Sensations
FALLING BACK
With their first few intentional breaths, many individuals begin to feel a definite shift in awareness as they enter their inner space. For others – and more often with men – it may take a few sessions. When this shift in awareness happens to you, surrender to the sensation that you’re gently falling backward. What is receding is your sense of self. Where it’s receding from is the front of your head and chest, or from slightly out in front of your body. Where your sense of self lands is a territory that can feel both unfamiliar, and yet like coming back to your comfortable home after a difficult day.
EXPANDING INTO DEPTH
The next sensation you’re likely to experience is a deepening of your inner space. Because your sense of self has likely been “pancaked” forward to the front of the body, this new sensation may feel like your inner space is expanding from the front of the body to the back. You may also feel that the back of your torso is waking up. Some of your inner space may seem to be in motion, while other areas seem still. Don’t try to connect or equalize these sensations, or fill in the space between them. Simply surrender to whatever sensations you’re feeling throughout your entire head and torso.
FEELING VERTICAL
As a session continues, thoughts will intrude projecting your awareness forward into past and future stories displayed to you like widescreen movies. The initial sensations of gently falling back and then expanding front-to-back will begin to distance you from these stories. And, as you repeatedly move your awareness up and down the tube, you’ll likely feel a new sensation that further disconnects you from these mind-made, windscreen stories. If this new sensation could speak, it might say, “Oh, I’m not a movie character out there on a horizontal screen. I’m a vertical being right here.”
Solitary Practice
GETTING STARTED
Choose a setting free from distractions. Sit alone in the dark, or in dim light. Sit with your back relatively straight but comfortable, legs crossed or feet on the floor. A solitary session is a series of intentional breaths. After each intentional breath, allow your breathing to return to its natural rhythm as you continue to feel your inner spaciousness for as long as you can. Yet, no matter how much you focus your awareness on your inner space, the thinking mind will ultimately intrude. At some point you’ll realize that you’re lost in thought. This is the signal to take another intentional breath.
INHALING EASILY
As you inhale, make sure your belly expands fully in all directions without exerting any unneeded pressure. Inhale without using your chest muscles or locking your belly muscles when your inhalation is full. This will allow you to comfortably feel the more focused sensations in the Narrows. During an intentional breath, the mind’s habitual projection can push awareness forward away from the body’s midline. So, as you anchor and then extend your awareness, make sure that you stretch it straight up and then straight down the tube. This will help you feel the Narrows in its true location.
EXHALING PASSIVELY
Inhaling is the active part of the technique. Exhaling is the passive part. As you release your breath and your awareness expands, don’t use any mental effort to interpret or “color” your sensations. With innocent curiosity, surrender to whatever you feel throughout your entire inner space. As your awareness deepens, the area around your eyes may feel more tense or active than the rest of your inner space. If this area attracts your awareness, don’t focus on your eyes or try to relax them. Simply feel this area as part of the overall sensation that’s encompassing your entire inner space.
FRACTURING THOUGHT
When you think, you project visual images. So, feeling the area around your eyes as a part of your inner space pulls your focus back from projected images. This can “fracture” the thoughts that do arise. Some thought fragments may seem like they’re not yours, or that they’re coming from outside of you. This is similar to waking up in the morning when thoughts can seem dreamlike. The difference is that now you’re intentionally choosing to focus on feeling instead of thinking. When you notice how thinking is fracturing, direct your awareness back into feeling your entire inner space.
SHEDDING STRESS
As a session progresses, you may feel spontaneous physical movements as your body sheds tension. Your natural breathing between intentional breaths may become slower and shallower. And your spine may straighten a little on its own. These are the natural results of reducing the stress that builds up when the sense of self is pancaked to the front of the body, or projected out of the body altogether. If you notice such physical effects, just direct awareness back to your inner space. If shallow breathing begins to unsettle the thinking mind, calm it by taking another intentional breath.
CHOOSING SENSATION
After a few sessions you may begin to notice that even when you’re lost in thought, the sensation of energetic spaciousness grows stronger in the background of your awareness. The tables are turned – feeling is intruding on thinking. When you notice this, you have a choice: You can take another intentional breath. Or, you can bring the spacious sensation you’re already feeling into the foreground of your awareness, and allow your current thoughts to fade into the background. You can always take another intentional breath later if thinking intrudes powerfully or for an extended time.
DROPPING DEEP
When you postpone taking an intentional breath in order to drop deeper into the spaciousness you’re already feeling, the technique has served its highest purpose… to disappear. When some individuals “drop deep,” they experience their bodies seeming to dissolve, freeing their awareness to feel like it’s expanding without limit. Some have said that this feels as if they’re radiating like a star. A few have reported these shifts occurring spontaneously without the technique or any intention to practice. Such unexpected shifts in consciousness can last for minutes, sometimes much longer.