Most of us know we are whole and complete beings, with our various incredible ingenious and highly complicated body functions, from the way we can think, down to the way we move, digest, reproduce as humans. And although we are whole and complete, most of us have lost the ability to really feel wholesome. This is due partly due to western medicine in the way that we see the body as bits and bobs that have been put together and partly because it is difficult to feel whole in a society which at large appears broken. We only have to look at nature to see her anger. But we can also refer it back to ourselves and the way we've been taught to look at our bodies. Often we feel and judge ourselves, through the mechanical mind which regurgitates stuff that we've heard our parents, relatives and or our friends say. We can be so critical of ourselves, we feel fat, we feel stiff, we feel unworthy of love, we feel hurt, whatever the thing is that we are going through, we feel incomplete. We lack love of self. We could even go as far as to say that we lack self. We have removed ourselves from our original tribal life, life amongst elders the wise ones. We have stopped our forms of ritual and prayer, contemplation barely exist in a life where we are continuously rushing against the clock, where we barely have time for a face to face conversation, where phones are the norm and they are expected to be on all the time. I feel like mine is on way too much, it drives me crazy, but as a self employed person you do want to keep that line of communication open for most of the time. But why? What use is it really? So what if we miss an email.
I also think the moment something goes wrong like for example when we injure ourselves, we only think of this one broken piece inside our body. Whether it is an elbow, a knee or issues with your back, something has been snagged, your knee that hurts or whatever the injury we somehow fail to see the whole picture. Mostly because we are so drawn into our pain and where that pain is located. What we don't realise is that it is often much deeper than just physical. Usually there is some kind of under lying emotional story that lies buried beneath.
In actual fact it is exactly this whole body feeling that will help us overcome our injury/ trauma. I find that more often than not that through facing our injuries with open eyes, we can begin to mend the bonds which were broken within.
Listen and go inwards with your mind eyes soft, without the constant critic on full blast. One cell will inform the other and hopefully at some point send the informers down from the brain to put in some relaxants so that the body can overcome that fight flight situation and hopefully begin to repair itself.
My point is that we have our whole body and as much as we like to break it down into bits and analyse it till we fall over, it is still a whole body and with that body we are able to create a wholesome feeling, from the inside out.
Sitting with yourself, by yourself in stillness something else is allowed to awaken. That feeling we often have after the asanas in a yoga class. When you are done moving and all your body longs for is to lie and be still. That feeling that you get when you are in nature. Nature is within you; with all its turbulence's, it's ups and down, with the days when the sun shines and you feel completely happy, as well as with the days that are grey, dull and unsatisfying to the point they are depressing. All of them allowed to be, within the context of your whole body feeling. For me that is enlightenment.
Being able to see the world exactly as it is.
And I'm not saying that you have to surrender to it all, but you have to feel it and from that honest place and make an executive decision whether you should respond or whether you should let it be blown by the wind until it is gone. Mother nature can be angry and so can we. But it is how we respond and to what we respond. Is it really necessary to fight my corner right now? Or can I do it from a place within me that can see both sides. Creating that moment of stillness before deciding how we respond...
"Enlightenment is when a wave realises it is the ocean" ~ Thich Naht Hanh
My idea of enlightenment may vary from your idea of enlightenment, but I hope that the words above at least help you be the wholesome person you truly are; realising that you are a little walking universe of miracles, having the privilege to tread your toes on our beautiful planet earth.
With love,
Samira x
