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A creativity perspective on body memories

 

A Releasing Your Unlimited Creativity discussion topic

Copyright 2009 by K. Ferlic,   All Rights Reserved

 
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From the creativity perspective, the key to understanding the consciousness of the body is the relationship between energy and consciousness and that mass is a form of energy. Since energy and consciousness can be seen as one and the same, our unique body as a specific quantity of mass, represents a unique consciousness and has a unique view and perspective. An addition understanding which arises from relationship between energy and consciousness, which should be a rather obvious conclusion, is that as a consciousness our body will hold memories as does the mind. That is, there are body memories just as powerful as the memories of our mind.

Quite simply, as a consciousness, our body stories memories. If we wish to consider the consciousness of our body as part of our current mind but reflected in aspects of our nonconscious mind, that is acceptable. We just need to understand that portion of our nonconscious mind has a unique perspective. It can and will function on its own in the correct conditions. If we properly focus our attention and awareness we can learn to discern what arise in our conscious mind from the unique perspective of our body. This unique perspective is what gives rise to our body wisdom. As with mental memories, body memories tend to surface in context. So we can expect that our body wisdom will be sharper depending on the context of the situation we face.

All the experiences we have had in life are felt by the body and the body forms itself in response to those experiences. We are not normally aware of this process. However, if we wear a new pair of shoes which are a little too tight, we will form a redness where the shoe rub if not a blister. This is just our body forming itself in response to the experience we have. What is important to understand here our body does this in some way for every experience we have.

Surprisingly, our body memories are one of the most significant issue we will face in reviewing our past, working to become our truth and/or access the depth and breadth of our creativity. As consciousness our body has a mind and memories as any other consciousness. The mind of our body and its memories reflect the experiences the body has had in our current life. Many of those experiences occurred before our current mind become aware of itself and, more importantly, they occurred very early in life such that they were the dominate experiences of our life. A one month old child having a twenty four hour painful experiences now has an experience which is 1/30 of the total experiences it has had in life. A one year old child having a twenty four hour painful experience now has a painful experience representing 1/365 of the total. A forty year old individual having a twenty four hour painful experience has an experience representing 1/14610 of the total (40 x 365 plus 10 leap years). It is only natural that our early painful experiences in life have a much greater impact in our body memory that later experiences.

However it does need to be noted that the body is said to replace all its cells over a period of about seven years. Depending on the conditions we experience later in life when cells are being replaced, we can replace painful body memories with memories which do not carry as much pain. In regard to these early memories, our body has memories beyond what our current mind will have. It has embedded memories which occurred before our current mind became aware of itself and the experiences the current mind either has or developed the awareness to understand.

The bottom line here is that all that we experience in life is in some way is encoded in the body. Most of the experiences and the memories in our mind are inconsequential as are the most of the memories of our body. However, there are many painful memories which surface such that when a particular part of the body is awaken through feeling. When the pain of that experience surfaces it will need to be addressed.

Why body memories surface as a primary issue when we are working to become our truth and/or access the depth and breadth of our creativity is that they represent was in which we have bound our creative life energy and not allowed that energy to freely dissipate in the experience. They represent a portion of our truth and our creative power unexpressed or unavailable for expression. So it is only natural they will need to be addressed if we desire to fully live our truth and access the depth and breadth of our creativity.

Body memories are a fixation of our creative life energy into a specific form. Most are probably familiar with body memories from a muscle memory view point or a physical performance view For example, developing the body memories for playing a musical instrument, dancing or an athletic movement of some type such that the movement is done without any conscious act on the part of mind. But there many other memories energetically much more powerful and subtle for the body encodes the memories of how the pattern was formed. It is not just about having the memories. It is also about how the memories were formed.

The scars on a body are a memory and are much like a conscious memory that we hold in our mind. A Calluses are another example of conscious memory and experience born out in the body. However, scars and calluses are not the only memories of the body. There are more subtle scars that is best characterize by how our creative life energy is flowing to maintain the body as a result of the experiences we have had. Sometimes the energy flow to create health, sometimes it flow to create illness. However, every experience remains in a subtle body memory many of which binds our energy as strongly as mental memories. In essence body memories and mental memories are the same just experienced differently with a different aspect of our being.

