Tune in to the power within: Our adaptability factor

We humans, as evolutionary beings have hidden evolutionary energy within. We need to tap this energy that is manifested in many different forms. Super computers which find its applications in many different areas, run at a faster speed in the order of nanoseconds. The speed of the neurons in the brain is in the order of milliseconds and not as fast as computer. But humans are more powerful than computers and that power comes from our capability to adapt. This adaptation capability of the humans is one such form of the human evolutionary energy.

Adaptation:  When there is a change that happens in our external or internal situations and the situations prevail continuously for a longer period of time, we tend to adapt to the new situation especially when there is no other option is provided to us. We slowly start to adapt to this new situation irrespective of whether the situation is good or bad to us. For example, our situations change when we start a new job and when the situation prevails for a long duration, we start to adapt automatically.

Our history: Simply by looking back at past experiences, one can see how the adaption plays a crucial role in shaping up his life. The level of adaptation varies from person to person and with their experiences. For example, consider the scenarios like a child learning a new language, jetlag due to long flight, moving to a new job, getting used to the back pain or knee pain or any chronic ailments, etc. In all the above scenarios, we adapt to the newly developed situations.

Law of self helplessness:  There is a trend which I observed with the clients who came to me for therapy programs. Most of these clients suffer from certain chronic ailments like asthma, back pain, high blood pressure etc.  Most of them tried to find many different ways to come out their unbalanced chronic state and when the methods did not yield the desirable result, they slowly started to accept the unbalanced state. This is a kind of adaptation that does not work in our favour and such negative development is called self helplessness.

To work in our favour: We are empowered to create a new situation. Consciously, one can define a new situation that works in his favour. Of course, there are challenges with the newly developed situation. With little perseverance, one can crossover his comfort zone and explore the new possibilities defined by the new situation. With time, the adaption power derived from our evolutionary energy helps us in moving towards our life goals. Such is the power of adaption, a form of evolutionary energy.

So, tap the evolutionary energy within us and tune in to the power of adaption from “self helplessness”  to “self helpfulness” to achieve our goals.

Practice stillness: An approach to a holistic lifestyle

In our fast paced lifestyle, our mind is occupied with too many things. Our brain is loaded with too much of information. We become less effective when our mind occupied with too many things. Any form of stillness practices even if practiced for a short period of time in a day creates free space in our mind which makes us a lot more effective during the day.

Fourth State: All of us live in one of the following states during a day. A wakeful state is the state where our mind and body are active, a sleep state is the state where the body and the mind are resting and a dream state is the one where the body rests while the mind stays active. There is a fourth state, technically called as ‘Turiya’ in yoga, where the body and mind stay in a very relaxed state and simultaneously we become aware of this relaxed state. Practicing stillness allows us to reach this fourth state where one can introspect the internal world within him.

Mind & Awareness: In general, most of us are under the strong influence of the mind. In this case, the mind stays on top of our awareness. While we practice stillness, we direct the awareness to stay on top of the mind. By doing so, the mind slowly loses its strength. Ego is the false identification of SELF to the mind. So, we are under the influence of ego as long as the mind has a strong hold on us. We experience our true SELF when our awareness expands with the stillness practice.

Postures: Any sitting posture which keeps the spine vertically upright with the root chakra at the base and crown chakra at the top. These are the potential and kinetic energies respectively within us. With continuous practice of stillness, a stage comes where one can tap and experience the inherent evolutionary energy which has infinite potential.

Process: A physiological effect of still body in the sitting posture has psychological influence on the mind. Awareness on the mind and the stillness of the mind can be experienced when one maintains a still body. So, the first and foremost requisite to gain access to the deeper layer of the mind is to establish a still body. It becomes easy to observe the involuntary subconsciously controlled automatic functions such as breathing, heartbeat, etc. once the stillness of the body is achieved. Our awareness laid on these involuntary functions improves our own sensitivity. Improved sensitivity allows us to feel the subtle body sensations activated by our nervous system. Our nervous system is the storage medium of the so-called, our conditioned mind. Stillness of mind happens as we become aware of these subtle sensations and as we continue to stay in a non-judgemental detached state. A pure expanded state of awareness can be achieved with a still body and a still mind.

First step: The first and foremost prerequisite for practicing stillness is to establish a perfectly still body. That is to have a still body in the sitting posture. During the initial days of practice, one may experiences very subtle movements in the body like forward backward movement of spine, the movement of head etc. So, do become aware of these movements and try to establish a still body. A still body lets us gain access to the subconsciously automatic involuntary functions.

Practicing stillness even for few minutes a day allows us to stay in a pure state of awareness. This has profound impact of our entire day. Personally, I feel it is powerful tool of the ancient wisdom which has now become a necessity in the fast paced modern world.

