Bodymind Exercises

First of all, I suggest you acquire a "journal": A notebook of some kind where you can write down any discoveries you make as you try out some of these ideas.

Having a personal journal can be a useful support on the days when we feel that we are almost going "backwards". On these days, we tend to forget the discoveries we have made, and the accumulated knowledge about ourselves that is actually there.

This is not a question of trying to follow some ideal way of living. Each one of us must find our own solution. There are, however, some basic tools and techniques that work for a lot of people. There is a lot of information here, and you don't need to do all the exercises or even read this whole chapter. Glance through the headings and see which areas appeal to you and leave the rest.

AWARENESS EXERCISES

There is a quality that I can best describe as "Life-Joy" that seems to boost our immune system and keep us healthy. Feeling life-joy is not the same as being "happy". It is the ability to feel and express all of our emotions. An aliveness of body, emotions, mind and spirit.

To feel this aliveness we need to be closely connected to our body and senses. We need to be aware of what goes on inside us. Often we think one thing, feel something different, speak something else and act in a completely different way. We are confused and in total conflict and wonder why we are not healthy and feel good about ourselves.

When we are very small, we know what feels good and what doesn't, and what we want and don't want. But over time we learn to listen to other people's judgements, and we begin to trust them more than our own senses.

The following exercises are all designed to expand your inner awareness and increase your life-joy:

Sense your body

Lie down, close your eyes and feel your body touching the floor or mattress.

Notice which parts of your body move as you breathe.

Allow your attention to wander very slowly through your entire body from the inside.

How much of yourself can you contact in this way? Are there parts that you can feel quite clearly, and other parts that feel dull or blank?

Do some parts of your body feel lighter, or larger, or warmer than others?

Take your time with this exercise, and afterwards write down in your journal what you have discovered.

If you repeat this exercise over some time, you will become more and more aware of your body sensations. You may also begin to feel pleasurable tingling sensations, which you can then imagine spreading throughout your whole body.

The Inner Smile

Lie down and allow your body to relax.

Relax your jaw and open your mouth a bit.

Close your eyes and breathe slowly and deeply, feeling as light and peaceful as you can.

Now let an inner smile start deep within you, and let it slowly spread through your whole body, so it fills all of your body and mind.

Let the smile unfold like a big, beautiful flower, and sense the colour and scent all around you.

This is a very nice exercise to do when you wake up in the morning. You can repeat it during the day any time you might feel heavy, tense, in pain or sad.

Staying in the Now

The following exercises are to train your senses. The only way we can experience is through our senses, and sharper senses give us deeper experiences.

A. Choose any one or more of everyday activities (e.g. cooking, washing your hair,

brushing your teeth, etc.) and invest all of your awareness in what you are doing:

smell, feel, taste, see what it looks like, listen to the sounds etc.

Be there totally with whatever you are doing.

Find other things that you can explore in this way.

B. Choose something that you normally find boring to do.

Now turn this into an experience of aliveness by activating all of your senses,

bringing a new awareness into the situation.

What do you experience?

C. Eat a meal with this same awareness. Keep your focus on your senses all the time: taste it, feel it in your mouth, smell it, look at it - even listen to it!

Doing nothing

Sit down in a place where you can be undisturbed for about half an hour.

Sit with your back straight and with closed or very soft eyes.

Sit very still - your body totally without any movement, breathing very quietly.

Sit as if you were waiting for something you don't even know what is.

Something will come into your awareness - wait for it.

Simply observe, feel and listen. Sense what it is like to be totally receptive.

Centering

It sometimes helps to feel more balanced and centered in ourselves when we focus our attention at a point in our abdomen, about 5 cm below our navel.

Place your hand on this spot. (If you stick your thumb against your navel, your hand will automatically rest in the exact place).

Breathe into this place, and let your attention rest here.

Imagine a shining ball of light under your hand, and that this ball of light represents very strong and powerful energy.

When you focus your awareness in this "power point", you will be able to manage more, you will have more energy available for whatever you want to do, and your body will feel more co-ordinated.

BREATHING EXERCISES

It is extremely important how we breathe. Through our breath we can come deeper into ourselves so that it is easier to know what we feel and what we need. We will also become aware that our breathing changes all the time - and why.

