Your friend arrives, somewhat worn by the day. You offer them a comfy seat, a drink and an attentive ear. Very soon they feel revived.
I would like to introduce you to a little practice that could be called "Inner Hospitality", because, although I have described how we would treat our guest, we often forget to extend the same courtesy to our own beautiful bodies that serve us so well and also get somewhat worn by the day.
Sometimes my client and I start a session of Craniosacral Therapy by allowing the body in all its glorious complexity to realise that we are going to be paying it some attention. You can do this any time
Sit or lie down, maybe offer yourself that cup of tea.
Now bring your attention to your feet. Are they a matched pair?
Don’t try to change anything, don’t wiggle them in the hopes of making things more comfortable, just feel what is happening.
Listen to the story of the feet, or travel inwards to see with your inner eye what is happening in those two amazing structures with all the little bones, the complex pattern of muscle and ligament, the amazing gravity-defying arch of the foot, the toes – are those toes the same on the right and the left?
What about your legs? Are they both meeting the chair underneath you in the same way? Is there the same weight in each leg? Can you feel all the complexity of your ankles? How are the knee joints? And your buttocks? If you were sitting or lying on sand would you make the same imprint with each buttock?
Go on up your back; the shoulder blades like to tell their story when you are lying down, then you can feel if they too are making the same print under you. Maybe one shoulder is nearer your ear than the other?
Your neck? Two arms and hands?
And what does the glory of your face have to say? Does your face feel symmetrical?
Each time you do this Inner Hospitality, you will find different stories being told, different parts of your body will be be crying our for attention. In the same way as you would have a different conversation with your friend (the one we were giving tea to at the top of the page) each time you got together.
Let us, for a moment, go back to that original scenario, the friend who is visiting: Imagine that the friend has a problem they are trying to resolve. You could offer them a solution, you could (but you probably wouldn’t) shout at them to sort themselves out. But if you are kind and wise, you will offer them the gift of your listening attention and probably be amazed as the solution comes to them in its own time and in an unexpected way.
With our bodies we are often not so kind. We have learned to over-ride the messages they are sending to us until they have to scream to be heard and we land up ill or injured.
But bodies too can find a solution to problems if we extend to them the same courtesy of our non judging attention. Of course if you haven’t done this for a long time (or ever) there may be a lot that your body has to tell you.
Trust the process. If your friend were really distressed you might have to give her a while to feel better. If your time is limited, promise to come back and discover a bit more later.
And if your body needs a friend to listen with you for a while, a Craniosacral Therapy session is really two people offering to pay close and skilled attention to the beautiful complexity of a human body.
Related Posts
