Good morning and welcome to our 30-day art and practice of “Both, And.”

I’d like to know who is on board with this immersion, so let’s begin with a simple introduction and intention for this 30-day journey. I’ll start . . .

I’m Carol McAnally and I have a few intentions. I am perpetually intrigued by the mystery and the challenge inherent in being human. My practice that supports tuning in, being present and course correction is floundering, so I am committing today to revitalize and deepen my practice – to breathe new life into it through this rich exploration of “Both, And.” Also, I very much want to do this in community. My tendency is to be a lone-wolf in my practice, which has its place, and – it is also imperative to come together with people moving along similar trajectories for support, wisdom, accountability, insight, vulnerability – and for me, to break through the isolation that is so ingrained.

As the facilitator, I will post daily conversation starters, practice prompts, quotes and whatever else comes forward – as well as sharing my own experience.

OK – your turn. You must be on the blog page, in order to respond to the group as a whole. Scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page (the comment box is, for some reason, way down the page – a bug to be worked out), write your intro/intention and click the “post as” button, you will be prompted to subscribe to disqus (provides the comment program). Just add your name email address, you’ll be sent an email to confirm that info – and away we go! We’ll see how this system of community interaction works and revise as needed.

Happy Immersion, Carol

We are unique and individual.

We are one with everything.

Seemingly disparate and oppositional statements. Both are true and both arise simultaneously in every moment

How can that be?

This is what makes being human so fascinating. We are “both, and;” simultaneously unique and One – multi-dimensional and multi-faceted, distinct renderings of Life. And this only makes sense when we realize that we are, each and every one of us, an expression of the Divine – that is at once the Many as well as the One.

We tend to get lost in feeling separate, other, alone and disconnected – polarized in our uniqueness. What is important to realize is that our uniqueness does not make us separate; our belief in our separateness is the only thing that holds us apart from realizing our place in the all that is. The universal life force that animates everything (and that’s a lot!) expresses as the unique being that is you, me, them, us, we, thee . . . in all the infinite forms that can be expressed. Everything is a distinct interpretation and expression of God.

As a concept, this is doable, thinkable, perhaps even logical. As a reality, as a direct experience, it can be elusive. How then, do we make room for our uniqueness as an explicit expression of our universality?

Practice. There must be a deliberate turning toward the One in order for It to reveal you to yourself – an open-ended and sincere inquiry into the inescapable “both, and” that is your true nature as a human being. And, practice is, well, it’s unique – unique to each and every person! Perhaps it is meditation, or prayer, or mindful movement, or hiking, or chanting, or . . . the form does not matter as much as the intention with which you approach your practice and its relevance to you, your life and your way of being in the world. It seems to me that without an ongoing, meaningful and relevant practice, each of us will stay mired in suffering; the belief that “I am separate.”

I must confess, I’ve been a bit lax in my own practice lately and can feel the effect. I am more prone to moods, less nurturing of myself and others, caught in feeling alone, more stuck in front of the computer, and, and, and . . . I’m thinking I am not the only one in this circumstance.

Here is what I propose. I would like to embark, with you, on a 30-day immersion into the art and practice of “Both, And;” exploring our uniqueness as an expression of the One. And because the e-rhythm newsletter is not particularly interactive we could come together through my Rhythm of Life Blog (which you can subscribe to on the sidebar of my homepage: www.rolife.com). I will post my updates, practice prompts, insights, progress, challenges – and invite you to do the same through the response box at the end of each post. Also, when you subscribe to the blog you will receive “Liven Up” and “Notable Nuggets.”

Please join me – let’s create community around this worthy exploration of the inescapable, “both, and.” Let’s plan on starting on Monday November 1st and continue through the month.

in body & soul, Carol

We, as human beings, are a complex blend of form and formless, made up of physical matter and energy – add to that the rich capacity for consciousness and what you have is a complex life form that is simultaneously finite and infinite.

We are matter – dense, physical, animal, body. We are energy – breath, essence, life-force, unseen. We are consciousness – self-aware, responsive, perceiving, evolving.  I find this to be fertile ground for exploration.

