You
get more of what you focus on, and what you focus on is the result of your
habits, of trying to reproduce today the world as it was yesterday. Many of our
habits are unconscious, but then ninety-nine point nine per cent of the brain’s
activity is unconscious. Worse still, it is your unconscious brain which is
deciding which tiny amounts of information to put up into consciousness! Your
consciousness is there for the new learning which may be required in novel
situations, in the face of danger or when an instinctive desire for belonging, for
food or for sex is unfulfilled.
Learning
evolved as a set of physical craft skills, of body awareness based knowledge - and
remains that way despite academics and educationalists thinking they are doing something
else. At school most of what you learnt was about your teachers. Human’s great
advance has been to take learning by imitation to new heights using the brain’s
mirror neurons; observation or demonstration is followed by imitation, then trial
and error practice, then more imitation. But most of our learning remains unconscious,
indeed we learn faster that way, when we let go of our hopes and desires, allow
decisions to make themselves, and just be in the present moment without a conscious
'self'.
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| 8,35 20.7.2016 (photo by Nick Hewling) |
Joseph
Pilates, in the early part of the twentieth century, was perhaps the first
person to attempt to codify a holistic but systematic fitness regime for
physical and mental wellbeing. He by all accounts was a bit of a control freak,
insisting that his rational, contrived procedures were ‘the one way’, but his
approach does make explicit a theme which has occurred through-out the history
of health, and feels both natural and fundamental, the idea of ‘core muscles’
or ‘a centre’. In order to become re-orientated to natural body movement it is
necessary for a while to stop moving in a reactive way towards our physical
surroundings and focus instead on our own bodies, on where muscular movements
will start if freed from external influence. Consider too, that all the muscles
of the body are really doing is lifting against the resistance of gravity.
Watch the breath, consider where involuntary movements begin and end. Then the
idea of ‘core muscles’ (around the abdomen, lower back, hips and buttocks)
becomes obvious, along with the breath that ultimately powers them! Consciously
starting every movement ‘from the hip’ can be a revelation, not just in the
feelings it provokes, but in the new orientation you experience towards the
natural environment and to other people.
Much
of Pilates is there in yoga of course, how could it be otherwise? But in the
modern world people come to yoga for varied and individualistic reasons rather
than as a necessary collective communal activity. Now, it seems there is no
wrong way to do yoga if your intentions are worthy, and what you take away from it psychologically has become an increasingly private
concern. Traditionally
yoga was never a practice for the attainment of physical beauty, rather it
taught that reconnecting with the natural is healthy and what is healthy is
beautiful, there is in all of us a brain and body trying to be fit, impeded
only by the unnatural. The natural body is perfect, we honour it by exploring
the breath and movement which heals and renews. When we move mindfully with the
breath we achieve balance and harmony. Yoga endeavours to open a space where
the truths of our existence can emerge, it should be transformative. Like any set
of skills, practice is everything and the more you put in the more you get out.
To
talk of the natural means one must be tapping into
ancient knowledge; yoga for example has a recorded history in its various forms
of around 3,000 years and perhaps a real history many times longer. Considered
in its recorded context, its particular forms of body movement and the emotions
they provoke - along with the meditative practices developed and taught by the
Buddha that were to grow from it - yoga appears to have been an attempt to cope
with the confines of early agricultural society. Restricted by fixed
territories and concentrated populations, practitioners developed a ‘personal
space’ to try and hang on to, or regain, the physical and psychological freedom
that their hunter-gatherer ancestors had possessed as they moved through a
landscape. A way to express natural instincts, but which over time became more
and more formalised and prescribed by those in authority.