The simplest way to understand how the body memories work is that as we exercise, the muscles we exercise grow stronger. When we stop exercising the muscles return to a normal state. If we begin to exercise those muscles again in some other activity, we will begin to remember how strong we were and how we use to live that keep those muscles in trim. Memories of our life when we were strong also arise. We think nothing about these memories which surface and never really pay attention to how they are tied to the muscles we are beginning to exercise. How often do we start an activity and quickly remember something like, "Gee, it has been years since I did something like this before" and we begin to remember the past. Or, we start an activity and say "I’ve never done anything like this before." Or, as we experience beginning to lose weight, when we reach a certain weight all the memories and experiences we had in our life around that weight being to surface almost as if we were living that life again.

We think our mind is remembering what we have and have not done. But we never pay attention to how much we are remembering is tied to the particular arrangement of muscles we stimulate by what we do. Of course, mind can over ride much of what we feel and the memories we have. To become aware of how our body stories memories we need to become very observant of what arises in the mind and when it does ask, "From where is this information coming?". Then, be open to what we receive. We also need to become mindful and aware of the thoughts and feelings we may have as we exercise or massage different muscle groups.

Body memories do not necessarily surface as thought but they do tend to shift the feelings we have in a given moment. Our mind interprets what we feel as a result of what mind is aware of happening. More often than not, mind tends to associate the feelings the body has with what is happening externally. When mind does this it never becomes aware of the body memories that are being reveal. This, in turn, allows all that mind is thinking to become captured by the past and what arise through the body memories even when mind thinks it is free to create something new.

It needs to be understood that we hold memories on every level of our being and our body. All is energy. All is consciousness. Given the equivalence of energy and consciousness all energy (and mass) possess an inherent consciousness. Any aspect of consciousness has a mind which can story memories and create habits. Most are familiar with mental memories and habits. Some mental memories and habits are the result of intentional conditioning and others are the result of simply doing something a particular way repeatedly. Body habits and muscle memories are similar and similarly developed but tend to be a little bit more subtle. They are subtle in that we will not necessarily have a conscious awareness of them when they surface for we tend to remember them through feeling and what we feel in a given situation. Here again, we need to be open to feeling and the awareness which lies in feeling.

All the experiences we have had in life are felt by the body and the body forms itself in response to those experiences. Because the body stores memories all the time, we can be assured the body hold the thoughts and feelings we carry when the body is imprinted with any strong feelings. The feelings get internalized in the body or the body forms itself in a way that the memory and feeling is entwined within body structure. If we have any strong feels we can be assured we have an accessible body memory to go with it.

If the experience we have allows us to grow and expand our being, our body will engage and align itself in a way that supports life and allows us to grow and expand in life. In this regard, the experiences can be seen as a healing energy restoring health and life to parts of the body that may have been otherwise low on life and energy. If we are stifled, manipulated, controlled, feel pain, feel denied, used or any other type and kind of feeling that does not support the freedom of growth and expansion also gets internalized in the body. These feelings lay the seeds for unhealthy conditions and conditions that do not support life and living. This in turn causes us to contract our being into a protective shell that can be so suffocating as to cause some type of accident, illness or disease.

In may ways we can look at this process of the body storing feelings and memories as a piece of iron in a magnetic field. The iron is our body, the magnetic field is the experience we have and the strength of the magnetic field to align the iron core is determined by how much the experience is freeing for our creative spirit to unfold true to its nature or how binding and restrictive the experience is. The body is always repairing itself and replacing worn tissue with new tissue. Whenever we have a freeing experience, the body cells that are being repaired and replaced in that moment get aligned in such a way that health is supported. Whenever we have binding experience, the body that is being repaired and replaced gets aligned in a way that does not support growth. Without a particular influence, patterns become encoded and copied again and again in the body until the patterns are replaced. The next time that particular repaired and/or replace portion of the body is repaired in the future depends on the experiences we are having at that time. If the experience is relatively neutral, the pattern is copied. If the experience is freeing, it is repaired in a way that supports life. If the experience is binding, it is repaired in a way that does not support life. Hence we create conditions of health and disease over time. When enough of a particular type and kind of tissue has non life supporting patterns, illness, accident or disease arises.