Whenever we feel threatened, physically or emotionally, our breathing is immediately affected. We simply stop breathing – at least partly. This is a normal pattern, thousands of years old, and it prepares us to run away from the wild animal or fight it. And even though we don’t meet that many wild animals on the footpath any more, our body still reacts when anything makes us feel insecure – whether it is an exam that threatens us, an important meeting or a visit to the dentist.

We do it all the time – hold our breath. Many times every day – and most of the time we are not even aware of it happening. I mostly feel it when I get busy and a bit ”stressed”. When I realize that I’ve stopped breathing, I say to myself ”Let go” – and automatically a spontaneous deep breath happens, and I can continue what I was doing, feeling much better. Try it. Maybe you need to say some other words to your body, så try it out and notice what works for you.

Feel what happens

Stand on the floor and stretch your arms out in front of you.

Breathe deeply – and feel how relaxed you are.

Still holding your arms out in front of you, now feel what happens to your breathing if you stretch both your thumbs upwards. Can you feel that you suddenly hold back your breath?

It takes that little for your breath to change and hold back.

If you don’t feel any difference, that’s ok. If we are not used to ”feeling ourselves” it sometimes takes a little practice. The best you can do is to become very aware of your breathing – many times during the day and in various situations. You will then become more and more aware of what happens inside you.

We stop breathing fully every time we tighten up, and we are then no longer totally in contact with ourselves and what we feel!

Get to know your breathing

Lie down on the floor and just notice how you breathe. - Describe it to yourself.

Can you feel your breath in your chest – and how much room it takes up?

Does your breathing change when you become aware of this?

Can you feel your breathing in your stomach?

Can you feel it in your sides – and if you can – equally in both sides?

Do you feel your breathing in your back?

Do you feel tension anywhere in your body? – And if you do, what happens if you gently push your breath into the places of tension (don’t try to force it – just very gently) while you say to yourself ”Let go”?

Notice your breathing many times through the day. When it almost stops – and when you breathe freely.

- When you feel tense or maybe have some pain in your neck, shoulders or back.

- When you maybe feel tension in your stomach or other places in your body.

Just start becoming aware. You don’t have to do anything about it – just notice it.

Breathe OUT

It is actually more important to breathe out than to breathe in. When we don’t have any more air in us, our body will automatically take the next breath.

Try this:

Open your mouth just a little bit and place your tongue upwards in your mouth.

On your next out-breath make the sound sss until you have no more air left in you.

Your body will then spontaneously take a new breath – probably deeper than you are used to.

Do this only once, or you could start to hyperventilate – get so much air in that you will get dizzy.

So don’t worry about your in-breath - that will take care of itself. It is on our out-breath that we can let go and really relax. The code word here is "no effort" - with everything that we do if we want a more stressfree life.

Our breathing is a good barometer. If you can feel that you are breathing fully (without forcing yourself) you have ”let go” and you are relaxed. If you are ”holding” your breath in any way you are unconsciously more or less in a state of emergency, putting yourself under stress.

Sound

Making sounds is really good for releasing any tension or negative feelings, and we will feel more alive and positive afterwards. Many people find it difficult to ”make noise” on demand, but give it a go anyway. If you feel better afterwards, you have found a useful tool.

Stand or sit on the floor. Move your body slowly from side to side.

Breathe deeply and a bit faster than normal and start making sounds.

Try out which sounds feel best: humming, grunting, moaning or whatever you can think of.

If feelings or emotions come up, continue with the same sound. If you start feeling angry make angry sounds, if you feel sad make sad sounds etc.

Keep going until the feeling shifts and check how your body feels now.

If you have small children, they would probably love to do this sound-exercise with you, and you can see who can find the most creative sounds. (And you will maybe afterwards find that you suddenly have happier children!)

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More ideas for full breathing

Any exercise where we expand our rib-cage will give room for more breath!

In the old days we used to say ”Straighten your back!” or ”Shoulders back!” But we need not concentrate on our back or our shoulders. It is much better to be aware of pushing our sternum forward every time we stand or sit or walk. We will then automatically get more breath into our rib-cage, which will start to expand allowing even more air into our body – and our back will automatically be straighter.

Just becoming aware of our breathing will take us a long way! And if we at the same time can remember that we also have a stomach, our breathing will begin to fill up downwards in our body, just by focusing our awareness in that place. And that in itself gives us a better ”grounding”. Check the grounding exercises further along.

