Reichian Organic Vitalism: Pulsation & Vibration & Rant on the AWFL Trauma Industrial Complex
BW Newsletter, 24th June 2023
Good day all,
Find Herewithin be Part 2 of the Wilhelm Reich deep dive. A further exploration of something close to my heart. The organic pulsation of the organism. And how Reich’s work can shed light on cultivating vital force. This is the final instalment of the ‘what he done good’ part of the series. Next week we will break down the less than stellar elements of his work. Or what I think of that, anyway.
This theme ties in with some other rants I have lined up for you. Inspired by an online friend who re-shared a famous Hakan tweet with me, presumably as a way to hilariously compare me an my interests to a neurotic liberal white woman. Fair call. For those unaware:
Excellent poster and I hope he returns. As cogent as the observation is as with all his tweets, I hope you see what is happening here as not quite this. This general perception of something also useful is why I’m intent on wrestling the work away from the feminised ‘AWFL Trauma-Industrial Complex” frame - ‘AWFL TIC’ for short…
Finally, the practical work presented for contributors will be a special sequence developed by me to induce a few things. This will be released tomorrow separately, as I ran out of time to chop up the accompanying mp3.
Vibratory response.
Loosening up abdominal region for the cultivation of belly breath for sitting.
The integration of this with ‘diaphragmatic integrity sequencing’.
This weeks table of contents:
Reichian Vitalism: Pulsation & Vibration Part II of Reich Series
AWFL’s and the Trauma Industrial Complex
Zazen is Enough: Shikantaza of Rev Kenshu Sugawara
Until next week, wishing you all a relaxing Sunday and a powerful week ahead.
1. Reichian Vitalism: Pulsation & Vibration
As 'just a British pragmatist' (another in a slew of bitchy and weird insults people have been throwing at me lately), I don't believe in idealism or ideology as being all that interesting. There's too much idealism these days. We’re covered head to toe in the stuff, and it’s rancid.
Starting from this rather silly framing of life and it’s problems, we tend to miss that solutions are usually reasonably accessible with a simple embrace of pedestrian pragmatism.
There is no need for a super-philosophy or 'grand over-arching metaphysical frameworks', as one such detractor insists is the real solution. Pragmatism in this work means we’re happy to try things out, discard what doesn’t work and hold on to what does. There’s no time wasting or room for shooting blanks in such a space. This general irreverent attitude shades how I view Wilhelm Reich and seek to frame his work. And so it is with vitality, vibration & pulsation. Not mere abstract values, but real forces that can be worked with.
"…Evil is that which obstructs meaningful vitality. It may show itself differently in each case. That which is above by reason of its charity suppresses that which is below; then the lower craves what is above…."
-Conversation with CJ Jung (47-49)
"What is the hardest thing of all? That which seems the easiest For your eyes to see, That which lies before your eyes."
-Goethe
"…Plasmatic current does not flow continuously but in rhythmic thrusts. Hence we speak of pulsation. The pulsation can be plainly observed in the blood circulation of all metazoa. The pulsatory current of body fluids is the work of the organismic orgone, a direct expression of its form of movement. From the pulsation of body fluids, we must reason, a posteriori, that there is a pulsation of orgone energy. This conclusion is confirmed by observing certain protozoa, in which pulsatory waves of excitation pass through the body and set the protoplasm in motion. Among worms, excitation waves of a pulsatory nature pass from the tail end to the head. The same phenomenon can be seen in certain amoeboid cancer cells. The following drawing expresses the form in which excitation waves move in the protoplasm of these cancer cells…Hence we must distinguish between two kinds of pulsatory movements in living matter: the pulsatory movement of orgone energy in the organism, and its effect, the pulsatory mechanical movement of body fluids. We differentiate here between functional bio-energetic pulsation and mechanical pulsation. The mechanical pulsation results from the functional pulsation of the orgone, its spinning forward in alternating expansion and contraction…."
- Wilhelm Reich
(i) Overview of Vital Pulsation & Orgone Superimposition
As we increasingly see, Reich, to no small degree, has been subjected to consistent malicious misinterpretation. In particular regarding what he thought and its apparent consequences.
And not only by his detractors. Some prominent followers also had (or have) their snouts in this trough. Often responsible for taking his work on divergent paths, which Reich disagreed with whilst invoking his name or implying successorship. Often in radical politicised directions which he had explicitly dropped. This largely coloured the popular conceptions that came after his death. Analysing this is no small matter and deserving of many books. But it covers up the practical elements of his work.
Our purpose here is to plumb the depths and go deeper into what Reich was getting at in his vision of vitality and how it related to his work, discarding any issues we’d have with his or others apparent framing.
This work on pulsation and vitality is after all his most important contribution. I think it is. Making the abstract comprehensible and accessible. A goal he explicitly states as reconciling the so-called body/mind split in man. The same split Reich contends separates man from his primal, energetic, sensory nature. The pulsation within natural phenomena that drives the élan vital.
One of the ways he has been misinterpreted is through the 'unleashing of sexual chaos'. Reich was reportedly furious about this implication towards the end of his life. Several associated and hangers-on had taken this work and ran with it in ways he never intended, insisting they were furthering his work and promoting the so-called 'free-love movements' that many see as so destructive today. So was the Zeitgeist of the time.
Yet, Reich would often clarify the obsession with sexuality and compulsive addiction to things like pornography for what they were: representations of the 'damming-up' of 'orgone' that was not free-flowing. He explicitly stated on several occasions that he detested pornography. Seeing it as yet another stunted attempt by humans to overcome their estrangement from their primal essence, driven by the sickness Reich sought to overcome.
The issue for humankind, according to Reich, was not overarching theories of organisation or correct moral or metaphysical frameworks but reinstating crucial access to the orgone: the vital life energy, the élan vital - that which animated all life and the universe itself. Anything that got in the way of this, no matter how outwardly conciliatory to his views, was simply another representation or anorgonia.