Breath is a wonderful way to experience this blend – we cannot see breath, yet it is essential to our physical life. And if we are conscious of our breath, we become present in this moment. Here are a few ways to play with your breath:

• Notice your breath as it moves in and out of your body. Sit quietly with your eyes closed and take a few natural breaths, becoming tuned in and aware. Slow the breath down and deepen it. As you inhale, feel the whisper of sensation in your nostrils, the passing of the air through your windpipe, the soft expansion of your lungs, the lift of your diaphragm, the subtle spreading of your ribcage, the quiet rise of your belly. As you exhale, feel the belly soften, the ribs drift in, the diaphragm relax and the throat open as the breath falls out of the body.
• Let yourself be breathed. Imagine that life is breathing you. Instead of actively inhaling and exhaling, become passive and pretend you are on a cosmic breathing machine that fills you with life giving breath and then receives that breathe back from you – an exchange of breath from the infinite to the finite and back again. Fun!

I also find movement to be great way to play with form and formless. The sideways figure 8, a symbol for infinity, is a holistic way to expand this experience and is incorporated into much of the movement in Gyrokinesis. Try this:

• Sit on the edge of chair or stool so that you can sit directly on top of your sit bones. Have your legs in an open V, and engage your abdominals so that you feel grounded and supported by your lower body. Now sit tall, lengthening the spine all the way from your sacrum to the top of your head. As you go through the movement, move the entire torso and head as one piece – like a stick figure.
• Tip from the hip and let the entire torso and head fall forward through the center as one piece. Sweep your body in a circular motion around and out to the right. Lean back at the center, then fall forward and sweep out and around to the left. Exhale each time you go through center and inhale as you go around to the back. Create a smooth continuous movement becoming more and more aware of the sideways figure 8 that you are creating with your body and with your breath.
• When you are comfortable with the basic move, close your eyes and continue moving in this pattern. Explore the round edges of infinity and the angular intersection as you pass through center on your way to the other side of infinity. See if you can feel how the infinite interacts and intersects with the finite, formless weaves through form and matter mingles with non-matter.
• Begin to make the physical figure 8 smaller and smaller, all the while allowing the energetic figure 8 to expand. Finally, come to rest in the center of the cross point of infinity. This is a place of great quiet, deep presence and grand neutrality. Take a few moments to savor and enjoy.

What other ways do you know of to explore and experience this multi-faceted human life?

in body & soul, Carol

“When God created Himself, He created Himself in two aspects: the Infinite and the finite. When you think of the finite, you think of form, and when you think of the Infinite, you feel that there is no form. However, inside the finite is the message of the Infinite; in the finite is first the revelation and then the manifestation of the Infinite. The finite is necessary because it is through the finite that the Infinite plays its role in the cosmic rhythm here on earth. At the same time, the Infinite is necessary because it is in the Infinite that the finite has its eternal shelter. There it finds protection and perfection.” Sri Chinmoy

I’m reading Spiritual Bypassing: When Spirituality Disconnects Us from What Really Matters by Robert Masters, and found myself particularly intrigued by the chapter, “Disembodied Spirituality and Embodied Being.” Here are some excerpts I thought you might find meaningful:
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. . . no matter how much we might neglect or mistreat it, our body calls us back through its aches and pains and imbalances to take real care of it, to integrate it with the rest of our being, to honor and love it, and recognize it as an expression of who and what we truly are. It is essential that we rediscover and treat the body as an inherently sacred expression of our fundamental nature, and that we outgrow our dissociative tendencies and judgment about body image. Somatic idealism has done incredible damage to us, as exemplified by the unending obsession with how we – and others – look.  Until we get under the skin of our distorted body image, journeying into and through its psychological origins, we will be at its mercy, held hostage by its ubiquitous mirrors. “The flesh” has been slapped with negative press for millennia, being associated with sin, carnality, moral weakness, and disease. Many of us don’t seem to like our body very much, or we may like it but not want it to change, as it inevitably must. In either case, we are burdening our body with unrealistic expectations, central among them our obsession with not showing signs of aging. Our body not only reveals what’s going on for us emotionally – through its posture, gestures, expression, but also signals our impermanent nature, no matter how much we try to stave off change through endless exercise, diet, or plastic surgery. If we don’t want to be reminded of our mortality, we are going to keep our distance from our body, despite the attention we may seem to lavish on it. So what’s a body to do?

