Self-inquiry means questioning our thoughts, feelings, perceptions, and physical self-use. We cease assuming that our thoughts, feelings, perceptions and other sensations are necessarily on target or ‘right.’ Instead, we check in with ourselves to clarify, verify, and explore. In this way we can align with a reality that enables choice, improvement and, if desired, change.
People are often surprised to discover how little they know about themselves. We have to stop and think when asked even simple questions like ‘What colors do I like? What makes me happy, sad or angry?’ or in the physical realm, ‘How do I walk, stand, reach, or sleep?’ In other words, what drives or motivates my behavior, actions, and movement?
Our automatic programming is powerful and habitual; it operates without our awareness. Upon examination, it’s as though we live our lives in a dream. We lose our curiosity, joy, our sense of connection to others and to the world around us — and most damaging, we lose our ability to grow freely and learn at the most important levels.
If we sense this absence of freedom and joy, of meaning and authenticity, the age-old existential questions may come up: ‘Who am I? What am I? What am I doing here?’ Then, I may begin to sense that I can separate from the endlessly streaming, mostly random content coming from my monkey mind. I find I am more than my autopilot. I can experience myself differently. For some people, an even brief encounter of this kind will energize a lifelong study.
Self-inquiry can also result from the need to move away from something unpleasant — from physical, mental or emotional pain. It can cause us to explore previously unconsidered methodologies — like prayer, meditation, spiritual movement classes like Qi-Gong, T’ai Chi, certain kinds of yoga, or pragmatic, somatic classes like the Feldenkrais Method that specifically teach body- and self-awareness, using movement as a vehicle for study.
Self-inquiry can lead us to:
- look beyond the narrow range of our habitual movements, thoughts, feelings and reactions; to learn more about myself.
- find a happier, lighter approach to living.
- realize how humans sense only a small percentage of the visible, audible, and vibrational spectra that exist and can be measured.
- the diversity of nature and our almost limitless ability to learn.
- distinguish truth from untruth.
To begin, focusing on the body can be the simplest starting point. Exploring movement habits helps us to see the connection between habitual thought, emotion, and our body, how they weave together to produce tension, pain, discomfort. When stress occurs in life, our chronic pain may increase, movement habits from long ago reappear, and we fall back into old patterns and ways of coping. Including pain.
We are helped by learning to sense our daily activities, observing which movements produce pain or instability, and developing an inner database of information that the brain stores and uses to help us move more efficiently. As our self-awareness increases, everything improves. New, learned movement patterns become embodied.
Here is a beginning exercise to get you started:
1. Sit
or lie quietly and feel the shape and weight of your body, the contact with the
chair or floor, or bed you are resting on. Sense the movement of your breath
and your heart.
2. Begin
to notice what is going through your mind and your emotions. Remember how
wonderful it is to simply identify what you are thinking, feeling, or doing,
how you move, without any judgment at all, just to know, sense, and feel; to be
more neutrally yourself.
3. Imagine
an experience you enjoyed. You can go back in time to childhood, or envision
doing something as an adult; in either case, let go of your self-judgment and
expectations.
4. Visualize
and feel the movements associated with the experience.
5. Notice
how your body and breathing relax as you begin to let go of all the judgment
and stress. Observe yourself without criticism, no matter what your experience
is.
6. Follow
your thoughts, emotions and physical feelings in this neutral way. You can
write them down to help you articulate your experiences, or not. You decide.
