Inner Work

For the week of November 3, 2008

A Place to Stand

To enter the world of presence, we need a place to stand, a body to be in. Our physical body serves so well as our place in the material world of this Earth. But this body does not directly offer us a place in the world of presence. That place is our inner body, our body of sensation. No stability of presence can be had even temporarily without being rooted in the sensitive energy in our body. Without the grounding in the present anchored by the sensitive energy, we blow away with the first distraction or random thought, falling back into the world of automatism and habitual patterns.

The difficulty lies in the fact that unlike our physical body, which is given us at birth, our sensation body is not handed to us ready-made. On the contrary, we must work indefatigably to conceive, feed, and build it. How? By focusing our attention in our body and holding it there. Gradually our attention activates the sensitive energy which gives us a vibrant, alive perception of our body. The sensitive energy is the actual substance of that perception.

So for example, if we put our attention into our hand or foot, and keep it there, our contact with the hand or foot comes alive. We feel this as the presence of an energy in the hand or foot, the energy of sensation, which is the sensitive energy in the body. We call this act sensing: attention to our body to open to and be in contact with our body through the sensitive energy. We do this with the intention of establishing our body of sensation, our inner body.

Through the persistent practice of sensing, we build up the sensitive energy in our body. Once we have developed a facility with sensing parts, like hands, feet, arms, or legs, we broaden into sensing our body as a whole. That practice of whole body perception leads to wholeness of sensation. And whole body sensation gives us a place to stand, a shelter from the winds of automatic, associative thoughts and reactive emotions. More than that, it becomes our home, with all the qualities of home: warmth, comfort, familiarity, and peace. We can strengthen our sensation body significantly through energy breathing, where we breathe in the sensitive energy from the air around us.

Notably, this inner home, our developing inner body gives us a place to pursue the deeper aspects of presence: the stillness of consciousness and the will to be. In fact presence follows in the natural progression of our inner work, once we are rooted in our sensation body. We inwardly stand in whole body sensation. With the strong and immediate intention to be, being the one who is here in this inner body, we open to the peaceful sea of consciousness that surrounds us. And thus, we are.

For this week, renew your efforts to establish your inward place to stand, your inner body.

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