My own experience with breathing

When I was doing my own Bodymind training with Ken Dychtwald (author of the book ”Bodymind”) back in the 1980’s, I learnt a wonderful exercise that taught me how my rib-cage played an important role in keeping myself down and not feeling very much self-confidence. My rib-cage was very contracted, my shoulders held high and were pushed forward. Ken told us that when you take on the posture of a lion or a mouse, you will feel like a lion or a mouse. We tried this – and I could quite distinctly feel it. This was revolutionary information to me, and I decided to work with that rib-cage. This lion-business was something that I could really use.

I also leart to get my breath deeper down into my body – to actually feel it going right down into my toes. I learnt how we control our feelings by unconsciously using our breath, and that most people go around not really feeling at all, because we are using our controlled and superficial breath as an armouring to keep down all kinds of unpleasant feelings. I wanted to feel more alive, so I did a lot of breathing that first Bodymind training year!

When winter came, I had a weird experience. I had a very nice winter coat that I had kept for special occasions because it had been quite expensive, and I wanted to have it for a long time. I now decided to use it every day this winter. I put it on - and it didn’t fit me any more – it could no longer button over my chest. So it’s always a decision, isn’t it - either you choose your favourite winter coat or you choose a bigger chest. Well, I decided to let the coat go and gave it away to someone with a less expanded rib-cage!

This ”breathing stuff” is ideal when we want to develop self-confidence and feelings of self-worth. It doesn’t hurt, it doesn’t cost anything, you don’t even have to take time out to do it – you can do it everywhere and all the time. And the more air you take in, the more you feel alive. So it’s a good place to start in your personal development.

GROUNDING EXERCISES

Body and mind are totally inter-connected. If we feel well grounded in our body, we will also feel secure in ourself emotionally and psychologically. The feeling of having our feet solidly on the ground makes us feel more independent and assertive. When we are well grounded we are closer to our body and our feelings and we don’t as easily ”fly away” to our intellectual head where all the old programs live and where our ”mind chatter” takes place.

To be well grounded is to have our feet firmly on the ground - and with ”soft knees”. Our knees are our ”shock absorbers” – physically and emotionally – so we don’t want to walk around with over-stretched knees – ever. With ”soft knees” we can be flexible and grounded at the same time.

Feel your roots

Stand on the floor with your legs about hip-width.

Have your feet firmly on the ground – knees soft and flexible.

Close your eyes and imagine that you have good strong roots from your feet and deep into the ground. Så you are deeply grounded in the earth like a good solid oak tree.

Send all your energy down - into your pelvis, your legs and your feet – and right down into the ground.

Feel that you are getting heavier.

And now imagine that you are so grounded that not even a storm would be able to blow you over.

Enjoy the feeling of security and strength in your whole body.

Grounding exercise with sound

Stand on the floor and straighten up your body by pushing your sternum forward, letting your shoulders relax.

Now slowly, slowly push first your left hand and then your right hand towards the floor so you feel a good stretch all the way up through your arm and down through your hand – first the left and then the right – and keep changing sides when you push down.

Do you feel the same stretch in both arms – or is there a difference?

Make various strong sounds as you push down – and make the sounds down towards the floor, still keeping your body upright.

You can try hissing or grunting or making other sounds while you keep pushing down, left and right.

Can you feel that you stand more and more firmly on the ground?

Focus also on your ”roots” – so they can grow even deeper into the ground.

SLOW-MOTION EXERCISES

When we move our body in slow-motion it makes it easier to feel every little muscle and tissue in our body. And by slow-motion I mean slower than you have ever moved your body before - so that you can focus on the inner experience and really feel what happens in your body. Remember Bodymind is experiential. It takes time to focus on the inner experience – and it is important that you are totally with your body. So ignore any outside distractions while you focus on your inner experiences.

Let your body move - (advanced exercise)

Sit on the floor and just feel your body.

Now start moving just one finger – so slowly that you can hardly feel that you are moving - and focusing totally on your finger.

Now let go totally of control and let your finger move itself and see what it wants to do.

Your finger is moving – and you just have your focus there to experience what happens.

As your finger slowly, slowly moves itself – just let whatever part of your body that wants to join the movement do that – slowly, slowly.

And just focus on the experience of your body moving itself without you interfering in any way. Just see what happens – and how much of your body joins in.

