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various DIY tools in an orange tool holder secured to a bare wooden wall
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When your body speaks- the power of awareness

various DIY tools in an orange tool holder secured to a bare wooden wall

Your body is a tool kit that can be used to determine your state in any given moment, feeding back to you your state of mind and being

You cannot consciously and purposefully change anything without being aware of it first.  Awareness gives you power to choose your actions. It is perhaps the single most important aspect essential for personal growth.

The Learning Cycle

You may know this cycle of learning:

  • Unconscious incompetence
  • Conscious incompetence
  • Conscious competence and
  • Unconscious competence.

We start the process unaware of what we don’t know (unconscious incompetence). Then through guidance or insight we realise that we don’t know something.  We discover we need to improve (conscious incompetence). This spurs us to learn and consciously apply our learning.  Firstly in quite a crude and clumsy manner.  Then with progressively more skill as our knowledge and experience develops (conscious competence). In time we act with great skill without paying conscious attention to our behaviour (unconscious competence). Then the process repeats, endlessly growing our skill base and competence. True growth never stops.

Judgement Free

This is as true for our feelings and emotions as it is for our practical and intellectual skill. Emotional intelligence is an important part of our behavioural and relational repertoire. Awareness of how the body feels is a route into our state of being in this moment. We recognise tension, discomfort, relaxation or pleasure in the body.  That tells us valuable information about how our body responds to this current situation. It takes practice to notice these feelings in the body rather than think about them and judge the reaction. There is great power in noticing how we feel without judgement.  Then we are free to act from where we are emotionally. 

We can then make a choice about whether this response serves us and the people around us.  Mindfully we begin to take responsibility and make changes to alter the way we affect the outcome.

Awareness Applied to Public Speaking

Recently I had a public speaking engagement.  I noticed myself getting nervous, tense and shallow breathing developing into panic behaviour. As soon as I realised it I began relaxing and deepening my breath which calms me down. I was able to deliver the talk without any difficulty. Previous experience tells me that left unchecked this panic reaction leads to ineffective communication, forgetting my lines and not interacting with the audience.  As a consequence the attendees do not get what they came for. It was better for all that I noticed.

How awareness influences conversations

When we are having a conversation with someone, very often we pay attention to what is happening between us and them. Is the atmosphere calm and relaxed, charged and edgy, aggressive and threatening? That is one level of awareness. Another is noticing what is going on for the other person and how they are contributing to the environment. A third is how you are feeling and how you affect what is going on. Only by being aware of how you are feeling can you affect the space around you consciously. The onus is on you to notice and then take responsibility for your role in co- creating the outcome.

Body as Tool Kit for Awareness

Your body then is a tool kit that can be used to determine your state in any given moment, feeding back to you your state of mind and being.  Developing methods to increase your awareness of your body and its feelings is important for greater relaxation, confidence and well- being.  I cover these and many other strategies during my Moving Meditation Courses.
You can e- mail me at david@potentialitycoaching.co.uk to learn about future events and  to discuss creating bespoke courses for your workplace.  We can also discuss how we can work together to build your confidence from the inside out. Click here to find out about and book tickets for future Moving Meditation Courses.

Over to You

How do you use your body to be aware of your state?  What do you find easy or struggle with about awareness?  Do you use your awareness of your body to adapt how you are in situations like the public speaking one I described?  Are you aware of how you use your body when you communicate with other people and yourself?  I’d love to hear from you.

Pass it On

Think this article or the Moving Meditation Course might be useful for someone you know? Why not send them a link to the blog or forward them the details of the course? I’d really appreciate you spreading the word.

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Embodied Confidence

What is embodied confidence?

Have you ever felt the confusion of not knowing how you feel about something? Do you sometimes feel blank when events happen?  When someone asks you how you feel, are you able to tell them?  Do you try to work it out in your head and draw a blank?  Do you experience strong feelings sometimes and find yourself unable to find the words to express them? Embodied confidence can give you insight into all of these questions.

Have you ever felt the confusion of not knowing how you feel about something?

