Loving Our Bodies

and freeing our bodies

Dancer: Caeli La. Photographer: Kyer Wiltshire. Words: Eduardo Galeano

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LOVING OUR BODIES

Many spiritual teachers make statements like “I am not my body” or “This body is not me.”

I revolt and protest. I recoil and denounce. This creepy dismissal is an insult and disparagement. It demeans our bodies’ magnificent beauty and besmirches our bodies’ sublime role in educating our souls.

I agree that we are not only our bodies. I concur that a key part of us is eternal, lives free of earthy limitations, and is spread throughout the interconnected web of life—not just trapped in solitary boundaried form.

But hell yes, I am my body. It’s a glorious and intrinsic facet of my identity. It’s a miraculous creation that has taken millions of years to evolve into the masterpiece it is now.

So yes, I am my body and yes, this body is me. I adore my body. I am in awe of it. I am delighted to be united with it.

I will also suggest that you are your body, and your body is you. You love your body. You are in awe of it. You are delighted to be united with it.

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Inflamed by these resplendent facts, I offer the following exhortations:

Let’s free our bodies to be as real as anything ever created. Let’s be brave and dynamic, graceful and daring, as we sanctify our impossibly marvelous, unfathomably intelligent bodies.

Let’s praise our sacred bodies. Thank our blessed bodies. Tell our righteous bodies we revere their uncanny majesty. Say we yearn to learn their heavenly secrets. We promise to treat them as our beloved allies, our sacred treasures, our splendorous possessions.

No shame, no apology: We will be in awe of our body’s staggering power to endlessly carry out the millions of chemical reactions that keep us alive and thriving.

How can we not be overwhelmed with veneration for our hungry, resourceful, unpredictable bodies?

Let’s study our bodies’ abracadabra. Exult in the bounties they stream forth every second. Celebrate their boisterous animal elegance.

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Hear me speak “Loving Our Bodies”:

Quote by Nisargadatta Maharaj
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DREAM OF MEETING ECKHART TOLLE

In my dream, my soul friend and I are passengers aboard a magnificent glass submarine called the Vesper Vessel, gliding through an underwater canyon off the coast of Big Sur, California. The translucent walls reveal schools of luminescent fish and swaying kelp forests that pulse with their own inner light.

Our destination is advertised as the Temple of the Renounced Flesh, which is a pilgrimage site dedicated to "the worship of transcended physicality." The brochure describes it as a sanctuary where visitors learn to "rise above the prison of the material body" and "escape the illusion of carnal existence."

The marketing copy makes my skin prickle with resistance. But as is my periodic custom, I have purposely put myself into a situation that’s uncomfortable—to see what I can learn.

I survey our fellow passengers, noting how they hold themselves. There are various spiritual teachers and gurus, dressed in flowing white robes that seem to float around their bodies like they're already half-departed from the physical realm. Among them: a famous yoga instructor who preaches about detaching from bodily desires (though I notice she adjusts her posture frequently, clearly attuned to her spine's needs), a meditation master known for his teachings on "pure consciousness" (whose stomach audibly rumbles), and several New Age healers whose work I know. They speak of the body as merely a temporary, disposable vessel for the eternal soul.

The person seated next to me is Eckhart Tolle, a spiritual teacher whose books I read years ago. He's dressed in simple beige clothing.

I've been estranged from Tolle's work ever since I fully ripened into my own unique spiritual perspective. Though I had enjoyed him early on, I eventually grew to feel hurt by his dismissive comments about the body being "the pain-body" and his constant emphasis on transcending physical experience. In one of his books, he wrote that "the body is your gateway to Being, but don't mistake the gateway for your true home." Ouch.

I work up the courage to engage him in conversation.

"Long-time reader, first-time submarine passenger," I say, borrowing the radio show caller's approach. "I read your book The Power of Now twice. Plus New Earth and Stillness Speaks once apiece."

"Allocating too much authority in books defeats their purpose," he replies in his measured, ethereal tone. "The point is to go beyond all concepts, including mine."

"Oh, I definitely went beyond yours," I say, stretching luxuriously, feeling my spine articulate vertebra by vertebra. "That's when I realized I much preferred being IN my body rather than trying to transcend it."

