Bigger Than We Think

Wednesday, August 2, 2023

Is there a more complicated and conflicted relationship than the one we have with our bodies? And that’s just on the conscious level! Who knows what is going on in our subconscious. But I got a little window into that deeper realm when a friend passed along a line she’d come across about bodies. She thought it was the sort of thing I’d be interested in:

“When I remember my body is a small universe, its rivers and tributaries leading me somewhere beautiful, I relax and ask it questions.”

Reading that, something clicked.

“Personal cosmos. That’s what our bodies are…” This thought felt revelatory.

As I reflected upon our bodies as a personal cosmos, something inside relaxed. Specifically, my stomach.  Not in a “Now that I’m a cosmo, I don’t have to care anymore and I’m going to eat whatever I want” sort of way, but in a “There is something bigger going on here than my superficial concerns” sort of way.

Along with that sense of something bigger going on came a combination of awe, curiosity, and regard. In this intelligence I could look at the parts of my body I’m not a fan of or can do nothing about (slackening skin and spider veins, I’m talking to you) and instead marvel at the harmonious system known as Elizabeth, this galaxy that is me. I felt immense in the best possible way.

Like tai chi or qigong, that sentence about our bodily universe invites a different way to be in our bodies. What does “When I remember my body is a small universe, its rivers and tributaries leading me somewhere beautiful, I relax and ask it questions” say to you?

Wishing the universe of you well,

E