We are emotional creatures, capable of experiencing powerful emotions ranging from profound love to deep hatred and everything in between. Often however, we become cut off from these emotions.  This can lead to us feeling numb, confused and disconnected from our self and others.  Reconnecting the relationship between mind and body, enables us to express the feelings the body experiences.  Then we can name, share, acknowledge them and move forward in maturity and fulfilled living.  When we become competent at this process, we are moving into embodied confidence.  It allows the on- going process of dealing with things as they come up in our lives and managing them in a mature and constructive manner.

Mind- Body Connection

Your body is the instrument that interacts with the world and creates feelings that are interpreted by the mind. Either we allow these feelings to flow in healthy expression or they become bottled up and we express them in unhealthy and sometimes destructive ways.  It is these feelings that we embody and express through emotion either constructively or destructively.  Awareness of what is happening in the body allows us to develop and use a vocabulary over time.  It permits us to show compassion, empathy, understanding, patience, love, intimacy and honesty in an open and authentic way.  It also allows us to safely express our anger, disappointment, frustration and vulnerability.  To be confident and strong in oneself is to be so in mind and body, the two are inseparable and go hand in hand.

What is strength?

I was brought up in a way that discouraged boys and men to show their emotions. As a result, it was thought of as showing strength when you showed no emotion unless it was a mild happiness.  Strong emotion of any kind was frowned upon.  Perhaps you can relate to that?  Yet, it is well acknowledged now that it requires great strength to show your emotions and requires little personal investment to hide how you feel.  What is important is that you choose an appropriate time to share them.  Ensure you share with the appropriate people.

In fact, the cost of smothering your emotions is vast. People tend to lack trust in those people that do not share their emotions.  This includes spouses and children to work colleagues at all levels.  Sharing your emotions engenders trust.  It is considered a powerful leadership quality whether you lead large teams at work or you are part of a small family team.  I am not suggesting regular bouts of tears or profound confessions.  Rather an honest sharing of how you feel to the people that matter or would benefit from hearing about how you feel.  It is this honesty that engenders trust.  A real self- awareness and inner strength are required to face that process.

The effects of stifled emotions

It is a very different way of being from the 1950s man who cannot own up to being a little nervous about public speaking or showing how sad he feels at the death of a loved one.  Locking it away does not require strength.  It shows a fear of facing the pain and an unwillingness or inability to do so.  Fear is OK.  Not facing it is a disservice to you and the people that love and want to respect you.  The consequences to your health are also severe.  Stored up emotion can be the cause of many stress related illnesses such as stroke, cardio- vascular disease, anxiety and depression as well as cancer, IBS, many skin complaints, fibromyalgia and more.

How does embodied confidence feel?

Embodied confidence is a new way of being for many people. It is that awareness of one’s inner state in this moment that allows you to be mindful of how you feel and be able to manage it skilfully, compassionately and powerfully.  It will improve the quality of your relationship with yourself and others as well as your health and well- being.  For me, embodied practice helps to give me more confidence.  I am more aware of how I feel each moment and so I am better equipped to walk into situations with more confidence.  It is not necessary to know every detail.  A further ability is to be able to adapt when things change or require flexibility.  I am better able to remain calm when before situations would have made me more anxious and stressed.  Generally, I am more relaxed, less stressed and more at ease.

I am grateful to the many embodied confidence teachers I have had over the years.  I’m proud to be able to share it for the benefit of others.  This includes life coaching, meditation, Moving Meditation and martial arts, all of which require some degree of embodied practice.

Over to you

Please share in the comments box below you experiences of living both aware and unaware of your feelings. How has this affected your embodied confidence?  What does it feel like?  How do you react?  What do you do to remain aware of your feelings and emotions?  What would you change in your life today to live with more awareness of your embodied confidence?

Pass it on

If you think this article would be of value to someone you know, why not pass it on? I would really appreciate it and so would they.  Also, you can find similar exercises and more in a free e- course on confidence available here (www.potentialitycoaching.co.uk).

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