The Spiritual Body: a contemplation of the physical form
It's apparent to me at this point that my spirituality is taking a primary position in my life. The interest that others have shown regarding my private practice, as well as the manifested results of my contemplations, have made this a reality.
But I feel stuck. What was once a playful and fluid practice has become something more concrete and worthy of establishment, however it requires of me something I never had to do before. To ask the questions: (1) what is the purpose of my path?, (2) who is and is not best suited for this calling?, (3) what is my relationship to darkness and to light?, (4) what do I desire from the unknown?, and so on.
Most importantly, I feel compelled to create a kind of identity for my spirituality. Having an elevator speech for it is a bit much, but at the same time having a quick couple of sentences I can tell someone when they ask about my beliefs seems useful. I feel compelled to create a structure for it, a kind of showcase.
Something not meant to challenge established religions, but to establish parallels with my own practice that I hadn't previously recognized.
This project isn't something that's going to fit in a single post of course. So in that regard, there is something I want to focus on first. And in all honesty, it may be the foundation for all that comes after.
The body.
So often, our tangible existence is overlooked in the context of the spiritual. Many view it as a form that can only hold disease and the cumulative weight of our transgressions. In my study it seemed that many religions preach a removal or a transcending from one's body. It feels like there's a great push to move beyond one's body to join entirely in the realm of the spirit via the mind. Many people say that the optimal path joins the body, mind and the spirit together, but I feel that the body is often left behind.
As I write this, though, I wonder if there is some symbiosis between the body and the spirit. Being that I believe in a conceptual spirit world that exists alongside our own, I wonder if it is a natural thing while we are incarnate to be hyper-focused on the spirit. Perhaps in the moment after death our spirit contemplates the absence of its body in the sensations it can't experience without one.
Maybe this is one of the many balances between life and death. It makes me think there could be something to offering up food and drink to spirits but I'm getting off topic.
I believe that the body is my primary temple and site of communion with all that is sacred. It is my responsibility to care for my body, to listen to it, and to create with it. It is more than just a tool for me to pilot and I wonder sometimes if it is experiencing life in ways that I actually can't perceive. If there are some mysteries that my body keeps from my mind and spirit, I couldn't be surprised.
There are things that my body must be able to do independently of my mind: chemical reactions, cellular functions, the private workings of each organ system. While I perceive myself as a singular entity, I wonder that my physical body may see itself more as an ecosystem full of forests and rivers, peaks and valleys. In this way, I might see myself as a snow globe, and I'm viewing myself from the outside in. I can see only what the physical limitations and boundaries allow me to see, but the world within is foreign. And it moves independently of my consciousness.
I wonder that my body may share secrets with my spirit, tidbits of information that I'm not prepared to know consciously. Perhaps the connection between body and spirit is what allows for dreams, and the worlds that I enter when I am asleep are entirely the result of the joining of my body and spirit. It could even be the case that this symbiosis between body and spirit prepares me for the milestones of life that I may not yet be aware of, the way a body knows it must grow, the way a spirit knows it must evolve, the mind must also learn.
So, for me the body is foundational. It is the center of my understanding of my spirit and how it moves within me, and it is my mind's focal point. Everything that I do and everything that I think orbits around the sensations that I experience and the fulfillment of my physical needs.
The abstract concepts that evolve from my contemplation of these sensations and needs push my awareness out beyond me to ask what are the needs of the bodies of others, and is it also my responsibility — if I am able — to to provide for those needs. How should I respond when someone transgresses my physical body and my ability to sustain it?
Essentially, what is the concept of justice — rooted in the physical sensation of peace or serenity that I can experience — which can help me understand both the chaotic violence of the physical world and the universal laws by which my actions may still be judged?
As I wind down this post, I feel that I have more questions than answers. Maybe that's typical of spiritual discourse but it isn't satisfying. What would I say if someone asked me what I believed in?
I would say: I believe that the body is sacred, I believe that the mind's judgments should be respected but taken with a grain of salt, and I believe that there is no end to possibility in the realm of the spirit. I believe that the forms that life can take are much stranger and ephemeral then we more stable life forms may ever understand, and I am beginning to understand that life itself is more like a dark fairy tale than a decaying machine.
However our ending comes — if indeed it ever will — is entirely the result of the steps we choose to take. Our body, the center of our universe, acts as guide and witness, and returns to the Earth — to be earth — when we are ready to part.
