The Power of Awareness for Healing

Those who study the mind say that it can operate on many levels at once, and that it is usually doing so. There is a multilayered functioning that is going on all the time, on levels ranging from hyperaware to pretty much unconscious.

Scientific American has an interesting article on this topic here. 

Can you feel any of those levels in your mind right now? When we think about awareness, we usually think about the unconscious part of the mind, the subconscious and conscious. We will stick with these layers for the purposes of this email.

In the conscious mind, we can turn on our awareness like a flashlight to illuminate areas that may be dim. By doing this, we can help things slide over from the subconscious to the conscious mind. I ask people to use their awareness in this way when we work together in a session.

Your mind is like a beam of light

Some people have  limited awareness of their body. They are not in the habit of tuning in internally. Other people are hypersensitive. Every little thing calls for their attention, distracting and irritating them. I have heard it said that a sign of good health is not having to think about your body. That you can just use your body to do what you want to do. And on one level, I agree.

However there are ways of being aware of the body that are enriching. Feeling deeply in our bodies, and feeling how the external world impacts us internally can be a deep experience, and make us feel more in touch with the earth, ourselves, and other people.

Recently, I was having a session with a patient. I showed her how her pelvis was asymmetrical, asking her to look in the mirror, and feel her hip bones.

When she lay on the table, I could feel how her right shoulder girdle and rib cage were very tight and shifted to one side, and that this was pulling her pelvis. I put my hands on the tight areas and asked my patient to close her eyes and tune into the areas. She was able to feel the tightness. 

I asked her to breathe gently into the area and keep her attention there gently but steadily. By doing this, the tightness began to release. I talked to her about the power of awareness. About how tuning into an area of the body, and becoming aware of it can allow it to change. 

Of course having my hands there and breathing into it helped as well. I find it interesting that when we don’t have any awareness of something it kind of stays in its own space, locked in, not able to change.

But when we can feel it and have some awareness, and perhaps breathe into it, that is in itself enough to let go of holding patterns. 

This is an example of the power of awareness that I use daily and find to be fascinating. I would be interested in hearing of any experiences that you may have had.