Breaking Free

 

Breaking Free of the Pain-body

written by Debbie

 


from the book A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle  (p. 161-184)

1.   First, you realize that you have a pain- body.  (description of the Pain-body)

2.   Then, more importantly, you stay present enough, alert enough, to notice the beginning stage of the pain-body becoming active in yourself as a heavy influx of negative emotion.

3.   When you consciously recognize the pain-body is becoming active, it cannot pretend to be you, and live and renew itself through you by feeding on your thoughts. Conscious Presence breaks identification with the pain-body.

4.   The pain-body may not dissolve immediately but once you have severed the link between it and your thinking, the pain-body begins to lose its energy. 

5.   In this way, without emotions clouding your thinking, your present perceptions are no longer distorted by the past. The energy that was trapped in the pain-body then changes its vibrational frequency and is transmuted into Presence.  "Every time you are present when the pain-body arises, some of the pain-body's negative emotional energy will burn up, as it were, and become transmuted into Presence (p. 180)."   This is why Eckhart says that the pain-body can be fuel for consciousness.

6.   "The rest of the pain-body will quickly withdraw and wait for a better opportunity to arise again, that is to say, when you are less conscious (p.180).  Being less conscious could be after you have had a few drinks or watched a violent movie.  Even the tiniest negative emotion such as being irritable or anxious can serve as a doorway for the pain-body to arise again.   


Pay Attention to Triggers

Triggering events or situations bring back to life the old accumulated emotion of the pain-body, so it's very important to be aware of our triggers if at all possible.  Something relatively minor can set off someone's pain-body but this is usually not the apparent cause.  It can look as if it is an overreaction to the other person but the trigger is tapping into old pain, usually something from early childhood.  Eckhart explains, "The triggering event or situation is then interpreted and reacted to through the screen of a heavily emotional ego.  This is to say, its significance becomes completely distorted.  You look at the present through the eyes of the emotional past within you.  In other words, what you see and experience is not in the event or situation but in you. Or in some cases, it may be there in the event or situation, but you amplify it through your reaction.  This reaction, this amplification, is what the pain-body wants and needs, what it feeds on (p. 173)." 

Eckhart further explains that the pain-body will often react to only one particular kind of trigger or situation.  The current trigger or situation will resonate with a certain kind of emotional pain suffered in the past.  Eckhart recommends to:

  1. Quickly learn your most common triggers that activate the pain-body, then you will immediately see them for what they are.

  2. When you recognize a trigger, enter a heightened state of alertness and within a second or two, you will also notice the emotional reaction that is the arising pain-body. (This reminds me of Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor's 90-Second Rule)
  3. In that state of alert Presence, you won't identify with it, which means the pain-body cannot take you over and become the voice in your head.

"When the pain-body is activated, know that what you are feeling is the pain-body in you.  This knowing is all that is needed to break your identification with it.   And when identification with it ceases, the transmutation begins (p. 183)." 


Transmutation

This knowing is all that is needed to break identification with the pain-body.  "The knowing prevents the old emotion from rising up into your head and taking over not only the internal dialogue, but also your actions as well as interactions with other people.  This means the pain-body cannot use you anymore and renew itself through you.  The old emotion may then still live in you for a while and come up periodically.  It may also still occasionally trick you into identifying with it again and thus obscure the knowing, but not for long.  Not projecting the old emotion into situations means facing it directly within yourself.  It may not be pleasant, but it won't kill you.  Your Presence is more than capable of containing it.  The emotion is not who you are (p. 184)." 

Eckhart cautions us to not fall into the error of thinking something is wrong with us.  "The knowing needs to be followed by accepting.  Anything else will obscure it again.  Accepting means you allow yourself to feel whatever it is you are feeling at that moment.  It is part of the is-ness of the Now.  You can't argue with what is.  Well you can, but if you do, you suffer.  Through allowing, you become what you are: vast, spacious.  You become whole.  You are not a fragment anymore, which is how the ego perceives itself.  Your true nature emerges, which is one with the nature of God (p. 184)." This teaching says we are already whole - with or without the pain-body.  So, be what you already are, whole.


Psychic Toxicity

Eckhart describes an energy field that emanates from every human being that corresponds to his or her inner state. He states that most people sense this subliminally even before any words are exchanged. It is very interesting when he says, "A little later, however, words take over the relationship and with words come the roles that most people play. Attention then moves to the realm of the mind, and the ability to sense the other person’s energy field becomes greatly diminished." (p. 162) 

The energy we bring into our immediate surroundings emanates from our inner state.  We cannot suppress the pain-body.  Our homes are pervaded with this negative energy we carry in our energy field.  It is extremely toxic and that psychic toxicity is absorbed by others, even our children.  Do the work of transmutation not only for yourself but for your children and grandchildren as well.


