BREATHING: ‘What we call “I” is just a swinging door which moves when we inhale and when we exhale. It just moves; that is all. When your mind is pure and calm enough to follow this movement, there is nothing: no “I, ” no world, no mind nor body; just a swinging door.’ Zen Mind p29
‘So when you practice zazen, your mind should be concentrated on your breathing.’ Zen Mind p31
***Zazen***
My zazen (meditation) was brief – maybe 8 minutes. I watched my breath moving like a swinging door, and of course, without the foreground noise of busy-thought, some difficult feelings arose from the shadowy background.
What sort of feelings, dear soul?
Um… ‘furious‘. :-/
Want to work with that?
Yes.
***
Ok. So here’s what happened. I turned to the brilliant book, The Language of Emotions by Karla McLaren:
And I looked up ‘Fury’:
“When the powerful intensities of your rage and fury can be channeled into fierce boundary definition and the focused annihilation of overwhelming and destructive contracts, they will heal and strengthen you in amazing ways. … Furies and rage arise when the intensity in anger isn’t quite enough to deal with the situation.” McLaren p183
“Rage and fury are your guardians and your sentries. Learn to attend to them in honourable ways, and they’ll protect you, heal your traumas and save your life.” McLaren p188
Excellent. McLaren’s advice to me on honouring anger to form boundaries has been amazingly good for me in the past. However, McLaren is also clear about getting professional help when things persist:
‘Please contact a doctor or therapist if your rage and fury persist unchanged after you’ve channeled them a few times. Repetitive cycles of rage and fury can exhaust every part of you – so take good care of yourself and reach out for help if you’re having trouble. You may need to fortify your body and brain chemistry before you can work with your intense angers in this way. If you’re a trauma survivor, please read on, but also, please reach out for proper medical and psychological support.’ McLaren p185
Yesterday was not a good day. I was close to a psychotic episode. I am drained and my adrenal fatigue is just relentless. My work is currently an ‘overwhelming and destructive contract’ because I don’t have safe boundaries around it. And a few days ago, I had a medical intervention which triggered all sorts of old and clearly unresolved trauma.
So, just now, I bit the bullet and wrote to a psychotherapist I’d been researching a few weeks ago, asking for an initial appointment. This is what I wrote:
Dear [Psychotherapist],
What we call “I ” is just a swinging door
