Language Of The Unconscious (What Is Now? Podcast)

What is your body language communicating and where does it come from? Each of these sessions begins with one minute of silence followed by an unplanned interpersonal exploration of the present moment and finishes with a short guided meditation based on the themes of the session.

Transcript

Welcome to the What Is Now experience. We begin with one minute of silence, And then explore whatever arises. So please join us for this one minute of doing nothing. We begin with one minute of silence. Anything come up for you in that time? Yeah, I think something interesting came up. And as soon as it came up, I was like, Okay, Now I've got the topic for today's discussion. And it was kind of a relieving feeling that yes, Something has come up for me. So that is an amazing thing just in itself. It seems to me anyways, I think I mentioned this last time, Too, I've been reading this Carl Jung book, Man and His Symbols. And a lot of it, It's not all by him. It's him and several other authors. But a lot of it is about the unconscious and sort of access to the unconscious, Developing a relationship with the unconscious or what is referred to often as the capital S Self. And you saying that just made me think of, You know, You, Your ego kind of went into silence, And then you became potentially receptive to your unconscious or to the capital S Self. And then received something. And then your ego self maybe caught it. And it was like, Oh, Yes, Got it. But it came from somewhere that was out of your control, It seems. Yeah, Yeah, Exactly. Absolutely right. And the, You know, That I think it came from the unconscious, But at the same time, It came from maybe a visual that I saw just before, You know, Going into like into into the one minute silence and meditation, Because then I close my eyes. So the visual was of me like speaking to you, You know, On this on this zoom call and interaction with video interaction that we are having for like for the listener, It's like an audio interaction, But we are actually having a having a zoom call a video interaction right now. So I close my eyes, And I then had a visual of myself speaking, You know that and I was like thinking this thought came to me that, How do I look while I speak? And then I, You know, I could see myself like, I realized that, Okay, I move my hands a lot, You know, While while I speak, And then I was this, This thought was coming in, Like, Is that appropriate? Is that not appropriate? How would the other person feel, You know, Is that distracting or not? And then you know that the the like, It led me to thinking that, Like, Is this Why am I even concerned about this? Like, Is it is it coming from my ego? Or is it like a concern for the other person? So that was like, Kind of a confusing state. But then I realized, Maybe it is because from the concern of the other person, Or maybe it is also from the place of the idea of trying to see that how do I look because, Like a long time back, I kind of stopped worrying about how do I look, But this was like after a long time today, That I had this, You know, Thought that how am I looking while having this conversation to you? Was there any sort of critical or self conscious element to it? Because I guess that could happen in different ways, Where one is, Has more of a self conscious tone to it. Oh, I wonder how I look, I wonder how that's impacting him or what he's thinking about me or what someone else is thinking about me and another that is more just kind of curious, Like, Oh, I wonder what it's like to see me talking. It's not something that I ever get to see. But without it necessarily being good or bad, Just maybe interesting. Hmm, That's an interesting question, Because I think it was both but the I think more it was the idea of how the other person might feel because it made me remember a conversation that I had with someone else, You know, Earlier, And like, She's a friend, And she she attended one of my like, Live sessions. And she said that, Okay, You move your hands a lot while speaking. And but your camera placement is not correct. You know, Your your camera is hiding your hands. And it's like, You know, Half of the hands are coming on the screen and half of them are not coming on the screen. So it was like, I think it was, I don't know, Maybe there are both factors to it, Like, It is also a concern for the audience of how the audience receives it. And in this case, How you receive it. And then it is also maybe coming back to the idea of why Why am I even concerned about this? You know, Is it coming from ego? Like, Do I want to just look good on the screen? I think it's Yeah, What do you think? And what do you think when you get that feedback, For example? I think what I feel now that you're asking me is, It's not it's not from the idea of how do like, It's not from the concern of how do I look, But it's more about kind of screen etiquette, More about how the other other person is feeling about me interacting. And how are they getting the message and are they if I'm using my hands, And that's a good thing, You know, To use your hands while speaking. And because I'm using one more mode of kind of expression, But is it like, If I'm not able to, Like, Do it properly on the screen, Then is it distracting for the audience? I think that's