Moving to music

Put some slow and soft music on and stand for some minutes and just feel your body.

Feel what parts of your body would like to move to the music – slow-slow-motion.

Now let your body start to move – coming from within – slowly, slowly - so it is your body moving you – and not you moving your body!

Let the music flow into your body and see what your body wants to do – without you interfering.

Feel and observe every little movement in your body.

Move for at least 5 or 10 minutes in this way – slow-slow-motion.

Now change the music to some more dramatic music and let your body move again – still slow-slow-motion. And again let your body move you.

Does it feel different moving to different kinds of music?

Experiment with various types of music – and try moving more and more slowly.

What do you experience?

Sometimes totally new movements are born in us when we let go of control and let our body move us, and we can also experience movements that we may recognize from earlier stages in our life. Memories can emerge, and all sorts of emotions can arise.

We can learn amazing things about ourselves from this kind of movement.The body exercises mirror everything that happens in us, as well as all the ways we act and react.

Enjoy it all – it all comes from inside you.

HEART AWARENESS

Close your eyes.

Look with closed eyes down towards your chest and keep your focus on your chest area - from your heart and up to your collar bone.

Take a deep breath and let go.

Now ask yourself ”What is my truth?” – and listen for the reply – even if it takes a long time for the reply to come.

Keep any ”mind chatter” out – and just come back gently to your chest focus any time your attention might stray.

This way of focusing – looking down with our eyes closed - helps us to come from our ”inner self” and not from our head where all the old programs live!

Looking down keeps us out of our head and gets us into our body and our feelings.

THE GAP

When we stay in the here-and-now and we let go - at least for a little while - of any ambition or demands on ourself, we are able to flow into "the Gap" - a very pleasant sensation of "emptyness" where our whole bodymind slows down to a lower frequency. This is basically the same as what happens when we meditate.

What we call "meditation" is very pleasant and helpful for lots of people - but other people prefer little short "meditations" maybe lots of times every day.

This is possible when we let ourselves flow into "the Gap" - and just stay there for a few seconds. My students used to call it "the 30 second meditation trip" - and they would "come back" to the rest of the group feeling rested and refreshed - and sometimes with completely new ideas.

Try out what works best for you.

PLEASURE

When it comes to healing our self and our life, there is nothing like getting into pleasure. It seems that it is only us humans that so often deny ourselves pleasure. If we look at plants and animals, they react in a totally different way: A flower always stretches out towards the sun, and we all know how a cat constantly seeks pleasure and comfort. The cells of our body react in the same way: they open and stretch when something feels pleasurable and safe, and they contract and protect themselves when anything feels uncomfortable or threatening.

If the thought of having pleasure is uncomfortable, then you may have received messages when you were little that are not very useful. Respect your comfort zone, and explore a little at a time. You don't have to do it all in one day.

Nurturing ourselves is very powerful. It is a way of saying "I love you" to ourselves. I believe we get sick because we haven't loved ourselves enough - haven't listened to our own needs. And when we don't consider our own needs, we are not respecting ourselves, and this affects our feelings of self-worth. Having low feelings of self-worth is the same as feeling "I'm not good enough the way I am". If we are not good enough, then we feel we don't deserve to have our needs met - and we are into a vicious circle. We can reverse this circle by listening to our needs - and doing things for ourselves that make us feel good.

Self-nurturing

Any time you are not feeling "on top", ask yourself: "What would make me feel good right now?" You will probably find that often the answer will be just little things, which very often will be sensory - for example a hot tub bath, to sit comfortably with your feet up reading a book, a cup of something hot, a hug, etc. Quite basic needs for comfort, safety and love.

If no ideas come at first, (sometimes we are so unaccustomed to nurturing ourselves that we no longer know what we need) then guess. Often our guesses are correct. Or you can experiment: explore what happens if you do this - and that. How does doing this make me feel? - and this? - until you find what works for you - the things that make you feel good.

Nurturing your body

Massage your body lovingly with some nice-smelling oil or lotion after every bath or shower. A loved body will respond with love and heal more easily. Program love into all of your cells. Imagine what kind of messages these cells have received during their lifetime, and feel compassion with them.

Feed new information and new messages into your cells while you nurture them, and they will start changing!

If you have operation wounds or scar tissue, then treat these places with extra love and care. Be gentle on these parts of your body, and speak to them like you would to comfort a hurt child. Scar tissue can become alive again with this kind of nurturing. Know that "energy flows where awareness goes", and consciously direct your attention to the places in your body that need healing.

