Breath Mastery, Presence in a Rush and Thorsten Wiesmann
September 8, 2024
8 min read
•
Newsletter
{Body}
Breath mastery as a tool
The breath has been studied for basically as long as the species has been self-aware. And that’s for good reason: the breath is the best reflection between body and mind in one’s inner Universe.
I say “best” for two reasons:
(1) Breathing is a bridge between the automatic and manual parts of your nervous system — it can happen all on its own, or you can override it at will. This feature makes it especially helpful for controlling the parts of your physiology you are typically unable to access or affect, such as heart rate, sweating and digestion.
(2) Unlike your auric field or the insane amount of thought forms arising moment-to-moment, your breathing is obvious: you can literally see it with your own eyes! In other words, you don’t need a lot of concentration in order to introspectively study it.
{Mind}
What does "being present" feel like in the rush of a busy day?
Presence (as we often conceptualize it) isn’t a feeling — it’s a state of being.
Are you angry, or are you aware of anger? Are you joyful, or are you aware of joy?
In other words, does your awareness depend on feelings, or does it exist independently of them?
What I’m trying to say is that being present in the rush of a busy day “feels” the exact same as being present while in the dawdle of an idle day:
You have no resistance towards arising sensations. If you’re feeling an intense adrenaline surge, fine. If you’re experiencing a pleasant wash of serotonin, also fine.
Your mind exists as a judgement-free space for thoughts to surface and dissolve in. If your thoughts are rapid-fire, anxiety-ridden and strategic, fine. If your thoughts are filled with peace, certainty and optimism, also fine.
An innocent curiosity exists about your next moment. If your world is poised to come crashing down, fine. If your world is on the brink of enlightenment, also fine.
{Soul}
Like one who stares intently through a window at the passersby but fails to see their own reflection in the glass, many of us are stuck living in our interpretation of reality, rather than being in reality itself.
The context in which you read these words is the perfect condition to understand this.
Maybe you’re on your phone; maybe you’re at a busy coffee shop; maybe you’re feeling restless. Whatever your outer or inner circumstance, notice that you have a story about it, and that you implicitly assume the story to be an accurate portrayal of what’s going on.
Unfortunately, that certainty traps you in a fun-house mirror of abstractions and concepts. It means – more often than not – you end up believing the story about the moment to be realer than the actual moment!
In other words, the ego never actually sees or hears the real world, because it’s too busy interpreting familiar patterns, generating spell-binding narratives about them, claiming those narratives as gospel, and then attacking others for failing to agree with it.
September 1, 2024
Previous
September 15, 2024
Next
