Chapter 8 Reconnecting Body & Senses

Q: How can one find happiness?

The most important thing is the body. The body is your foundation, your root, your anchor. To be hostile to the body is suicidal; it leads to mental breakdown and brings misfortune and tragedy. You are the body—of course, you are not just the body, but this "not just" comes later; initially, you are simply the body.

 

But you've always been taught to go against your body. So sometimes you're captivated by the verdant trees, sometimes by the sun, moon, and flowers, but never by your own body. Yet, the body is the most complex phenomenon in the universe. No tree or flower is as beautiful as your body, and even the sun, moon, and stars don't have such a highly evolved mechanism.

 

Herein lies a profound paradox: if you gaze upon a flower, people will say, "How beautiful!" But if you gaze upon a man's or woman's beautiful face, people will say, "Lustful." If you stand beside a tree, gazing dreamily at a flower—opening your heart to let the flower merge with you—people will see you as a poet, a painter, or a mystic. But if you stand reverently beside a man or woman, gazing at them dreamily, letting your senses savor their beauty, then the police will arrest you. No one will call you a mystic or a poet; no one will appreciate you. Something has truly gone wrong.

 

If you say to a stranger on the street, "Your eyes are so beautiful!" you'll both feel awkward. He won't say "thank you"; instead, he'll feel offended. What right do you have to interfere in his privacy? How dare you do that? A tree you touch will be happy, but a person you touch will feel offended. What's wrong? Something has been completely destroyed.

 

You've always been lukewarm. Your passion has long since cooled and died out; you need to rekindle it. Tantra says: First, purify the body—purify all repression, allow the body's energy to flow, and clear blockages.

 

It's rare to find someone whose body is completely free of blockages and tension. Let go of tension; it blocks the flow of energy. Why is everyone so restless? Why can't you relax? Have you ever seen a cat napping in the afternoon? It's so relaxed and carefree. Can't you relax like it? You toss and turn in bed, unable to relax. The beauty of a cat's relaxation lies in maintaining alertness even in complete relaxation. At the slightest sound in the room, it opens its eyes, ready to pounce, not just sleeping. The way cats sleep is worth learning—it's something people have forgotten.

 

Tantra said: Learn from cats—see how they sleep, relax, and live freely. All animals live without tension, and humans must learn from them because humans have been wrongly conditioned and molded.

 

From a very young age, you were molded into a tense person. You were afraid to breathe. People are afraid to breathe because they fear sexual desire, because deep breathing touches the core of sex, massaging and stimulating it from within. Because you were taught that sex is dangerous, every child begins to shallow their breathing—breathing only to the chest, never beyond, otherwise they suddenly become aroused: not only arousing sexual desire, but also fear. Once you breathe deeply, sexual energy is also released.

Only the Tantra allows you to be fully present and fully free. The Tantra gives you unconstrained freedom; regardless of your identity or abilities, the Tantra does not restrict or limit you, but gives you complete freedom. Because the Tantra understands that complete freedom brings more possibilities.

 

Your body must be light, so that you almost walk on the ground—that's how Tantras walk. You are so light, unaffected by gravity, that you could practically fly, but this comes from deep acceptance.

 

Accepting your body is difficult. You criticize and condemn it, never appreciating or cherishing it, yet you expect such a miracle: that someone will love you. If you don't love it, how can you expect others to love your body? If you don't love it, then no one else will, because your very nature will make others resist.

 

You will fall in love with someone who loves you, and vice versa. The earliest love is always love for yourself—all other loves will only derive from there. You don't love your body, you try your best to cover it up, to conceal its essence with clothing. You try to beautify the lingering sense of loss, and the result is that you become more and more hypocritical.

 

Once you accept yourself, you are beautiful. When you feel joy for your body, you will bring joy to others, and many people will fall in love with you because you love yourself. But now you are angry with yourselves, feeling ugly and repulsive . This kind of thinking will discourage people from falling in love with you, and will only make them keep their distance; even if they get close to you, they will feel the atmosphere is not right and leave.

 

There's no need to pursue others; it's simply because we haven't loved ourselves, otherwise others would come to us. It's hard for people not to fall in love with those who love them. Why do so many people seek out Buddha and Jesus? Because these people loved themselves; they were immersed in deep love, joyful in their own existence—people are naturally drawn to them. How can you resist that allure? Their mere existence was utterly joyful.

 

Tantra first teaches you to love your body, treat it kindly, respect it, value it, and take care of it—it is a gift from God; treat it well, and it will reveal great mysteries to you. All growth depends on how you connect with your body.

 

Q: I don't like myself, especially my body!

You have certain ideas about your body, and holding onto those ideas will bring you unhappiness. The body is just as it is; clinging to certain ideas will cause you pain, so you should let go of those ideas.

 

This is your body, a gift from God. Use it well…enjoy it! If you begin to love it, you'll find it changing, because a person who loves their body begins to care, and care implies everything. You won't give it extra food because you care; you won't let it go hungry because you care. You'll listen to its needs, its hints—what it needs, and when it needs it.

