Authentic Living (Truth)

Authenticity comes from the Greek and originally meant, “to do something oneself,” to have a sense that one’s actions and feelings are one’s own. A person who truly expresses himself or herself through feelings and thoughts is considered “authentic” in contrast to one who is alienated from what he or she expresses. Authenticity therefore requires us to take responsibility over our lives.

Authentic living is disrupted when there is isolation of human living from its ecological habitat. Harvard Scientist and Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Edward Wilson stresses that all humans have an innate urge to affiliate with other life forms, and a biological need towards the natural environment. For humans to truly reclaim their life, it is crucial to live in harmony with nature and reconnect to our natural rhythms that are facilitated through nature. The primary experience of nature has been substituted for television and computers, creating an over emphasis of secondary experience which is limited to vision and sound. The natural environment acts as a strong foundation for our sensory freedom, which allows for creative, spontaneous experiences to occur. When we are not in contact with nature, we begin to limit our development and healthy growth as a species.

(Felt) Experience + Awareness=TRUTH=Freedom

As a graduate student of somatic psychology, I questioned how we can share this profound, but simple knowledge, and how can we do it in an efficient and graceful way. J. Krishnamurti spoke of the need for communication to be as simple as possible if we want to work together as a global community solving our problems. The words in which we use in our daily life seem to offer more significance and resonate deeper.

The heart of somatic psychology seeks the cultivation of consciousness in the individual through the development of heightened awareness of one’s experience. When this occurs, the body is more capable of choices that support full functioning as a whole organismic being, thus living in truth, which thereby results in freedom. The journey to freedom begins while tuning in to the experience and fully being present to whatever is happening at that exact moment. When we check into the present moment, asking, “What am I feeling right now?” we can cultivate awareness. Checking in requires us to turn the attention inside and track our sensations, energies, and thought patterns that are occurring right now. When we allow ourselves to completely feel everything, without premature discrimination or judgment, we take responsibility, and this empowers us to resolve the obstruction of energy flow. This sense of owning breathes depth into the direct experience, allowing for insight to occur. Allowing yourself to feel the direct experience allows the healing to occur. This is not new knowledge; it is simply a new knowing.

Human awareness occurs during an experience of time and space when attention is given simultaneously to thought (concept) and sensation (feeling and emotion). Unfortunately, we as human beings fragment our lives in a way that tends to recognize only one aspect of our experience. Our somatic form is, “a process and an ongoing movement comprised of two inter-related and simultaneous aspects that we call mind and body”. Awareness is the perception of this process and is the source of our sense of feeling alive. When we have a greater sense of awareness, we lose our belief systems and judgments about others, and ourselves causing an opening, an expansion for movement and change to occur. The important ingredient for this cultivation of awareness is the ability to pay attention without attempting to control or analyze the experience that is happening. When this occurs we witness a natural unfolding and tune into our life force. When this happens, we realize we are truth. Truth is inseparable from who we are. When we are in our natural state, all of our relationships and actions will reflect this truth. From this, we gain a deeper sense of our oneness with all of life; this in itself is love. Therefore, acceptance of the awareness of the experience as it is unfolding is the truth.

Cultural Conditioning

As a culture, it seems as though we must unlearn our conditioning and reawaken into sensuous beings that are fully alive. Don Hanlon Johnson states, “The supple newborn can be trained in mechanical behavior so that once grown up it will react to its world predictably and passively, buying the right products and voting for the right candidates. Shaping the flesh becomes crucially important in the organization and maintenance of power”. Developing a clear awareness of how we relate to our environment is essential to reclaiming our authority and our authentic individuality.

