Loving the body you have
Many of us, too many of us, have developed a hateful relationship with our bodies (if any relationship at all). Yesterday I picked up a book that resonated with my own relationship with my body: 200 Ways to Love the Body You Have. Just a few excerpts from the introduction:
Whether people acrimoniously disown their bodies or narcissistically sculpt and worship them, the body is treated as if it were an object separate from the person who inhabits it. In either case, there is an intense involvement with the body. But neither is an example of embodiment.
To be embodied is to live in a state in which Self inhabits a body-mind, in which you are in touch with--not just intellectually aware of--the dance of interplay between these two aspects of your being. To be embodied is to experience your body as the center, rather than the focus, of your existence--as the frame of reference for being in the world. To be embodied is to feel alive, to perceive bodily states as they change from pleasure to pain, from energy to fatigue, from vitality and excitement to calm and tranquility. In other words, it is to have access to and to value a body of knowledge that reveals itself only in fully embodied living.
The book goes on to describe various exercises/activities in becoming more body aware and growing in that relationship with our bodies. Both men and women suffer with their bodies...some because it's not perfect enough, others because they want to deny it even exists.
I'm intrigued by this book and thought that I would start on some of the exercises. I'll post the exercises here and invite you, my friends, to join me in them as we go along.
I'll be doing the exercises (in random order), posting about my experiences with them and then linking back to those posts here. So, if you miss something, you'll be able to keep track here and do them on your own as well.
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Whether people acrimoniously disown their bodies or narcissistically sculpt and worship them, the body is treated as if it were an object separate from the person who inhabits it. In either case, there is an intense involvement with the body. But neither is an example of embodiment.
To be embodied is to live in a state in which Self inhabits a body-mind, in which you are in touch with--not just intellectually aware of--the dance of interplay between these two aspects of your being. To be embodied is to experience your body as the center, rather than the focus, of your existence--as the frame of reference for being in the world. To be embodied is to feel alive, to perceive bodily states as they change from pleasure to pain, from energy to fatigue, from vitality and excitement to calm and tranquility. In other words, it is to have access to and to value a body of knowledge that reveals itself only in fully embodied living.
The book goes on to describe various exercises/activities in becoming more body aware and growing in that relationship with our bodies. Both men and women suffer with their bodies...some because it's not perfect enough, others because they want to deny it even exists.
I'm intrigued by this book and thought that I would start on some of the exercises. I'll post the exercises here and invite you, my friends, to join me in them as we go along.
I'll be doing the exercises (in random order), posting about my experiences with them and then linking back to those posts here. So, if you miss something, you'll be able to keep track here and do them on your own as well.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200