up for battle.

But the truth is, we can flip this scenario by focusing on the body first. Anytime we want, we can check in to see how it feels to be in our bodies. Right now: do I feel relaxed, open and content? If the answer is no, we can ask: what would it take for me to change that state in my body to the one I'd rather be in? Leave the mind out of it, ask it to step inside, and make a choice on the body level for a kinder state of being. Begin to create the reality you want through breath, posture, perhaps a stretch.

If it's hard to get there right away, use a memory of when you feel relaxed and open. Maybe it's an image of you lying in the sun, getting a massage, taking a nap with a pet. If you catalog the series of sensations connected to that feeling of relaxation, you can begin to recreate them by going there with your mind and body the next time you're stressed. What's it like when your body feels relieved, relaxed, unbound? Again: what is your breath like, the feeling in your chest, a sense of lightness, an openness?

Now come back to the present moment, take a deep breath and build that state again through your body. Feel the breath the way it feels there, then the expansion through the chest. Take a few breaths. Now bring in other senses: the melting feeling of being in the sun or the surrendered softness of being touched. Watch what happens as your body goes into this remembered state. After a few breaths here, notice if the situation you'd created as stressful in your mind has the same impact.

Our bodies remember, and they tell us--by being keepers of sensation--when we're stressed or out of alignment with how we want to feel. But they can also be the doorways for how we get back. To allow them to be that, we just need to be willing to disengage from believing in the story about what's stressing us out and create and experience peace and openness through our bodies now instead. It just takes practice.

If it helps, find a word that you can say that brings you back to that relaxed and peaceful state and series of sensations you imagined earlier. It might be 'peace' or 'contentment' or 'love.' Say it to yourself when you visualize that moment of relaxation, and then practice saying it throughout the day and repeatedly calling up the state you associate with the word. What's your breathing like? Your level of openness? The sense of relief in your body? See if you can feel that state getting more easily accessible as you practice saying the word.

The power of this remembering is to see that we have more of a choice over the state we're living in than we think, all the time. Through the simple physical cues of the body we can practice and recreate what we most want to be feeling in our lives, or notice when we're in some other state and change it.

I encourage you to stay open to the possibility that you have more of a choice over the state you're living in than you think. Practice some of these awarenesses with your body. Then watch your life change on the outside to meet the kinder, more peaceful state of being you've learned to create from the inside out. Thank-you body!

Getting Rid of the Skeletons in the Closet: Other People's Voices About Your Body

Do you remember what kinds of things other people said about your body when you were younger? Ways they treated you that made you feel bad about your body? One step of the process I do with clients to reconnect them with their bodies is to do an inventory of the beliefs they took on about their body over the years. Like a couple reviewing the history of their relationship, we look at how you got to a place of negatively relating to your body. What happened in the past that brought you here?

One of the ways we take on beliefs about our bodies is through actual physical experiences: illnesses or injuries that make us feel like we're not sure we can trust our physical selves. But another way we can take on beliefs is through the way our body is treated or talked about by others. It's important to also take a look at the impact of those forces, because we may want to undo the beliefs we once took on--especially now, as we want a better relationship with our bodies moving into the future.

Looking back on the messages we got about our bodies, it's not hard to see where we may have abandoned a loving relationship with our bodies for someone else's criticism or judgment. One client I worked with was constantly 'scanned' by her mother and analyzed for how much she weighed. It was easy for her to lose a deeper connection with her body because it was always being examined from the outside, and her worth was associated with it. The belief she took on was something like, "My body is only worth something to me if it pleases my mother."

Another client lived through constant sexual harrassment by a stepfather who made lewd comments about her appearance and her attractiveness to boys--something she grew to be both desirous and afraid of. Her stepfather's voice made her feel that her body was something she couldn't control, that brought her unwanted attention. The belief she took on was something like, "I can't trust or control my body and the attention it brings; it's forcing me to experience things I don't want."

I urge many of my clients--and you too--to look closely at the actual beliefs you may have taken on about your body as a result of the observations and actions of others. Then ask yourself if you still want those beliefs. Sometimes we need to literally review our history in order to mine out the moments and patterns that created what are now beliefs we don't question. But we can begin to question them, to apologize for taking them on, and even to undo them.

One powerful exercise can be to write a letter now, from the desire to have a better relationship with your body, to anyone who treated or spoke about your body in a way that demeaned it, belittled it, or caused you to take on a negative belief about it. In that letter, you can say that you no longer accept (if you ever did) their behavior or their truth about your body and that you are now forging your own way with a body relationship that includes trust, respect and compassion.

Tell this person or group of people that you are learning to love your body no matter what, and that they no longer get to be right about how to treat or think about your own body. Sign the letter and date it, and make a note to yourself that from this moment on you're no longer living with other people's baggage about the way you relate to your body.

It's amazing how powerful this can be. You begin to realize that ultimately no one has the final word on your body and how it feels to be in it. And you begin to recognize and let go of the beliefs that may have accumulated over the years that take you out of a better relationship with your body. Realizing they never belonged to you and choosing to no longer carry them around makes you and your body both breathe a sigh of relief.