Evolutionary Impulse of the Universe

Where do people that stay unconscious fit into all this?  Eckhart explains that unconscious human beings are out of alignment with the "evolutionary impulse of the universe" and are meant to evolve into conscious beings. They truly don’t know what they are doing in their unconsciousness, but will, nevertheless, suffer the consequences of how they act (p. 163).  But, "… from a higher perspective, it is not possible to be out of alignment with the evolution of the universe, and even human unconsciousness and the  suffering it generates is part of that evolution.  When you can’t stand the endless cycle of suffering anymore, you begin to evolve." (p. 164) 
        		   


Witnessing Presence Coming into this World (p. 164-167)

Much of our emotional pain is not caused by our present situation but originated in early negative life experiences. Our mind quickly identifies with this negative emotional-charge because structural characteristics of the past experience correspond to the current experience eventhough the content may be totally different. It then acts as a catalyst to produce the same corresponding chemicals in our body, which then give rise to the same negative emotional charges. Also, a current threat to the body-mind system may be something you are only thinking, the body’s intelligence is reading it as if it is actually happening in the physical world. There seems to be no mechanism to discriminate the real signals from the thought-only signals to the brain.  

    Steps Eckhart used to Facilitate the Release of Pain in a Woman
                        Physically Abused as a Child by her Father          

    1. Direct the focus of her attention to what she is feeling inside her body.

    2. Direct her to sense the emotion directly instead of through the filter of her thoughts, of her unhappy story.  You can say, "At this moment, this is what you feel.  There is nothing you can do about the fact that at this moment this is what you feel."

    3. Ask her to inquire within asking, "Instead of wanting this moment to be different from the way it is, which adds more pain to the pain that is already there, is it possible for me to completely accept that this is what I feel right now?

    4. When the answer comes ask, "Who is speaking, you or the unhappiness in you?  Can you see that your unhappiness about being unhappy is just another layer of unhappiness?"

    5. After a short amount of time, whether anything is said or not, clarify by saying, "I'm not asking you to do anything.  All I'm asking is that you find out whether it is possible for you to allow those feelings to be there.  In other words, and this may sound strange, if you don't mind being unhappy, what happens to the unhappiness?  Don't you want to find out?"

    6. Sit for a brief moment or two of silence as needed.  You may notice a significant shift in her energy field.  She may sense or visualize some space around her unhappiness, some distance between her and the unhappiness.  The unhappiness may seem to matter less.  That space comes when there is an inner acceptance to whatever you are experiencing in the present moment.

    7. Don't say much else for a few moments and allow her to be with this new space around her unhappiness.  Encourage her to just be, don't label or judge it.

    8. Then discuss the teaching that the moment she stopped identifying with the feeling, "... the old painful emotion that lived in her, the moment she put her attention on it directly without trying to resist it, it could no longer control her thinking and so become mixed up with a mentally constructed story called "The Unhappy Me."  Another dimension had come into her life that transcended her personal past - the dimension of Presence.  Since you cannot be unhappy without an unhappy story, this was the end of her unhappiness.  Emotion itself is not unhappiness.  Only emotion plus an unhappy story is unhappiness."  Emotion + Unhappy Story = Unhappiness.

    9. At the end of the session, report the witnessing of "... the arising Presence in another human being.  The very reason for our existence in human form is to bring that dimension of consciousness into the world."  Also acknowledge "a diminishment of the pain-body, not through fighting it but through bringing the light of consciousness to it."

The Reattachment of Released Toxic Energy from the Pain-body

Eckhart proposes that the released toxic energy of the pain-body he was working with may have, somehow, piggy-backed on his energy field to arrive at another physical location and entered another human form with which its vibrational frequency resonated.  Read the story of the man in the wheelchair

eating at the same restaurant as Eckhart (p. 167-168).  Eckhart had just finished a session and witnessed a major release in someone with a very dense pain-body.  Even a friend that came by to drop something off felt the energy as heavy and murky and told him to open the windows and burn some incense. Eckhart said he opened the windows and then left to go eat at a small Indian restaurant nearby. This is where the man in the wheelchair had a verbal and physically violent outburst, ending with the police being called. Eckhart wrote, "… the released energy field left behind after our session followed me to the restaurant and attached itself to the one person in whom it found a compatible vibrational frequency, that is to say, a heavy pain-body." 

