Finding Peace In Your Body

I'm sure the title of this blog post could mean different things to different people.  Depending upon your own paradigms and experiences, it could easily be construed to be a belief system that may or may not prove repeatable.  Finding peace in your body is essential to the human experience, but far too often we miss the mark.

Even though we think we've found peace in the body, many times it is a temporary illusion.  In many ways, we have multiple influences and pressures and stresses hitting us constantly.  When we combine that with past experiences that we may or may not remember, it becomes a recipe for anything but finding peace in your body.

Meditation, Yoga, prayer, dancing, singing, and mind-body centered work can all help us achieve greater peace in our life.  Unfortunately, sometimes we only hit the surface and because the relaxation feels better than what we're used to in life, we think this is deep peace.  Don't get me wrong, any type of relaxation is better than nothing, but it may not be as a deep peace as you want to believe it is.

Awareness leads you to deep peace...

I've gone through some wonderful and deep work called Unified Therapy with Dr. Paul Canali.  In a session, it is body centered, connecting the felt sense of the body with the mind.  As you go into these moments, the pains and anxiety and struggles surface and show up.  As you're guided through the process and as you keep fear in perspective, you reach a very deep inner place.  This place of knowing gives way to a greater awareness.  As you step into the awareness and out of the fear that arises in your body, you find deep peace.

This peace is not superficial.  It is very difficult to describe, but once you experience it, everything makes sense.  It is a moment where  you don't want to be disturbed and you wish you could stay in this state of deep peace forever.  To think about coming out of it is not always welcomed because it is such a pure state where nothing else matters in life.

We follow our limiting paradigms...

These days, I find that most people are going through their lives not finding peace in their bodies.  Some will use religious beliefs to give the illusion they are.  Others will use new age practices and claim they know deep peace.  More often than not, we're following our own limiting paradigm of all that there can be.

No, I'm not saying you haven't found a way to access peace in your body.  I'm just making the point that finding deep peace in your body is beyond the realm where most people go.  We're too busy.  We're too stressed.  We're too tied up in our own belief systems or paradigms to go where we need to travel.

Let us strip away all that we think is right and learn to go deep within the body to experience all that may be uncomfortable at first, but yield results that you never thought was possible.  If you think you've found the edge of all that there is and you've defined it in your own set of beliefs, opinions and thoughts, you're missing the possibility of what lies beyond that.

Your beliefs and paradigms and thoughts are fine as long as they don't limit you and hold you back.  Building our life on what we think we know, rather than what is possible is like building a mansion at the edge of the ocean in the sand.  It may look pretty when its built, but most likely it will not stand the test of time.

Finding peace in your body is about going further, not just stopping at the water's edge.

#Peace

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2016 by Don Shetterly

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Illusions Of Abundance, Part 2

This is part 2.  Please read part 1 from yesterday before reading this section.

Part 2

If you ask the person who has lost everything in life what truly matters, I doubt money will be on the top of the list.  Ask the person who lives in the forest and does not know modern conveniences exist, what truly matters, and I bet you will get a much different answer than someone living in mainstream society.  You see, we have truly lost sight of what matters in life and our warped view has muddied the waters of abundance and wealth.

While I know that we require money to function in society, it is my opinion that this is wealth, not abundance.  Abundance has more to do with the essentials of life that truly matter.  Of course, when you are truly abundant and in line with your role in the universe, then I believe wealth follows. 

I laugh when I hear people thinking that if they picture a boat in the front yard because they feel that is what they “NEED”, that it is going to show up.  Why on earth, would that happen?  What purpose would it serve?  I think to view the universe or the spiritual concepts of abundance as a catalog you can order from, is foolish and not very enlightened.

What matters in life is how we align our life with our purpose of being here and how we grow in our own awareness and evolve as humans.  It isn’t about how much money we can gain or how many followers we can obtain; it is about aligning and surrendering to our purpose in this world. 

Illusions Of Abundance, Part 1

Part 1

Seek and ye shall find!  I remember hearing that repeated so many times growing up.  Often though, we fail to seek out that which we need for ourselves and we become attracted to the illusions of our day.

There are many out there pointing the way towards abundance and wealth while confusing these different concepts as the illusion of answers for our life.  We act as if these people have all the answers to our life.  We seek the answers, but we fail to find them because we are blinded by the illusion.

When life is tough and we are down and out on our luck like many people in our day, it is easy to see the pretty neon flashing lights of the wealth and abundance preachers, as the answers to our problems!  They give us pretty words to listen to or read on the internet and they make claims that sound almost believable, but in reality they are too good to be true!  We all know that there is no such thing as a free lunch, yet we park ourselves at the table waiting for the food!