Reich took the ideas of vitalism further then many of his contemporaries. Reich reifies this force beyond mere aesthetic or abstract conception. He tells us that this animating energy is a superimposition that gives rise to reality and its patterns, shapes and structure. Our estrangement from this energy Reich saw as the primary plague afflicting the species.
Given this energy was ubiquitous, his work eventually took on suitably cosmic proportions. No longer was is just treating patients and neurosis. It became the work of uncovering a universal principle of which humans were a part. Nor was it simply the case that retvrn as such was required, the idea that x is 'primordial', thus x is 'good'. It was necessary for Reich that above all else receptivity to the free-flowing of this life energy, the ability for the organism to handle the charge, was achieved. As part of the cosmos, dynamics of the ecology and the environment all played a part.
Orgone, what Reich’s famous term for the vital life energy, when blocked was the root cause of ill-health, sadistic behaviour and the errant or devious constructions of various codified moralities. Technologies that both represented and enforced a stultification of life vitality.
This necessarily led to misshapen forms, generations of in-vital reproduction, and environmental or ecological dysfunction. Reich believed that not only did orgone ‘flow’ through us, but animated all life and gave it shape and contour. And I mean everything. Atoms, cells, planets, galaxies - material itself were shaped by this superimposing vital force he called orgone.
The reintegration or unblocking of the tissue structures or otherwise impeding the flow of this force in the organism was crucial for Reich. Of cosmic importance. Many 'product-based' or what I call 'molecular fetishists' miss this - they feel it's simply necessary to 'charge up' with energy or take supplements for example; however, the main point is missed: the structure and tissue must be capable of receiving and discharging this vital charge.
This is referred to as pulsation in Reich's works. And many new scientific discoveries shed light on this process in the body and its so-called 'systems', which I will speak to in later publications.
The intrinsic vital energetic dynamic of the body and its tissues are expressed by quality of pulsation. The quality of pulsation roughly refers to ability of the organism to 'hold a charge' is directly responsible for the organism's effectiveness and ability to act in time and space.
For Reich, energetic pulsation entirely determined the organism's effectiveness in forming and completing goals and objectives; its great creative work. Every organism in an environment possesses such a pulsation, and structure expresses its ability to receive, maintain and discharge this vital force accordingly.
For sure, many of these concepts and terms are pseudo-scientific; yet these terms nevertheless refer to actual events that Reich’s work trigger in the body. Authentic experiences and phenomena. In accusing Reich of pseudo-science, many detractors miss the point. Nonetheless, we can use so-called 'hard science' to model and demonstrate what Reich sketches out using his own peculiar language.
Within the human organism, vital energy animates all cellular and metabolic structures. Essential in a structural sense for Reich are the metabolic functions of the cells (Peat Bros) that were directly related to orgone. So we can determine the charge of an organism quite intuitively, based on things we can observe.
Breath was critical to Reich, representing by the cell's ability to transport oxygen throughout the body. Other indicators of effective pulsation could be seen as being related to the vagal tone and responses of the nervous system and its ability to regulate these forces and maintain homeostasis. The qualitative nature of our barrier to the world, the skin is another. Importantly for the species the reproductive health and dynamic force of the species itself.
We can begin to see how something very individual can have far-reaching consequences for the species at large. Should certain ideological technologies operate or take hold, what are the consequences? How to these ideas and behaviours impact physiology? Are they against the natural and complete expression of the life energy? I disagree with Reich on his utopian outlooks, but I agree that what ails us, or what I think ails us, is a physiological problem at its heart.
When orgone and its flow are inverted or turned inward, whatever term you want to use - what does Reich tell us about outcomes?
Last week, you may recall the notion of anorgonia as Reich's word for describing a structurally retarded flow of orgone, where the vital life energy becomes a metabolic problem. There is, as defined by Reich, a lack of pulsation and a lack of vibration in this state. The energy loses its ability to shape and flow and is turned inwards, becoming pathological.
This leads to the things you’d expect: ill health, invitality, neurotic symptoms, stunted sexual impulse and expression, and the inability to sustain a charge or develop one. Of course, as Riech elaborated in the cancer biopathy, metabolic dysfunction and cancer.
In the psychic and mental element of human experience, anti-life attitudes and compulsive behaviour are flare-ups of this malaise. They are also representations of it. Reich refers to Anorgonia as being the undergirding driver, or lack thereof, of the bug man. Or worse yet - the dreaded AWFL.
We’d be familiar with many of these outbursts in recent times. Covid under the guise of hygiene, the sadistic yet cowardly pleasure many on the left take in the death of a soldier on a twitter feed, for example. Invital organisms possess a kind of petty maliciousness. A disdain for the unarmored. Such types, bred for generations show us that we have a real problem on our hands. Reich apparently noticed many of these traits in compulsive armoured individuals:
"…against all genuine and unrestrained attitudes of the unarmored organism, against the spontaneous, pleasurable, enthusiastic, vibrating, wild and foolish things in life. Above all, it opposes what is involuntary and free in the body. In its destructive attitude toward the alive or unarmored organism, the armoured organism knows no mercy. Here it loses the qualities it has otherwise raised to the level of ideal human behaviour. In the guise of idealistic or hygienic attitudes, the armoured organism knows how to kill every spontaneous impulse in itself and other organisms."
-Reich, Ether, God & Devil & Cosmic Superimposition (p. 66).
(ii) Pulsation, Orgone & God
"The "moral existence" of the human animal was subject to conscious moral responsibility. Everything evil that happened was blamed on the "evil will" of man. The damage caused by Schopenhauer to human thought affected intellectual circles just as much as did the "original sin" of the Church. Man, as a conscious being, was held fully responsible for morality and justice and as a citizen for his thoughts and acts. To this day, he has not freed himself of this erroneous thinking. There was no logical question as to where consciousness and will originate. Consciousness, will, and responsibility were indestructible metaphysical conditions existed from time immemorial, absolutely and forever. Nietzsche's magnificent critique of morality had no social impact. It was not a part of the Zeitgeist, such as will and guilt. But it paved the way toward an important step—the step into the realm of unconscious psychic life, investigated and comprehended by Freud. One should emphasise that while organised religion made use of guilt in the moral consciousness, guilt was not actually anchored in man's consciousness."
