by Mark Walsh
THE REAL MAGIC
Special skills (real and imagined) are very attractive. The promise of learning advanced sexual alchemy, shooting Reiki energy from your fingers like a benevolent Yoda, having the ninja death touch or the psychic skills to see what mere mortals cannot – and a host of other things – is seductive.
People can make a lot of money offering such tricks, as there’s a huge appetite for them. I could do this too, but choose not to.
What I notice in myself though, is that there is a desire to learn such things, but that it reeks of ego: a need to be special, to impress and control others, to be unique. It’s a natural, childish urge to be noteworthy and have power over others. To use magic to be safe and grand. Who doesn’t want to be Harry Potter or Luke Skywalker?
I want to make a case for inclining oneself to the skills of a normal human adult. Simply being competent is challenge enough for a lifetime. This takes a certain honesty and humility.
My real learning edge involves things like only eating when hungry and resting when I’m tired. Being nice to customer service people when frustrated. Listening to my wife. Showing up on time to work and doing the job well. This is enough.
Not so sexy. Not so good for impressing people…but the real deal. Ordinary competence is the real magic.
BE AWARE OF THE FLOW
“Go with the flow” usually means doing what’s easy; going with habitual, addictive patterns; not honouring your word, and having no sense of commitment.
Then there’s the deep flow of what you’re genuinely, deeply, intuitively called to; dancing within the context of adult responsibility.
Learn to tell the difference.
BEING AUTHENTIC IS LIKE WILD SEX
If you think you’re doing it, you’re not. The same could be said for embodiment: you can’t think that you’re embodied.
EMBODIMENT IS ORDINARY
Embodiment is profoundly ordinary. If you’re wearing your embodiment as a technicolour jacket to impress, dominate or feel superior to others, it is not embodiment. Embodiment is not an identity, not a fashion, and not a fucking hashtag.
THE MISUSES, ABUSES AND TRAVESTIES OF EMBODIMENT
I have made an impassioned case in this book that coming home to our bodies will make the world a better place. This is fundamentally true, and yet it is important not to be naive and to heed the lessons made obvious from what has happened to the modern secular mindfulness movement, and other parallels. The main danger actually comes from what in Buddhism are known as the “near enemies” of embodiment. Sometimes the idea is misunderstood, or simply misused, as the word becomes fashionable and therefore profitable. Here are a few things that embodied practitioners should take care to avoid, and that as a community we should be vigilant of.
Embodiment isn’t any damn thing
Embodiment is many things, but it isn’t anything [waves to goat/beer yoga]. People may place the line differently, but it’s important to have one. In my view, if a practice isn’t body awareness based and focused on developing the person who is practising, it isn’t an embodied art. Knowing what is and isn’t an embodied practice matters, hence I am including a whole chapter on this subject. Frankly, I fear that the word will be used for any old BS and I see signs of this already in some circles as people cash in, or just want to sound cool as “embodiment’ trends as a word.
Travesties vs. gateway drugs
Arts that look like they are always embodied, such as yoga, can not only not be this (e.g. if ‘merely bad gymnastics’), but can actually be travesties. While I don’t mind activities that are not so deep but ultimately lead people into more embodied arts (acting as “gateway drugs,” I like to joke), I do mind those which lead people away from them. Embodiment travesties are activities which actively numb people while claiming to be embodied. Such abominations may involve such strenuous activity, such neurotic forms, such authoritarian teaching, or such faux-spiritual body denialism that they actively disconnect people from their bodies. It is hard to feel, when all your attention is on surviving, or on getting it right for the teacher or an imagined spiritual ideal, rather than reality. See my e-book Making Yoga Meaningful for more on this.
Crutches, compensations, escapism and enabling
I have seen people become reliant on embodied practices to the point where they use them as crutches for underdeveloped skills, e.g. getting great at centring to deal with bad social skills rather than gaining better social skills. Embodiment can also become enabling whereby people use it to abuse themselves more, say using yoga to push past what is a sensible and kind workload; or even to feel better about abusing others by blissing out on practices. You feel bad about working in a meaningless soul-crushing that job you hate? Don’t worry, take this meditation pill and go on this dance holiday! State highs make great escapism and one can drug oneself in order to cope, rather than use practices to connect and learn. People can also learn to perform embodied arts really well as a compensation for being terrible at life, taking solace in their perfect hip-throw or triangle pose, while their job and marriage are disasters, and they’re achieving nothing. Brutal to say it, but I see it.
More efficient arseholes
There were senior Nazis who did yoga, and the atrocious Imperial Japanese Army of World War Two widely practiced and was supported by Japanese Zen. More recently, modern mindfulness taught independently of any ethics has been taken up by everyone from corporations with no social values, to snipers, to pickup artists; to improve their main activities. It is possible to use embodied practices to make ourselves more efficient at whatever we do, including bad things…though it is often the near enemy of transcending the body (and therefore empathy), or those missing relational practices, that are the prime culprits for simply sharpening the knife of evil. True embodied practise is safer ethically as it turns on our capacity to feel the pain of others, so we are less likely to infect it.