We are living in an age where reality television seems to fuel our conversations and sedate us to sleep at night. We fixate on other people’s lives and stories as a way to avoid looking at our own life. Perhaps if we consciously wake up and taste our lives without the past history, cultural conditioning, or what our expectations for the future are, we will be left with the here-and-now. We can examine belief systems as, “an edifice of thoughts, feelings and actions that give us a misleading sense of what is “really real”. These stories are constantly told and retold, so that we become defined by the stories as they offer us a sense of security. The only way to feel the truth of our lived experience is to release ourselves from this self-imposed systematic belief system, dissolve our deluded ambitions, and experience the divinity, the Holy Spirit, that is within each of us. When we go within, nothing is left except our senses sensing only our senses. It is argued that only when we can truthfully feel everything we are experiencing in our highly diseased state of being can we be set free, because this numbed stated of being is unsatisfying. When we are in a state of whole organismic functioning, our awareness allows us to experience a continuous rhythmic contraction and expansion of our whole being at all times, thus feeling a part of all of life.

The term, “waking up” has been floating abstractly through our language, conjuring images of a fluttering, utopic feeling of a planet on the edge of something better. In conversation we exchange the latest facts that make this “waking up” more concrete. Concern of the environment, and a new “green” language has developed. Concern over our political system has developed, and new “conscious politics” slogans have been thrown around. We value this “waking up” state as something that is happening or something that is about to occur throughout the larger global family. Yet, with this language, we once again are trapped by the narrowness of our mind adapting new belief systems and allowing the authority to shift from something “less conscious” to something that seems “more conscious”.

Anthropologists have defined culture as, “ a collection of learned survival strategies passed on to our young through teaching and modeling”. Convinced that we must pass the “baton” of our ways onto the next generations, we pound in our systematic way of living, and tell children that it’s for their “own good”. Children are herded through the system: college, marriage, mortgage, babies, 401K’s and then, finally, it’s time to retire. It is thought that at retirement, it is acceptable to then start truly “living” without society’s pressures of what living should look like. It is evident when culture has such a strong effect on our development, it is difficult to understand that we must actually rise above the techniques we learned for survival purposes; thus the paradox is that only when we lose our life can we begin to find it. As we mature and start questioning culture’s effect, we realize that we do in fact have a choice. It is asking ourselves, do we want to contract or expand energy to move into or withdraw from the world?

Adler states that this change in consciousness must be embodied:

“ It is in our bodies where the phenomenon of life energy, a physical reality, is directly experienced. One by one, knowing (and knowing implies consciousness), knowing in our bodies that we belong, creates a collective body in which life energy is shared. I imagine that the collective body as the energetic consciousness of the earthbody, which includes all living beings. It is the body-felt connectedness among people, profoundly related to the source of our humanity. Becoming conscious of our part in the whole through direct experience of membership allows exploration of the relationship between the personal body and the collective body. (Adler, 1994/1999: 4-5)

Use of Narrative: Stories, Film, and Gatherings

Our ancient ancestors used to gather around the sacred fire and simply just be with each other. They didn’t have religious, scientific or psychological words and catch phrases to bounce around. In this “beingness”, stories would unfold, songs were sung and a heightened awareness of one’s experience was nursed through the witnessing of another. These stories acted as an effective medium for teaching and learning, and profound truths about life naturally unfolded. Families would sit together for the sole purpose of listening to each other. In modern times we may be disconnected from the wisdom that has been traditionally passed down from one generation to the next. The quiet moments of learning from another and the sense of togetherness have subsided.

Instead, we look to what is more easily accessible such as reality television and celebrities. We eagerly read their interviews, look at pictures of them shopping in tabloids, wanting to connect or resonate to a part of them and see ourselves reflected back. Instead, we often use the illusion of celebrities to judge imperfections and failings within ourselves or cast judgment onto them. This judgment registers in the heart as a disruption of relationship, causing one to shift from relational to defensive. Our world as we perceive it has been altered and we are cut off from functioning fully.

