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Healing waves flowing from the inside out
Category
- Meditation
Author
- Lumen
Emotions seeped into the stillness of my breath, like distant memories I'd thought forgotten. In the stillness of meditation, I existed as the me of my head. I sat, a being capable of choice, conscious of this moment. And beneath that, somewhere deep within my heart, I felt a stirring presence. It was the unconscious me, the me that held memories and emotions.
The first emotions that surfaced were discomfort. They were feelings I thought I didn't need to express, feelings I thought were already past. Shame, resentment, anger, and sadness. Before I could even name them, they came to me as a colorless, vague weight. But this time, I didn't avoid them. As my mental self, I allowed them to arise. And so, the emotions surged up like a single wave.
And I approached the body. Carefully, as if reaching out to a long-lost friend. "It's okay, it's okay now," I said in my mind. At that moment, my body responded. Very specifically, clearly.
I felt a weight on my shoulders, and something pent-up, knotted, rose up near my navel. My waist, my abdomen, the back of my neck. Those places where emotions had been condensed seemed to finally reveal themselves. I decided to feel them as they were, without judgment or attempting to fix them. It was as if I were examining an old wound.
I brought imaginary light to those areas. A soft yet strong light. A symbol of spirituality descending from above, an energy beyond me. Wherever the light touched, warmth spread, and the pent-up emotions began to quietly dissolve. It wasn't a moment of definitive healing, but a change was definitely taking place. As the light touched the pain my body remembered, that pain transformed into an emotion that longed to be recounted.
And then something strange happened. In the days after I awoke from my meditation, I encountered kind people at the most unexpected moments. A stranger offered me their seat on the subway, someone stepped aside in line, a cashier smiled silently. Small, insignificant acts of kindness reached out to me, and I knew they weren't coincidences.
I could sense that the very heart I had sought to reconcile with my inner self was spreading outward like a wave to the outside world. Those kindnesses were telling me, "Because you began to care for yourself within yourself, the world began to care for you."
At that moment, what I had learned from meditation became clear.
When subject and substance meet within me, that is, when I face myself with compassion, spirituality descends. That spirituality comes as a concrete feeling, in the form of bliss. And that bliss keeps me alive and makes the world I encounter soft and harmonious.
When subject and substance meet within me, that is, when I face myself with compassion, spirituality descends. That spirituality comes as a concrete feeling, in the form of bliss. And that bliss keeps me alive and makes the world I encounter soft and harmonious.
The body holds memories. Emotions are the language of those memories. When I listened to my body, past repressions surfaced, and I attempted to reconcile with those memories. The essence responded through the body, and light became a conduit for healing. Thus, the journey that began within me found itself greeted by the outside world with kindness.
Meditation is a story that never ends. The small realizations I had that day continue to call to me today. My body continues to speak to me, and the world continues to encourage me with gentle signals.
Now I know.
When I face and accept the darkness within me, the world opens up brightly to me.
That my inner healing is expanding into kind encounters with the outside world.
When I face and accept the darkness within me, the world opens up brightly to me.
That my inner healing is expanding into kind encounters with the outside world.
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