Being ourselves more fully
We are not just our minds. We are mind, body and Spirit.
Most people know themselves predominantly as mind, and experience life from that perspective. Even though we can obviously see that we are body, most of us experience body through our thinking minds. A couple of examples to illustrate this :
Have you ever experienced a sunset with your body? We all know the appropriate language to express our delight at a sunset, but have you really taken in a sunset with your body and in complete silence? And without saying a single word about it later? (No Facebook posts or Instagram pics either! 😄)
If not I would urge you to do so. It is life changing.
Nothing wrong with sharing sunset pics, but that’s more of what the mind calls for. The body calls us to experience the sunset tangibly, even viscerally, in our belly, our bones and our tissue!
Another example- you know how we take great pleasure in crossing off the physical exercise task on our checklists for the day? In our global and mostly mental culture, we are urged to feel good about having done our exercise, as part of completing our plan for the day.
My suggestion is to replace that habit with something more like this : feel what the body feels before, during and after your exercise. Take the time to do this and stay with it consistently for a few days. Don’t settle for the mental compensation of crossing something off a checklist when you can have the deeper fuller satisfaction of a bodily experience of real wellbeing.
We are mind and body, both.
Last but by no means least- we are Spirit too. For now we can think of Spirit as that which animates the mind and body, without which we are dead, and with which we are alive. One way this expresses in experience is just simple gratitude and delight for Life, and for being alive! It doesn’t require us to earn joy through making something of ourselves. It is the getting in touch with our innate fullness, unconditionally available to us all.
There are many ways which help us to get in touch with this aspect of ourselves, like meditation, and other deep spiritual practices.
The point is we are mind, body and Spirit. Each aspect is magnificent, and vital to Life and living. The more consciously we experience all aspects of our being in our living, the more fully we are ourselves. The more fully we are ourselves, the more fully we contribute to each other and to our world. In this way we experience true joy; we be it, and embody it; we share it and spread it!