"The body is not the problem," he says, his voice taking on the patient quality of someone explaining something obvious. "Identification with the body is the problem. We are not these temporary forms."

"See, that's where we part ways," I say, rolling my shoulders and feeling the delicious release of tension. "I most definitely AM this temporary form. And I am madly, exuberantly, gratefully in love with being it."

"That attachment will cause you suffering when the form inevitably breaks down and dies."

I watch a school of silver fish spiral past our window, their bodies moving as one organism, and feel a sudden surge of kinship with their fluid intelligence.

"But what about all the ecstasy I'll miss,” I say, “if I spend my life trying to detach from this miraculous flesh? What about all the wisdom I'll never receive from this body that has been learning how to be alive for millions of years before my mind ever formed a single thought?"

Tolle regards me with what I imagine he thinks is compassionate concern, his eyes holding that particular softness of someone viewing another's delusion with kindness. "Ecstasy that depends on the physical is ultimately hollow. True bliss comes from recognizing your essential nature beyond form."

"Have you ever had really good sex?" I ask bluntly.

My soul friend snorts with laughter beside me. Several passengers turn to stare, their expressions ranging from scandalized to secretly intrigued. Tolle's composure doesn't waver, but I catch the faintest flicker of something—surprise? discomfort?—across his features.

"Sexual pleasure is fleeting," he says, as if this settles the matter. "It creates more craving, which creates more suffering."

"What about the pleasure of tasting perfectly ripe strawberries? The way the sweetness explodes across your tongue and your whole mouth celebrates with joy? Or diving into cold ocean water on a hot day, feeling every nerve ending wake up at once? Or dancing until your whole body becomes rhythm itself, until the boundary between you and the music dissolves?"

"All are temporary sensations that reinforce the ego's addiction to experience."

I lean forward, studying his face, looking for any crack in his certainty. "You know what I think? I think maybe you're afraid of how powerful the body is. How intelligent it is. How it knows things your mind never could and never will."

"The body is unconscious. Only awareness is conscious."

"My own body knew about my partner's pregnancy before any test could detect it—some shift in pheromones, some cellular hum that bypassed my rational mind entirely. My body has led me away from dangerous situations my logical thoughts couldn't assess. Has felt the wrongness in a person's energy before their words revealed it. My body has orgasms that are direct communions with the Divine Intelligence—moments when every cell is exuding prayer, when the boundary between self and cosmos dissolves not through transcendence but through the most intimate possible connection."

I pause to breathe, watching his face. "None of that is unconscious,” I add. “It's a different kind of consciousness. Older, deeper, and more integrated than the chattering mind could ever be."

"Those are still just physical phenomena arising in consciousness."

"But they ARE consciousness!" The words burst out of me with more force than I intended. "The consciousness of muscle and bone and blood and nerve. The consciousness of a heart that has beaten billions of times without me ever having to think about it. The consciousness of cells that repair themselves while I sleep, that fight off invaders I'll never know existed, that maintain the precise chemical balance necessary for my thoughts to form, for my emotions to flow, for my dreams to unfold."

I put my right hand on my chest and massage it tenderly, feeling the steady thrum of my pulse beneath my palm.

"Every second," I continue, my voice growing warmer, "my body performs millions of chemical reactions. It maintains its temperature within one degree of perfect. It processes light into vision, vibrations into music, molecules into the taste of chocolate and the scent of jasmine. It takes the food I eat and transforms it into the energy that powers my words right now. How is this not divine? How is this not worthy of worship? How is this not the most sophisticated spiritual technology ever devised?"

"Because it will all end," Tolle says. I hear something vulnerable beneath his certainty. "Why attach to what is impermanent?"

"Because impermanence makes it precious!" I feel tears spilling from my eyes. "Because this body—my body, your body whether you acknowledge it or not—is the only way consciousness gets to experience texture and flavor and the feeling of wind on skin. This is one of the most ingenious and necessary experiments the universe has ever devised. It's a privilege and honor beyond imagining to have been given the chance to learn how to be our bodies, to discover what it means to be the cosmos experiencing itself from the inside out."

