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Authors: Dennis Lewis
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reality of the moment.
6 Include your breath
As you continue to work in this way, and as your inner attention becomes stronger and more stable, include your breath in your awareness. Follow your breath. Sense any movements or sensations associated with it. Let yourself really feel these movements of inhalation and exhalation, as well as their limitations and restrictions, in the context of the whole sensation of your body. Notice how your breathing influences your sensation of yourself. Don’t try to change anything. Work in this way for 15 minutes or longer. You may want to try this practice morning and night for a week or two before continuing on.
AWAKENING ORGANIC SELF-AWARENESS
As we pointed out in the first chapter, our breath has an influence on all our major organs. Most of us, however, have little awareness of our inner organs. Few of us even know their locations in our body, and our doctors don’t seem to have much interest in showing us. It wasn’t until I reached my late forties that I even knew the difference between my small and large intestines, and where they were located. If you are one of those readers who is not familiar with the location of your organs, take a look at Figure 11 . Study it carefully, seeing if you can sense the approximate location of the organs in your body.
As you undertake this work of organic self-awareness, it is important to recognize that though the internal organs and tissues are well supplied with nerves, the sensations in these areas are not as strong as sensations closer to the surface of the body, especially the skin. Pain in a particular organ, for example, is often “referred” by spinal nerve segments to other locations, so that it appears that the pain is coming from near the skin.
Figure 11
For example, though it is well known that problems with the heart are often first felt in the arms, shoulders, and neck, it is not quite so well known that the uterus and pancreas refer pain to the lumbar region; the kidneys, to the groin area; and the diaphragm, to the shoulders.
PRACTICE
1 Visualize and sense your internal organs
Sit in the basic sitting posture. Visualize and sense the location of each of your internal organs. As you attempt to sense your organs, use your hands when possible to rub or probe around them. Start with the easiest organ to sense: the small intestine (in the area of the navel). Then move on to your liver (on the right side of the rib cage), and to your stomach, pancreas, and spleen (all more or less on the left side of the rib cage). Then sense your colon, your large intestine. (The colon extends from the end of the small intestine near the right hip bone up the right side of the abdomen and loops around to the liver area behind the ribs on the right side of the trunk. It then crosses the front of the body somewhere between the sternum and the navel, loops around behind the ribs on the left side of the trunk, and drops down toward the left hip. Near the left hip it angles toward the center of the body and turns into the rectum.) Now bring your attention to your heart (more or less in the center of your chest), your lungs (on each side of the heart), and your kidneys (protected by the lowest ribs on each side of the midback). As you touch these areas gently with your hands, feel the muscles and tissues around the organs begin to relax. Spend at least a couple of minutes sensing each area.
2 Sense the outer movements of your breath
Next, put your hands over the lower part of your chest, with the bottom edge of each hand touching the bottom of the lowest ribs, and the tips of the middle fingers touching each other at the bottom of the sternum. This is the area where the front of the diaphragm is attached to the ribs. The center portion of the diaphragm is actually higher, approximately at the level of the nipples. Observe your breathing. See if you can sense which way the diaphragm moves as you inhale and exhale.
6 Include your breath
As you continue to work in this way, and as your inner attention becomes stronger and more stable, include your breath in your awareness. Follow your breath. Sense any movements or sensations associated with it. Let yourself really feel these movements of inhalation and exhalation, as well as their limitations and restrictions, in the context of the whole sensation of your body. Notice how your breathing influences your sensation of yourself. Don’t try to change anything. Work in this way for 15 minutes or longer. You may want to try this practice morning and night for a week or two before continuing on.
AWAKENING ORGANIC SELF-AWARENESS
As we pointed out in the first chapter, our breath has an influence on all our major organs. Most of us, however, have little awareness of our inner organs. Few of us even know their locations in our body, and our doctors don’t seem to have much interest in showing us. It wasn’t until I reached my late forties that I even knew the difference between my small and large intestines, and where they were located. If you are one of those readers who is not familiar with the location of your organs, take a look at Figure 11 . Study it carefully, seeing if you can sense the approximate location of the organs in your body.
As you undertake this work of organic self-awareness, it is important to recognize that though the internal organs and tissues are well supplied with nerves, the sensations in these areas are not as strong as sensations closer to the surface of the body, especially the skin. Pain in a particular organ, for example, is often “referred” by spinal nerve segments to other locations, so that it appears that the pain is coming from near the skin.
Figure 11
For example, though it is well known that problems with the heart are often first felt in the arms, shoulders, and neck, it is not quite so well known that the uterus and pancreas refer pain to the lumbar region; the kidneys, to the groin area; and the diaphragm, to the shoulders.
PRACTICE
1 Visualize and sense your internal organs
Sit in the basic sitting posture. Visualize and sense the location of each of your internal organs. As you attempt to sense your organs, use your hands when possible to rub or probe around them. Start with the easiest organ to sense: the small intestine (in the area of the navel). Then move on to your liver (on the right side of the rib cage), and to your stomach, pancreas, and spleen (all more or less on the left side of the rib cage). Then sense your colon, your large intestine. (The colon extends from the end of the small intestine near the right hip bone up the right side of the abdomen and loops around to the liver area behind the ribs on the right side of the trunk. It then crosses the front of the body somewhere between the sternum and the navel, loops around behind the ribs on the left side of the trunk, and drops down toward the left hip. Near the left hip it angles toward the center of the body and turns into the rectum.) Now bring your attention to your heart (more or less in the center of your chest), your lungs (on each side of the heart), and your kidneys (protected by the lowest ribs on each side of the midback). As you touch these areas gently with your hands, feel the muscles and tissues around the organs begin to relax. Spend at least a couple of minutes sensing each area.
2 Sense the outer movements of your breath
Next, put your hands over the lower part of your chest, with the bottom edge of each hand touching the bottom of the lowest ribs, and the tips of the middle fingers touching each other at the bottom of the sternum. This is the area where the front of the diaphragm is attached to the ribs. The center portion of the diaphragm is actually higher, approximately at the level of the nipples. Observe your breathing. See if you can sense which way the diaphragm moves as you inhale and exhale.
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