Take the skeletons out of the closet. Tell them you no longer need them.

Then when you're done with that letter, look at those old beliefs you may have taken on from others and see if you might reword them into new and beautiful ones, ones that make you and your body sing with delight and a deeper place of peace and self-love. It's your choice now, and no one else's.

The Body As A Bodyguard to Intimacy

Have you ever wanted to get close to someone and then realized that your body won't let you do it? You get a weird feeling, feel sick or shut down. You like everything you see and hear but your body doesn't go there with you. Something else is calling you away from the person in front of you.

Of course, for the most part it's good to listen to these instincts. When we learn to listen, our bodies can show us truths we might not want to hear with our conscious mind. But what if your body is simply defending itself based on old patterns and beliefs? What if the body is putting up its defenses and you don't need or want it to anymore?

This often happens when we've been through past traumatic events or if something makes it hard for us to get close to people. A client recently admitted that although consciously he says he's thrilled to be in relationship with his current partner, his body's repeated inability to sustain an erection seems to be saying something else. As we move into exploring the body's message for him, we realize that his past history--and a particularly damaging and abusive former relationship--means part of him may feel he needs protection every time he lets his guard down. As he begins to open up emotionally, his body has put up a different kind of road block for him.

From the standpoint of the body relationship, what do we do if our conscious mind and our body don't seem to be on the same page? We get curious. As Joe and I work with his experience, we realize that he needs to let his body know somehow that it's safe for him to be vulnerable and aroused; that he's now capable of taking care of himself emotionally and that he chooses to be present and open in his current relationship, even if that openness was unwarranted in the past.

I suggest that perhaps Joe write a letter to his body, letting it know how he feels and that it's okay to take away the sexual obstacles to intimacy. (Of course I also suggest that Joe get a medical check-up to see if there's anything else going on!) He's mature enough to handle what's happening and he appreciates the body's attempts to keep him safe by avoiding sexual intimacy. I then suggest that Joe let his body know how he'd like to be experiencing sex and create a vision of himself being able to have sex with his partner and enjoy it, fully embracing both the power and vulnerability of that act, giving his body a map of what he'd prefer to be experiencing instead.

The same process is important for any disconnect we go through with our bodies, but I think it's particularly poignant with sexual issues. Our body is the boundary with which we meet the world, and it is possible for it to react to protect us if it doesn't know it's okay not to. Even if we think we're 'over' something and ready to handle the intensity of sexual intimacy, our body may be holding on, not believing us, thinking it needs to take charge.

Ask yourself if this is true for you anywhere in your sexual experience. Are there places where your body holds back that you might let it know that it's okay to trust instead? On the other hand, are there any truths your body is trying to tell you that you ignore, but that keep showing up in sexual side effects or shut down? What would happen if you listened instead and tried to discern what's being said?

I'm always amazed at how little most of us use our body as a resource or move through physical challenges without dialogue. If you are struggling with blocks in your body around sexual intimacy, ask yourself if there's anything your body might need to know from you in order to let down its guard. How could you kindly thank it for doing what it thought it needed to do and let it know it can stop and move toward greater openness and receptivity?

When Your Body Tells You Something You Don't Want To Hear...

This past weekend was Labor Day weekend, the final hurrah of the summer. I returned to my family's home in Maine for lobster, blueberry cobbler and the occasional cocktail. There's also homemade ice-cream and cannisters of nuts, chocolate and cookies. My husband, a former bartender, whips up fresh summer drinks with lime, mint and rum. It's the ultimate opportunity for indulgence. The only problem is, indulgence isn't fun like it used to be.

You know what I mean. Come on, you do. Even if you think you don't. Indulgence feels like a headache the next day. Or a sense of something happening in my stomach that doesn't quite feel right. More important these days, indulgence can feel like I ignored a deep part of myself, and I'm sadly realizing I don't actually find that enjoyable.

This epiphany is showing up the most in my use of alcohol, which I've never particularly overdone, but which often accompanies a good meal or a piece of chocolate. Lately, alcohol just makes me feel sick. And I mean actually dizzy, with a headache and the sense that I just need to lie down.

I want to ignore it. I want to say, 'just forget about it, have fun!' and yet I think my definition of fun is changing. My body must be changing. And now, in the moment, alcohol is no longer appealing--no matter how much my mind wants it to be, or my emotions want it to be a social lubricant at the party my parents bring me and my husband to. I just have to listen, say no, and respect what my body is saying.

But it gets me thinking about the crossroads we're faced with when our body is telling us something we don't want to hear: a negative reaction to a food we love, a sense of tiredness when we want to push to get the best workout for the week, even a gut feeling that a relationship isn't right when we want to convince ourselves someone is perfect for us. It's like any relationship when a partner's truth is inconvenient, not what we wanted to hear, interferes with our agenda, our own perfect plan.

What I have come to realize in most of my other relationships, however, is that when that inconvenient truth is spoken (and I can actually hear it) there is almost always something very important, some gift gleaned, by actually listening and finding middle ground. That kind of humility and openness to my partner's needs aren't just good because they make my partner want to stay. They're also good because my partner's thoughts and feelings--even if I don't think I want to hear them--almost always have something to teach me. They help me to grow.