- Reich, Wilhelm. Ether, God & Devil & Cosmic Superimposition (pp. 22-23).
(Few know Reich adored Nietzsche, btw from his own book:)
"Deep is its woe—, "Joy—deeper still than grief can be: "Woe saith: Hence! Go! "But joys all want eternity—, "—Want deep, profound eternity!"
- Nietaszche - Zarathustra's - roundelay
For Reich, part of the problem was man's tendency to see god or life force as essentially unknowable and to externalise it or seperate himself from it. In his work, he attempted to distinguish god as a not simply an ‘esthetic quality’ but something able to be scientifically understood and utilised. He disputed any difference between god and the world, or the body and the cosmos, doing away with such dualisms.
For Reich, orgone and god were essentially interchangeable terms. As such, he never described himself as an atheist. His view was that due to our armouring, we struggle with a connection to this cosmic life force because we're kinaesthetically detached from it - from vital life energy. He stated that we 'perceived reality as a mirror without ever touching it' as a consequence. God and ether were the same thing, both categories representing our experience of unified vital life force.
Reich represented his thought on this in the following famous diagram:
Reich proposed that the physical manifestations of ether that drive all life could be known and used, and these forces were functionally the same as god.
That the mathematician, who attempts to explain or synthesise truth through the use of abstract symbology, is driven by the very force he seeks to uncover. His genius is driven by the pulsation of his organs and subjective sensitivities. Reich thought it was somewhat amusing that almost no one understood that this was the case. Despite their ardent searches, they could not touch the mirror, merely analysing its reflection while the force they were searching for it right there in front of them, and in them.
As we know now, the idea that abstraction can exist in a vacuum is patently idiotic. Like any artist, the searching mathematician expresses the pulsation of orgone in a mathematical form. Reich believed that the dismantling of the co-called muscular armour inhibiting this, and encouraging the reinstatement of the pulsation would unleash individual creative energy in this way.
He considered this a birthright of man, and to varying degrees, all humans possessed some of this potential. This is an example of his strong idealism, something I'm yet to see evidence for. I know and have noticed that for some humans, including myself, this process absolutely 'unleashes' abundant energy and a strong desire for creation. Where it was not extant or properly expressed previously, for whatever reason.
From Reich's framework, we could derive that genius in cultures, the arts, and sciences is not merely outcomes or features of statistics, 'IQ' or other such abstract metrics: genius exists in so far as a biome of organisms in culture represent or channel this vital force individually and collectively. This is related to the cultural cultivation of the physiology of its members.
Abstraction can be disconnected from pulsation; it can become wholly disconnected from lifeforce. In which the accursed rote of the modern age forces in-vital fibrosis. A vital pragmatic approach to life is replaced with strong disconnected idealism and ideology, futile attempts to intellectually return.
The well-spring of creative energy, the life force of organisms, ecology and civilisation, is expressed by vigour and pulsation, Reich determined that these things were not intellectual subtractions, but measurable biological responses.
The bugman invert this primordial organismic response. Over time pulsation is stunted, and reactions to the environment are frozen in bizarre and strange ways. Even being deeply dissatisfied with their station, they still seek to impose their structures on the world. Attempting to bend it to their own peculiar regulations, which are typically anti-life attitudes.
Bizzare and completely disconnected behaviours. Thoughts about thoughts, words about words; the mass of men exist entirely disconnected from the sensation of their organs and the organic intuition of their psychic and inner life. We see this today with Redditors, hygiene fanatics, and specific sexual dysfunctions that I will not name explicitly as examples of the worst outcomes of being utterly detached from the body as the vault of truth.
For Reich, our modern mechanistic world was perverted for this reason. It is an outcome and problem of physiological regulation. The energetic charge and the bodies pulsewave.
This is a primary reason bodywork and breathwork are so powerful; it is dismantling our compulsive and negative reactivity against the vital life force. We promote contact with the undergirding of life itself, which drives us irrespective of our acknowledgement of it.
We can choose to be ruled by its dysfunction, as Reich would call it, or to master it and ride it like a mighty steed.
(iii) Pulsation and Vibration in Practice
"In addition to the splitting up of organ sensations, there is the mortal terror of total pulsation, of spontaneous motion and spontaneous excitation. This anxiety constitutes the actual brake. If the splitting-up process prevents the functional unity of the individual functions, the anxiety produces terror or rage in the armoured organism whenever another person fills and connects the gaps, comprehends functional unity, or creates it."
-Reich, Ether, God & Devil & Cosmic Superimposition (p. 119).
One element Reich himself and preceding practitioners noticed in working with the body was a phenomena described as vibration. In practice, vibration was seen as a necessary part of the reintegration of pulsative mechanisms, particularly in the musculature.
So what's it? That's a good question.
Lex Huberman SCIENCE types call the twitches or fine tremors induced by bodywork 'fasciculations'. They are considered an involuntary firing of the peripheral nervous system, which is extremely sensitive to external inputs. It is seen as unimportant, a kind of thing that just happens and no one really knows why. If fasciculations become pathological, individuals are prescribed muscle relaxants. But it’s still not really understood why or how. In serious cases involuntary fibre twitching can be indicative of neurological disorders.
This has always been a topic that's fascinated me. Anyone who has engaged in bodywork can tell you this occurs very strongly sometimes. Yet of all the talk about this response being orgone itself, or 'loosening up of armour' or whatever else, very little is said or apparently known about it and what's specifically happening. I hope to impart some of what I've found over the years, because it’s fairly important to comprehend, as it turns out.
We all use terms like 'vibrant health' or 'looking and feeling vibrant' to describe people who exhibit such a constitution. This shows us that we all acknowledge an implicit understanding of the connection between natural vibration and health.