Gentle morning-awakening

How do you wake up in the morning? Do you set your alarm clock? Do you jump out of bed straight away – or do you let yourself just lie there and wake up slowly?

Try taking 5-10 minutes when you wake up in the morning for this pleasurable exercise:

Lie on your back and feel your breath.

Now start breathing deep down in your stomach and very gently push your breath right up to your shoulders – and into your back. Very, very gently – don’t force it.

Notice what happens in your body.

Keep breathing this way for a few minutes.

Now make a small sound when you breathe out – and let go totally on your out-breath.

Notice whether some parts of your body want to move a little?

- Maybe your shoulders – or your arms?

- Maybe your legs – maybe your pelvis?

Let your body move as it wants to – so that you ”surrender to your body” and let your body do whatever it wants to do.

Notice what else happens in your body.

- Does energy maybe come right up into your face? – or into your fingers or toes?

This simple and pleasurable exercise can over time give us feelings of joy and vitality right from the start of our day. And we only need 5 minutes to do it.

Massage with a partner

Massage is a wonderful way of giving and receiving nurturing.

Something nice and fun you might want to try with someone is to sit facing each other - maybe in each end of a sofa - and simultaneously massage each other's feet. You receive at the same time as you give.

Another very pleasurable and sensual thing is to take turns and massage each other's hands and face.

If you want to get into full-body massage with a partner, neither of you need a course in massage. Just think that whatever would feel good for you will probably feel good for your partner too. Choose a time when you are not tired, and a warm comfortable place. Warm the massage oil, so it feels pleasurable on the skin, have some dim light and some nice soft music. If this is new to you and you feel uncertain about what you are doing, give each other feedback and say what feels good and what you would like different. Enjoy!

PHYSICAL EXERCISE

It is good if you are able to get some physical exercise, as long as it is pleasurable, and as long as you respect your own boundaries and limitations. Whether you walk, swim, ride a bike or just stroll through your garden, don't think of any goal. Enjoy the very movement, however little time you take. Sense the air, enjoy the beauty around you, and breathe it all in.

Choose the form of exercise that you really enjoy. Dance or move your body to some music you like. If you are ill in bed or in other ways are unable to dance on the floor, then move your body to the music as much as you can, even if you are lying flat on your back.

OUR BODY LISTENS - to whatever we tell it

We do it all the time – tell our body what to do. For example ”go to the cupboard” – and our body instantly responds. We can also consciously ask our body to release tension, breathe more, ground itself – whatever we need and want our body to do. And we can use this wonderful ability to cooperate with our body in all the ways we want to further our health and positive development.

Our body also listens when we say nasty things to ourself. So if we want to feel more self-worth, self-confidence, appreciation and love, we must remember to speak lovingly to ourself and give ourself comfort and care. Never criticize or scold ourself, because that will create the opposite of self-worth. We can give ourself ”feedback” and be objectively aware of what we are doing and thinking, but being objective is not being critical or judgmental.

The Observer

Imagine that you have a little ”observer” that can see and hear everything you do. It’s just there – totally neutral – just observing everything. But there is no judgment. It only observes - and you will learn a lot about yourself. You can then choose to change things if you want – but without criticizing yourself for whatever you have done. That’s over and done with.

FLOW WITH EASE

We live in a new time energetically, whether we have observed it or not. The hard times that our body has known so well are over, even though we still out of habit tend to stay with the hard way of doing things. Practice the new way: ”Flow” with what feels easy and light – and your body will thrive. Trust that if something feels heavy it might not be the best time to be doing just that – whatever it is.

Become aware of the two very different energies: ”This feels heavy” – ”This feels light and easy”. Dare to experiment with it – and learn – and become even more aware.The new code-word for the new energy is ”No effort”. So let go - and don’t try to push the River!

GO TO EINSTEIN TIME!

With the new energy we can also learn to play with time, which is only an illusion anyway. Our old way of experiencing time is tied up with clock-time, and not with

”felt time”.

The Bodymind Way is very much like living in Einstein-time: Being in the here and now at all times! Have your awareness and all of your senses in the here-and-now, and you will experience time and everything else differently.

You will even be able to ”manipulate” time – at least in your own consciousness.