I do some of my best thinking at Walmart, especially when I leave the kids at home. I don't know whether it's the time of day I usually end up there (it's generally me, a few college kids and the elderly masses), but I was struck today, as I have been before, by how many people there seem to be in pain. Not the existential, spiritual questing kind of pain, either. I'm talking about real, physical, "Damn, that hurts!" kind of discomfort.
There were people limping, people with braces and bandages and still more people with wheely carts and other devices meant to help them get around. And there were any number of other folks who, while not sporting some of the obvious accoutrements of the physically infirm, were obviously just not feeling at their best.
Yes, we are spiritual beings. In this world, however, we inhabit our physical bodies and experience the world from within their confines. So, anything we think or feel is filtered through our skin and muscles and bones, as well as through our psyches. When we're not at (or near) our physical best, we can't fully appreciate much else.
Don't believe me? Think back to the last time you had a toothache or headache. If you're anything like me, I'll guess that that constant, low level of physical pain prevented you from being as patient, inquiring, inspired, enlightened, fun and interesting as you might otherwise have been. Even if you get used to the pain . . . even if you don't consciously think or know it's present, the pain is real and there and affects (for the worse) the way in which you experience and interact with the world.
Take a moment to think about what is . . . right now . . . causing you physical pain. Are 20 or 50 or 100 extra pounds making your joints ache and your clothes uncomfortably tight? Does your lower back twinge every time you sit down or get up? Are your hamstrings so tight that you can't move as easily and freely as you otherwise might?
Chances are good, if any of these things apply, that you might have thought of doing something about it. And chances are also good that you dismissed those thoughts as too difficult, selfish or unimportant. They are not. If we experience the world through our bodies, it is important . . . essential even . . . to ensure that they are working properly.
Here's where I think we get hung up, though. We get tied up with the "externals" of physical fitness. The how we look, not the how it makes us feel. Which makes it really difficult, once our swimsuit cover model days have passed, to get out there and do something about ourselves.
Choose one simple thing to do today. One reach for your toes. One five-minute walk around the block. Something . . . anything. Then tomorrow, do it again. Next week, do it twice, or for two minutes longer. It might not be fun, and it probably won't be easy. But it will work.
Focus on how these slow, gradual changes make you feel physically, and realize how those physical changes can, will and do reshape the way in which you interact with the world. Take care of the physical and you will free essential mental, emotional and spiritual space for thinking, feeling and experiencing the world as you truly deserve to experience it . . . fully, unreservedly and free of physical barriers.