As consciously as possible, bring awareness – compassionately wakeful attentiveness – into sensation, into emotion, and into the energetic  patternings and psychological holdings of the body. Moving toward and into emotion, feeling it in the raw and giving it room for expression while understanding its connection to events in our life, is an especially effective way to reconnect with the body. We may be resistant to doing this, given that there might be considerable pain and perhaps also trauma embedded in the deeper layers of emotion, but in contacting and freeing up such zones of feeling, we become more integrated, more intimate with our body.

and later in the chapter . . .

Getting back to the body means doing whatever is needed to cut through our disembodied experience, which in part means a journey into and through the very pain that first drove us to disown and dissociate from our body.

The first step is to name this pain, to openly acknowledge the reality of it. The second step is to turn toward it, however counterintuitive this might seem to us, so that we are directly facing it, and the third step is to enter it, getting beneath its surface and encountering its originating dynamics. In so doing we become not only more intimate with our pain, but also more intimate with our resistance to entering our pain. As we engage in this process, we find ourselves more and more immersed in our somatic reality, with a considerable deepening  of both our sensory and emotional awareness. We feel more deeply – feeling into, feeling for, feeling with – becoming increasingly present to our body. Instead of just thinking as we walk, we become more aware of the actual process of walking, enjoying the sensory flow and particulars of our experience. We may still feel much of our old pain, but now we can hold it in a way that catalyzes its healing.

Food for thought – eh?

in body & soul, Carol

“Who we are makes its appearance not in a body but as a body. This does not necessarily mean that we literally are our body, but that our body expresses rather than contains us.”

“To really feel our body is an art in which compassion, patience, and the spirit of exploration all coexist.”

Robert Masters

Being human is quite a conundrum. This is the only earthly vehicle we have for living an enlightened life, yet we are prone to resist it, hate it, abandon it, abuse it, judge it, ignore it . . . In general, we seem to be busy in a myriad of strategies to deal with this thing called life. How then, do we navigate the complex terrain of living a human life that neither idolizes nor devalues the body’s rightful place in the scheme of living a fully realized life?

I think of being human as a grand experiment of the soul: Is it possible to live as conscious matter, fully expressing and experiencing life in a body? And can we find ease and pleasure in being a complex integration of form and formless? Is it truly feasible to touch the infinite from the finite construct of our physicality? Could we stop fighting or resisting our life and just relax into all sensations as dancing energy? Can we open the vastness of our hearts and brilliance of our minds to allow our flesh and bone to fully participate in the awakening of consciousness and the evolution of the soul?

I have been actively traversing the maze of embodiment for quite some time and am very familiar with the quirks and pitfalls inherent in this endeavor. I am also keenly aware of the joyful moments of intimacy, ease and peace that are the over-arcing consequence of relaxing into the soul-filled enjoyment of this human life.

We so often feel alone – lost in this maze of confusion about the body and what it means to be human. You don’t have to be alone in this endeavor. Let me join you as a guide and co-conspirator to:

• shift your relationship to your body to one of clarity, strength, appreciation and pleasure
• walk with you as we tease apart the ways in which the ego holds your body captive in a jail of judgment
• discover your soul’s intimate, deliberate, devoted and affectionate union with your body
• recapture your exuberance for this life, in this body, at this time and in this space

With that in mind, I am offering a year long program:

Body and Soul: A Compassionate Conspiracy. This will include – 15 individual sessions (3 the first month, 2 the second month and once a month thereafter) and a full year of weekly Gyrokinesis classes. Together, we will approach this from many angles, including spiritual, psychological, physical, belief systems, movement, sensations – and who knows where else our co-conspiracy will take us.

Don’t underestimate what it means to be human.
Let’s journey together to:
Explore it. Embrace it. Co-create it
Respect it. Embellish it. Enjoy it.
Embody it!

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Here are the details:
Pay in Full: $1275
($975 for the 15 sessions which works out to be $65 per session / $300 for a year of weekly Gyrokinesis classes, a $600 value). You save $120 by paying in full.

Pay Monthly: $116

Sliding scale is a possibility, depending on your circumstance.

If the weekly Gyrokinesis classes don’t work for you, there are other possibilities that we can work with. And if you don’t live locally we can work with that as well.

This offering is near and dear to my heart and I would love to compassionately co-conspire with you to consciously explore the dynamic relationship of body and soul.

Please contact me for more information or to simply schedule your first session.

in body & soul, Carol

“Our imperfection is one of the most astonishingly beautiful facets of being human, for it is our imperfection that compels us forward. And it is our imperfection that must be met with the open embrace of unconditional love and compassionate kindness. It is our deep acceptance – and not our judgment – of our humanity that creates a more authentic, purposeful and joyful life.”