I hope that this book goes some way to deterring some of the possible misuses of embodiment and pseudo “embodiment”, but people are people, and time will tell!
FOR THE PROFESSIONALS
This section is for anyone who works as, or wishes to be, an embodied facilitator of any kind. This could mean being a yoga, dance or martial arts teacher, a coach, bodyworker or even just a leader in the widest possible sense, as many sections will apply to anyone who works with people. We’ve gotten really geeky about this stuff on the Embodied Facilitator Course (EFC) and learnt much of this over the years in the UK and Russia as a team; so thank you to all the EFC trainers for gathering this wisdom, especially Francis Briers, Rachel Blackman and Alexandra Vilvovskaya.
HOW TO HELP SOMEONE WHO’S SUFFERING
This is from a resilience workshop I led for managers. It’s super simple, but possibly profound. Usually people try a limited range of these approaches or have a strong habit to. They’re also in a progressive order, so you can think of this as an options “ladder”.
• Get your own shit together, both for role modelling and the capacity to help. Centre yourself first.
• Check your motivation before getting involved.
• Listen, if they want to talk.
• Offer empathy, not sympathy. This usually comes before more seemingly active steps.
• Reframe the situation to encourage responsibility and acceptance, if they’re open to that. This could mean steering away from apathy or self-hatred. NB: it could be aggravating for someone, if what they want is solely empathy.
• Touch them, if they want touch (and if it’s not about easing your discomfort with their suffering). It can be soothing or invigorating, to suit the individual and situation.
• Coach them or try creative problem solving, if they want help but don’t know what they need. This is usually better than advice; offer that only if directly asked and you are qualified.
• Encourage or challenge them, to fit the individual and situation; again, with permission.
• Offer direct, practica
l help, if they need it (fix their car, kill their enemies, etc). Only offer this when they can’t do something themselves or can’t learn to. Teach them, if you can, whilst helping.
TOP TIPS FOR FACILITATORS
I have been working with other embodied facilitators for some years, this is most of what I know condensed into a short list!
• Know what you’re trying to do. Clear aims matter.
• Being is more important than tools. Embody what you’re teaching.
• Any training is a cycle. The beginning is not the middle, and the middle is not the end. This flow matters, for example building trust and authority early, and helping people get clear take-aways and “come down” ready for outside life, at the end.
• Give clear instructions, involving a “how” that a ten-year-old could grasp.
• Speak the truth. I don’t just mean, “don’t lie”.
• Have a plan.
• Listen and adapt what you’re doing in the present moment. Don’t just follow a plan or do yesterday’s training.
• Take what you do seriously, but don’t take yourself seriously. Humour is a powerful tool.
• Don’t fuck anyone that you’re teaching or take advantage of them financially.
• Culture matters. We’re not all the same and American showmanship or a sensitive Californian style won’t work most places.
• A little love goes a long way.
SEVEN WAYS THE BODY GIVES COACHING SUPERPOWERS
Many coaches have a vague sense that the body is important in their work, but may not be aware of exactly how much it matters or, practically, how to work with it. I’ve spent many years helping other coaches increase their embodied skills, and for the last few years this has been my main focus35.
Here’s a quick list of some of the most important reasons not to ignore the body.
1. It tells you what you’re broadcasting
Your bodily states and general disposition are always transmitting to others. Your body is “screaming” and our bodily ways of being are one of the most dramatic influences on clients, regardless of the words we are speaking. Learning about this is vital.
2. It’s your super-Google
While logical techniques and tools are helpful, it’s only by accessing deep bodily wisdom and intuition that we can do our best work.
3. It’s your free legal high
Simple bodily techniques, such as centring, can be used to quickly self-regulate and relax (or wake up), when faced with the challenges of coaching and facilitation.
4. It’s your X-ray specs
Your own body is shouting a story of your history and dispositions, and so do your clients’ bodies. By becoming more embodied yourself, you can more accurately assess and adapt to clients, both in marketing and delivery.
5. It makes you and your clients Transformers
If you develop a greater embodied range for yourself and then teach clients to do the same, new possibilities quickly open. By being able to step into new ways of being, we quickly see new ways to do things and new solutions to problems.
6. It’s your psychic spy
By tuning into your own body when coaching, you will become aware of how it mirrors others, giving you vital information about a client or group, for example when they are feeling uncomfortable. In this way, you can intuit far more, which of course makes you better able to facilitate.
