2.3
August 20, 2013

Dropping the Veils, Invoking Ganesha. ~ Kirsten Webb

Our cells are engaged in a constant delirious dance—a pulsing collective absorbing releasing back-and-forth roaring group ecstasy.

Deep inside, DNA unfurls; proteins haul enormous Dionysian lipid molecules; blood cells stream through vessels like salmon in a river. The soft disks of their beings pour through us, bearing life like hordes of angels, converging in the heart. And on and on and on and on.

What does it sound like? What do you hear as a blood cell soaring through magical rhizomatic interwoven interconnected rivers branching through the body, thinking of nothing, unencumbered by logic, flies through a dark sea?

As the body breathes out, you begin to tire, you’ve absorbed so much in your long life, it feels like your darkest time—darker, darker—then you pass into that chamber, the central darkest toroid vortex whose pumping, all around you, is slow as the tide and as steady. You are home, in the heart, replenishing.

You breathe new breath, you are filled again. Out you soar.

Breath. Pulse. The deep drum-beat. Tides. Renewal. Birth and death, of sun, of life, of everything.

We simply need to relax and receive. Breath, to me, is a perfect way to practice. The instrument, the method, the exercise equipment, is built into the body. We’re all born with it and we can turn our attention to it whenever we wish. As we breathe out entirely and our lungs are at their emptiest, they pause, wait, then expand again—all on their own, it seems—to draw in new breath. Effortless. Always re-given.

Focusing on breath allows us to experience the connection between mind and body, between seen and unseen, between the invisible, internal “magic” and the sensible, day-to-day “external” world. The yin and the yang.

From this connection and synergy pour all the answers we need. Breathing demonstrates, experientially, the in-and-out pulse of the heart, the rise and fall of the tide, how sleeping and waking interweave. The secrets of death and life. How to give and how to receive.

We’re always doing it. Our bodies, like our breathing, ebb and flow, advance and recede. Cells perish and regenerate every moment. Dark and light. In and out. The Tao is yin and yang, together and we need them both.

The most delicious thing is to find the body’s unique balance. For a while, I thought being “goddess-like” meant being constantly receptive, sleepy and yin—all important things when the time is right, but too much and I start to feel crazy.

Same with being constantly active. In the middle, though, we each have our own point of peace. And, when we start from there, we can trust our bodies to know when to rest and when to act. Just like they know when to breathe in and when to breathe out. The body knows when to release, when to wait and when to respond. And, for the magic to flow, we gotta let go.

When our muscles relax, the blood, lymph, nerve signals and chi have an easier time getting from one place to another. This brings our bodies into greater harmony, within and without, all parts in communication and working together. The body is a fantastic, incomprehensible, experiential example of living synchronicity and we each have one!

How cool is that?

As we relax more and more, the more just-right people, events, things and ideas enter our experience. We no longer need to go out and “make” things happen, to constantly think about how to adjust life to fit us or vice versa. Instead, our body’s level of effortlessness spills over into the world.

We drop our layers of tension like Salomé’s veils, revealing the true dance: an effortless orchestration conducted by earth and stars, by all beings, by the body, by the˙breath.

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Assistant Ed: Steph Richard/Ed: Bryonie Wise

 

 

 

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