The
power of yoga postures is that they change our emotions minute to minute – any
meaning or understanding always follows our emotional response. Movement is
creative - just as demonstration followed by imitation, then trial and error,
leads to skill. Yoga is perhaps the most easily observable example of the
purposeful manipulation of the natural phenomenon of ‘embodiment’, and of the
psychological concept of ‘embodied cognition’. Everyone must live with change
and uncertainty, making creativity fundamental to our wellbeing. Creating appears
to ‘bring something out of nothing’, but is better described as a recombination
of elements imitated from others to form a new and temporary uniqueness. The
structured movement of yoga follows tried and tested ways of igniting a spark,
leading us to look anew at the taken for granted. But equally, changes to our
body’s coordination, change our actual physical perspective in a given
environment, leading to changes in how we navigate the world. For example, the
many variations of Warrior pose and the movement between them highlight the
symbolism in posture. The warrior does not flinch from conflict, and in the
last resort is willing to turn from flight to fight. (Again, in natural,
instinctive nonverbal behaviour the sequence in response to a perceived threat
is always; freeze, flight, fight.) The warrior is a strong defender and
protector, whether male or female. Our inner warrior survives in us today,
although it only emerges under intense stress. Yoga brings it into
consciousness in a controlled way. Warrior pose shows us how to function from a
position of strength, courage and determination when it is most needed.
Grounded
by the non-dominant foot, the placing of the leading foot forces into
consciousness how the placing of the feet can cultivate or constrain awareness
itself. How we are grounded mediates what any of our senses can sense! Warrior
feels as though it is all about preparedness. It resonates with similarities to
other martial endeavours, from finding the stance for using a slingshot, to
learning to lunge in fencing. Equally, the discipline of achieving level and
forward facing hips and pelvis embodies an approach to life itself. The
movement from a more gravity-defying posture to a lesser one should be
experienced as a mental release as much as a muscular one, whilst a rising
movement is powered by the core. But holding a posture through the breath
requires commitment and endurance, and thoughts and feelings will crash into
consciousness. Simple positive affirmations help to let go of the unwanted and
hold on to the desired.
Whilst
Warrior is a task focused set of postures moving all the way from preparedness
for action to the expression of victory, Cobra opens us up to change and
renewal, to reconnection and engagement with our intentions; mental, physical
and spiritual. The body movements of yoga can unlock our potential for
transforming the emotions that are created in action and reaction.
Self-confidence emerges when we have evidence from our own bodies that change
is possible, and in turn allows the mind to accept the inevitable uncertainty
and brevity of human life. Taking nature as the only possible muse and
inspiration, yoga identifies certain postures which evoke similar feelings in
whoever practices them. Cobra, is the most fundamental embodiment of what is
variously called transformation, renewal, regeneration or rebirth. The shedding
of a skin no longer required. Inhale, with a strong image of what is to be
achieved. Ask, for the strength and resolve. See, the breath flow and carry
intention. Follow the breath as it reaches the core of the diaphragm, of
commitment and determination. Here lies fire, the means of transformation, of
burning away to release new energy. The breath expands the abdomen towards the
ground, connecting to mother earth, nurturing resolve. As you exhale you let
go, release fear of change and challenge the burden of anger. Practice the discipline
of gesture.
But
a pose freezes a moment and real targets move. In reality the body should be in
constant movement and we evolved to find solitary practice of anything
stressful. It’s in the way you move; it is your body’s coordination
and orientation to others in an environment which enables you to navigate the
world. Your body shapes your mind, how you move determines how you feel. Around
us is change and we must reality check constantly and recalibrate our routine
behaviour and responses in order to belong. The faster you can move, the faster you can
learn; the more you can calibrate your body, the more accurate your knowledge,
the more likely you are to hit the target (your aims and objectives). Mental
distress is so much a desire to avoid the present, of stopping behaving
naturally. Yet we increase our speed and efficiency in life often by letting
go, which feels like slowing down and seeing more, of increased stillness. We
know we are ‘in the moment’ when we feel balance, symmetry, comfort and confidence.
Being there, means there is no difference between the self and what’s going on around
us - the world of others and things.
Nonverbally
we can experience each moment in terms of a continuum from comfort to discomfort;
of fear, or the lack of it. I see someone in the distance approaching, their
gait identifies them as a stranger or someone familiar, but also their degree
of balance, health and competence. As they come closer I am aware of the need
to freeze, to take flight or to fight. The need for ‘personal space’
(proxemics) sets real boundaries. I turn towards in liking, or away in dislike.
The direction in which my dominant foot points gives a reliable indication as
to whether I would rather be elsewhere or am happy to stay. But all this is
context until we are close enough to read the face.