Reich noticed that specific postures and exercises combined with special breathing would induce gross and very fine involuntary muscle tremors. He generally termed this as 'vibration'. He considered this vibration, particularly when very fine, to represent literally the flow of orgone through the tissues. The more a patient could learn to notice, induce vibration and surrender to it over time, the finer the tremors or shaking would become. This vibration was seen as integral to re-integrating energetic pulsation. Most people are unable to do this, because they’re guarded against pulsations of energy. As Levine (2003) describes:
"Reich felt that the comfortable, pleasant sensations of feeling the soft pulsations of energy within oneself had become so foreign to his patients that they were frightened and braced against these deeply pleasurable pulsations. In other words, pleasure and ease had become 'alien', and tension, anger, sadness, depression, and pain had become the 'familiar' experience. This state of 'dis–ease' became the 'normal' feeling tone! All other experiences were experienced as unusual and, therefore, threatening".
Pulsation of the inner core wants to spontaneously express itself in states of energetic excitation; the ability of the tissues to experience the pulsatory waves throughout the body, organs, vasculature or whatever else, as we've been discussing, is what Reich considered to be of foremost importance.
The ability to experience pulsatory waves is, therefore, related to the integrity of the body's structure and segments and the tissues' tone and quality. This is managed by the expansive and contractive response of the autonomic nervous system.
The ability of the organism to acknowledge and feel the intensity of the wave is directly related to tensions within the tissues; anyone who has done bodywork can tell you this. The issue arises when the response to external stimuli becomes 'frozen'. The autonomic homeostasis, therefore, shifts to being sympathetic dominant. Part of this dominance is muscular tension. Reich, therefore, sought to undo this dominance and 'hack' the regulation of the nervous system. When working out the tensions, shaking and vibration is a side effect. The shaking itself appears to be a manifestation of the resetting the homeostatic response of the ANS.
This behaviour is even seen in higher mammals. As Bercelli tells us, animals naturally shake to release tension after a life-threatening event. This is to discharge the tension associated with a strong sympathetic response to a threatening event. A kind of re-calibration of the ANS. As I've stated before, staying 'frozen' in fight or flight is energetically expensive and an enormous liability from a reproductive point of view, and only humans seem to do it.
Of course, this doesn't imply that the binary opposite of being a soft floppy mollusc is the proper way of being like many assume. Indeed this can be seen as its own dysfunction. The devil is certainly in the details, but this is a general principle when working with these techniques.
From a Reichian perspective, the vibration arising indicates the change in the body's energetic charge and its flow through the musculature. Over time with this work, jerking or larger tremors give way to a buzzing vibration. The finer the tremor, the less jerky, the higher the quality of the tissues and cells to 'hold and distribute the charge' of orgone.
Alexander Lowen, the famed neo-Reichian bodywork practitioner, describes it in one video I saw as being similar to a current passing through an electrical wire. Given what we know from the ancient traditions regarding kundalini and charge and some of the pathologies that can arise in people who can't correctly conduct the charge due to having done no work on the musculature prior - this makes perfect sense, and Reich came to the same conclusions; rather suspiciously I believe. If the wire can conduct the electricity as it should, there would be a gentle vibration or humming to indicate this. The body is similar.
Several related problems come up when trying to work with your vibratory response. The first is common, and that’s simply having no vibration at all. No 'electricity running through the wires'. This is the manifestation of the complete lack of vital energy.
On the other hand, when you start working with the body, you may notice jerking and strong and localised twitching in the muscles. This is a representation of the body's redacted ability to hold and distribute the charge.
Chronic tension and poor segmental structure dam up the flow of this energy. When it begins to flow, the blockages act a little bit like hazards on a road or, better yet - local beavers setting up dams throughout a river system - instead of the water flowing as it should, those nasty beavers have interrupted its flow with their blockages; bioenergetic bodywork should be in principle the removal of the beavers' dams, allowing the vital energies to flow as they should, and as the blockages are removed, the tremors become much more refined. Indicating the flow is much more ubiquitous and efficient.
When working with the chronically contracted and spastic tissues, all sorts of 'vibratory' manifestations can occur. As stated, if you've done any of this work, you would notice varieties of shuddering through the body. People can have powerful responses, sometimes convulsions, strong weeping or rage responses, for example, that physically manifest in the same way.
Rather than the emotional content being important (which is what everyone gets hung up on), these vibratory responses should be seen as more important, features of tangible 'unblocking'. We expect the vibrations to become much more refined and all-encompassing as time passes. This is the 'endpoint' of the physiological work. Pulsation is full and effective with vibration is refined and universal.
This description should shed light on the actions of your favourite feline - Ever wondered why they purr? I believer they’re physiologically processing the day's activities through their muscles with this physiological purring response. They do this from a place of safety, as the safety circuitry is intimately tied up with para-sympathetic vagal emphasis. Our beloved cats releasing the tensions and balancing their nervous systems' response to the external environment.
Somehow, our species has managed to retard these natural processes.
In my experience of bodywork, this has been precisely the case. After a time, the vibration became much more subtle. It takes me minimal time to access this physiological state if required. Along with this comes:
An extreme lightness of experience, relative positivity or optimism day to day.
A feeling of being able to experience the range of human emotions more deeply, such as sorrow or joy - no 'running away' from these impulses.
The ability to function in the moment, with less or minimal rumination tendency, very little worry.
Being less bound up in the reactivity of the so-called 'self' - an acculturated and self-defeating energetic contraction in most cases...
Greater cultivation of true self-regulation of the nervous system.
A simple feeling of pleasure in the body itself, winding down when appropriate and being energised where appropriate.
"Animals walk around in a state of permanent religious intoxication. This is the natural condition of the mind and intellect, the moment-to-moment perception of man as well. I heard some computer fool say that religion is the 'older virtual reality' experience to justify his scam industry. No, the denuded state of the spirit and intellect, where you walk around 'demystified' and 'disenchanted', is the virtual reality condition and a terrible condition at that."
-Bronze Age Pervert
Conversely, if regulatory vibration is not in working order, you get everything you'd expect.
Modern people.