Carol McAnally

There once was a sore and achy left hip that wanted to communicate to Command Central (ComCen) that something wasn’t quite right. So the hip enclosed its message in a bundle of neurons, the messenger, and sent it on its way. The messenger found his way to the super highway and was moving along, humming and happy to be in the flow.

All of a sudden, out of nowhere, something plowed into his side and sent him reeling and tumbling end over end until he came to rest in a ditch.

The messenger shook himself off and looked around trying to get his bearings. There, bigger than anything the messenger had ever seen, was a massive, oily, sludge-like, black blob. The messenger did not like the looks of that at all and tried to just move around the blob and be on his way. But the blob would have none of it and blocked the messenger’s way. An ugly mouth opened up in the middle of all that blackness, and began to speak. The messenger tried to ignore the voice, but it was compelling, mesmerizing – and he began to listen intently; “You are carrying a worthless, stupid message” it hissed. “No one cares,” it murmured in a whisper that was so loud that it shook the messenger to his core – he didn’t want to hear anymore but the blob was relentless, “Don’t deliver it. The hip is foolish for sending it. It is just a trouble maker, a big baby. Nothing is really wrong.” The blob droned on and on until finally it closed its oily mouth with a nasty grin and slithered away.

The messenger sat immobilized for a long time. He felt woozy and confused. Slowly, he began to recall his journey – he was on a mission to ComCen and even though he couldn’t remember the purpose of that mission, he made his way back onto the super highway and into the flow.

He spent the rest of his journey trying to remember the message he was carrying or even who sent him – blank, nothing – only a sense of some purpose to his mission.

When he arrived to deliver the message, he began to confess that he could not recall why he had been sent. But instead of his confession, a nasty voice he didn’t recognize growled from his mouth, “The stupid left hip thinks something is wrong. But it’s just a big baby that wants to cause trouble. You should ignore it. I was there and I know it’s really nothing. It just wants some attention. So stupid!”

ComCen, confused by the message and preoccupied with the running of the body, asked the messenger to put the message on the desk and turned back to the task at hand. The messenger floated away with a nagging feeling that he had not really completed his mission . . .

Suddenly the whole body was flooded with stress as it began to deal with the day ahead, muscles contracted, the stomach knotted, the mind reeled and the emotional body tensed. Command Central was on full alert; bells ringing, lights flashing, activity everywhere. The message from the hip fluttered to the floor . . . and was forgotten.

A few months later, after many messages – unfortunately usurped and diluted by the black blob – the hip could take no more. Bone scraping on bone, tissue swelling, joint frozen, no longer able to bear weight – the hip failed and the body fell. ComCen was now on full alert to deal with the crisis in the hip.

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The moral of this story is no mystery . . .

It is imperative that we cultivate a compassionate awareness of the messages that our body is sending. And that we do not let our judgment, disdain or apathy (the black blob) usurp and distort those messages. If we are able to hear the messages with clarity and concern, then we can respond in a way that is meaningful and relevant – and circumvent a potential disaster that puts the entire body on full alert, stressed, anxious and unstable.

Deep blessings to you and your body, Carol

“Loving oneself is no easy matter, just because it means loving all of oneself, including the shadow where one is inferior and socially so unacceptable. The care one gives this humiliating part is the cure.” James Hillman

As much as I talk about the wonder of being human and the miracle of the body, it is important to understand that you are NOT your body. You are much more than your body.

You ARE . . .

• the ever present awareness that cares for your body.
• that which experiences your life and is profoundly present in every moment.
• the force that animates your body.
• the intelligence that breathes your body.
• the energy that moves your body.

As a concept, this is fairly accessible. As a way of living, it is elusive. It can be a struggle to hail from the ever present sea of awareness. We tend to over-identify with the body as the sum total of who we are and forget that the core of our being is boundless, pure consciousness. The resolution to this conundrum is NOT to dis-identify with the body as that leads to devaluing this amazing human experience.

Rather, begin to investigate, to inquire, to contemplate, Who am I? It’s fine to begin to answer this with who you think you are; I’m a writer, I’m a wife, I’m a seeker, I’m a business owner . . . These may be ways you’ve identified yourself – but do they speak to who you really are or do they speak to a persona that comes and goes?  Are the answers satisfying? Do they have substance, true substance? Or are they undependable, inconstant, and ever changing? Who is the I that endures? Who is the I that is asking the question?