Christmas Illusions

Christmas is many things to many people. If you ask a hundred different people what Christmas is all about, you will most likely get a hundred different responses. It is celebrated in many ways among many different people and yet, all across this world, it is a day of great importance.

When I was a child, the Christmas season was one of the happiest times of the year to me. My mom would bake Christmas cookies and candy, and together we would decorate the beautiful cookies with icing and sprinkles. I remember the taste of the fudge, so full of sugar and chocolate that it made your taste buds dance with glee. I remember the divinity and the peanut brittle along with many other types of Christmas treats.

Leading up to the days before Christmas, I was a child full of smiles, waiting for Santa Claus to bring me those special few gifts. It didn’t really matter to me what I got, just as long as there was some special gift for me to unwrap. I was happier receiving a gift than being concerned with what I was given. It did not matter to me what the gift was. It was the joy of the surprise and the endurance of the wait that I longed for each Christmas.

Through the many church programs, singing and playing the Christmas songs for the Christmas story, I found myself wanting to perform these moments forever and ever. I enjoyed playing the piano as well as singing the songs at the retirement homes, where the faces of the elderly beamed with joy. Tears would come to my eyes as these beautiful songs filled the room, and I felt the peace and love of the season flowing through me.

As time passed by, my life endured many things that were difficult beyond measure. I hid within the joy of Christmas from the pain that surrounded and engulfed me. It became my hope and fantasy but it also was my illusion. For me to realize that anything but happiness, joy, and good cheer existed, took me from the illusion that I was living in life. It grew into a conflict between trying to deal with reality and trying to enjoy a world of fantasy. The pain that I felt was mixed in with the joys of the season, and my heart longed with sadness, my eyes filled deep with tears.

As I stated at the beginning of this, Christmas means many things to many people. I wish I could write that it was all joy and magic and make believe that is portrayed through the season. I wish I could write that it is a time of family being together that I was born into, but I cannot write those words. For if I tried to make it appear that everything was full of cheer for me during this time, I would be living an illusion. As difficult as it is, I face a reality that is anything but full of cheer.

During the holiday season, I see so many people spending countless dollars of worry to make sure they buy the best present they can buy for another person. Whether it is family or friends, the stress of picking that right present is a struggle to many. I know completely just how difficult it can be to spend what little you could save throughout the year to buy Christmas gifts for family members, only to be shunned and ridiculed for the gift you bought and gave them. Christmas has to be about so much more than giving gifts or being with family.

Of course, we should not forget that the corporate retail market believes Christmas is a success when every man, woman, and child is out buying armfuls of gifts to shower their love upon their fellow humans. For according to the retailers, if you aren’t buying Christmas gifts and putting yourself in debt, you truly aren’t human. So many in our country celebrate this time by spending thousands of dollars to show they love one another.

Yet, my mind wanders into the night asking, “Is this what Christmas is truly about?” Is it a time of stressing over holiday parties, holiday gifts, and which family member is going to visit which home at what time? Is it a time of living in a fantasy world full of illusion, and sipping the champagne and egg nog until our senses grow numb? It is a time where we become intolerant of how others believe?

The answers to these questions I see in our world are inadequate. I only write about that which I see and currently understand. Each person is of course, free to believe and practice in the way that is appropriate for their life. My hope though is that each one of us will really stop and consider what this season truly means.

Christmas is a time of celebrating peace, love, and goodwill to men. It is a time of giving to others, not with hopes that you will have bought the perfect gift but that you will have given it out of pure love. It is a time of helping our fellow man, and realizing that the help should not only be on one day of the year, but each day we are fortunate to be alive and living in this world.

Christmas is much more than we make it out to be and much less than we think it truly is. The lights, trees, gifts, carols, and parties are all part of it. There is nothing wrong with these things. However, if we forget what Christmas is all about, we become a noisy gong and a clanging symbol decorated with pretty lights and glitter.

Let us remember that during this holiday time, not everyone is able to participate and many suffer in silence as a result of Christmases past. They often sit on the sidelines in suffering, hoping that the day will soon pass, when all they want to do is to forget the painful moments that this day brings. Let us reach out in love to these people, but let us remember to respect their pain and honor their true feelings.

Christmas is not about doing something because we expect anything in return. Christmas is about giving of our true heart through peace, understanding and goodwill to all that we know and meet. If we can understand this one thing about Christmas, then we will have truly celebrated the real spirit of the season.

I leave you with the lyrics to the song, “Let There Be Peace On Earth”

Let peace begin with me
Let this be the moment now.
With every step I take
Let this be my solemn vow.
To take each moment
And live each moment
With peace eternally.
Let there be peace on earth,
And let it begin with me.



Blog Post & Images (c) 12/5/10 Don Shetterly - use by permission only