Depression, psychic masochism, being a 'stiff', a pallid complexion or energy-less constitution, putting on your serious hat all the time, being against sex or having compulsive sexual morality, ‘scared of her own tail’, prone to extreme outbursts of moral outrage…not knowing 'what I should do', 'I can't feel motivated', orienting oneself purely from the point of view of petty malice or negative feelings...consistent distraction…The list goes on.
Depression is precisely what the word indicates - it is the physiological manifestation of poor pulsation and a lack of vital force. I’ve never met a person who is depressed and can vibrate. Maybe they exist, but I’ve not met one.
Treating our modern malaise with pills is really a great crime. It's like a 'hyperactive' boy, bristling with vital energy, being put on drugs by the female, moralf@g state as directed by the chronic wordcel psychiatrist who is also disconnected from vitality - all these are great crimes inflicted on the young by the fibrotic, geriatric and armoured. And I hope one day they are seen as the deeply disgusting acts they are.
Likewise, the obsessive pursuit or supplemental or molecular solutions for bio-energetic problems also strikes me as missing the point almost entirely.
So, the list goes on, and I'm sure intuitively, we can all add a few since we're all afflicted by these things periodically.
For Reich, the vibration and breath are orgone itself. It was the vital energy. The pulsation of life expressing itself. Reich showed us that vitality is no mere abstraction or something imparted by chance of birth. And I increasingly agree with him.
(iv) Framing Vitality: Nervous System Regulation & EPC
A crucial part of all this is obviously the nervous system, and I'll offer my take on how this fits in.
"We grasp that the parasympathetic nervous system operates in the direction of expansion, "out of the self-toward the world," pleasure and joy; whereas the sympathetic nervous system operates in the direction of contraction, "away from the world into the self," sadness and un-pleasure" or possibly into a protective mode.
Reich (p. 288)
The above is a dramatic oversimplification. However above I began to allude to how the nervous system is related to Reich's idea of pulsation. Reich's descriptions and observations of the breath reflex, muscles, tone and flexibility of the abdominal region, for example, are all that we would could see today as direct manifestations of the homeostatic response of the nervous system to external stimuli. Reich is inferring here that pulsation is regulated by the accelerating and braking emphasis of the various branches of the nervous system. Operating in unison and without unneeded bias, capable of flexibility and adaption as the environment requires.
In some ways, these therapies are methods of resetting the homeostatic response of the body to be more energetically efficient and adaptively flexible. Conferring a greater range of adaptive behaviours in the organism. This can all be measured of course. I take metrics like HRV in my business that indicate to me the general state of an individual's Energetic Pulsative Constitution (EPC).
By looking at posture, breathing, eyes and complexion - combining these observations with EEG, HRV, and GSR measurements, I can get a pretty good intuitive reading on that person's EPC - at least over time. Such metrics offer a snapshot of how the ANS emphasis and how badly it’s stuck or frozen. I can see, for example, by short-circuiting the nervous system in various ways, what the energetic response is, and what might be beneficial for an individual. It’s almost always the same thing these days.
In most cases, I've found most people are chronically uptight. Most people have poor thoracic flexibility. Most people exist in a constant state of alertness, as betrayed by their atrocious HRV readings.
I like to see humans in terms of their conscious ability to regulate the expansive and contractive tendency of ANS pulsation. I interrupt the homeostatic flow with a few different body exercises during our breathwork sessions. This induces a vibratory response depending on the person. Over time, the vibratory response, along with all the other metrics, indicates to me the homeostatic state and if progress is being made.
For me, muscle tension, and more importantly, the ability to use the muscles in specific ways, is one feature that indicates an individual's EPC.
In manipulating structure and chronic tension, we're, in effect, interrupting the stultified homeostatic ANS response of the individually making the organism aware of what’s going on. Over time, the conscious awareness of sensations seems act to regulate formerly strong reactivity.
This natural integration reinstates the contractive sympathetic and expansive parasympathetic responses into a complete and more or less fully expressive pulsation response. The purring, the gentle humming, imperceptible vibration, whatever you want to call it, represents or shows us autonomic balance and an openness to the environment and what is happening.
There is much more to be said on this from a technical standpoint, including dorsal and vagal response mechanisms and how they relate to musculature; however, the above description is sufficient in understanding autonomic response and vital pulsation.
Why vitality is not an abstraction or imparted by mere chance or 'genetics'.
(v) Some Final Words
"A wild population of any species consists always of individuals whose genetic constitution varies widely. In other words, potentiality and readiness for change is already built into the survival unit. The heterogeneity of the wild population is already one-half of the trial-and-error system, which is necessary for dealing with the environment. The artificially homogenised populations of man's domestic animals and plants are scarcely fit for survival."
- (Gregory Bateson, 1972, Steps to an Ecology of Mind, p. 451)
Vitality is being actively discouraged by our root culture's strange forms of domestication. Fibrotic responses to life are perpetuating exponentially, reaching extreme and absurd levels. Metastasising and taking on new and bizarre forms.
I see this work as the attenuation of cultural and moralistic excesses, with their accompanying retardation of physiology.
As left-brain extremists, wordcels, whatever you want to call it, we try to attack the absurd outcomes of our generations-long disconnection with vitality on their own terms. i.e. words against words. Ideas against ideas. Culture wars...Just need the right edumuhcashuns or the right 'old-time' religion, and we'll fix it all up. The proper set of words or theories and a presto!
Reich's valuable contribution was to tangibly demonstrate why this is an absurd and ridiculous approach.
This cannot work because, right or left or whatever, almost everyone suffers from the same fundamental malaise. Disconnection from our primal essence.
I, for one, call for a re-wilding.
"Life has a thing inside it that reaches beyond itself. This is an intergalactic worm; I can't say here; you must wait. But if you don't reach beyond yourself, you are dead! Most of mankind is the walking dead."
― Bronze Age Pervert,
2. AWFL’s & The Trauma Industrial Complex
I like Hakan, he's the one of the only large accounts I ever liked.
