Clean Pain Lasts 90 Seconds

Friday morning I was privileged to be part of a teleconference with Martha Beck. We talked about many things but with all the energetic changes going on right now, I’d like to address that subject.

I’m always recommending to everyone, (including myself) that we take the time to monitor our breathing at frequent intervals and make sure that we take in deep breaths now and then. Eckhart Tolle talks about this frequently, my newsletter last week with the quote from US says the same. Most spiritual teachers are recommending that today. Martha talked about how intense the energies are that are coming our way now. She also advised us to breath and to meditate to deal with them.

As a bodyworker in the ’90’s, (a Trager practitioner), I became aware of the importance of breathing. It was impressed on me even more so during my kriya yoga meditation training. Breath is important…after all it keeps us alive! It fills and heals our very cells. Breathing is what allows our energy to cycle and clear itself in our bodies.

Keeping our energy moving and clear is most important today. Often energy seems to become heavy during perimenopause, and stays that way after menopause, although it’s not so up and down by then. Dr. Wang, my acupuncturist, says that women’s energy gets blocked. (I think men are dealing with their own decreased and blocked energies too, but perhaps in a different way). The combination of being midlife women, plus the intense energies around us now make moving our energy even more important.

Martha also talked to us about moving our bodies in whatever ways appeal to us so as to “become a clear passage for energy” . In this way we clear energy blocks in various parts of our bodies and let go of stuff.

Energy can actually be cleared very quickly if we allow it to and catalyze the movement with yoga, stretching, dancing, hiking, or whatever else appeals. Martha says: “Clean pain lasts only 90 seconds”. “Clean pain” refers to emotional pain that is the result of our direct experience of an event. “Dirty pain”, on the other hand, is the translation of the event that our mind does later on…the meaning it attaches to it. That can go on for years if we let it. My counsellor and group facilitator in Toronto in the ’80’s, Skip Perryman, said basically the same thing to us at that time. She called it “true pain”.

As you know I move my body by attending a dance/movement class several times per week. We work with our energy spirals, left and right brain balancing, and even our physical balance. Zeta always reminds us that our DNA is made up of spirals.

I also walk, and have recently acquired (for free!) a lovely used Raleigh bike with a ‘girls’ bar…just what I wanted! I’m considering taking one yoga class a week as I’ve had the urge to go back to yoga for several months now.

So whatever you can do to keep your energy moving, please do it. Think of it as refreshing yourself body, mind and spirit.