"That blessing becomes a curse when you cling to it."

"And transcendence becomes a cop-out when you use it to avoid fully living."

Around us, the other passengers are listening now, their spiritual masks slipping to reveal raw human curiosity. Some nod in agreement, others look scandalized. The yoga instructor whispers something disapproving to the meditation master.

"I'm not advocating unconscious indulgence," I clarify. "I'm not talking about losing yourself in sensation or mistaking pleasure for purpose. I'm advocating conscious embodiment. Sacred embodiment. Treating this flesh as the holy temple it actually is. Not a temple you visit, but a temple you ARE."

"The temple is just a structure," Tolle insists, but his voice has lost some of its authority. "What matters is what's inside it."

"What if the structure IS what's inside it? What if consciousness and flesh are so thoroughly married, so completely interpenetrated, that trying to separate them is like trying to separate wetness from water, or warmth from fire?"

My soul friend rises gracefully from her seat, and I can see the decision forming in her body before her mind catches up to it. "Watch this," she says to Tolle, her voice carrying the authority of someone about to demonstrate rather than argue.

She begins to dance. Not the ethereal, floaty movements often associated with spiritual practice, but earthy, sensual, grounded dancing. Her bare feet seem to root into the submarine floor, drawing energy up from some invisible source. Her hips move like tides. Her arms undulate like kelp in the current outside our windows, and I realize she's mirroring the underwater forest, becoming part of the ocean's own choreography.

"This is prayer," she says as she dances. "This is meditation. This is enlightenment with hips and spine and belly. This is the Divine moving through form. Can your transcendent awareness do this? Can your pure consciousness taste salt or feel texture or know the difference between rough and smooth?"

Several other passengers begin to move in their seats.

"The body is not the enemy of enlightenment," I tell Tolle, watching his eyes follow my soul friend's movements with something that might be longing. "It's enlightenment's most intimate partner. Maybe instead of trying to escape the physical, we should be thanking it. Celebrating it. Learning from its ancient wisdom. Maybe the goal isn't to transcend the body but to become worthy of it."

"And when disease comes?" His voice is quieter now, more human. "When aging comes? When death comes?"

"Then I will love my body through all of that too. I will honor how it has carried me through every experience—the painful ones that taught me compassion, the joyful ones that taught me gratitude, the ordinary ones that taught me presence. I will be grateful for every sensation it gave me, every pleasure and even every pain that deepened my capacity to be fully alive."

I pause, watching the kelp forests sway beyond our windows, feeling my own breath synchronize with their ancient rhythm.

"When my time comes to let this body go,” I continue, “I want to release it with love, not with the relief of finally escaping a prison. I want to thank it for being the most faithful friend I ever had—the one who stayed with me through every breath, every heartbeat, every moment of this wild, precious human experience."

Tolle looks out at the kelp forest, his reflection ghostlike in the glass. For a moment, his carefully maintained composure cracks.

"You make it sound beautiful," he admits quietly, his voice carrying the weight of years of practiced detachment.

"It IS beautiful. You are beautiful. This conversation of ours is happening through the miracle of vocal cords that learned to vibrate at precisely the right frequencies, eardrums that translate those vibrations into meaning, neural networks that fire at the speed of thought to create understanding between two seemingly separate beings. How can that not fill you with wonder?"

"Because wonder is just another experience that will pass away."

"Then let it pass away! And let it come again! And let yourself be amazed each time! It’s no less real because it’s transitory. Let yourself be astonished by the fact that you get to have experiences at all, that consciousness found a way to know itself through the poetry of flesh and bone."

My soul friend finishes her dance and sits back down, slightly breathless, her skin glowing with exertion and joy. The submarine breaks the surface, and through the glass dome above us, we can see sunlight streaming down through the water in cathedral rays.

"I'll make you a deal," I tell Tolle. "For the rest of this journey, try loving your body. Just as an experiment. Thank your lungs for breathing without your having to remember how. Thank your heart for its faithful rhythm. Thank your skin for feeling the warmth of this sunlight, your eyes for transforming photons into this vision of light dancing on water. See what happens when you treat your body as an ally instead of an obstacle."

"And if I do this experiment and still find suffering?"