Part of the problem with what I’m trying to project in this blog, and the podcast with Kev, is that all this bodywork stuff is seen as feminine. This is understandable. It has therapeutic utility after all, and inevitably when reinstating pulsation emotions and other things do come up. Indulgence in emotions is rightly seen by men as a weakness, particularly aggressive reactions against it are understandable when living in a gynocratic regime. Indulgence in emotions is also simply not adaptive for men. Nevertheless, to some degree or other, emotions are undeniably an important part of the regulation of our being.
In the US, around 75% of therapists are female. Anyone in our game knows the consequences of this. Marriage counselling….you’re right and your husband is wrong…get in touch with your emotions...Your emotions are valid and should form the basis of policy…The consequences of this emotions based civilisational outlook are far reaching.
As we all know, females tend to approach life from an ‘emotional’ point of view. Rudimentary glances of therapeutic publications will show you that there is a focus on emotions for emotions sake. A real focus on feeling and processing, and a kind of implication that ‘your emotions are valid and important’ as if a feeling or emotion are the prime movers in life.
The expressions of emotions as valid are tied up with this idea of unprocessed trauma. Granted - this is not just a feature peddled by females - prominent psychologists like Gabor Mate take a very concerted approach toward ‘trauma’ healing.
I believe the strong drive towards identification with ‘being traumatised’ and 'needing to express ‘legitimate feelings and emotions’ implies a kind of impulsive assumption of being broken. I believe the overuse of such terms is a kind of indulgence in sickness and incompleteness.
Legitimate trauma does exist. I don’t dispute that. But it seems all AWFL’s are traumatised now, and they think everyone else is too.
The female AWFL race, one of the richest and well-treated populations in world history are traumatised. And if you don’t acknowledge my trauma, well that’s because you’re broken as well. Who hurt you? I’ve been subjected to this contemptible statement on many occasions at the point, usually for the great crime of saying therapy was unnecessary and stupid, and the real problem was simply not facing reality as it is.
It’s not that AWFL’s were once African child soldiers taking lines of cocaine and gunpowder and eating the hearts of their enemies before they could talk - it’s that their boyfriends looked at them the wrong way, or expressed an opinion outside of the ‘the world as broken’ framework - that’s why I’m behaving this way, and you need to acknowledge it.
Every woman I’ve dated or known is highly susceptible to this indulgence in being broken. Trauma is its currency. It’s an indulgence. It’s a conscious reframing of a bad experience, or even just an ordinary experience, into some kind of metaphysical indulgence that keeps on paying. Trauma often covers the fact that their models of life don’t fit reality, but they’d rather blame everyone else than face that they’re not as intelligent or special as they think.
The word trauma legitimises sometimes bad or dysfunctional behaviour. It’s all ok that I act like an absolute twat, because as an official credentialed victim of trauma, I reserve the right to not be responsible for my reactions. I’m broken. I’m valid. Im allowed to be triggered at the drop of a hat. To air my bad habits in public. To read an enjoy the great crime of Rupi Kaur poems and impose them on actual victims of that poetry.
Trauma is often a self-defeating reframing of normal human experience. It is perhaps an extension of modern day victim theology. It encourages us to hold on tight to the errant impressions of our nervous systems with grasping heaviness and seriousness. To feel like every emotional flare-up, no matter how irrational, has legitimacy and is something worth having in and of itself.
In this metaphysical framework, the trauma - this spook - is trapped inside muscles and sacs as Hakan hilariously says. So part of dealing with trauma is ‘reinstating squishiness’, of course.
As we’ve seen above, the full picture is far more complex than this. From this oversimplification, and the concurrent indulgence in trauma as the prime point of self-reference, we derive ‘going to therapy’ as something of paramount importance for everyone in this nasty world.
As we’ve discussed, aside from legitimate trauma - in practice our civilisation now fetishises trauma. And this magical trauma is found in the muscles. in fact, many of us would rather indulge in trauma that we weren’t even around for, than live normally.
in truth, emotionality, depression or sadness are outcome of the brain/nervous system/quality of the musculature, tonus and how 'all these systems' interrelate and regulate each other. It’s not emotions per se, but the complex inter-regulation of all such things that can be represented as ‘tension in the muscles’. This outlook returns the responsibility of what’s happening to the individual, though.
The musculature is related to the regulation of the autonomic nervous system, the integrity of the bodies structure, and vascular system. These are not systems apart; they're all the same thing, so identifying only one element is, as usual, how we get confused about how a homeostatic system regulates itself in an environment. And why we would think about how nasty trauma gets magically stored in muscles like it’s some kind of absorbent towel of memories.
Hakan is right that AWFLs are obsessed with trauma and 'processing trauma'. Bodywork and psychotherapy has gone down this path because they believe, like any Marxist or progressive, that man is fallen from his gooey, soft, loving, un-traumatised long-house lifestyle. Only boy processing trauma, and accepting our brokenness, can we retvrn.
My point of view is different obviously. I think man is estranged from his primal essence, for many reasons, neurological and otherwise: and the process of reigniting this doesn’t include sitting around sobbing about highly subjective ‘memories’ and ‘dis why me triggered’ or fire twirling at the beach.
That man is an unfinished product and there are ways, as we all know, to master ourselves. Emotions are useful because they provide data in overcoming tangible, silly or self-defeating approaches to life - that is our inability to regulate ourselves. But trauma strikes me to often be a rather pathetic indulgence of middle class whims, in simply not being able to take responsibility or just let something go - and the ever present very very sneaky human tendency to present oneself as a victim. A victim for gibs. Narcissism. Letting something go is actually quite easy once you know how. And you don’t need to process trauma - whatever the f^ck this even means - to do it.
My work has been in some capacity to wrestle this work back away from AWFL TIC. Remove it from this gynocractic sappy frame of trauma and healing. And simply present it without any ‘metaphysical framework’.
