New beginnings are exciting. They are full of new possibilities for new successes. However, only babies come new to new beginnings. The rest of us bring our old selves to our new beginnings.
That isn't all bad. Our old selves contain the experience and wisdom we've worked to accumulate. On the other hand, our old selves also contain all our misperceptions and misunderstandings. Our old habits can work to undermine our new beginnings. How can we bring into awareness old, counterproductive habits of thought and action and overcome them?
As a somatic educator, when I am faced with a question like this, I turn my attention to my body. The body, after all, is the solid manifestation of the whole self. Posture, breathing, and movement reveal and also shape a person's philosophy of being.
Imagine yourself ready to start a momentous new undertaking. Perhaps you're moving to a new job, getting married, or having your first book published. Think of some important new beginnings in your life.
Beyond just new undertakings, every moment of your life is a new beginning. How can you keep flexible and open to new experiences and new learnings? How can you approach an old problem, see it in a new way and find new solutions? How can you face old traumas and find new healing? How can we all break free of history and find new possibilities for peace and a sustainable world?
The answer is as close as your body. Body awareness can be a powerful tool for creating a new mind.
What do you feel when you are faced with an old situation or a new beginning? Most people would feel excited, perhaps a bit anxious. Perhaps you might feel helpless, or confused, or irritated, or panic stricken. There are so many possible feelings. But let's pin down these mental actions.
When in your body do you feel excitement or anxiety, for example? What exactly do you do at those body locations? Perhaps you feel butterflies in your stomach. Or tension in the muscles around your neck and shoulders. Maybe you tap one foot over and over again. Describe your new beginning aloud. How does your voice sound? Perhaps a bit tense and shallow.
If you think about what you are feeling in your body, you may realize that it's familiar. You may be doing in your body the same thing you did on some important occasion in the past when an old situation or a new beginning overwhelmed you. You may be readying yourself for the past to repeat itself, which certainly is no way to achieve new possibllities.
How can we come fresh to new beginnings? Fresh in the sense of seeing clearly what is in front of us right at this moment. Fresh in the sense of being able to focus on the new possibilities rather than noticing only what we have already known in the past. Fresh in the sense of allowing the present to be different from the past?
Let go of the image of your new beginning. Take a moment to focus on your body. Let the back of your tongue, deep in your mouth and throat, soften and relax. Let your chest hang soft and your belly plop out. What does all that do to your breathing? Walk around a moment and feel what that softening and opening does to your walk. Most people find themselves calmer, better balanced, more alert, more ready.
This soft, open body state is precisely the opposite of the negativity that is such a part of our old habits. Is shrinking or tightening really the best preparation for thinking, talking, moving, and acting effectively? Or course not.
Try thinking of your new beginning again, but this time monitor your somatic responses. Substitute openness in your muscles for constriction. Replace hard-chest breathing with soft-belly breathing. Change tensed-throat squaking to soft-throat speaking. You can create a more relaced state of the whole mindbody. You will be able to resist old narrow habits of thought and behavior when you soften and widen your body. Remembering to hold your body in new, more open ways will go a long way toward preventing old habits of action from contaminating new beginnings.