"Then at least you will be suffering as a fully embodied human being instead of a ghost trying to pretend it doesn't exist. At least you will be suffering with your whole self instead of just the parts you've decided are acceptable."

Tolle looks down at his hands, and I watch something shift in his attention—from observing his hands to being his hands. Slowly, almost reverently, he flexes his fingers, watching them move with what might be curiosity or wonder or the first stirrings of recognition.

"These hands," he says, "have written thousands of pages. They've touched the faces of people I love. They've felt rain and snow and sand between the fingers. They've applauded beauty and wiped away tears and held other hands in comfort and connection."

"Yes," I say. "Those hands are holy. They are made of stardust that traveled billions of years to become fingers that can touch and be touched. They carry the evolutionary memory of every creature that ever reached for something beyond itself—the first fish that developed fins, the first amphibian that crawled onto land, the first primate that grasped a tool, the first human that reached out in love."

The submarine surfaces completely now, bobbing gently on the Pacific swells. Through the glass walls, we can see dolphins leaping alongside us, their bodies perfect expressions of joy in motion.

"Perhaps," Tolle says slowly, each word feeling carefully chosen, "transcendence and embodiment are not opposites. Perhaps they are dance partners.”

I settle back into my seat, feeling the warm pressure of my soul friend's hand in mine, grateful for every nerve ending that allows me to feel her touch, every muscle that holds me upright, every cell that participates in this ongoing miracle of being alive in a body that knows how to love.

"Thank you," Tolle says to me, “for reminding me that I have a body."

"Thank your body," I reply, "for reminding you that it has you."

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Image borrowed (and altered) from Barbara Kruger

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“Keeping your body healthy is an expression of gratitude to the whole cosmos — the trees, the clouds, everything.”

― Thich Nhat Hanh, Touching Peace: Practicing the Art of Mindful Living

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Your Cells Listen: How Talking to Your Body Heals You: tinyurl.com/TalkToYourCells

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Is there scientific proof we can heal ourselves? tinyurl.com/ProofWeCanHealOurselves

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This perfect moment is brought to you by your bone marrow, which every second of your life produces 100 trillion molecules of hemoglobin, the stuff that carries oxygen from your lungs to the rest of you ... and by your immune system, which every minute begets 10 million lymphocytes, the key players in your body's defenses.

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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY

Week of May 29

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Gemini author Jean-Paul Sartre was offered the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1964. But he rejected it. Why? He said that if he accepted it, he would be turned into an institution and authority figure, which would hinder his ability to critique politics and society. He was deeply committed to the belief that a writer has an obligation to be independent and accountable only to their conscience and audience, not to external accolades or validations. I think you are in a Sartre-like phase right now, dear Gemini. You have a sacred duty to be faithful to your highest calling, your deepest values, and your authentic identity. Every other consideration should be secondary.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): You are now highly attuned to subtle energies, subliminal signals, and hidden agendas. No one in your sphere is even half as sensitive as you are to the intriguing mysteries that are unfolding beneath the visible surface. This may be a bit unsettling, but it’s a key asset. Your ability to sense what others are missing gives you a unique advantage. So trust your intuitive navigation system, Cancerian, even if the way forward isn't obvious. Your ability to sense underlying currents will enable you to avoid obstacles and discern opportunities that even your allies might overlook.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Underground fungal networks are essential for the health of ecosystems. They connect plant roots and facilitate transfers of nutrients, water, and communication signals between various species. They enhance the fertility of the soil, helping plants thrive. In accordance with astrological indicators, I invite you to celebrate your equivalent of the underground fungal network. What is the web of relationships that enables you to thrive? Not just the obvious bonds, but the subtle ones, too: the barista who has memorized your order, the neighbor who waters your plants when you’re away, the online ally who responds to your posts. Now is an excellent time to map and nurture these vital interconnections.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): Virgo author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie warns about "the danger of a single story." She tells us that authentic identity requires us to reject oversimplified narratives. As a Nigerian woman living in the US, she found that both Western and African audiences sought to reduce her to convenient categories. She has not only resisted that pressure, but also outwitted and outflanked it. Her diversity is intriguing. She mixes an appreciation for pop culture with serious cultural criticism. She addresses both academic and mainstream audiences. I offer her up as your role model, Virgo. In the coming weeks, may she inspire you to energetically express all your uncategorizable selves.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Where have you not yet traveled but would like to? What frontiers would your imagination love for you to visit, but you have refrained? Now is the time to consider dropping inhibitions, outmoded habits, and irrelevant rules that have prevented you from wandering farther and wider. You have full permission from life, karma, and your future self to take smart risks that will lead you out of your comfort zone. What exotic sanctuary do you wish you had the courage to explore? What adventurous pilgrimage might activate aspects of your potential that are still half-dormant?

