When I was training with some special forces people earlier this year, one of the surprising things I was able to share with them was the fact that several classic martial arts holds and locks only work IF your opponent is resisting you - if he relaxes, the technique doesn't work at all!
How Tension Enters Your Life
Here's a really tough truth for you: most of the tension you experience, whether physical or emotional, is produced by YOU and no one else. It's not the jerk who cut you off in traffic and it's not your circumstances. Rather, the tension is caused by your resistance to all this.
And every time you resist psychologically, you produce stress and tension we could measure physically if you were hooked up to the right equipment. Your blood pressure and possibly your heart rate will elevate, the electrical resistance of your skin may change, some muscles may tighten and your metabolism and energy circulation will suffer.
So when you worry about a situation, react impatiently with someone or dread going to that family picnic, your inner resistance will manifest physically even if it does so in a way that's too subtle for you to notice.
The Two Doors to DEEP Relaxation
Deep relaxation is a state all of us can enter into - we're actually built for it. And the way to get there, the only way, is by passing through the two doors of Non-Resistance.
The first door, as the world's authentic ancient traditions have long since proven, is your breath. If you can stay gently focused on your breathing as if it is the only thing that matters (warning: if you're new at this, don't do it while driving or doing anything similar), you'll quickly discover two things:
1. You'll become much more relaxed.
2. You'll notice inner tensions and disturbances much faster.
The second door builds on the first. This is when you spend most of your time focused on your inner world because you've finally understood your inner world is not only more important than those "external circumstances", but also that by practicing non-resistance internally, your outer world changes for the better with very little effort on your part.
In fact, as long as we see our problems as "external" and as circumstances we have to change by force and manipulation, we remain stuck in "resistance mode" and experience unending tension in our lives. As soon as we realize that our outer world or at least how we experience it is based on our own mind and that changing our mind will cause a corresponding change externally, we begin to relax and start working on the "one thing needful" - ourselves.
Here's a great video with Bob Proctor's take on "non-resistance". Enjoy!
A Challenge For You
How do you reach non-resistance? Well, first you have to become aware of all your resistance! So try this and see what happens....
For one full day at least, track your perceived levels of emotional and physical resistance on a scale of 1-10, where 1 is negligible and 10 is very severe. Make a point of taking a reading of your condition at least every two hours. Between those times, try to be aware of and note down all the resistance you find within. Don't try to resist the resistance; just notice it and let it go.
~ Dr. Symeon Rodger
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