 

When you care for and love it, you become in harmony with it, and your body will naturally be fine.

 

Disliking your body will cause you trouble because you'll ignore it and be indifferent to it. Who cares about their enemy? You'll ignore it, avoid it, stop listening to its messages, and then hate it even more.

 

This problem is entirely your own doing. The body never causes trouble; it's the mind that does. So it's the mind's idea. Animals never worry about any thoughts about their bodies, never... not even hippos—they're happy because no mind is causing trouble, otherwise a hippo would think, "Why do I look like this?" There's no problem at all.

 

Discard this idea. Love your body—it's your body, a gift from God, and you should enjoy and care for it. Care for it, and you'll exercise, eat, sleep—take meticulous care of it, because it's what you depend on for survival, like maintaining a car. You'll listen carefully to every sound it makes, checking for problems—even minor scratches deserve attention. Care for your body, and it will be perfect—and indeed it is! It's such a perfect mechanism, so complex, that it continues to function effectively even after seventy years. Whether you're awake or asleep, conscious or unconscious, it keeps running, quietly running, serving you even without your care. You should be grateful for it.

 

Just change your attitude, and you'll see a difference in your body within six months. Like a woman falling in love: you'll find she suddenly becomes more beautiful. Perhaps she never cared about her body before, but once she falls in love, she starts to care. She can stand in front of the mirror for hours… because someone loves her! It's the same: once you love your body, you'll see it change. It's loved, cared for, and needed. It's a very sophisticated mechanism—yet it's often used roughly. Just change your attitude, and you'll see!

 

Q: I'm terribly ugly, and I've suffered a lot because of it. What should I do?

Ugliness has nothing to do with your body, nor does beauty. Physical beauty or ugliness is superficial; true beauty comes from within. If your inner self is beautiful, you will be captivating. This has been seen countless times; even an ugly person with inner peace can begin to become beautiful.

 

I have been observing this phenomenon. Year after year, people's appearances upon arrival are vastly different from what they are now. As they begin to meditate, dance, and sing, their faces begin to relax, their tension dissipates, and the pained expressions gradually disappear, replaced by a childlike ease. A new, radiant inner joy shines upon their faces.

 

Physical beauty is not important; what matters is inner beauty. I can teach you how to achieve inner beauty, which is true beauty. With such beauty, physical appearance will no longer be so important; your eyes will begin to sparkle with joy, your face will radiate light and happiness, and the form of beauty will become invisible. When your inner self begins to exude a certain elegance, outward appearance will be relegated to the side, becoming meaningless in comparison, so there's no need to worry.

 

Quiet your mind, love, dance, sing, celebrate—and ugliness will vanish. Introduce the higher, and the lower will be forgotten; it's all relative and comparative. Introducing the higher is like having a small candle in a room, but when another large candle appears, the original small candle becomes insignificant.

 

It's relatively easy to cultivate inner beauty; I can't help with anything else, I'm not a plastic surgeon. You can go to a plastic surgeon, but that won't help at all. Perhaps your nose will become longer and more prominent, but your inner self will remain unchanged. Your beautiful appearance only highlights your inner ugliness, creating a stark contrast.

 

There is a very delicate bond between the left and right hemispheres of the brain. If this bond is broken due to an accident, a physical defect, or other factors, the person will split into two people—forming schizophrenia or split personality disorder. If this exceptionally fragile bond breaks, you will be divided in two, and your behavior will be completely different; you will be as beautiful as a loving angel in the morning, but a fierce demon in the evening, your appearance completely changed. You can't remember who you were in the morning… how could you remember? That was the masterpiece of the other mind—the result is two completely different people. If this bond is strong enough that the two minds dissolve and merge, then integrate, crystallize, and ascend, that is what Gurdjieff called "the crystallization of nature," that is the unity of these two minds, the unity of the inner masculine and feminine, the unity of yin and yang, the unity of left and right, the unity of logic and non-logic, the unity of Aristotle and Plato.

 

If you can understand this fundamental difference, you can understand all ongoing conflicts—your inner and outer conflicts.

Elegance and Efficiency: The Cost of Imbalance

The female mind has its elegance, the male mind its efficiency. If the two are locked in a struggle, elegance will surely lose, and efficiency will win, because the world understands mathematics, not the language of love. However, once efficiency triumphs, you also lose something priceless: the connection to your own existence. You may be very efficient, but you are no longer a real person, but a machine, a robot.

 

If you remain dominated by your left brain, you will be very successful—so successful that ulcers will follow you around age forty; you'll have at least one or two heart attacks by age forty-five; and you'll almost die by age fifty—dying with great success. You may be a great scientist, but certainly not a great life. You may accumulate enough wealth, but you'll also lose everything of value. You may conquer the world like Alexander the Great, but your inner territory will remain barren.

 

Many things that attract attention follow the patterns of the left brain—the worldly mind, which is more concerned with cars, money, houses, power, and prestige. That's the orientation of men, known in India as "grustha"—the head of the household.

