Freeing Body, Mind Image Through Mindfulness
By Rev. Shar Schwengler
Everything in your life experience is revealing an expression of the self. One of our most intimate expressions is the image of our self-carried out through form. Not just the body, but the IMAGE of the body and self-combined. The form is usually dressed up through false beliefs so that it can appear to be something it is not. Usually it is one that the ‘self’ deems ‘better than’ the original. An ‘improvement’.
We have become a society that abuses its own image. We abuse it and use it like a billboard of false advertising. Why? Because we are filled with dis-satisfaction.
Self-Esteem, Self-Worth and Self-Love are at a deficit when who you are has been indoctrinated with invalidation.
The abuse of the image is the inner aspect of self-crying out to be truly recognized. NOT by society but by the egoistic personality, the wounded child that dress’s up every day in an image that reflects their inner beliefs of self in life. In living out this paradigm we have lost a sense of authenticity which is now a pop culture battle cry. But we do not need to fight our way back into a feeling of authenticity. It can be simpler than that.
Quiet acts of mindfulness with form / image will bring realizations of self that could take years of psycho-therapy to uncover. This is not to say that psycho-therapy will hamper you, just that mindfulness can be a gateway into the truth of self often a lot faster than psychological study alone. It is a form of study of self but it leaves out the story of itself in the process. Taking the focus to what is present with self and not looking for a past but allowing anything from the past that will serve the present in any way to made aware of.
Today I am going to share with you some simple acts of mindfulness that can ease the identity with form from one of low self-esteem or love to one in which acceptance of life as it is brings one closer to the state of peace we all appear to crave yet carry eternally.
As with all mindfulness exercise, in the beginning it is a positive thing to become as relaxed as possible before you begin. So sit comfortably where you will not be disturbed for at least five minutes. Create an atmosphere of relaxation with music and lighting if it helps to calm the senses. Begin focused breathing. Simply noticing the breath as it moves in through the nostrils and body and is expressed back out again. This is a basic intimate process of discovering the body mind connection.
The Simple breathing with focus.
After a few cleansing breaths and mental relaxing look down at your hands. Move the fingers, the wrist. Watch as they curl to grasp and unfold to let go. Constricting and releasing to make living easier.
Think as you observe the movement: How many things they have held, caressed, carried, entwined, and created? How many injuries have they experienced? How often has the skin on the hands repaired itself? How long these hands have served you. How well have you served them? What have they helped you carry? Build? Play? Look deep into the hands of self and see….
If you have more time turn the focus to the arms. Move the arms in quiet observation. Think as you study them in movement: How many things they have held? How many hugs have they given or been open to receive? How have they served this life? How has this life served them?
And if you have a bit more time to contemplate the majestic form and its image of service move to any other part of the body that calls for attention and allow it to reveal the truth of itself to you.
Observe your feet the same way. How many places have they taken you? How often they have stood as your foundation. How long have they served you and how well? How well has life served them through you?
Observe your face. Watch it contort into all sorts of familiar and unfamiliar expressions. How many words has that mouth spoken? How many laughs escaped through it? How much hunger was appeased with it? Those eyes, all they have seen, the tears they have shed. The awe they have witnessed?
This is the face of a 1,000+ stories… you can only experience its reflection. What is watching the mirror image is the originator not the reflection. You are not the feet, the hands the arms nor the stories told by them, yet there is a great intimacy occurring through them with life. When we take a moment to truly notice form and image for the miracles they are the abuse we gave fades into glorious acts of kindness and love through gratitude.
Beyond the stories of life your body will share the truth of its existence if you have the courage to sit with it and allow it to reveal every beautiful inch.
Body image is not about who we think we are it is always about who we believe we are. Over time we become influenced with false belief systems from various sources. So it is a wise practice to sit with the image and form of self and take a more compassionate realistic look at what your moving and expressing self through.
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Rev. Shar Schwengler
Rev. Shar is an innovative and intuitive, energy/ spiritual counselor in private practice for 15 years. Host of the online talk radio show, Lucid Waking- the way of mindful living as well as the Inner-Faith minister and Spiritual Director at The Chapel of Spiritual Light, Corpus Christi, Texas.
