When you think of the popular buzzword “mindfulness,” you think of meditation or calming the mind to quiet your thoughts, emotions and body. But what if you tapped into your body’s wisdom by letting the body become the path toward full body or somatic mindfulness? Somatic meditation is a process of going deeply within and sensing the body, making this the focus of your meditation practice.
In “The Wakeful Body: Somatic Mindfulness as a Path to Freedom,” (2021) Buddhist teacher and author Willa Blythe will guide you back to a place of “pure” mindfulness that exists in our bodies already, because the body is already mindful. The body’s sense of time is always present, with no future or past, just breathing, just feeling. The mind is distracted but the body is not. She will get you past the conceptual ideas, or negative thoughts about your body and help you focus on the “experiential body” or our safe place we can always return. Once you let the precious body become calm and fully grounded by gravity, positive things will begin to happen as you discover the body’s honesty and learn to work through and dissolve dormant emotions or “knots” through self-nurturing and acceptance.
Blythe ends each chapter with a guided practice meditation that will open up new ways to tap into your "earth and awareness body" and help you connect with your "subtle body" energy, emotions or sense of aliveness we all have but often too distracted to listen to what she calls our "quiet symphony." And she gives tips on computer screen fasting. As our attention is constantly held hostage to other people’s choices, our “freedom over our own mind slips away.”
