When we’re living in the mind, we’re always in the past or future. For example, we’re thinking about what happened and how I could have done it differently. Or about how they did that to us. Or we’re catastrophizing what may happen, like a typical “news” show. Or imagining a better future while rejecting what is here now.
The challenge is that trauma predicts trauma. What is unresolved expects more of itself and expands with attention. This happens when it’s regurgitating, not resolving. It’s taking you on a loop. The same themes coming round over and over. Much of our mental babble is just that.
The key here is not to judge yourself but just, with curiosity, notice where you’re dwelling. As we become more conscious and heal some, we “interrupt prediction,” as they term it in psychology. We interrupt the loop.
There is a common theme in spiritual circles to live in the present. That can actually be another loop, trying to control our experience. Or we discover some calm within and abandon the body and emotions.
Yet true spirituality is lived in our human life, not divorced from it. If we go deeper, we can discover that under all the mental looping and emotional resistance is the body.
The body only lives in the present. It can react to the looping with a stress response, as if its happening now. If we break the loop, our natural calm presence is right here.
That’s why they call it “embodied.”
Davidya
Hi, Davidya. Can you clarify these two references to the present moment? One sounds like a bypass and the other like a solution.
“There is a common theme in spiritual circles to live in the present. That can actually be another loop, trying to control our experience. Or we discover some calm within and abandon the body and emotions.”
and
“The body only lives in the present. It can react to the looping with a stress response, as if its happening now. If we break the loop, our natural calm presence is right here.”
Thanks!
Exactly, Dharm.
Many spiritual practices can be co-opted. The intention shifts to escaping/ bypassing. Now, this isn’t about making ourselves wrong. It’s natural to have more challenging periods where we lean a little more on escape. More important is to recognize the trend and address the issues so the need falls away.
The body is something many of us try to escape because of the burden of unresolved experiences. The shadow of our histories. This is already going on before we start spiritual practices. People try to use the mind to be in the present. But that’s just the mind trying to control the experience. However, if we heal our history, the body becomes a safe space to be in again, and we naturally shift into the present. And we can embody our spiritual development more fully in the life.
As a further note, awareness itself is also present. We can culture presence from that side of the process too. But unless that can be brought down into the body, it’s not fully embodied.
Mind sits in the middle between the 2 ends. It’s what takes us into the past and future. That’s a good tool but not the best place to live.
Since you mentioned it again the body only lives in the present, I have a hard time understanding it. I will use myself as an example. As a child I was physically abused, although I am healed, meaning I don’t carry the hurt or pain and have forgiven myself and perpetrator, how come my body still feels tense that any moment now someone will hit me, but I am aware this is not so. So isn’t my body living in the past? How is my body living in the present, then? Thank you for your answer in advance
Hi Lynette
We can do a lot of healing and still have more to come. Abuse can be deeply traumatic as it can come from our caregivers, the ones we depend on. We’re put in a situation where we depend on our abusers. Where is the safety? Who can I learn regulation from?
In what you describe, there is still reactivity, plus a deep habit pattern to respond this way. That is natural, given your history. But it’s important to understand that’s the patterns, not the body itself. We could say it’s the trauma thats reacting. The body is responding to that, yes, but is not the source.
We can certainly have released a lot of ideas and emotions about it already. This can be deeply healing. But when we’ve lived in an unsafe place for years, there can be other layers still in there. That’s been my experience. I adapted to my childhood by moving into my head, out of the body and emotions.
If we’re thinking about the experience, we’re in the mind. The body is sensations and is pre-cognitive. The body doesn’t think about itself. For most people, the body doesn’t feel safe. For people who have experienced abuse, this is even more so. You’ve probably not been in the body since you were a child. That’s not uncommon.