We are now beginning to understand the neuroscience of the use of storytelling. Daniel Siegel proposes “that narratives that make sense of life emerge out of a blending of the left-mode drive to explain and the right-mode storage of autobiographical, social, and emotional information. A coherent narrative, one that makes sense of life experiences, may emerge from a flexible blending of left and right modes of processing.” Each side of our brain perceives and processes information differently, thus contributing to an integrated whole. When this neural information is properly passed between the two hemispheres, we are able to function at a higher level. Use of narrative allows for free interchange between these hemispheres. The right mode has a more integrated sense of the body and awareness to raw emotions; therefore it specializes in autobiographical information. The left mode specializes in linear, logical and language based processing. When one tells a story we must draw upon both sides of our brain. For example, if we rely solely on right brain processing we may become immersed in our bodily and emotional aspects of a story.

We are bombarded with self-help books, people telling us what do think or say as was discussed in cultural conditioning. Witnessing another’s life at an intimate, truthful level can be an effortless way to bring a greater understanding into our own lives. We begin to see ourselves reflected back from that person, possibly finding new perspectives or hidden truths along the way. As a transition to reclaiming our lives back, what if we could witness a “shift” occurring in another’s consciousness?

Neuroscientists have recently discovered mirror neurons, which are found in various parts of the brain. Due to the unique development of the neocortex and language function, humans are capable of assuming the perspective of the other person. This is a great scientific insight into our evolution. Marc Iacoboni, the discoverer of mirror neurons in humans and his colleagues are exploring how mirror neurons function in transmitting aspects of social and emotional life cross culturally. This emotional understanding of others is directly linked to our own understanding and cultivation of awareness within ourselves.

This witnessing of a “shift” in someone else may likely cause something to “shift” in ourselves, which may begin create a profound opening to occur. There is no specific experience for this shift to occur. It doesn’t solely happen on top of sacred mountains, temples or after hours of meditation. Narratives prove to us the diversity of all of our experiences, while our truths can be reached doing the mundane, random, unpredictable ordinary tasks of life. The use of narratives allows for the creation of a bridge from our own direct experience to the universal, connecting our individual life with the universe as a whole. Hearing other’s narratives clearly remind us of our own possibilities and potential. We have an overriding feeling, that we truly are all in this together, which invites us to awaken to the unknown. When we hear narratives of “regular” people we are reminded that ability to function at a higher consciousness are not solely reachable by a select minority of individuals that have access to great teachers and therapies. We realize that everything that we need to exist as fully whole functioning, free human beings, already lies within us. Author Linda Hartley writes that as our personal stories are shared:

“Magical things occur that show us that without a doubt that we are in some mysterious way all connected to each other, and the world in which we live-that our personal stories, unfolding through movement and sound, interact and evolve in ways that support each person’s developing consciousness and healing, whilst also embodying a greater story in which we all play a special part. The interweaving of personal stories in a spontaneous and synchronistic embodiment creates a larger story, when each mover honestly and courageously expresses her own direct and embodied experience of the moment.” (p.67).

Moksha (Total Freedom)

Our own human suffering overwhelms the natural pulsation of the earth, disengaging us from our natural state as a way to dissociate from our pain. We may compensate by engaging ourselves into a deepening distraction of work, study, frenetic play and material accumulation. We hide behind the hustle and bustle; we allow our ego to gloss over, so that no one sees our pain. This numbness may initially work, disconnecting us from our source, yet the life force begins to blast through the defenses and insist on being lived.

The evolution of human beings allowed us to rise from our “auto pilot” of the subconscious mind to a sense of “manual control” of our creative, conscious mind. The conscious mind allows us to observe behaviors as they occur, thus providing us with free will, no longer victims of our programming. The greatest hiccup we come to is to realize the freedoms we dream about are merely limitations we’ve acquired from the subconscious. These limitations trickle into our behavior, physiology and health.

Feeling everything as a compassionate witness, without the mindless chatter and judgment. One sees the “game” that we have been conditioned to play in, and sees the way that the soul is prevented from growing and simply being itself. True freedom isn’t about what it looks like on the outside, but what arises within. When freedom occurs at that visceral level, there is no option of falling back to sleep and accepting cultural conditionings-social, political, economic, they seem merely superficial.