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Astrologers say that Scorpio is ruled by three creatures that correspond to three ascending levels of spiritual maturity. The regular Scorpio person is ruled by the scorpion. Scorpios who are well underway with their spiritual work are ruled by the eagle. The Scorpio who has consistently succeeded at the hard and rewarding work of metaphorical death and resurrection is ruled by the phoenix—the mythical bird that is reborn from the ashes of its own immolation. With this as our context, I am letting you know that no matter how evolved you are, the coming weeks will bring you rich opportunities to come more into your own as a brilliant phoenix

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SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Seas off the coast of Singapore are heavily polluted. Some of the coral reefs there are showing resilience, though. They have developed symbiotic relationships with certain algae and bacteria that were formerly hostile. Their robustness lies in their adaptability and their power to forge unlikely alliances. That’s a good teaching for you right now. The strength you need isn't about maintaining fixed positions or rigid boundaries, but about being flexible. So I hope you will be alert and ready to connect with unfamiliar resources and unexpected help. A willingness to adjust and compromise will be a superpower.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Sometimes, disruptions are helpful prods that nudge us to pay closer attention. An apparent malfunction might be trying to tell us some truth that our existing frameworks can't accommodate. I suspect this phenomenon might be occurring in your world. An area of your life that seems to be misfiring may in fact be highlighting a blind spot in your comprehension. Rather than fretting and purging the glitches, I will ask you to first consider what helpful information is being exposed. Suspend your judgment long enough to learn from apparent errors.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): This isn’t the first time I’ve said that your ideas are ahead of their time. Now I’m telling you again, and adding that your intuitions, feelings, and approaches are ahead of their time, too. As usual, your precociousness carries both potential benefits and problems. If people are flexible and smart enough to be open to your innovations, you will be rewarded. If others are rigid and oblivious, you may have to struggle to get the right things done. Here’s my advice: Focus on the joy of carrying out your innovations rather than getting caught up in fighting resistance.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Sunlight can’t penetrate deeper than 3,280 feet into the ocean’s depths. Even at 650 feet down, a murky twilight zone prevails. But nearly 75 percent of deep-sea creatures can create their own light, thanks to a biochemical phenomenon called bioluminescence. Jellyfish, starfish, and crustaceans are a few animals that glow. I propose we make them your symbols of power in the coming weeks, Pisces. I hope they incite you to be your own source of illumination as you summon all the resilience you need. If shadowy challenges arise, resolve to emit your steady brilliance. Inspire yourself and others with your subtle yet potent clarity.

ARIES (March 21-April 19): The strongest, most enduring parts of China’s Great Wall were the 5,500 miles built during the Ming Dynasty, 1368-1644. One secret to their success was sticky rice, an essential ingredient in the mortar. The resulting structures have been remarkably water resistant. They hold their shape well, resist weed growth, and get stronger as time passes. I hope you will find metaphorical equivalents to sticky rice as you work on your foundations in the coming months, Aries. Proceed as if you are constructing basic supports that will last you for years.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): The world's most expensive spice is saffron. To gather one gram of it, workers must harvest 150 flowers by hand. Doesn’t that process resemble what you have been doing? I am awed by the stamina and delicacy you have been summoning to generate your small but potent treasure. What you’re producing may not be loud and showy, but its value will be concentrated and robust. Trust that those who appreciate quality will recognize the painstaking effort behind your creation. Like saffron's distinctive essence that transforms ordinary dishes into extraordinary ones, your patient dedication is creating what can’t be rushed or replicated.

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