Get your freedom – that is your right

Mind layers: The mind is a layered structure. The structure of mind in itself is fascinating as there is no limit to identify the bottom most layer. It becomes endless as we try to reach the deepest layers of it. The simplest representation of mind has two components namely the conscious mind in the upper layers and the subconscious mind in the lower layers. The subconscious mind’s layers consist of the layers related to our survival as well as the parts related to our habits. Both the layers of survival and habits govern our autopilot mode. The survival part of the subconscious mind controls all our involuntary actions such as breathing, heartbeat, reflexes etc. The layer that defines the habits is also automatic and spontaneous by nature. Habits are the effect of our conditioned mind.

Difference between an adult and a child: As a child, we have our survival layers defined which aid in basic operations such as breathing, heart beat etc. But, as we progress as a grown up adult, the layers of habits began to take shape based on our life experiences. The mind is conditioned and the conditioning of the mind varies from person to person based on an individual’s life experiences.

Flexibility of the body: As a child, the body system which operates on the layer of survival has greater body flexibility. There are greater movements of muscles and joints. Greater the movements, better is the blood circulation in the body. This aids in oxygenating each and every cell of the body which puts the child in a highly energetic state. This is the freedom given to us at the time of our birth.

For an adult, conditioned mind may be more rigid or less rigid based on his life experiences. There is a direct correlation between the rigidity of the conditioned mind and the flexibility of the body. The body becomes less flexible when the conditioned mind is rigid.

Test: In mind body exercise, the static postures (asanas) are good to test the flexibility of the body. A simple flexibility test is to do the forward bend posture. The level of flexibility can be determined by the palms of the hands to reach the ground. The flexibility is good if the palms touch the ground by the side of the feet’s. Remember not to bend the knees as this test is performed. Also, to retain balance, one needs to perform the complimentary back bend posture.

Unconditioning the body: The body as well as the mind can be unconditioned with regular practice. The habits can be unconditioned with the unconditioning of the body and the mind. A simple concentration of focusing on your breathing does the trick. In the above test, do exhale with the forward bends with a simple mental chat,” My body id relaxing”. Similarly, do inhale with the backbends with a mental chat, “I am energised”.

With the regular practice of the above mindful exercise, considerable changes can be noticed in the body, mind and habits. Get back the freedom given at the time of birth and that is our right!!

Listen to your body

Our conscious choices, the ‘efforts’ that we put in create ‘causes’ in our internal world as well as our external world. In fact, the experience of our external world is nothing but another representation of our internal world. Our internal world is nothing but our subconscious programming of our conscious efforts. Majority of our behaviors and actions in life are automatically governed by our own subconscious programming. It is said that 95% of our daily actions are subconsciously programmed and we are programmed to react or act in specific ways. We act consciously only 5% of the time and the rest of our actions are on an autopilot mode governed by the subconscious mind.

Subconscious communication: Since, we are majorly controlled by our subconscious mind, it is important to understand the communication media of this subconscious mind. The communication of this subconscious mind appears as bodily sensations. The degrees of the sensations vary from gross to subtle. Now, we know why we need to listen to the body so that we have better understanding of our internal world and hence better external life experiences.

Sensitivity: The sensitivity of picking up the body signals varies from person to person. Those with better sensitivity have better control of their life. They stay in a balanced state which is by definition our default state. Those with good sensitivity have ability to capture not only the gross signals but also the subtler signals from the body and those with less sensitivity have ability to capture only the gross sensations from the body. In a way, sensitivity defines our closeness to our subconscious mind that governs our internal world.

Let us take for example that we develop cold. At the beginning stage of the development of cold, the body signals out subtle signals. We either do not have the sensitivity to pickup these signals or we simply ignore those signals. Over a period of time, this unbalanced cold state moves to a different level and this time, our body signals out gross signals like runny nose, blocked nose etc. Now, even if one picks up these signals, it is going to take a long time for him to get back to his balanced state.

So, developing sensitivity keeps us close to our default balanced state.

Advantages: There are many advantages of listening to our body. It helps in

-          Improving the self healing capacity

-          To stay in a balanced state

-          To understand our internal world

-          To improve our performance in the activities that we get involved in.

Techniques: Any form of mind-body exercise like Yoga helps in developing a better sensitivity. If you are wary of doing yoga then let me suggest two simple practices to improve the sensitivity. First, develop a simple habit of listening to your breathing rhythm. You may pick up this rhythm at your tummy, tip of the nostril etc. After few days of regular practice, move on to listen to the rhythm of your heart. This can be felt easily by touching the thumb and the index finger. The meeting point between the thumb and the index finger gives the sensation of your heart rhythm. These two practices help in developing your sensitivity that keeps you in a balanced state.