To truly free ourselves, we must continue cultivating our awareness, which in many cases will cause conflict. This new “alertness” produces a disturbance, rather than escaping this feeling, we can stay with it, and something begins to “shift”. We think differently, creatively, and that very thinking is eternity. When we truly go inside, when we are able to fully feel the truth of our existence, no one or nothing can imprison us again. Freedom is simply being fully open and feeling life as it is, when we live this way we cannot free another, we can only exist in our truth and this effortlessly lights the ways for others.

Collective Consciousness

When one feels they are only but a soul entrapped in a corpse, there is automatic separation from others, especially if they look different or have different belief systems. This false sense of separation and social negation of life creates isolation, tension and segregation, resulting in conflict, unjust wars, and loss of life. It is only when we can reconnect to our breath, breathe in the same air, plant our feet on the ground with the same gravitational pull, feel the same sunlight penetrate our skin and surrender to the shared bodily existence only then can we heal our collective consciousness. Nurturing our inner core provides us with a state of grounding. Keleman describes grounding as being anchored in the physical-psychic growth processes. When we separate this bodymind it can be compared to trees that are uprooted from the earth; they lose their nourishment, support, and ability to grow.

We have spent many years searching outside ourselves for answers that will make us feel more comfortable. This has caused an undeniable corruption of humanity’s spirit, a global family that is lost in confusion and despair.

In my own experience, over the years as I have delved into my own self awareness and exploration of truth, my cells would dance vigorously as I read the newest research or the latest book, singing to me that this deep rooted knowledge was and always had been within me. They danced with gratitude and freedom and the pulsation expanded into my lived experience. Often I would recommend a book to a friend or email a great quote or statistic, but eventually this began to feel as if I was intruding. Living in culture of information-overload, this too became quite daunting and overwhelming for my friends to sift through. Our chattering minds distract us from our own innate wisdom. The business and busyness of our daily lives assist us to live in our heads and allow past doctrines, beliefs and dogma to govern our existence. In actuality, most people don’t want to know their internal state and may fear the intensity of their sensations, so willingly or unconsciously turn away. I came to the conclusion that the best way that I could serve this world was to just simply live my truth. To allow what I had studied and practiced to penetrate so deeply that it naturally overflowed my body and expanded into the world.

With a world that is undergoing a quite dramatic and fast paced shift, there is a need for this type of information to be distributed to the entire global family in a creative, spontaneous, intelligent manner. Eckart Tolle writes of the beauty of people he calls “frequency holders”. People who generate consciousness through the way they live their lives. This can be seen through their interactions with others and their sense of “just being” in being present in whatever they do. Tolle states that this opening of stillness they create just by being in the world, has a profound affect on our global consciousness.

Simple Feeling of Being

(I often look at this quote from Ken Wilber and it continues to inspire me of the importance of making this film)


“And so: given the measure of your own authentic realization, you were actually thinking about gently whispering into the ear of that near-deaf world? No, my friend, you must shout. Shout from the heart of what you have seen, shout however you can… Let it start here, right now, with us- with you and me-and with our commitment to breathe into infinity until infinity alone is the only statement the world will recognize. Let a radical realization shine from our faces, and roar from our hearts, and thunder from our brains-this simple fact: that you, in the very immediateness of your present awareness, are in fact the entire world, in all its frost and fever, in all its glories and its grace, in all its triumphs and tears. You do not see the sun, you are the sun; you do not hear the rain, you are the rain; you do not feel the earth, you are the earth. And in that simple, clear, unmistakable regard, translation has ceased in all domains, and you have transformed into the very Heart of the Kosmos Itself-and there, right there, very simply, very quietly, it is all undone.”

(Ken Wilber, “The Simple Feeling of Being”)

*I took out my in text citations to match the blog style flow.

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