Relaxation

So the first thing. Relax in the chair, have the light dark or dim as you like, but the light should not be bright. Tell everybody for these twenty minutes no disturbance, no phone call, nothing whatsoever... as if the world is no more for those twenty minutes. Close the doors, relax in the chair with loose clothes so there is no tightness anywhere, and start feeling where the tension is. You will find many spots of tension. Those have to be relaxed first, because if the body is not relaxed, the mind cannot be either. The body creates the situation for the mind to relax. The body becomes the vehicle of relaxation.

When you want to be angry, or when you are angry, if the body does not collaborate with you, you will not be able to be angry. A subtle mechanism follows, certain poisons are released into the blood: your face becomes red, your eyes become red, your hands want to beat or to kill or to hit. You want to shout or shriek, and the whole body is ready. Sometimes try -- without any bodily symptom of anger, try to be angry, and you will feel that it is impossible. Unless the body gives a base, nothing is possible. So the first thing is to create a body base.

So just go on touching the place. Wherever you feel some tension, touch your own body with deep love, with compassion. The body is your servant, and you have not paid anything for it -- it is simply a gift. And so Complicated, so tremendously complex that science has not been able yet to make anything like the body. But we never think about that; we don't love the body. On the contrary; we feel angry about it. And so-called saints have taught many foolish things to people -- that the body is the enemy, that the body is your degradation. that the body is pulling you downwards, that the body is the sin; it is all sin.

If you want to commit a sin, the body helps, that's true. But the responsibility is yours, not the body's. If you want to meditate, the body is ready to help you for that too.....
----Excerpt from The Great Nothing....