Something I've slowly begun to realize is that I have not been very present in my body for almost my whole life. There are a couple of reasons: 1. Religion taught me to disdain and even mistreat the body... to dismiss it and neglect it. 2. I passionately searched for meaning from an early age and assumed the best way to do that was intellectually. So... rather than living in my body, I lived in my head. In 2009, after I had a profound kind of epiphany moment when I "saw" everything unified, I've been trying to let this realization, this insight, to trickle down into my body at a cellular level. It's taken a long time. It's been 13 years since then. But I'm beginning to see what needs to be done. So, I reject religions disdain of the flesh... including matter and nature. I also get out of my head. I let my thoughts float past on the surface while I maintain a peaceful posture within. Practically, this means just sleeping, eating, sleeping, loving, walking in the woods, cold showers, breathing, working out... just living right now in this place and in this moment. Now, this realization is fairly recent, really. But I'm sure I'm going to start seeing results. To just be here. Now. Present. Live and in the flesh! |