more of a impairing the message that you're attempting to get across. Is it acting as noise rather than like something that is being helpful? Yes, And exactly. Right now I can see that that is the same for you. Your hands are also like coming up half on the screen. And yeah, Like for you when you see it, Is it distracting? Is it? What's it like? It is, It is actually kind of curiosity. Because when I when I see your hands moving, And like, I'm seeing it because now my conscious attention is on it. It is not that much conscious attention on it while we are like having a normal conversation, Because kind of more looking at each other's face, You know, And trying to read the face. But there when these hands come up, Then it kind of becomes the question of, Do I want to see the hands or not? And then I'm like, No, Maybe I don't want to see the hands. But let's say if you are using your hands, And if I would see your hands fully, Then it will add to that expression. And maybe I can read read you better, You know, But right now, As you mentioned it, And as we were moving your hands, It became a curiosity. Okay, What's happening down there? Right? Yeah. At your hands. And maybe I was trying to figure out what you are doing with your hands, Right? Because there are different ways of and I noticed that I'm bringing my hands higher now. There are different ways of using your hands, Because one could be where it's very much related to the message. So and I'm noticing that that's happening right now. So I sort of had my hands in front of my face. And then I was, You know, I was trying to figure out what I was doing with my hands. And then I was about to identify two different things. And so I then I moved it to one side. And that's indicating that here, I'm about to talk about the one side of it. And so there's, There's one side of the sort of nonverbal movements and hand gestures, Where it's kind of centrally related, And it's really complementing the actual essence of the message, Versus maybe the other side, And now I move my hands to the other side. So this is pretty central to the message. That I'm communicating, That maybe feels less like it's part of the actual thing I'm talking about. It's just more like, Flowing with your speech. If that makes sense, Because it's interesting, Too, Because I was looking at you, You know, Speaking, And there's so much more than the hands, Because there's a leaning forward. There's like, Yeah, And now there's like a certain, Like, Like, A certain sense of like, You know, Like, The posture that you're in, That's communicating something, It might mean that I'm, You know, Like, I'm not really communicating or I'm not really communicating, But I'm communicating. And then I'm communicating, Like, I'm communicating with my hands and my hands and I'm communicating with my hands. And it might mean that I'm, I'm inquisitive, Or I'm in agreement or I'm not understanding or I'm thinking I'm distracted or like, Whatever it might be, All these different things that are happening and hands are one maybe particularly potent part of it. And I feel that, You know, Even when we think that we are not, As you mentioned that when, When we are thinking that we are not expressing with our hands, Maybe we are, You know, That is not something which is useful. Like when you give the example of you telling right side or left side, Then your hands can show that, But otherwise it's just like not useful. But I feel that it is very useful actually, Because maybe reading the hand gestures can tell a lot about the person, You know, Like, For example, You just noticed that my hand was like, You know, The listener cannot see it, But I was kind of holding both of my hands, You know, My fingers are joined and my one of my fingers, You know, Is touching my teeth. So this is for me, I just realized that it is a mode of inquiry for me, You know, When I do an inquiry, When I'm like kind of contemplating things, Then I do this, You know, Hands together almost like a sort of TP. Yeah. Yeah. And so and my usually my finger goes into my mouth when I'm inquiring something. So it's like, Like this. So I, So I think it tells a lot about the person that how, You know, One how the person is using their hands when they are feeling, Having different feelings, Or in a different state, Maybe when we can start and that can be a good way to read a person, Maybe, You know, I think I think there must be fields of study where people read such gestures, I'm sure how people are interacting. So yeah, That that becomes useful, Because then your hands are kind of also expressing your emotion, Then I'm not only focused on your words, But I may be able to figure out that with your hand movements that this is the emotion that you're feeling, Because I now understand that this particular hand movement is associated with that emotion that you're in. It seems hypothetically less mediated by the ego. You could potentially exert conscious control over your non-verbals and over your hand movements, But I am imagining maybe generally, That the hand gestures and the non-verbals are maybe a much more pure expression of your, Like the truth, Or maybe of the unconscious, Like this is here's something that is happening through you. I don't know how these hand gestures are happening, When I start to pay attention to them, Then I start