"The mind in itself
is not dysfunctional.
It is a wonderful tool.
Dysfunction sets in when you
seek yourself in it
and mistake it for who you are."
Eckhart Tolle,
Author of The Power of Now.
Oprah asked the question of Eckhart Tolle, “When you are gripped by the pain body, how do you get out of its grip?” Eckhart tells Oprah that we are to bring our awareness into the body. At the moment we bring awareness to the pain body, we stop identification with the pain body. The pain body is then contained.
This is easier said than done when the pain body catches you! Even when there is no pain body, if we bring awareness into the body we can still feel the residue of the pain body. The pain body is without doubt, a formidable foe.
What is the pain body?
The pain body is an accumulation of our conditioning coupled with intense emotional reaction. Conditioning is the ego, and emotions are energy. The pain body is ego + energy. When we experience pain body it feels real. We respond to it as if it were the truth with a capital “T”.
If you examine the pain body closely you will see that it is simply energy that is uncomfortable. When we are in the pain body we experience it as much more than just uncomfortable energy. It feels as real as anything in our lives.
The way to break the cycle of pain body is to bring consciousness into your body. Bringing consciousness or awareness into your body is learning to live in the interior of your body. This is difficult because our conditioning has most of us living in “thinking” and not in the body.
The more you practice bringing consciousness or awareness into the interior of your body the less identified you become with the pain body and the easier it gets to
live in the now moment. But what about the times you are gripped by an emotion?
*The following are two techniques to resolve pain body.
Feeling into the core is a technique that goes slightly beyond bringing consciousness or awareness to the pain body. Feeling into the core is bringing awareness directly down into the energy of the pain body and permanently resolving it.
Typically we go in the opposite direction of feeling into the core of pain body. When we are triggered into our pain body we scramble up into our thinking to find a strategy or solution to “fix” or “survive” the discomfort. If we can’t find a solution or strategy then we look to our circumstances (people places and things) to feel better. Oftentimes when we go to our thinking or our circumstances to resolve the energy of the pain body things get worse.
When we go into the opposite direction by feeling into the core of the energy of the pain body we experience the illusionary nature of the pain body. Feeling into the core is to bring your awareness straight down into the core of the energy that is creating discomfort and a feeling in to it so completely that it naturally dissolves.
When the pain body dissolves, in the absence of the energy there is peace.
This peace is the “present now”, the truth of who you are.
A second technique is to bring your awareness to the energy of the pain body.
When you are at the energy, notice it as energy. Drop any story or thought about it other than just energy. Then go to the center of the energy and follow it out to the perimeter of the energy. Now bring your attention just beyond the perimeter where you will notice a vast space. Then bring your awareness and drop into the vast space. You will notice a deep silence. Allow yourself to merge with the qualities of that space. Once you merge with this space, look back that the energy and you'll notice that the pain body energy is less intense. The energy will loose its meaning. This technique is a way to dis-identify with the pain body and reemerge with the truth of who you are, the fully alive peace within the now moment.
The more you use these two simple techniques the more pain body resolves. In the beginning these simple techniques appear difficult because our conditioning tells us to stay away from discomfort. As time passes, and as you become proficient at resolving pain body, you'll notice that it will be difficult to find emotional discomfort.
Coaching is a way to help you practice this inner work until you become proficient.
If you have a ½ hour a week, and a willingness to resolve the pain body, then the coaching package that I have developed to specifically resolving pain body is for you.
In our ½ hour phone sessions, I will coach you in using these two simple techniques (plus other simple techniques) to resolve the pain body.
The pain body would convince you that it isn’t that easy to resolve. I would say – yes, it is easy than you can imagine! To learn more about the coaching package to resolve pain body and other coaching packages click here.