Gangaji, a spiritual teacher and author, writes: “Unless this question has been truly answered, not just conventionally answered, you will still be hungry to know. The moment of recognizing that no answer has ever satisfied this question is crucial. It is often referred to as the moment of spiritual ripeness, the moment of spiritual maturity. At this point, you can consciously investigate who you really are. When you turn your attention toward the question, Who am I?, perhaps you will see an entity that has your face and your body. But who is aware of that entity? Are you the object, or are you the awareness of the object?”

And why would it matter one way or the other? Why bother to investigate? If you identify with what you DO in your life as who you ARE, then life can knock you around and cause great suffering. Who you truly ARE at the core of your being is constant, stable, unwavering certainty that holds a steadfast place for you to surf the tides of change rather than be swallowed by them. Worth exploring? If so, carry on . . .

Begin to question any assumptions you have made about who you are and what you truly want. When you begin to question the certainty of who you think you are, soften the edges of knowing and let go of any hard and fast identity, what’s left? Perhaps, with any luck at all, what’s left is the truth of who you are – boundless, pure consciousness that inherently contains love, peace, joy and fulfillment . . . A great place from which to experience this amazing human life.

Have a great week,

Carol

“So who are you? You are not objects out there, you are not feelings, your are not thoughts – you are effortlessly aware of all those, so you are not those. Who or what are you?

Say it this way to yourself: I have feelings, but I am not those feelings. Who am I? I have thoughts, but I am not those thoughts. Who am I? I have desires, but I am not those desires. Who am I?

So you push back into the source of your own awareness. You push back into the Witness and you rest in the Witness.” Ken Wilber

Many of us (particularly women) have, at one time or another, been guilty of talkin’ trash to or about our bodies.  You know – words and phrases filled with the judgment and distaste we sometimes feel when we look in the mirror, have aches and pains or find it difficult to maneuver around our physical lives. These rubbish words are plentiful and easily identifiable. You know what I’m talking about – we each have our favorite areas of aversion and ongoing allegations against the body. These thoughts are the easy ones to catch because they are so blatantly mean. And, I trust that you are doing what you can to be aware of that nasty voice and to quiet it with the deep love and acceptance that you inherently have for your body.

What about the more subtle ways you disrespect your body? hold it in contempt?  make unreasonable demands of it? wish it were anything but what it is? hate that it hurts, is sensitive or sick? are disappointed that it is not as resilient as it used to be? ignore its communication and wish it would just shut up?

These subtle messages flow below the surface of awareness, are non-verbal and much more destructive than the obvious ones. Is the answer to go after all those sneaky, subversive ways of judging ourselves, identify and then try to undo each one? Yuk! That sounds overwhelming, exhausting, unproductive, zero fun and potentially depressing.

What to do? Here are a few ideas:

Instead of thinking of the body as an IT, think of your body as SHE or HE. This takes you out of an object orientation with your body and into the possibility of relationship, partnership and mutuality. How is SHE feeling? What does SHE need?  What brings HER joy? How can I help HER? See if you can feel the difference in this simple turn of phrase.

Accept HER as she is, right here and right now. This may seem like old news, a bit trite and overused. It isn’t. The internalized programming that we can only accept her under certain conditions (thin, pretty, pain free, graceful, athletic . . .) must be arrested and put asunder – not by convincing yourself that she already has these attributes, but by letting go of needing her to be anything but what she is. Wanting her to be other than who she is currently,places you firmly in the future, unable to appreciate her or even truly experience her right now.

Yesterday during my errands around town, I practiced deep acceptance – not only for myself but for every woman I saw. I looked at each imperfectly perfect body and sent her unconditional love and acceptance. A sigh of relief moved through me and I felt waves of deep appreciation for women and a softening toward the challenges that we face, as a collective – needing desperately to relax the hardness with which we judge our bodies and nurture a more joyous and pleasurable way of being with her and caring for her.

Deep blessings to you and your body,  Carol

“ . . . God has been here all along. In the noise and in the stillness, in the upheavals and in the rafts of peace. In each moment of kindness you lavish upon your breaking heart or the size of your thighs, with each breath you take – God has been here. She is you.” Geneen Roth