to exert some sort of conscious control over them. Maybe just like when we pay attention to the breath, There's like, We tend to start to try to control it, But it's happening all the time without us being aware of it. These hand gestures are happening in the same way, And all of this body movement is happening somehow in the same way with zero, At least it seems to me, Zero ego conscious control over it until I start to pay attention to it or try to appear in a certain way. This is also the unconscious in a way that's just like happening in an external way, Which maybe we typically think of it as, Or I typically think of it as something that is hidden, But it might be here on the surface too. Yeah, Yeah, I think, And that brings me to the mind, The idea of a persona, You know, That this might be a part of a persona, The external personality that we kind of create when we are with people and when we are not with people, When we are alone, Maybe, You know, When we are with people, Then as you said, There is a conscious awareness of our actions, Even, Even the expressions on the face. So you know, That, Let's say maybe we are smiling more, Or when maybe we are trying to be shown being being seen as a pleasing personality, You know, In front of someone, And we are having that facial expression also, You know, As as we are having hand gestures, But when we then we are consciously aware of how we are presenting ourselves, But when we are maybe sitting at home, You know, Relaxing, I think once we also noted that how our body shifted once we ended this recording of the podcast, You know, We became more relaxed. So that is kind of dropping the persona. And maybe the, As you said, The hand gestures also have, You know, A different persona of them themselves. When we become conscious of it, We present differently. But when we are not conscious, There is another kind of moment happening. I just made me think of a potential practice in daily life or maybe in social situations of attempting to drop into that physical posture that you just mentioned of, For example, Like, Even now, Even though this is a very kind of intimate situation and very comfortable, There is still some element of performance, Even if it's even though it's just you and me and we don't know who's listening or if anybody might be listening, There's still some element of that here and that when we stop recording, There is some sigh of relief and letting go, Leaning back into the chair, Like just something that's more comfortable or maybe even more real and a potential practice because you just kind of did it there. I even felt it in the moment of sort of, I even lean back a little bit of the possibility of like doing that or remembering to do it throughout the day, Or maybe in a situation where I might feel anxious or something, There's maybe some possibility of dropping into that feeling, Just physically. I do think about this and I talk about this with clients sometimes of going the reverse route of through the body first, As opposed to trying to work something out through the mind of just attending to your posture, Like what is your posture saying or communicating and how might you just keep attempting to practice, Like letting go in the posture opening in the posture. I noticed that my posture is communicating maybe a closeness or tightness or a rigidity and it's pretty clear as to how to change that internally. I can shift my energy into an openness or like literally open my chest up or unfold my arms or open my hands or move my body more directly in front of someone else as opposed to being to the side of them. And these are all things that I can just do pretty easily internally and I do have a hypothesis that that affects both how you feel and certainly I think how the other person perceives you, Which then impacts how you feel also. Yeah, No, That's, Yeah, That's a very good point. And I think this is something that I can learn from you here, You know, For, And apply it to my sessions as well, Where, You know, Maybe start with the practice of first giving up that persona and you know, That idea of having our body in a certain posture and having certain expressions on the face, Because that takes up a lot of energy, You know, It takes if you think and if you feel about it, You know, There is a huge energy shift from if I'm kind of just leaning towards you for having this discussion. And you know, Considering that we are on a video call, Which is being recorded right now, But if I just go back in my chair and relax, You know, And just be as I would be without this video call, Then it is a release of energy. And that's why I think when we have these interactions a lot of time, Especially when people do sessions, When there is a, You know, One on one interaction, Or there is a meeting or of something, People feel drained after that, You know, And, And, And what I can now realize the reason is, This extra energy that we are putting into, Into building that persona in front of the other person, Like maybe on a, At least partly very physical level, Like, Like very physically exerting subtle energies that are these tightenings all over. Yes, Which is which would inevitably be taxing on the body and leave you tired. Yeah, It just ended just gave me an idea, You know, To apply in maybe mindfulness at work in terms of