To make the heart retreat long enough so that the body, which perhaps has reached a fever pitch, can “release” sensation. And yet we must not be too quick to believe that this “urgency,” and this “release,” this fever pitch, this demandingness, belong to the body alone. For the separation between the body and mind is unnatural. The body speaks the language of the soul. In the body’s fevered longing is perhaps a deep desire for that part of the self which has been sacrificed, a desire for that self to come to consciousness, to be remembered. For an experience of the heart is also an experience of the mind. The body and heart cry out like a long neglected child, pleading, “Pay attention to me.” pg. 86
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Sense of Urgency
I have felt a sense of urgency for quite some time now. Actually ever since I read "Ishmael", which has been close to ten years now. I ran across these words in "Pornography and Silence", by Susan Griffin that I think explains the mechanics behind this sense of urgency I feel every morning.
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It is amazing that unlike the intellect, the body does not really feel a separation between it and the world. It lives in second level awareness, where everything is connected. The denial of that in our culture- and within ourselves - is the westerner's greatest tragedy.
Pornography is an interesting example of the typical relationship to the body-mind that most westerners have. They approach food and sex often in much the same way, filling the hole they feel inside by trying to fulfill every want as soon as possible so as to silence the awareness within them. Both food and sex can carry human beings beyond their perceived limitations, but these powers are almost unknown in modern times.
Horniness and hunger aren't necessarily biological needs. In our culture, I would argue that they rarely are! Instead, they are overt symptoms of our deeper seeded issues of needing to relieve stress and connect to the world.
I will be blunt...
Good sex for me is when I can't tell where my body ends and my wife's begins. When bringing pleasure to her is what pleasures me most. These are bodily experiences, not ideal words. Selfishness subsides, because the body awareness is allowed to come through and our sense of intellectually-created separation is pulled back or set aside.
Food for me is like that as well. The best food is the food that causes me not just to fill my belly, but that brightens my senses. Often really good food causes my senses to cross and meld, even to the point of synethesia. And great food is enjoyed not just in the eating, but in the preparation and even anticipation! The best meats, vegetables and fruits are those in which I can literally taste the stories of their lives... the soil they come from, the sunshine, the grass that was eaten and so on.
Good food, like good sex connects us to the larger world. Reminds us that we are not separate, but part of something much bigger.
It is no wonder we long for something more, when these basic needs never actually fulfill their natural functions...
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