The truth about relaxation is that there cannot be relaxation if we are not in the truth.

If we tell a white lie, even if exquisitely justified, we will experience an excitement to the nerves that innervate our eye muscles, which will in turn throw our eyes slightly out of focus.

In fact, if we mistakenly misstate our age, with no intent to deceive, our eyes will be thrown out of focus. If we then state, or even just think our true age, our eyes will be restored to normal immediately.

The subconscious mind is responsible for this glitch. It knows the truth and cannot help but register a reaction, however subtle, to untruth. This is not from the place of morality or judgment; it’s simply the subconscious mind’s unswerving loyalty to the truth.

The subconscious mind is wired to do the right thing. This is how it keeps our physical body alive. Nonetheless, it is a true servant to the suggestions it receives from the conscious mind. It exercises its creative power to manifest anything we want, even if what we want serves not the true needs of the self. It will fully manifest a life of error, if that is what we choose to explore.

However, every thought and every action have an effect, which is often called karma. If our thoughts and actions misalign with the truth, the body will register a reaction that indeed, keeps the score.

Our thoughts and actions are constantly straining our central nervous system, often resulting in various states of dis-ease. Often this can manifest as physical symptoms that are erroneously thought to be physical problems, when in fact they are actually but feedback mechanisms from the body that reflect the disordered effects of our current state of mind.

Relaxation requires a quiet mind, where thoughts do not impose themselves upon the body.

The eye, like all senses, is a passive sense. Light waves impress themselves upon the retina, reflecting what is in the world outside of the eye. It does not see from the inside but is only impressed upon, like a small reflecting pool. Seeing is a completely receptive, inert state.

If we squint and try to see, we completely contort the eye and interfere with its receptive ability. To see best, the eye must be left alone, completely relaxed, to receive its impressions. To trust the eye, is to completely relax one’s grip upon it.

Taste is another sense that requires complete passivity to deliver a true flavor. If the mind decides to think and talk when we eat, we hardly taste our food at all. We cannot make ourselves taste.

The sensory capacity of our taste buds passively receives impressions from the food. It requires of our mind to relax its thinking, and passively be present and attentive to these sensations, to know the fullness of the flavors of what we eat.

Even touch is a passive sense. Although a massage therapist might be quite active in giving a massage, they must really be quite passive in order to receive the true state of a client’s musculature, which allows them to truly connect and know how best to touch.

Relaxation requires trust in the body, and trust in the subconscious mind.

If we passively let go of trying to control the non-activity of our senses, they will operate most efficiently.

If we center our attention on our eating, refusing thinking and talking, we will have a pleasurable and fulfilling culinary experience. This includes not listening to podcasts when we eat!

When we touch another, if we take our mind off our thoughts, we can, in the experience of sympathy, register the truth of that other person’s state of being, and instinctively deliver the right touch. And yes, when we actively touch, we are taking action, but it is action informed by the truth passively received.

When we act in alignment with truth, we are, and deliver, calm.

A path to relaxation is to intend that the conscious mind stay in alignment with truth. That truth is best known through passive presence that follows the guidance it receives from its senses and the natural wisdom of the subconscious mind.

Beyond the senses is the wisdom that all guidance arrives when we are calmly, passively available to receive it. If the mind is actively fretting about what decision is right, it is too distracted to take in the myriads of signs from spirit, often arriving through the subconscious mind, that point to the right path, the path of true knowledge.

Ego, for all its valiant efforts to anxiously do the right thing, is at its most mature when it waits, gets calm, and truly listens and receives the truth, from which naturally flow its true marching orders.

Get calm and really listen, effortlessly,
Chuck