It's not that trauma is 'stored in the muscles', it's that the entire system is 'stuck in a certain quality of homeostasis' and all the 'interrelated parts of the whole' create a vagal-homeostatic response that determine the vital and qualitative orientation of the organism, including the quality of subjective experience, hormonal profile and the nature of thought that pops up.
Sometimes, bad feelings and anxiety - what 'AWFL’s call trauma - may come up - but many feelings or sensations come up when re-orienting this system. Most of what I’ve felt, was, or is, completely pleasurable and energising. So I never really got this whole ‘sad fee fees’ and trauma thing even when I began the work.
I just see that for the most part, men just don’t need this framing. And if they indulge in this framing, it just makes everything worse because it’s a dumb life-orientation.
I will say this however - and this is where the online tough guys are also somewhat wrong, but also the AWFLs are wrong - part of vagal response and homeostatic regulation IS contingent on the feeling of safety - this is a very ancient circuit in the human nervous system, and the ability to feel safe is an important regulator of negative emoshuns.
What they don’t tell you of course, is despite AWFLs thinking that feeling safe is cuddling a teddy bear away from bad words, and maybe for them it is - for a man with a masculine orientation to the world, safety could be sleeping next to an enormous arsenal or weapons cache. Schopenhauer with a revolver mechanism above his bed.
The feminine-framing and ‘processing of emotions’ indulgence, the 75% female therapist influence says safety is cuddles and teddy bears. It could be for some, I don’t dispute that. Doesn’t have to be.
AWFL's have made references to ‘safety’ an insipid, sappy kind of thing for sure. And references to bad feelings being stuck in your calf muscle because the trauma central processing centre is down because she missed her trip to the Maldives with hubby this year may be ridiculous - but where there's smoke there's fire.
So for me, I think trauma is an indulgent, dumb way of framing life for most people who are NOT traumatised. You’re better of fixing up your body, dealing with things as they come up, and framing bad things realistically - they happened, they couldn’t have happened any other way, thusly, I don’t need to sit around with a box of tissues indulging in them as if something so ephemeral and empty could ‘define me’ as a person.
Take the data a way, reframe the experience, let it go, move on and become something better. That’s how you get rid of the AWFL TIC.
3. Shikantaza with Rev. Kenshu Sugawara
If you are not Buddhist or no interest in Buddhism, I suggest the following is still worth a glance. It's short and reveals interesting things about the interaction of verbal and non-verbal states of consciousness. It's also worth thinking about in light of the above article on pulsation.
Some perspective on why the physiological art of sitting in stillness is enough in and of itself
Developing more free will or scope for flexible behaviour outside the limited purview of our conditioned experience we call a self.
Descriptions of non-verbal experience.
Simply becoming more energetic, happier, and lighter. Mastery of the nervous system.
What does the simplicity of Zazen, or seated meditation, imply regarding so-called self-overcoming and the interplay between body and mind?
Is this life-denying? Is it anything?
What would sitting be doing in terms of vibration and pulsation responses in my physiology?
This document sheds a great deal of light on these questions. It's worth putting your pre-conceptions aside and viewing what is being indicated on its own terms.
You may notice the simplicity of the method and the lack of dogmatism surrounding this form of practice and insight. In fact, there is a rather charming lack of theoryceldom and 'over-arching metaphysical frameworks' or similar trite twaddle.
Zazen, I see as the great art of balancing errant human physiology. Tempering the elements of reactivity that 'push us away from ourselves'. Tempering the worst excesses of our nervous system and primitive circuits in complex, information-rich environments.
Undertaking sitting contains an implicit acknowledgment that there is something more going on, something moving us that we don't fully comprehend and can't fully see.
Zen is not responsible for the Western cringe imposed upon it. Many Westerners are cringe, not Zen. Soto Zen is simply sitting.
Insight is universal and not contingent on any dogma. You could be Catholic, Nietzschean, or atheist, and if applied correctly, the method would work the same way. There is no belief to be had here. There is no otherworldliness. There is just a method that is already perfect in and of itself.
Shikantaza by Rev. Kenshu Sugawara
1. Shikantaza as the essential doctrine of Soto Zen Buddhism
In the Sotoshu Constitution (Sotoshu Shuken), Soto Zen Buddhist doctrine (Shushi) is set down as “. . . abiding by the True Dharma singularly transmitted by the Buddha-ancestors, the Sotoshu doctrine is to realize shikantaza (just sitting) and sokushinzebutsu (Mind itself is Buddha).”
This means that we as followers of Soto Zen Buddhism should practice shikantaza according to the correct Dharma purely transmitted by the Buddha-ancestors. Properly transmitted zazen is a wondrous and essential art for all Buddha Tathagatas who have been transmitting inconceivable dharma to actualize unsurpassable, complete awakening. Zazen is the authentic gate to free ourselves into the realm of self-receptive samadhi (jijiyu zanmai).
In Chinese, the expression shikantaza is vernacular speech. ”Shikan” implies “to be solely concerned about.” “Taza” means “to sit.” So shikantaza means “to be solely concerned about just sitting.” This expression has been emphasized in Soto Zen Buddhism under the strong influence of Zen Master Tendo Nyojo (T’ien-t’ung Ju-ching). He was the main teacher of Zen Master Eihei Dogen, who founded Eiheiji Monastery.
Although this expression is not found in The Recorded Sayings of Zen Master Nyojo, but in Hokyoki Zen Master Dogen said:
“The head priest (Nyojo) taught: ‘Zazen practice (sanzen) is body-mind dropping off. You have no need for incense-burning, homage-paying, doing nembutsu, performing penances, or reading sutras. Just single-minded sitting alone”.
Zen Master Keizan said of Zen Master Nyojo; “He always excelled in zazen” (Zen Master Keizan’s Denkoroku, chapter 50). As we can see in The Sayings of Zen Master Eihei Dogen (Shobogenzo Zuimonki), Zen Master Nyojo personally practiced zazen very diligently. He integrated zazen as an important element of monastic training even though he was criticized for it. In the fascicle of “Buddha Sutras” (Bukkyo) in Shobogenzo, Dogen says that Zen Master Nyojo “always” talked about the extreme importance of shikantaza. This suggests that in his ordinary sermons he strongly inspired disciples to practice shikantaza.