Facial expressions reveal universal emotions plus individual
variation. Emotions are overwhelmingly displayed on the face, of everyone -
supported to varying degrees by tone of voice, and some body movement. Forty-three
muscles, up to ten thousand possible expressions, about a third of which are
expressed emotions. The repeated making of an emotional facial expression will
lead to the persistence of that emotion, inducing changes in mood. It is in the
act of making the expression, in response to another human, that the emotion is
felt. What is personal, is specific to the context an individual finds
themselves in, and is always a variation built upon the structure of universal
emotional expression. What remains uncertain is the extent to which emotion can
be said to be made in the moment that you physically feel the shape of your
face change, how much felt emotion is cued by others, how much effective
communication depends on correctly learning what you are feeling, being able to
communicate it to others, and make a correct interpretation of what others are
showing you. Put another way, the windows through which we can understand
another’s mental distress, the extent to which we can be said to ‘have empathy’
(feel what others feel) are; the facial expressions of emotion, the tone of
voice, plus some supporting cues found in the gestures which support them. But
when it comes to meaning, to what a particular emotion refers to, then gestures
display their principal role - and that is to support language.
We
are a social species and our greatest desire is to belong, this is the context
when considering all motivation or intention which proceeds action. If society (parents, siblings, peers, school, work,
community) was the cause of the way you turned out, and it almost certainly was,
then the chances of it helping you change your emotional education is
practically zero! But you don't have the answers otherwise you wouldn't have
got into such a mess. Neither do your friends or your partners - it was their
similarity to you which attracted you to them. The only way out, is to
find the few people who represent excellence, those who have the life you want,
and to model them.
There
is a hierarchy to our senses; from the most fundamental but
least conscious, to the most conscious but overused; from smell, taste and
touch to sound and vision. From a state approaching hibernation to the highest levels
of self-awareness, they may take as little as ten minutes a day to bring back into
consciousness, or they may take a lifetime! It is usually assumed that sight
and sound are dominant but this is only so amongst the small amount of
sensations which we can be conscious of in any one moment. Equally, touch is
thought to be hugely powerful because of its ability to suddenly appear and
seem to overwhelm conscious emotions and thought. But most action is
unconsciously pursued by the massively unconscious brain; here smell, taste and
touch dominate our navigation of the world without our being aware of them. Each
day we must coordinate and then re-orientate our bodies and minds to both the
environment of others as much as to the natural environment, allowing us to navigate
the world. It begins as individual practice, but then becomes social. If we use
the breath and core muscles to activate the hierarchy of senses then upon
waking, smell, taste and touch are actioned before we are conscious of sound
and vision. Body movement can be conceived in terms of three basic postures,
lying, squatting and walking, with all else a movement between them.
Touching
the ground we are aware of temperature and humidity, the dampness or dryness of
flora and fauna. On our skin we can feel light and shade, and the wind. The
felt temperature on the surface of the skin is the main filter for what is put
up into consciousness upon waking. Throughout the day we are moving through
different states of consciousness, sometimes by deliberately focusing, more
often as the result of sudden external influences. Our brains and bodies
evolved in a landscape, a visual topography and an emotional one. Our natural
measure of time is distance. Our focus is one we can see, the current horizon, and
we can orientate to any fixed point upon it taking the path of least
resistance. The sun is our guide; whilst washing at dawn and paying salutation it
is the fresh water that is sacred, not the river. When we start to walk, we
walk with nature. Stillness in the mind is not the same as being motionless in
the body, being in the moment is an ambling pace most of the time; slow enough
to observe, fast enough not to be depressed by gravity. I have purpose; my goal
is the horizon I see today. My actions should not be a fixed set of routines
and habits but a series of moving targets to be hit moment to moment, hour to
hour and day by day. Our ancestors hit moving targets with a bow and arrow
whilst in motion themselves, using more skill than is required of us today -
there is nothing necessarily progressive about evolution.
When we move; from the core muscles, from
the hip, and walk; follow the sun, turn towards what or who we like, turn away from
what or who we dislike; stress should be a distance from us, whilst relaxation
ought to come with closeness. Moving from the hip we calibrate our
movements with our emotional responses. Let go. We orientate ourselves to others to
invoke social interaction, for our prime motivations to action, our ‘get up and go’, our passions and desires, come
from and are directed towards others, rather than from a goal that a 'self' can
have.
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