 

The right brain, on the other hand, is more of a seeker's orientation. It's more concerned with its inner existence, peace, and joy, and less concerned with external things. Having something is good, not having it is also good. It's more concerned with the present moment, less concerned with the future; more concerned with the poetry of life, less concerned with aspects that require calculation…

 

Following calculations is one approach, following dreams is another; the two are completely different. Just a few days ago, someone asked me, "Are there demons or monsters?" If you're operating through your right brain, they are; if you're operating through your left brain, they aren't.

 

Every child is right-brain oriented; they all see monsters and ghosts. But adults always corner them, telling them, "Nonsense, you fool, where did these monsters come from? There's nothing there, just shadows." The helpless child is gradually convinced, and so he inevitably shifts from right-brain oriented to left-brain oriented, because he has to live in your world, forget all dreams, myths, and poetry, and learn to calculate. He naturally becomes scheming, and as a result, almost lifelong numbness. Existence drifts further and further away from him; he becomes like a commodity in a market, crippled for life… even though he may have value in the eyes of the world.

 

People think they know love—but they don't at all, and they mistakenly believe that jealousy is caused by love. People think "love" means some kind of monopoly or possession, unaware of a stark truth about life: to possess a life is to kill it.

 

You cannot possess or control life; if you want to have it, you must let go.

But things have gone astray for a long time, leading us to believe that love and jealousy are inseparable, almost like the same energy. For example, your lover seeing another woman will make you jealous and upset. But let me tell you, if you don't feel jealous, you'll feel worse—you'll think you don't love him anymore, because loving him means being jealous.

 

Love and jealousy have become conflated. In fact, they are worlds apart. A jealous mind cannot love, and vice versa; a loving mind cannot be jealous.

 

Q: A few days ago, I finally confronted my biggest demon: jealousy. I fully embraced it, and the result was joy, gratitude, and a surge of energy. What did I learn from this experience? How can I prevent myself from being consumed by jealousy again?

 

This experience is very meaningful to you. A pivotal experience can completely transform a person's energy.

Gurdjieff first discovered this in his disciples: personality is their number one enemy, because this enemy contains a crucial key that, if not understood, can be destructive, or it can bring about transformation.

 

You've faced jealousy. Jealousy is one of the most dangerous elements in the human consciousness, especially in the female mind. Confront your archenemy nakedly, without embellishment or self-justification—without claiming you're right, that you were jealous out of necessity, etc.—and without trying to smooth things over in any way that satisfies yourself.

 

Justifying your jealousy will only intensify it, and you won't even feel its current energy anymore. It will continue to be absorbed by jealousy, remaining a part of it, and constantly finding excuses to exploit it. But because you haven't given it any explanation... haven't rationalized it, you've simply treated your jealousy as a fact... and accepted it. It concerns you, but not others; the world is not responsible for it.

 

All excuses are just defenses of jealousy.

You did a great job; simply by observing quietly, the jealousy disappeared.

That's what I've been saying for years: you don't have to do anything, just face the problem like a mirror, without judgment.

Because it was your number one enemy, it had a lot of energy. Now that it's gone, that energy is released. So you feel more vibrant, more loving, and more emotional. You dealt with jealousy well, so the energy was released. You've struggled with jealousy for years, and now you've found the key.

 

The next time jealousy strikes, seize it immediately. This approach to dealing with the number one enemy can also be applied to all enemies that invade the mind, which are relatively insignificant, or even vanish in an instant, and do not have much power.

 

If life flows smoothly, you will climb higher and higher, and death is the highest peak of life.

But why do we keep missing out on life? Why do we only age instead of mature? Something must have gone wrong, taken a wrong turn, and you've somehow accepted this arrangement. This agreement must be broken, burned, so I call those who understand: "I have been living wrongly until now—I have only compromised, never truly lived," disciples.

 

You learned to compromise at a very young age, gaining nothing but a pile of garbage except for selling your own existence. You sold yourself for trivial things, preferring to be someone else than yourself, and so you went astray. Your parents wanted you to be a big shot, society wanted you to be a big shot, and you agreed. Gradually, you decided to stop being yourself, and from then on, you fantasized about becoming someone important.

 

You can never grow up to be someone else; you can only grow up to be yourself. Let go of the "should" mentality, and don't care too much about what others think. What do their opinions matter? What right do they have? You were born to be yourself, not to meet other people's expectations—though everyone tries desperately to. Your father may be gone, but you're still desperately trying to fulfill your promises to him, while he once desperately tried to fulfill his promises to his father, and so on. This kind of foolishness started very early.

 

Try to understand, muster your courage, and take control of your life; you will find energy surging within you. When you decide, "I want to be myself, not someone else, no matter the cost," you will see a significant change; you will feel vibrant and energetic.

Unless you do this, you'll be afraid of growing old. You've squandered your life, and now you're old—will you even be able to live after that? Death is drawing ever closer, and you've never truly lived? How can you avoid these realities? You'll inevitably live in misery. If you ask me what to do, these are my basic suggestions.