Embodied Presence Exploration 6: State
Welcome to Presencing State.
We begin by taking a baseline, bringing our attention to what is in our bodies, noticing any sensations and becoming aware of our breath, without seeking to change anything. Pause the audio if you wish. Take a baseline now.
We continue by attuning to Source, simply by intending to do so. Attune to Source now.
This past week we’ve journeyed with Presencing Soma, the living body, mind and spirit. We’ve presenced to our goddess-bodies, to what the sacred in our bodies wants and needs, to treating our bodies as a temple. We’ve presenced to the unique gifts that our soma, our living bodies, bring to us.
This week we build on this inquiry by exploring state. State is the most important muscle we can build. State cultivation is essential to living powerful lives and to being embodied spirit, presencing strong and clear. Cultivating state changes everything. Any activity that you engage in, any work that you do, any relationship that you are building - all of this can transform as you increase your capacity for presencing state.
Just as we take somatic baselines, take a baseline around state. What is your current state? As you become present to state, notice what happens. Presence now also to your desired state. What is the state you desire to be in in this moment? Bring your self as close as you can to that state in this moment, simply by intending to do so or by changing something in your internal experience. What can you shift inside of yourself to approach that state in this very moment?
If you desire joy, find joy in your body. Smile in a way that brings joy into your current experience. If your desired feeling state is freedom, find what will help you be more free.
Choose a state that you have some capacity to access and bring that state to an activity that you are about to engage. During our week of presencing grace, cascading gratitude was a practice of state cultivation. When we bless before we eat, that is a practice of state cultivation. Sometimes we do it by rote, and the state transmission takes minimal effect, but we can just as easily presence to gratitude and embody that state before we eat without saying a bracha. So many prayers, blessings and spiritual practices are structures designed to support us in state cultivation. Prayer and intention-setting are deeply amplified by cultivating our state first. Yes, they can bring us to the state we want, but if we show up into prayer already embodying the state we wish to create, whatever we do becomes deeply amplified.
State and Structure
While prayer practices and physical practices are often designed to shape our state, sometimes we can get lost in conforming to structure -- completing a certain number of prayers in a certain order, or performing a certain number of postures or repetitions of an exercise. In most situations, attention and the state we bring to any given act far outweighs the content of the act itself. Certain prayers or mantras hold specific access keys. And, I find that equally if not more significant in devotional or spiritual practice is the essence with which the prayer is offered. If I have a practice of praying for 30 minutes each day, I might discover that saying one prayer, deeply, fully, slowly savoring each sound and meaning, is much more fulfilling and activating than reciting 10 prayers during that time. I might discover, regardless of how long I pray for, that offering one heartfelt prayer is more potent than praying three services a day to their liturgical completion. Cultivating an awareness of state and it’s impact supports us in making choices around practice that are most resonant for our needs and desires.
Placing State in the Body
Last night, I had difficulty falling asleep. I’d gone out dancing, stayed outpast when I felt sleepy, and had too much adrenaline going when I did arrive home to fall asleep right away. I was frustrated and judging my decision, feeling regret. I decided to shift my state, but was so deeply hooked into the regret spiral that simply choosing a new state and accessing it was not happening. So I decided to place state in my body. The state I chose to cultivate was compassion. I brought that state to myself all over. With my mind’s eye, I brought compassion to each place in my shoulders many spots in each shoulder with compassion. I let the compassion cascade down my arms... actually placing compassion over and over again in as many spots as I could touch with my mind’s eye. I continued bringing compassion to my chest and down along my front body. My breath changed, my being softened and warmed, and from a state of embodying compassion I drifted into sleep.
I woke this morning excited about this practice. I felt into my desired feeling state today and it remains compassion. Before writing this I placed compassion - in so many places in my body, presencing to that area and bringing compassion there. This is not me being compassionate with that place, rather it is my bringing attention there and activating compassion in that place. Ultimately, this practice of presencing state is like bathing in a state - allowing it to fully wash over us. Soaking in its waters. As I practice embodying state in this way, I notice that the compassion I bring to each place is replacing an already existing state... that whatever my current state is is made up of a collective of states inside of my body, that my body has learned. This is a retraining process. You may discover different states that live in certain pockets of your body, and that bringing new states there brings powerful release of old patterns. Embodying state in this way is indeed a repatterning practice and strengthens with time. Just as the food we feed our physical body affects our health, the more we feed our emotional-body or state-body the nourishment that is most healthful and aligned, the more capacity we have in experiencing and embodying those particular states.
State Transmission and Manifestation
How we do anything is how we do everything is a mantra that we began this course with. Our work on pace and grace/gratitude/integration and clearing space was oriented toward building our fluency in choosing state. The saying - It’s not what you do but how you do it - speaks to the essence of state transmission. What we bring to any given act vastly affects the ripples and resonance of that act. When we give attention to how we want to be, the content we give our attention to can change dramatically.
Master manifestors often suggest feeling state as the fulcrum around which all else pivots. In Danielle LaPorte’s book The Desire Map, she suggests that clarity about our desired state is a guide by which to make our decisions. She says that sometimes we think we know what we want - and we have very specific ideas about what it is or how to get there, and that really, focusing on cultivating our desired feeling state is the most powerful and integrated way to meet our goal.