The same is true of our bodies. And yet, mute partners that they are, unable to threaten us with divorce, they often do get ignored when they tell us something we don't want to hear: when they give us a symptom we wish weren't there, a reaction to something we'd like not to have. Things usually have to reach a fever pitch--legitimate overweight or some kind of health crisis--before we listen.

Lately--as I have come to feel in most of my relationships--I'm wanting to choose the kindness of being in a listening, compassionate relationship more than I want my way. Even though it's annoying and inconvenient, I think I'd rather not have that wine if it's going to give me a headache or eat the homemade ice-cream if it's going to make my digestion feel stuck.

I used to think this was boring; maybe I used to think it was too much like my body controlled me and I wanted my freedom. But these days I think I'm beginning to see that within a loving connection to my body is a kind of freedom and peace that exceeds the wild whims of junk food and alcohol. Not unlike a swinging single finally committing to a relationship that matters, I'm truly seeing that playing a field of choices that might harm my body is not as much 'fun' as moment-to-moment listening, awareness and attunement to my body and my life.

Call me crazy. But I urge you to think about how you respond when your body sends you a message you don't want to hear about something you'd rather keep doing, ignoring the body's voice. Then take yourself through to how you'll actually feel when it's all over. Will you still be glad you made that choice?

Think of it as body maturity, body commitment: finally settling down into this relationship you'll have for the rest of your life. What if you let yourself fall into it, belong to it and partner with it? How much more time would you spend experiencing your body rather than resisting it? What will you do the next time your body tells you something you don't want to hear?

How to End Binge Eating? Stay Connected.

Do you struggle with emotional or binge-eating? Do you find yourself eating because you're lonely, sad, bored? We've spoken in previous blogs about how to begin to tell the difference between those feelings and hunger in your body. But what if you can tell the difference and you still can't stop? Knowing that we're overeating can be humbling and humiliating, and--like other self-destructive patterns--leads to feelings of shame followed by a stalwart promise to never do it again. Over and over, we set ourselves up for failure.

Using the relationship that you have with your body, I propose a different way. It came out of working with a client who had struggled with binge-eating for years. Despite her relatively normal weight, she found that she continued to act out with food and then beat herself up afterwards: 'Why did I do that? I have to stop. I won't do it again...'

Because she had begun to understand that her body was something she was in a relationship with and not just a mute object to be controlled, we started to get curious about what was happening in her relationship to her body every time she binged. The pattern that emerged was similar to what can happen in any of our relationships when tough issues came up, or when we do something we aren't proud of, let someone down. Reflexively, we can move to denial or shut down. We don't want to share, talk about what we did wrong. Or we feel so guilty that even if we do share, we can't forgive ourselves. She was doing this with her body every time she binged.

But this client had a different experience in her own personal relationships. She found that the best solution when she messed up with her partner was to just fess up, be honest and stay connected. She also found that if she could bring a little humor to the honesty, that helped too, "Boy, I did it again didn't I? I'm sorry, I don't even know how that happens sometimes. Thanks for hanging in there with me..." Her partner was often far more sympathetic to this approach and they often got through the situation and came up with a situation that worked for both of them, rather than staying mired in animosity.

We came to realize that there was a similar and important tactic to use with her own body after a binge. Rather than beating herself up, feeling guilty and separating from her body's sensations, we got curious about what would happen if she treated her body much like she did her partner: staying honest, owning what just happened and wondering how they might get through it differently the next time.

She could feel in her body the difference between the guilty rigidity and judgment she usually slipped into after a binge and the possibility of this feeling of connection and humor instead. She was literally redoing her relationship with her body and herself. And guess what happens when we do that? We break the cycle of 'having to be better' the next time and then failing. We choose the love and forgiveness right now, and cop to what's happened. And the healing connection with our own body eventually becomes more powerful than whatever it was we were seeking in the drama of guilt and purgatory we created with the food.

I urge you to try this the next time you emotionally eat, at any point that you notice--whether it's before, during or after. Instead of shutting down, stay connected. Ask your body how it feels about what you're doing, admit that sometimes it's hard for you to stop. But stay honest, loving and real about what's going on. Notice if your body responds differently, with less fear and stiffness. And notice if you break your own cycle of shame.

Once we own our bodies as something we're in relationship with, an entirely different relationship to our behaviors is possible. We might find that we actually want and need to be accountable, and that feeling connected feels better and kinder than perceiving ourselves or our bodies as 'right' or 'wrong.' We begin to choose love over judgment or loathing. And love has a tremendous capacity to heal, even those things we thought we'd be stuck in forever.

Watch yourself grab for those cookies, let yourself pick up that carton of ice-cream. But stay in relationship. Ask your body how it's doing. Admit that this is hard for you. Over time, the realization that you're in this together and that you're doing the best you can will start to work surprising miracles. Your behavior will start to change not because it's good or bad but because love and acceptance are easier and more present, because they feel better. And so will taking care of yourself when the hundreds of options other than food begin to present themselves to you, like weeds growing out of fertile ground.