like, Maybe, You know, People can be trained, People can be told and trained into that how, Because a lot of, I'm sure a lot of people in the corporate world feel tired after such meetings, Right? Because I feel that it's not just about like the boss or, You know, The people around it's, It's a, It's, It's about how we are presenting ourselves and how we are being in that meeting. I now remember, Like my meetings when I used to work in corporate, That how I would like, You know, Wear a suit always. And that was, Although I didn't like that, But I just used to do it, You know, And, And that will take a lot of energy from my body because a suit makes you stiff, And you are not able to move freely. And then I would be like, You know, Sitting with my back with kind of leaning forward and not relaxing in my chair, You know, Trying to maybe show myself as someone who is on their toes all the time. So this takes up a lot of energy. So maybe it can people can be trained in, You know, At workplaces for how to utilize, How to not release that energy and how to not drain their energy and feel more comfortable in meetings. And it also brings to my mind the you know, I was thinking as you were saying that how how we like shift into a more relaxed posture when the recording is done. But I feel that there is an extra layer to that I feel that we when even when we when we both stop talking, You know, When we are not being recorded, And we are having our own casual conversation, Even after that, There is an extra level to that when we stop when you know, When we stop talking, And we are just ourselves, Then we go more into a relaxed state. Like way back, Almost falling back. Yeah. So I think there are so many layers that we kind of form onto ourselves, Rather than what is very true, You know, To our personality, There are so many layers on top of that. It was just making me think of like traumas to both a big how they refer to capital T and lowercase t traumas that would maybe ingrain a real protective posture physically in some way or like manifest in some part of your body kind of getting tight and, And that being maintained for a long period of life, And potentially leading to lots of physical, Like stuff happening and maybe headaches or whatever it might be. Through that repeated tightening out of some sort of protection or defense against some really bad stuff happening. Can you give an example of that? I don't think of particular examples. I mean, I'm just thinking of maybe repeated bullying. That's the first one that I think of it, I can only imagine a particular kind of physical posture that would be a sort of tightening and protecting and moving away. Yeah, No, That's very right. You know, Maybe maybe that comes from like, If, If I talk about and if I take this example of bullying, Then I can remember like my childhood experiences of bullying. So I would be like, You know, Someone says a lot, A lot of people would say, Like, Things about my how I walk, You know, In my childhood. So I was bullied around how I walk, You know, By by children in my in my school. So like, They used to say that, Oh, He's a camel, You know, So it's, It's like, I used to, And I don't know if I still have that, I'm not very conscious of that. But what I realized was, When I walk, My lower body is, Is in movement, You know, But my upper body is kind of stiff, When I walk in front of people. So there was this bullying around, Or maybe not, It's not, It's not in front of people. But that's how I actually walk. You know, It's like, My upper body is not moving, Like, I'm not moving my hands much for example, You know, The way models do on a on a ramp, You know, Their hands are in perfect movement and bodies in perfect movement. But for me, Like, My hands are like, Still on my side, And my legs are moving while I'm walking. And I, My, You know, Schoolmates used to make fun of that. And they, They used to say, They used to say that, See, The camel has arrived, You know, And that made me kind of have developed a conscious, I don't know, I've not known that it is is it Do I call it conscious? Or do I call it a persona, You know, Fake puff persona, But that made me started walking in a certain way. And that took a lot of energy because I was every time conscious of how I'm walking. Yeah, You're exerting energy to try to walk in a certain way, Which is not your natural way of walking. And maybe that becomes really ingrained over a long period of times you develop this other way of walking, But it still continues to take a certain energy to continue to do that, Which is taxing. I'm thinking of I might have mentioned this before, Maybe we're talking about self consciousness or something. But I remember I used to, And I think it's still like, Happens unconsciously, Because it becomes ingrained over a long period of time. But I used to, Like, Flare my nostrils. Like, Because I didn't like the way that my nose looked. So I would like, Do that frequently, Like as often as I can remember, Because I liked the way it looked better when my nostrils were flared up. So it'd be this kind of like flexing of my nose in a particular way, Which clearly is taxing and like, Is taxing on the face, There's all kinds of muscles involved with doing that all the time, Versus just being in my natural face position, Which feels like is a consistent practice