Do you focus most of your attention on your baby? Do you notice when her diaper is wet without criticizing her for peeing? I think the answer is a resounding “YES”. We do this naturally so our babies will develop trust that the world as a safe, loving, and caring place.
However, at the same time that we become more tuned into our children, we can find ourselves growing less and less attuned to our own physical sensations, needs and feelings. We often have to set aside our own body signals in order to meet the needs of our children. Have you ever noticed your bladder is about to explode because you kept putting off the bathroom pit stop? Or have you found yourself famished and realized you haven’t eaten in hours and hours? Or you might be mindlessly eating whatever is around. As we distance ourselves from our bodily cues over time, it becomes harder to notice these felt signals. In addition to becoming numb we can see our needs as less important than those of our baby’s, and feel critical of ourselves for even having needs. Yet, our bodies are wise beyond our imagination. Our body, emotions, mind and spirit all need our attention. And if we stop paying attention, we stop feeling a sense of trust in ourself.
Basic trust is not “a thing” we get as babies and wear as protective armor for the rest of our lives. Having a fairly healthy attachment to a caregiver sets the stage for basic trust, but that trust can be lost with life experiences and it can be developed and strengthened as we grow. As we mature, our sense of trust becomes more internalized and less dependent on outside circumstances. We realize that we can trust people to be who they are, and life is unpredictable.
And we can learn to trust ourselves more deeply than ever. Yoga is the perfect practice for developing or strengthening basic trust in ourselves, by teaching us to tune into our breath and our body’s sensations with compassion and acceptance. On our mat we have the permission, the time and the space to ask ourselves, “how do I feel, and what do I need?” We can watch our response to that need. Do we follow a teacher’s instruction even if it hurts, or do we become confident enough to listen to our bodies and modify a pose?
Next time you practice, set an intention to tune into yourself with a body scan, asking each part of your body “how do you feel, and what do you need? Send some respect and love for the open lines of communication between sensation in the body and your mind, you are removing obstacles to clarity.
Our bodies are vast reservoirs of wisdom. We just need to pay attention. And the more we pay attention to our own body’s wisdom, the more we trust ourselves. And the more we trust ourselves, the more sensitive and discriminating we become with our children, giving them the gift of basic trust as they begin their journey through life.
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