In the chapter of “Xuefeng’s Enlightenment at Mt. Ao Shao in Tu-Tang-Ji” (Sodoshu), we find the word “shikantaza” paired with “shikantasui” (just sleeping). But later in “Tahui’s Shobogenzo,” they were respectively changed to ikkouzazen (single-minded zazen) and tadakoretasui (daily sleeping). By shikantaza Zen Masters Nyojo and Dogen tried to convey the idea of both “single-mindedly” and “daily”. We practice zazen on a daily basis but it should be practiced “single-mindedly” instead of being done as a common routine. It is because we admire and yearn for the Buddha-ancestors who practiced shikantaza and feel deeply moved by Bodhi-mind to continue the wisdom/life of Buddha-ancestors that we accept and settle down in the practice of shikantaza.
2. The Content of Shikantaza
Shikantaza has two aspects of emphasis:
(1) Emphasis on zazen and rejection of other practices (full devotion to zazen)
(2) Rejection of zazen as a means to an end (oneness of practice and realization)
As for the first aspect, Zen Master Nyojo rejected practices other than zazen, from incense-burning to reading sutras in the sayings quoted above. This rejection has several dimensions. The first is the superior religious value of zazen when compared with other practices. In Shobogenzo Zuimonki, book six, Zen Master Dogen replied to a practitioner who compared zazen with koan practice, “Even if you may seem to have some understanding while reading koans, the attainment of enlightenment is due to the merit of sitting zazen.” At a jodo at Eiheiji, he said,”The true Dharma correctly transmitted by Buddha-ancestors is simply just sitting.” (Eihei Koroku vol. 4-319, jodo). We can see that he rejected other types of practice and emphasized zazen as the most important practice.
However, Dogen wrote a fascicle on “Reading Sutras“ (Kankin). Also, there is a phrase about “sutra reading and recitation of Buddha names” in his Eiheiji Chiji Shingi. This implies that Dogen did not totally exclude other practices in monastic training. Dogen describes the proper relationship between shikantaza and Buddhist sutras as “. . . the practice of sitting zazen is unquestionably a Buddha sutra from beginning to end and from end to beginning” (Shobogenzo Bukkyo – “Buddha’s Sutras”).
By this Dogen means that zazen is a Buddha’s sutra. In the same way, it can be said that a Buddha’s sutra is zazen. Therefore, at Daibutsuji (Eiheiji) where daily observances centered around zazen, based on “Bendoho (“Model for Engaging the Way”) were established, an essential point of monastic training was undoubtedly shikantaza. Because of this, Dogen encouraged practitioners to favor zazen over other practices. He emphasized that they must practice zazen “to the exclusion of all other activities” as the Fifth Ancestor Hongren on Mt. Huangmei did (Shobogenzo Zazengi – “Instructions for Zazen”).
As for the second aspect, if we do practice as a means to an end, that practice would end its role when the goal is accomplished. However, in Fukanzazengi Zen Master Dogen points out the example of Shakyamuni Buddha who sat upright zazen for six years, although he was wise enough to know the Buddha Dharma at birth. He also mentions Bodhidharma, who sat facing a wall for nine years after coming to China though he had already attained the mind-seal.
Dogen stresses that Buddha-ancestors do not practice zazen as a means to an end. Therefore, as is said in Gakudo Yojinshu, “Realization lies in practice.”
Enlightenment is clearly manifested in the Buddha-ancestors’ zazen. In the same vein, in Bendowa Zen Master Dogen wrote, “To suppose that practice and realization are not one is a view of those outside the way. In Buddha Dharma they are inseparable.” He states that when instructing beginners we must teach them not to expect realization outside of practice. Practice is the immediate, original realization.
The practice of beginner’s mind is itself the entire original realization. Dogen clearly distinguishes the zazen of Buddha-ancestors from the zazen of other schools. The principle of zazen in other schools is to wait for enlightenment. For example, to practice is like crossing over a great ocean on a raft, thinking that having crossed the ocean one should discard the raft.
The zazen of Buddha-ancestors is not like this, but is simply Buddha’s practice. We could say that the situation of Buddha’s house is the one in which the essence, practice, and expounding are one and the same. (Eihei Koroku, vol. 8:11).
In other schools zazen is a means to gain enlightenment. Like a raft, it is no longer useful when the goal is achieved. Some people boast about their experiences of great enlightenment and kensho. If their zazen practice regresses because of such an experience, that experience is nothing but a delusion that becomes a hindrance to the continuation of practice.
Zen Master Dogen says that the zazen of the Buddha-ancestors is Buddha’s practice. It is a very simple and plain practice of just continuing to sit, letting go of our views. Such zazen embodies the “situation of Buddha’s house” in which the essence (foundation/enlightenment), expounding (explaining the Dharma) and practice are one and the same. Therefore, there is no need to seek the Buddha outside zazen. Zazen is not a practice that produces a Buddha-ancestor but an action causing the Buddha-ancestors to live as Buddha-ancestors. The Buddha-ancestors are beings who have already clarified all kinds of enlightenment and psychological states.
They have nothing more to gain, nothing more to realize. When zazen is valued as a practice performed by those Buddha-ancestors, the content of that zazen is called “nothing to attain nothing to enlighten” (Shobogenzo Zuimonki , book 6). When there is nothing to be gained, nothing to be realized, sitting zazen is “body-mind dropping off (shinjin datsuraku).” Body-mind dropping off is not a wonderful psychological state to be gained as a result of sitting zazen. Rather, zazen itself is nothing but “body-mind dropping off.” It is to escape all kinds of clinging. When we sit zazen, our body-mind naturally drops off and the true Dharma manifests.
Ok, that’s it for this week. Diaphragmatic sequences are coming tomorrow for members, as a few finishing touches I need to put on to the instructional mp3, I’m not satisfied with yet.
Until then, stay untraumatised.