Integrating Ourselves, Moment by Moment
Experience your being differently with short meditative practices
My personal practice has become my life’s work. I read, learn, do, adapt, integrate and teach others. The initial platform was yoga, and it’s still in the periphery, but the primary focus of my life (and work) is learning (and teaching others) to live an authentic, embodied, spiritual life, moment by moment.
A main practice I find myself frequently engaged in, writing about, and teaching others about is how to stop — or at least slow down.
Slow down enough to sense yourself as the complete person you are, not as the content of your mind.
Integrate the fragmented pieces into a whole.
A constant doer, I’ve learned many tools related to beingness. For most of us, doing comes naturally — it’s embedded in us and in our culture. We must DO to get ahead. But …
If all we ever DO is do, how much enjoyment are we receiving for the effort? How much consciousness are we bringing to our lives? How well do we know ourselves? Is it even possible to fully know ourselves, our true nature, if we never stop?
You can read about, learn and practice meditation, but most of us are not well suited to dive right in. Most of us don’t find success right away. We’re so engaged in doing life that meditation doesn’t work and we give up.
When I began practicing meditation many years ago I literally drove myself crazy. “Am I doing it wrong? Why won’t my mind ever stop?” Followed by, “I’m a failure. I can’t do this.” I was doing all of the things explained to me but it was causing more angst than peace.
I didn’t give up on meditation, but I did discard the traditional methods.
Fast forward twenty years, I read about somatic meditation — a bottom up approach versus the top-down I’d previously learned — and I began to practice regularly. “Everyday embodiment” is a concept I explore each day — short practices that can help you integrate mind, body and soul, focusing more on the felt sensation of the body than getting the mind to stop (an impossible task, except in fleeting moments). Read more about it here.
These days I’m studying Jungian theory, something altogether different, yet in a book I recently read, Living Your Unlived Life, by Robert A. Johnson and Jerry M. Ruhl, Ph.D., they introduce a practice called the Doing/Being Shuffle.
It’s fascinating that seemingly unrelated topics have overlap — a sign we’re on the right path.
Related and reinforced concepts on our path have an opportunity to stick.
Likewise, short practices we can truly incorporate into life sink into our psyche. They become part of who we are.
Try the following TWO MINUTE PRACTICE several times a day to allow it to integrate into your being. If an audio version better suits you, go here.
Doing/Being Shuffle
- Bring awareness to the content of your experience at the moment: the words someone is saying, the thoughts in your head, the apparently solid images all around you. Doing awareness is filled with the stuff of the world. Everything looks normal, solid and real; it has what is called object constancy. Experiencing in this way is like taking snapshots of reality, a series of fixed impressions. Do this for about thirty seconds.
- Now shuffle your awareness to being. Let your mind go loose. You can’t will awareness of being; just gently unravel the knot of sharp attention that keeps you anchored in content and forms. Sense the flow of life in and around you, starting with the changing sensations in your body. Are you relaxed or restless? What small movements are occurring involuntarily?
- Go deeper. Notice the spaces between your thoughts. See if you can anticipate your next thought before it arises, then hang out in that in-between space for a bit. Observe any patterns trying to emerge. Notice your feelings and associations. Don’t judge them; just observe. Odd little ideas and images float up in your mind. Watch them move. The means by which you experience the world as solid and real — your mind — is itself constantly shifting and flowing. It’s like a motion picture rather than snapshots. Just watch it unfold. Do his for about thirty seconds.
- Now shuffle back to doing awareness. The content of doing may include outer or inner perceptions. It may include sights, sounds, and smells from the outside world or thoughts and commentaries that you play in your head. If you become lost in being, get back to doing mode by asking yourself: Where are my keys? What about my wallet/purse? These are cues for the modern person to become very doing focused. The edges of reality quickly become more defined because keys, wallets and purses are so closely associated with our identities. Your ego snaps to attention.
Take a few minutes to journal about your experience. Let it sink into your psyche.
