{"id":187,"date":"2019-07-09T12:06:00","date_gmt":"2019-07-09T12:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adrianharris.org\/blog\/?p=187"},"modified":"2021-05-25T19:11:54","modified_gmt":"2021-05-25T19:11:54","slug":"the-embodied-pathways-of-connection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adrianharris.org\/blog\/2019\/07\/09\/the-embodied-pathways-of-connection\/","title":{"rendered":"The Embodied Pathways of Connection"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What links mindfulness, psychedelics, nature connection, ritual and the therapeutic technique of Focusing? They can all help us access to our deepest embodied knowing<\/a> and awaken us from the illusion of separation. For Thich Nhat Hanh, a Buddhist monk and lifelong peace activist, the purpose of our existence is \u201cto awaken from our illusion of separateness.\u201d But how?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meditation<\/a> is one path, and John Danvers wrote that mindfulness is a tool for coming to \u201cfully realise that we are relational beings in a relational universe\u201d (Danvers, 2016). John describes an experience where mindfulness allowed his fixed sense of self to dissolve:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cthe egocentric, unitary, \u2018I\u2019, wasn\u2019t there. Instead a different state of being was at work (or at play) \u2013 as if the edges of myself were dissolved into the surrounding space. It felt like there was no separation between me and the world\u201d (2016).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Gail Bradbrook felt an inner stuckness for years. She was passionate about social change, but none of her campaigning efforts had really taken off. So Gail headed off to Costa Rica to experience the healing power of psychedelics \u2013 AKA enthogens \u2013 including Ayahuasca. She had heard reports of how \u201cpeople on psychedelics report a deeply felt sense of peace, oneness and unity with the planet\u201d (Bradbrook, 2019). The experience was transformational and on her return home Gail co-founded Extinction Rebellion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Throughout the \u201860\u2019s and \u201870\u2019s Robert Greenway led groups on multi-day treks into the wilderness. He found that spending several days in wild nature could have a \u201cprofound impact on the psyche\u201d. People typically had \u201cfeelings of expansion or reconnection\u201d that he identified as spiritual (Greenway, 1995). I\u2019ve written about this wilderness effect<\/a> elsewhere, but it\u2019s important to note that spending even a brief time in nature can open our awareness of deep connection. Claire Thompson describes her experience of watching a dramatically beautiful sunrise:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t realise until afterwards, but my sense of self was absent. I was simply absorbed by the intrinsic wonder of the view and intimately involved in deep contemplation of the pure grace and delicate beauty of nature. I was an integral part of the scene\u201d (2013).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Loch Voil<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Ritual is one of the most ancient, powerful and widespread pathways to connection. In Sacred Ecology<\/em> I wrote that being \u201cpart of a powerful ritual\u201d can enable us to \u201ccome to the wisdom of the body; that all things are ultimately one\u201d. A lot depends on the intention of the ritual and the integrity of those who facilitate it, but it\u2019s no accident that members of my local Extinction Rebellion group will lead a Summer Solstice Ceremony this evening to support the movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve often written about Focusing and Eugene Gendlin, the philosopher and psychotherapist who developed it. In essence, Focusing is a process of sensing into the body, curiously open to what meaningful sensations might be there. Many people have walked this pathway of connection and Herbert Schroeder is a good example. Herbert was working as an environmental psychologist for the US Department of Agriculture when he began experimenting with Focusing in natural spaces. He experienced \u201can inward, bodily sense of myself expanding out into space, as though the boundary separating myself from my environment had become relaxed and permeable\u201d (2008).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How can practices as diverse as Focusing, ritual, meditation, taking psychedelics and walking in nature have such dramatic \u2013 and similar \u2013 effects? Gendlin gave us a key part of the answer when he wrote that the \u201cphysically felt body is in fact part of a gigantic system of here and other places, now and other times, you and other people \u2013 in fact, the whole universe\u201d (1981). Gendlin, like many other thinkers, recognized that we are not the isolated individuals<\/a> of our cultural myth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The quotes above all speak of connection, relationship, expansion and the dissolution of boundaries. Although they\u2019ve taken different pathways, they seems to be arriving at the same place; the wisdom of the body that revels what Thich Nhat Hanh calls the \u201cillusion of separateness\u201d. Mindfulness, psychedelics, nature connection, ritual and Focusing are all pathways that lead us to deeper connection. Crucially, they are all part of our embodied experience. These then are embodied pathways of connection<\/em> (EPOC). There are other EPOC, some of which I\u2019ve already identified; trance, dance, sex and sensual experience<\/a>. Others are still to be recognized, so if you think there\u2019s an EPOC I\u2019m missing, I\u2019d love to hear from you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In my next post I’ll explore the role of the EPOC in therapy<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n