Journey to Feeling

The series of posts on this page are abstracted notes from therapy sessions where I explored the question, How does developing emotional sensitivity contribute to developing the kinesthetic sensitivity needed to develop internal strength?

My Journey to Feeling: Part 1 (March 11, 2011)
I recently discovered that my efforts in developing kinesthetic feeling in Wujifa Zhan Zhuang conflicted with my lifelong habit of stifling my emotional feeling. I was trying to grow feeling AND at the same time, I was trying to squash feeling. I was trying to light the candle and extinguish the candle at the same time. Not a recipe for success!

My Journey to Feeling: Part 2 (March 18, 2011)
Most people are neither "up" nor "down" but in a kind of "neutral" emotional space. I've noticed that my "neutral" space is more a kind of numbness as if there were no undercurrent of the joy of living, curiosity, playfulness, enthusiasm. Daily life is more like mechanically going through the motions of living; like a kind of emotional zombie. Question: How do I develop a feeling of that which is under this "numbness"?

My Journey to Feeling: Part 3 (March 25, 2011)
To the extent that I dampen one feeling is the extent to which I dampen all feeling. Huge insight! For example, dampen anger or sadness and I unwittingly dampen joy and compassion. If I dampen my ability to feel emotions, then I also dampen my ability to feel kinesthetically.

My Journey to Feeling: Part 4 (April 1, 2011)
How much of my posture is an embodiment of emotional cowering? How would your posture, your structure change if you were to allow the free expression of all emotions, not damper emotions, not holding?

My Journey to Feeling: Part 5 (April 15, 2011)
Emotional communication is not a sequential, one way data-transfer (like email or e-chat), rather it is a simultaneous, two-way process where the feelings, actions, expressions of each are both the cause and effect of the others' behavior. Getting a "feel for" and understanding of your repertoire of "emotional" kinesthetic experiences can help develop your feeling sensitivity in zhan zhuang.

My Journey to Feeling: Part 6 (April 22, 2011)
The body and the emotion form a bio-feedback loop. Fear begets a submissive (slouching) posture. Slouching, whether standing or sitting, begets a submission/fear feeling. Feeling causes posture causes feeling causes...

My Journey to Feeling: Part 7 (May 17, 2011)
One purpose of training is to help you notice your patterns and to shake you out of those patterns. Alter the "dance step" in manageable, safe measures. Judgment stifles curiosity. Practice curiosity. Hmm... I wonder how that person will react when I respond differently? Change the dance step.