  

After reading this I recall the account of Jesus casting out demons in the Bible (Mark 5:1-20). On one occasion Jesus cast out a "legion of demons" from a man with a dense pain-body and directed them to enter a bunch of pigs. The pigs then ran off a cliff and fell into the sea and drown. "Demons" could be their word for toxic negatively-charged psychic energy generated from a dense pain-body. Eckhart even calls this negatively-charged energy field of the pain-body a "psychic parasite" (p. 148) that feeds on the cycles of deeply negative thinking and the ensuing drama that it produces, which, in turn, give rise to even more negative thinking and drama.



Personal Consideration
  
The Meditative Practice of Grounding 

You can begin each meditation and/or pain-body release work by grounding your energy center within the energy center of Mother Earth.

 

  • Grounding anchors your spirit to your human consciousness and physical body. 
  • Grounding is your unique connection to Source through your heart center.
  • Grounding enhances your heart connection and your intuitive abilities.
  • Grounding is the conscious act of connecting yourself to Source through your heart center and center of the planet. It enhances your connection to your highest essence. It is an action and a state of Being.
  • Grounding is a spiritual connection. 

When you are not grounded, you may feel like you are bouncing around, unfocussed, confused, and feel the effects of negative energies around you. You might notice you misplace things, drop things, stub your toe, feel rushed and out of control, and generally "frayed" or "spacey". Decisions are more difficult to make and the smallest thing might irritate you. You might feel depleted, that your energy is scattered.

Grounding connects you to Mother Earth so that you have access to her frequencies. This is especially important in the present time when there are so many chaotic energies on the planet. This allows you discernment and the ability to connect to your unique spiritual energy without getting knocked out of your body and "spaced out." When the physical body is grounded, it is easier to ground yourself to higher vibrations and your heart center. This is also a healing to the planet as you provide a connection for consciousness to and from the Source.

  • Grounding draws your life force energy around you. You have the fullness of your energy to use.
     
  • Grounding puts you in touch with where your body is, and what it needs in present time.
     
  • Grounding enhances opening up to your intuitive abilities and higher Consciousness.
     
  • Grounding creates "centeredness" in prayer and meditation as you communicate with your highest essence. 
     
  • Grounding enhances your ability to move through your day with certainty, joy and enthusiasm.  

Many strongly recommend integrating grounding into every aspect of our daily life. Below is a simple way to add this meditative practice. You can add your own unique ways. (click to read my unique way)

  • Be aware of your energy center (vortex) that is located in the general area near the base of the spine. Allow a "cord" of energy to flow downward from your body and into the deep earth beneath. Allow your grounding to flow down into the earth past all the rocks and layers of the planet, past the water, deep deep into the earth, into the heart of Mother. Until it reaches the center of the earth.
  • Allow your grounding cord to connect securely into the center of the planet. Be aware of your grounding cord being securely connected also to your energy center. 
  •  Breathe and relax and experience your grounding, your spiritual connection to this beautiful planet. 
  •  Notice how your body responds to your grounding and becoming more present in it. Release tension and discomfort down your grounding cord, allow it to simply drain away.  Your grounding belongs to you and you can create it in any form you like.

Eckhart Tolle and Oprah talk about the Pain-body

 

www.eckharttolleTV.com

May love, joy and peace
be  more fully realized
as our state of Beingness
which has no opposites!

Blessings to you on your path!

 

Debbie @
www.TheFeminineWhisperers.net
http://etolle.meetup.com/239

   Luis Diaz and the Pain-body (in Spanish)

  

Introduction to the Process of CMR (transcript in English)

Life is full of possibilities. It’s expression is unique to each one of us. As it comes and goes, we are often distracted by the things we do and who we believe we are that we miss the magic of the present moment. There is so much power in the present moment that when we bring our attention to it, the transformative grace and divine source is there to guide our lives and create it in peaceful ways. It is found in each and every thing there is and it has never left.

Too often in our perception and judgment of what is happening in and around us, our lives gets in the way and prevents us from experiencing the peace that holds it all together. We create beliefs about what we see and feel. We make decisions about who we are and what our lives should be like. These concepts condition our lives. They limit us from knowing our true potential. In a very organic way, they are stored within us, reproducing and creating in our life’s situation. In this way, we are powerful beings. We get to experience exactly those beliefs and feelings that we hold within ourselves.

The work of Sessions in Cellular Memory is a response to transforming concepts of what we are not. An investigation within of that which no longer serves us allows us to transform and create newer healthier possibilities for our life. If we bring awareness to that which we are not, maybe what we are will make itself known to us. We invite you to join us in exploring the practical tools of Sessions in Cellular Memory that is a way to bring awareness and healing to your present life. 

www.cellularmemory.org

Posted by Debbie at 11/20/2008
Categories: Original Writings and Productions by Debbie, Eckhart Tolle's Teachings
 
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