This is why a way of being every day is so important as compared to one time or infrequent attempts to create conditions of health. The body is reforming itself every moment. The goal is to create a state of being such that every moment the body is creating a conditions where we have a desire and passion to live life.

This one reason why it is important to have supportive and life nourishing experiences as a child and as an adult to have spontaneous and innocent childlike experiences. As a child, because the child’s body is developing so fast, there are a tremendous number of pattern being imprinted that will get carried though life. Additionally, as said above, since so many of the child’s experiences are the first of its kind, those memories always seem to carry a bit more emotional energy. Hence life supporting or non life supporting patterns are encoded early in life. As an adult, to experience spontaneous and innocent childlike play allows the tissues being repaired to be recast in life supporting ways and help one to maintain health. It needs to be remembered that unhealthy patterns first form at the energetic level and a scattering and fragmentation of our energy. In time, the more we scatter and fragment our energy the more we create experiences around those scattered and fragmented patterns.

Although we are forming patterns within our body all the time most individuals are not aware of their existence. As such, many they fail to understand how their experience may be imprinting the body creating unknown influences controlling their life and ability to create. For example, in understand the different types and kinds of accident, illness and disease, we can look at many forms of heart disease as being memories stored within the heart of being unloved or unable to love. Medical intuitives have called cancer the disease of unfinished business that continually eats away at our life. In this regard the cancer can be seen as a body memory that is continually is diverting and consuming our creative life energy that could be used in more life giving ways.

We can use this understanding that freeing experiences help to create conditions of health in the body. Something like a deep massage can often release body memories. Intense physical experiences go deep within our being and those memories are stored deep within the tissue and organs. Massaging specific locations on the body with a focused intention on releasing bound energy of both the masseuse/masseur and the one receiving the massage can be quite effective at accessing the memories. Of course, one will have to face what is released.

Relative to body memories and sexuality, there is an interesting cleansing effect that is possible because the flow of energy can be so large and intense. When the body is touched either in a sexual way or massaged in a certain way, it is not uncommon to have memories of sexual experiences arise if not incidents of sexual abuse. However, it has also been observed, when an individual is free to engage in sexuality with a totally supportive partner who is looking to create freedom for the individual the flow of energy which is created can be seen to literally and figuratively flush out many past body memories. It is surprise what memories arise.

Flushing out memories tends to occur when the sexuality turns into a spontaneous and innocent childlike play of discovery and exploration, especially when follows specific feelings in the body. However it is not something that can be controlled by mind. That is, one cannot enter sexuality with the expectation of creating this cleansing effect. Rather, it is about being is such a safe and secure space and the freedom to just be true to oneself such that our creative spirit is totally free to flow however and wherever it needs to flow. It is then the most powerful transformations occur in sexuality or through sexuality. It is as thought an entire new life is created within the individual.

In addition to the memories our body stores from the life we are currently living, its genetic code stores memories of the lives that have gone before us. In the same way our creative spirit in its transcendental mind carries memories of what we call past life experiences, our body carries memories of the past experiences of our family lineage. These can have a profound effect on how we experience life because they "bias" how we view life. Said another way, our genetic makeup brings the cell memory and experience of our ancestors into the life we create today. Often when we look to free our creative spirit, live the truth of our being, and/or access the depth and breadth of our creativity, in addition to working our own past, we work the past of our genetic lineage and what is encoded and being carried forth into our bodies. One should not be surprised if the issue they face seem to go well beyond their current life and bring up experiences they have no awareness of every having experienced. Although past lives often do surface through body memories as a result of how our transcendental mind created the body, there are memories we can have that we know are not "our" experiences of this life or any other life we lived. These are the memories carried down through the genetic pool of which our body formed. Often it is about passing through the human collective and discussed in the topic "Female collective and the pain female archetype."

Related topics
Body wisdom
The body as an antenna
Origins of body consciousness
The body as a creative living process
The role of an initiation in reestablishing feeling
Body sensations and feelings as a communication
The need to become mindful and aware of what we feel
Natures way of dealing with the issue of the feminine giving more
Issue of the body

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