one week from today: The Nature Of Pain And Freedom | live Zoom class
These two phenomena - pain and freedom - are intimately connected, shaping and forming each other. To know one is to know the other. Yet...they are not at all the same thing. What are they, exactly?
Dear friends,
We won’t need scientific theorums or have any need to run experiments when we learn to behold the truth in a living way.
You’re invted to join me inside the School for Living Science next week for a LIVE Zoom class where we will practice beholding truth together.
CLASS: The Nature of Pain And Freedom
WHEN: Thursday November 7th, 2024
TIME: 10AM PST | 1PM EST
WHERE: School for Living Science [Zoom]
RSVP: CLICK HERE here to join the School (it’s free) and get the Zoom link
Click the link above or the pic below and you’ll see the event in YOUR time zone (so please note that the time listed below is my time zone - MST or Mountain Standard Time in the US). You’ll also be able to add the event to your calendar, and check out our other free classes coming up in November.
Modern material science vs living science (applied to pain).
Imagine, for a moment, that you are my subject of study.
You’re in pain, and my mission is to understand your pain; to apprehend everything there is to know about it.
What modern material science tells us we must do in order to know what is true about the objects of our study is that we must cultivate impartiality and objectivity; in other words, we must distance ourselves from the objects of our studies lest our subjectivity get in the way of the truth.
Here’s my question:
How far away do I need to get if my goal is to know the truth about you?
How impartial and unemotional and coldly objective do I need to be, before for you will reveal your deepest secrets to me?
Living science differs from modern material science in that it is relational and participatory.
What modern science tells us about pain is that it is nothing more than electrical signals in the brain that have traveled from the body’s sensory nerves (called nociceptors) to the brain, where they are “interpreted” (by the brain itself as distinct from you) as the presence of potentially noxious stimuli.
That’s it.
That is about as cold and impartial as we could get, and this “fact” of science has not helped us resolve the chronic pain epidemic of our time.
Astute observation of reality will show, especially as it pertains to the human being (but also to other sentient creatures like animals), that trusting relationships built over time are the bedrock of truthful disclosure.
Rather than impartiality, what is needed to apprehend Truth is a certain kind of intimacy.
Initially hidden truths are revealed (and mysteries are solved) as a natural byproduct of demonstrating sufficient devotion and reverence to (an)Other that we are deemed worthy of knowing this Other in its fullness.
From the living science orientation, if we want to know the truth about pain then we have to get closer to it…not farther away. And we must be willing to admit that approaching a Mystery such as the pain of a human being - including, perhaps, our own - with anything resembling judgment, resentment, bitterness, rejection, anger, hatred, blame etc, will block the truth like a log in our eye.
We do not reveal our true selves to anyone who hasn’t earned the right and responsibility to know us that deeply. Neither does pain. In fact, we are masterful at hiding from ourselves.
Why?
Because we are harsh judges that are quick to condemn, punish and berate ourselves when we find anything less than our preffered self.
To know the whole truth we must approach (an)Other - whether a human being, or our own body - with reverence, devotion, awe, gratitude, curiosity, and childlike wonder…and maintain that state of being no matter what we find.
And if it’s your own body that you wish to know…
Then chances are you feel as if your body is foreign and alien to you - a mysterious and frustraing Other that seems to have an agenda separate from your own.
In this case, you are a Mystery to yourself.
Isn’t that fascinating?
We are mysteries to ourselves!
Which means we must approach our bodies - and everything we find there - in this same reverential and relational way if we wish to develop a trusting, reciprocal and healthy relationship with our bodies; and if we want to feel truly at home there.
When we approach pain in this way, we will know and understand it - within ourselves, and within other human beings - to be holy, and right, and true, and beautiful and good. And when we behold pain as holy, right, true, beautiful and good - our relationship with it is changed forever. No longer foreign or alien, no longer viewed as an emeny or a frustrating Other, pain becomes an ally and friend.
The above is a taste of what you will learn during next week’s class as we explore the spiritual lawfulness of pain as a physical manifestation, and what this phenomenon can teach us about freedom.
CLICK HERE to join me for the free class next week.
With love,
Elisha
✦ ✦ ✦
P.S. If this way of approaching pain speaks to you, please consider coming to Colorado this winter for a Kinetix workshop where we will use these living science practices to build tools for understanding - and transforming - pain of all kinds: physical, emotional, psycho-spiritual and social.
The winter workshop is NOT a practitioner training - it’s for individuals who feel called to get closer to pain in order to know its true nature. You will guided towards the development of co-creative powers with your body - and other human beings - for healing, regeneration and freedom.
If you are a practitioner, you will bring these new tools back to your practice. And if you are an individual, you will bring this wisdom into the rest of your life.