The sensations of our bodies are potent tools for meditative transformation.  Let’s remind ourselves of our goal: to steadily gather all the sensations of our bodies into a single, astonishingly powerful sensation.

Let me offer you a challenge today.  It is almost guaranteed that something will occur to piss you off as the day transpires.  (More than likely, your day will be full of small events of annoyance, and maybe one or two larger events.)  Someone will say something or do something that will produce an instant sensation of stress in your stomach, your diaphragm, your neck or shoulders.  That little sensation of dread at having to deal with a small, (or large) injury will occupy your mind.

Find that sensation of stress.  Locate where in your body you feel it strongest.  Find a time and place for a moment of stillness.  (Might be just at your desk while no one’s around to bother you.)  Isolate the sensation of the injury, the tension produced by the stress of it…breathe into that sensation of pain.  Don’t ignore it–in fact, if you need to, remind yourself of the person’s face–stimulate the sensation of the stress.

Let all the inner scripts, dialogues and replays go.  Release them.  Focus only on the sensation, the subtle energetic frequency of stress in your body.  Here’s the most important part of your exercise: USE THE PAIN OR DISCOMFORT AS A FOCUS POINT TO RELEASE ALL THE TENSION IN YOUR BODY.  USE THE SENSATION OF STRESS, CONCENTRATE ON THE SENSATION OF STRESS–AND RELEASE ALL THE TENSION IN YOUR BODY.  Your hands, your neck, throat, thighs, chest, back.  Use the energy of stress to stimulate relaxation.

If you practice this exercise daily, you will begin to realize that all stress is simply energy.  The time will come when stress will no longer cause you pain.  You will experience the sensations of your body–no matter how they are influenced by any particular circumstance–as a single, all encompassing sensation of warm contentedness.  In time, this sensation of tranquility will become the abiding character of your conscious life.

 

PREGNANT PAUSE

 

You want to

know yourself?

Consider this:

breath never

departs but that

it is returning.

You are the honeymoon

of this marriage of

flow and ebb.

Seeking wisdom,

find the erotic

sensation where at

once the breath

comes and goes–

discover that

Sacred Between

and there surrender

heart, mind and will.

Heed this promise,

you who love

truth–

a flower will grow

free from time’s

hunger,

never thirsting yet

ever in bloom–

for this, O cherished One,

is the fertile

Heart of tantra.