I wanted to share something which happened to me as I think it illustrates the connection between mind and body.
I recently suffered from acute back pain. The kind of pain that paralyses you, and in this case, made me pass out. It was the culmination of an extremely stressful week, both physically and emotionally.
I had not been very nice to my back throughout the years, as my job in the film industry was very demanding physically. A regular Tai Chi practice was actually the only thing that helped and kept my back supple and healthy.
I had a similar bout of sharp back pain once before. In that case I was bed-ridden for a few weeks, unable to move without causing intense pain.
What both cases had in common was an intense emotional charge. In both cases life-altering changes were threatening my sense of self. In both cases unacknowledged emotional currents were ramping up. And those emotional charges needed to express themselves somehow.
The back pain, and the paralysis, were simply the way the body expressed the emotions that were being carried. My back was the instrument, mostly because it was the weakest link in my body.
We often make the mistake of separating what is happening “in-here” ( the head, the heart) with what’s “out-there” ( the body, our relationships). Truth is, there is no break. There is no line you can point to where a thought ends and physical response begins. The thought IS a physical response.
In Traditional Chinese Medicine, psychological troubles are always treated first as physical problems. Part of the idea is that emotional imbalances cause a physical disturbance, so treating the physical disturbance protects the body while minimizing the emotional trauma.
This is similar to Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, where life-management tools are learned before dealing with the root of the problem.
If we don’t have access to a doctor skilled in Traditional Chinese modalities, we need to become our own doctors. We need to treat ourselves, the whole of us. Mind, body, community, everything that makes us who we are.
The mind is dark and full of terrors. We can meditate, but that will not end the subconscious thoughts that swim in the darkness of the mind.
We need a body that is healthy enough to express those fears and anxieties, without breaking. That means a healthy body, but also a healthy practice, which allows the body to move, to burn off the nervous energies, as well as relax and vent the negative vibes we’ve accumulated.
We also need a healthy community, a group or even a single loved one, who can be trusted to help, to be there, to be a mirror or a balm. Just as we are not separated between mind and body, we are not separated between “I” and “You”. We are shaped by our relationships, molded by our teachers and friends, sharpened by our adversaries.
I’m going to go out and wave a sword around, do a little Tai Chi, get back into my body after being bed-ridden. Shake this off. I’m also going to kiss someone I love. ‘Tis the season after all.
Take care of yourselves.