Sensory Appreciation

How do you know what to do with yourself on your mediation cushion?  You arrange your robes, and your body to sit.  You arrange your robes so they are tidy, but why do you arrange your body as you do?  You want to be upright because being upright is important, right?  But how do you find upright?  This is important.  Dogen, in his instruction on sitting, devoted quite a bit of his instructions on the importance of how to sit physically.  Place your ears over your shoulders, your nose in line with your navel.  I have an intellectual grasp of what this means.  I’ve studied anatomy!  But how do I do it?  How do I know when I’ve been successful?

Does it happen “naturally”?  Look around the meditation hall before the end of a long sitting.  This person is sitting a bit forward, that one looks like she’s sitting back.  That person’s is holding one shoulder higher than the other.  This person is sitting with his head far forward, and she looks like she’s looking down.  That one looks a bit twisted.   Ask them if they are in pain.  Does it make sense that sitting has to cause pain?  Sitting upright does not come naturally.

I’ve relied heavily on how I feel.  I’ve held my body or changed my posture to make my zazen conform to what I think it should be - to improve my sitting - to get more concentrated, focused, relaxed, present, alive, quieter, etc.  Through all these years, I have held dear a phrase I heard at the San Francisco Zen Center: “The body is always present”.  I misinterpreted this as meaning the sensation of my body can be relied upon, that these sensations are honest, that they will support me and guide me, that they can teach me to improve my sitting.

  I don’t think I have been alone in using my bodily sensations to guide me in sitting.  Buddhists have written about the use of a body practice.   But Zen students are direct, honest, and in the moment.  We embody the truth.  Well, here is my truth:

I am not at all sure what I am are actually doing.  It is hopeless to try to sit more upright because I have an inaccurate idea of what I am actually doing with my body.

Even though I learned this gradually, to write it is still profoundly disturbing and unsettling.  And writing that makes me sad: This sitting, which has been the backbone of my life, and I have no idea at all how to physically do it.

I have lots of colorful and descriptive examples from my own life to illustrate how profoundly unreliable sensory appreciation actually is.  In fact I have so many examples that I must conclude that everyone who has notices their use, must come to the same conclusion that I have.  Since I have no evidence that anyone is interested I won't talk about my own examples.   I don’t think anyone could convince you that your all your ideas on what you are actually doing are unfounded.  I imagine that you are like me and have to have many examples before the truth sets in.  But let me offer this: has a teacher ever come up behind you and ‘adjusted your posture’?  Afterward, did you say “Ah, now this feels right!”  or did you think “Oh! this feels totally wrong!”

FM Alexander had something to say on this topic.  FM Alexander was a theatrical speaker.  He began to lose his voice.  With consultation of physicians it was decided that the cause of his difficulties was something he was doing while reciting.  With the use of mirrors, he found that to his surprise he was not doing, or using himself, in a way that he thought he was.  He called this unreliable sensory appreciation.

It is not that the raw data that our senses provide are at all wrong.  The problem is that the judgments, opinions, and conclusions are poor and unreliable.  They do not provide sound basis for actions.    We are like a ship in the ocean and we constantly missread the compass.  We just can not read it right.

But again I won’t try to convince you.  I can’t convince you that the sensation from your back may, or may not, have anything to do with your back.  Who am I to tell you that you don’t know if you are leaning right or left.  You would never believe me if I suggested that your use of your self should not be based on how you feel, on your proprioception?  You have a lifetime of experience and that makes you an expert .  Experts are loathe to change their opinions.  And when they do it hurts and they feel lost.  Anyway, I do.
 And an expert in the meaning of their senses might be deeply afraid to admit they have faulty sensory appreciation.  Then what would you do to guide their use of their body?  How would they know how to adjust their posture?  You don't have a teacher who is correcting you posture frequently.  You don't have mirrors around you for feedback.  Can you imagine sitting for long hours knowing that you really don't know how to sit upright?  What a scary thing to imagine.   But it's also a start.