7. It makes you human!
Being tuned into yourself makes you authentic, ethical and in touch with what you care about. If we aren’t bringing that fully into our work, what’s the point? Being embodied is being human.
THE NECESSARY FOUNDATION
Ten thousand+ hours of embodied teaching across fifty countries has taught me something of the key conditions for transformational embodied work. There’s a universal set of conditions that help people “open up”, “dive in” or whatever cheesy metaphor you like for getting real and doing the work. These really apply to any relationship-building activity, but are particularly vital if you want intimacy or the necessary conditions for significant personal growth. Sometimes people talk about “safety”, which I don’t like. It’s too vague and tends towards a kind of soft, new age, politically correct tyranny that I can’t stand and don’t think is helpful. But maybe that’s just a personal terminological preference and much of what I outline below is especially helpful for those with trauma. In any event, here are some concrete foundations that will be useful to build, if you have any interest in working with people at all. I teach them to Embodied Facilitator Course (EFC) and Embodied Yoga Principles (EYP) teachers, as pass-fail criteria for teacher trainings as a I regard them as so important.
Six universal conditions
1. Choice
Don’t keep slaves. Consent matters. Give options. Choice teaches agency and shows respect.
2. Commonality
People must see what they have in common with you and others in the group. There should be a sense of belonging, including shared experiences and values. Often you can just point this out. At twelve-step groups like AA, they say, “Look for the similarities, not the differences”. My favourite is to ask, “Anyone here not gonna die one day?” Another good one is, “Who doesn’t have any stress in their lives?”
3. Predictability
Tell people what’s happening and what’s going to happen. This makes the future less threatening. Be reliable. Be fair. Back up agreed rules.
4. Authority and equality
You need to both establish subject matter authority and create a sense of personal equality. The ideal balance between the two is pretty culturally determined, and is shown in many small ways. You can show authority by being well-introduced or mentioning your past clients, for example; and equality by waiting in line for lunch or also wearing a name badge, even though everyone knows who you are. These things may seem trivial but such implicit messages matter.
5. Serve
With every action ask, “Is this for me or for them?”
6. A sense of humour
Take note overly sincere new agers and fundamentalists left and right: humour creates space to grow, and distance from unhealthy patterns.
These foundations are all embodied of course. For instance, being relaxed shows expertise far more than verbal humble bragging.
THE TEN PRINCIPLES OF EMBODIED EDUCATION
These ten principles form a pithy reminder of much of what’s in this book. In fact as stated here, these principles are so condensed that they could appear as riddles. While seemingly simple, they take years to understand deeply and to apply skilfully.
1. Bi-directionality holography
The body both creates and reveals our way of being, and one aspect shows all others (holography).
2. Context
Our current situation, relationships, culture, disposition and the environment are all embodied. We are layered adaptations to context and history.
3. Comfort
Familiarity reveals what’s habitual. We feel “at home” in what we have practised, and it feels easy.
4. Joy
Delight reveals what’s needed or longed for, including what brings meaning and our values.
5. Deviation
Inability to follow a form (for example a set of dance moves or a yoga pose) reveals habitual patterns. Habits assert themselves unconsciously and are exposed by form.
6. Guidance
The body can guide our life. When listened to, the body gives wisdom. Not to be confused with comfort!
7. Practice
We are always practising, unconsciously or consciously, and become what we practise. We can learn to embody new ways of being over time through an intelligently designed programme.
8. Contrast
The body reveals and learns by exaggeration, contrast and embodied differentiation. By enhancing the differences between two things, those things become clearer.
9. Relationship
We learn in relationship. By bein
g witnessed and naming something to others we deepen insight and declare new futures.
10. Integration
We can transfer embodied learning into daily life, by identifying micro-indicators of pattern, and micro-movements/poses, or by shifting these.
Supplemental principles
11. Process
The body is a process (verb) and it benefits us to listen and follow.
12. Self-regulation
The fight-flight-freeze (FFF) and craving36 responses can be managed through relaxation, expansiveness and structural alignment.
13. Trigger
Shadow is revealed by triggering and infatuation.
14. Chaos
The body is free and has no laws!
Developed for Embodied Yoga Principles and through teaching The Embodied Facilitator Course, drawing from Paul Linden, Richard Strozzi-Heckler, Wendy Palmer, Stuart Heller, Ginny Whitelaw and Dylan Newcomb. The vast majority of embodied training works explicitly or implicitly with these principles.
VERBAL MISTAKES TO AVOID WHEN TEACHING EMBODIMENT
These are the most common verbal mistakes I see people in this field make:
• Giving possible outcomes and metaphors, rather than clear methods, e.g. “Empty your mind”, or, “Have a mind like water”, versus “Bring your attention to the physical sensations of breathing”.
• This is known as non-operational language, as the clear method is missing and it forces people to guess what you’d actually like them to do!