for me, Now of noticing anytime I have any sort of subtle, Exerted energy or tension, Especially my face, But all of my body too, It's really kind of an enjoyable practice for me now. And at any moment, I'm, I'm inevitably, I'm tensing something without being aware of it. And there's always the possibility of letting go of that thing and moving into a more natural, More efficient state of being versus some sort of wasted energy. Yeah, And a lot of a lot of it comes from I think, Also, Ideas about, You know, The belief systems that are built around how one should be, You know, What we call the the the etiquette, The social etiquette. I don't know, I'm not sure how, Like, What is the line between, Like having like those basic etiquettes, So that others don't feel like maybe troubled by how you are presenting yourself. But at the same time, It can go to the other extent of trying to, Like you you losing your authenticity. Totally, You know, For example, Like, If I take a simple example of nail biting, So this this is this, This is a habit which which I used to have, And I consciously, You know, Worked on it and kind of let go of it. But still, Today, I feel like biting my nails. And but then the question is, Like, The question arises, That is nail biting, You know, Something which should be avoided? Or, Or is it something that, You know, It is okay to do? Because it's now when someone else is looking at you, I'm not actually harming the other person by, You know, Practicing nail biting, But someone else is getting troubled by it. So it's like kind of a dilemma that whether I do it or not, Right? And then come to maybe a perennial question that only you can answer as to whether something is a natural expression of you or if it's an expression of anxiety or something, Because I think a conventional thought would be that nail biting is some piece of maybe an anxious energy, Which could be potentially let go of that maybe even that would be something similar to like a tightening or a flaring of the nostrils or something. It's like a way of, You know, Exerting some sort of control or release of a feeling. But then, Certainly, Like, That could be the question of, Well, Maybe that's just the natural expression of you. And yeah, For because for me, It is it is what I realized and I asked this question, You know, Long time back, That is it anxiety, But I realized it is curiosity. So every time I'm like curious, Every time I'm like, You know, Questioning something or excited about something, Then it will, You know, I usually, I'll find my nail in my mouth. So then it becomes like, Let's say even if it is anxiety, For example, You know, The question is that is it okay, Maybe it is a body's natural mechanism to, You know, Let go of anxiety in that moment. But the question is that, You know, This whole idea of right and wrong, I see as something which is maybe which is we have created this idea of right and wrong, Maybe it is not wrong. Have you ever heard the maybe this is a good idea or a good spot to end for today? But have you heard the line? Maybe I've shared it before that. It's about Zen, Zen could be, You could replace Zen with many different words, I think, But Zen is what lies beyond ideas of good and bad. Yes. Heard that one before? Yeah, I really like that. Yeah, Feels. Yeah. Yeah. And I think this whole idea of duality and non duality is based on that. And basically how we kind of create polar opposites in the world, You know, We see the world in terms of black and white, But there are actually so many colors. So maybe a good way to end here could be just shifting into ending and as the session ends, Potentially, If you can, You and me and the listener, If you want to just notice whatever tension like habitual, Built up tension, Maybe long term tension and also tension just of this moment might be within you right now and see how you might be able to just totally let go of all of it, Let that leaning back in the chair, Whatever that might mean for you in this moment. At the end of this time together, Potentially just moving into that state of just totally letting go for a little bit. And then maybe there could be a practice of coming back to that again and again and again and being a practice of noticing that habitual built up physical energy and not having to understand it intellectually, But just shifting again and again into just this posture of sitting back in a chair and finding your most natural position in that moment. Yeah. And I think maybe, You know, The listener, I think for us, It's, It's very much practical right now, But I think for the, For the listener, The listener might be in their natural position because they are kind of just listening, You know, In their, In their relaxed state maybe. So maybe the listener can observe their difference and how they can, You know, Maybe mindfully practice this when they are in a, Like a kind of a meeting with someone or, You know, In a, In, In a social space. Well, Sounds good. Thank you so much and see you soon. See you next time. Thank you for joining us in the what is now experience. We hope that you liked the episode. If there were any insights or ideas arising for you as you were listening to our conversation, Then you can share those ideas through your comments. We would love to know. Stay tuned for the next episode. Namaste.