Jose Stevens of The Power Path (www.powerpath.org) instructs that a powerful way to manifest is to ask questions about feeling state - For example: What would it feel like to have all of my physical needs met? This opens room for spirits’ response. According to Stevens, “The quantum field has all information, content and blueprints for everything you and anyone else has ever imagined, is imagining or will imagine. It does not do anything with that information unless it is asked...The quantum field cannot ignore a question, but it is compelled to respond to it. The best open ended questions begin with “What if ...?” “How would it feel if I ... ?” or “I wonder what it would be like if...?”. Just like we explored the question “How could this get even better?” during our week of presencing grace, I invite you to find resonant questions to increase the quality of your experience - focusing on the positive experience that you are invoking.”
Victoria Castle writes in “The Trance of Scarcity”, “Our experience of abundance, of living in the world with effectiveness and ease, is determined by our inner state more than by our outer circumstance. We embody abundance when we cultivate the state that matches ease and flow. So our focus ... is on state, not on getting our circumstances to line up neatly. We attend to our state because it creates our daily experience.”
State transmission profoundly affects our experiences. We are all familiar with how a brief counter can affect us. When a barista is warm and friendly when offering our tea, or cranky and frustrated - or perhaps it is we who are warm and friendly or cranky and frustrated when ordering - this makes a difference. The act of choosing and consciously cultivating our state affects each encounter, each conversation, even each email we send. When my contacts were lost in my phone, I could often tell who was contacting me based on the feeling tone and the state signature. Cultivating a state signature that matches the energetic resonance we seek to offer is one of the most impactful practices I know.
Practice and State
Part of the purpose of regular practices is to support state. I wake to my daily practices to help ground me in the state I wish to cultivate. My morning practices that are based in somatic awareness and in gratitude support me in cultivating presence and devotion as states which I begin the day inside of.
On one of my breaks from preparing this material, I went outside and heard my neighbors jamming to Prince’s song 1999. Very quickly my state went from sleepy and a little bit cranky to feeling playful and like anything is possible. I quickly moved out of my mentality of “I need to figure out what to eat for breakfast and then I need to finish this document” to asking the questions “How much fun can I have today? What would be a delicious and nourishing breakfast? What would support me in being in joy as I create this material?” I realized I could go on an adventure and bring the computer along. Internalizing joy, being open to the possibility and desire for the day to feel spacious, lush and fun, supports me in accessing that state whatever I am eating, wherever I am preparing this material. Thestate I desire in this moment is joy and spaciousness and trust. When I am clear about that, the external choices clarify and my inner state is invited to shift regardless of what is happening outside of me.
All of this was invited by hearing a few bars of Prince/1999. Knowing what supports the states we seek, and having those tools readily available to us, is important self-care. My state-cultivation tool kit includes a music library of songs that support me accessing a variety of states I might seek - devotional music, music guaranteed to make make me dance, or guaranteed to make me cry. My incense library is filled with scents to transport, deepen, uplift or purify, depending on what I seek. My clothing library is built similarly. Each color or shade, cut and texture both fits and creates a mood. I choose with care. (See a wonderful book that Ketzirah turned me on to - Color Your Style - for more information on this). It’s wonderful to have external resources that support us in embodying our desired states. Surrounding ourselves with state-aligning sensory stimulus strengthens our resources. And, ultimately, it is our internal state, which we can adjust in any moment, that ripples into all of our creation.
The question what would be a delicious and nourishing breakfast inspired me to journey out of the house. When I got to my driveway, I noticed a construction crew and a large crane parked in front of it. My immediate response was fear that I wouldn’t be able to leave my driveway, frustration and disempowerment. I saw a man working amidst the construction and asked “Am I going to be able to get out of my driveway?” He smiled, of course, and immediately the crane was moved out of the way and I was supported to navigate my way out of my driveway and around the cones. I’m intrigued that my first response to the construction crew was concern that I would be stuck and about what would happen to my plan. I imagined other immediate responses I might have had. How wonderful - the street in front of our house is being improved! or Oooh, fun, and unexpected situation to navigate. I wonder who I’ll meet! I wonder what the blessing in this experience or encounter will be? Instead of greeting the construction worker with a nervous question, I might have began the conversation with Good morning and with curiosity about the work he was doing. I desire to be curious and adaptable and to greet each new situation and with assumption toward good and flow. What is your immediate response to something unexpected? How can cultivating state support you in responding to life in accordance with how you want to show up in the world?
When leading ritual or prayer or facilitating any kind of experience - even if it is as simple as initiating a phone call to or conversation with a friend or family member or colleague, cultivating state has deep impact. How we choose to approach eachsituation - which energetic frequency we choose to introduce into the field - creates clear and strong ripples. Allow space and time to cultivate and embody the state you wish from. Every moment offers opportunity to practice state cultivation. What state are you choosing now? Practice. Practice. Practice.
Journal about all of it.
Feeling tremendous excitement and power at playing in the realm of state cultivation with you.