Recognizing and embodying our interconnected wholeness within, with others, and with the world and universe around us is fundamental to the practice of iRest Yoga Nidra Meditation. Our challenge, here, is to realize and embody the fullness of this realization amidst the challenging circumstances of our daily lives. 

Beyond our basic needs for food, shelter, clothing and safety, as social beings we also have four fundamental needs: to feel seen, heard, connected, and to belong. Without these four fundamental needs in place we may survive, but we won’t feel that we’re truly thriving. In order to thrive it is imperative that we are willing to see, hear, and connect within to ourselves, and be willing to be seen, heard, and connect with those around us.

In order to feel whole, we must be able to embrace both an egocentric perspective, where we experience ourselves as unique, authentic, individuated, and separate souls who are willing to be seen, heard, and connect, as well as embrace an allocentric perspective where we feel ourselves interconnected and not-separate with everyone and everything around us. When we are able to accept and embody both these perspectives—egocentric and allocentric points of view—we will experience ourselves as unique expressions of an underlying wholeness or essence that has given birth to ourselves, others and the entire cosmos. We are already whole and interconnected. This is our innate inheritance by birth. We just need to recognize, accept, and embody this realization.

In the words of Albert Einstein: “As a human being we are part of the whole, called by us ‘universe,’ a part that feels limited in time and space. We experience our self, our thoughts and feelings, as something separate from the rest—which is a kind of optical delusion of consciousness. This delusion is a prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task is to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”

Before the age of 18 months, we all swim in a sea of undifferentiated being and wholeness, where we experience ourselves as undulating waves of sensations, emotions, and sensory perceptions, but without the cognitive awareness of being a separate self. Then, around 18 months, as our cognitive abilities start to develop, we begin to experience ourselves as separate. We begin embodying an egocentric perspective that entails experiencing ourselves as unique souls, who move through life amongst other separate and unique souls.

Unfortunately, as our sense of separation develops, which our family, culture and life experiences reinforce, our undifferentiated sense of wholeness gets relegated to the background. And, the more we lose touch with our innate sense of wholeness, the more we will feel within ourselves that “something’s not right.” As our egocentric perspective and belief in being a separate self grows in strength, our ego-I separate-self function identifies with this feeling and interprets it as, “something’s not right with me.” Identification and fusion with this thought-feeling can throw us into a state of inner turmoil and chaos, leading us to experience feelings of confusion, anxiety, isolation, alienation, and depression. But this thought-feeling can also serve as a pointer to its source, where we can re-cognize and re-embody our underlying wholeness. For now, as an adult, we have the cognitive resources available to us for recognizing, understanding, and re-embodying our innate wholeness and well-being; cognitive resources that weren’t available to us when we were an infant.

Re-cognizing, welcoming, and embodying our essential wholeness enables us to thrive in our life with unshakable and unbreakable feelings of equanimity, peace, well-being and warm-hearted compassion and kindness. Knowing and living from our wholeness provides us with an indestructible and unchanging inner sense of value, meaning, purpose and well-being that we carry within us wherever we are, whomever we’re with, whatever our circumstances.

So, please join me into inquiring and embodying our innate wholeness that is a portal for realizing the unbreakable inner resource of unchanging well-being, joy and equanimity that resides within us that always remains pristine and available amidst the ins and outs of our daily life.

The following practice, drawn from the ancient teachings of nondual śaiva tantra, explores six vital questions that I have found to be instrumental in helping people recognize and embody their innate felt-sense of unchanging, ever-present and unbreakable wholeness.

I have used these inquiries over the decades in a variety of ways each day. For instance,  I begin every period of meditation by moving through and re-experiencing the felt-sense that each of these inquiries opens me to. Throughout the day, I return time and time again to them, as a way of remembering and deepening my felt-sense of unbreakable wholeness as an inner resource that I carry with me. Then, whenever I feel challenged by a particular circumstance, whether from within or without, this inner resource is here to provide me with an unbreakable foundation of resilience and well-being from which to meet, greet, welcome and respond to the situation. I hope you find these five inquiries as precious and vital as I and my students have.  

As you move through the following practice, do take all the time you need with each inquiry before moving on to the next one. I have spent uncountable meditations and hours with each inquiry, one per session of meditation, as well as exploring and embodying all five during a particular session of meditation.

Rest back now in a comfortable standing, sitting or lying down position. Open your senses to your surroundings… The feeling of the environment around you… Sounds that are present… The touch of air on your skin… The sensations where your body touches the surfaces that are providing support…

Set attention free to wander about your body, welcoming and being with the various sensations, emotions and thoughts that are calling attention to them…

Now, as you welcome sensations throughout the body, start by bringing attention to the hinges of your jaw… The sensation of the lower jaws, gums and teeth… Upper jaw, gums and teeth… Sensation of the mouth and tongue… Skin on the face… The touch of breath as air enters and leaves the nostrils… Sensation all around and back behind the eyes… The touch of air and sensations of coolness on the forehead… Scalp… Back of the head and neck…

Rest attention in the shoulders… Welcome natural sensations of heaviness, or lightness, in the shoulders, arms, hands and fingers… Welcoming the sensation of both hands, arms, and shoulders at the same time…

Welcome the sensations as the chest and belly gently rise and release as breath comes in and goes out…

Allow attention to explore and welcome sensations throughout the torso… Pelvis… Hips… Legs… And feet… Welcome natural sensations of heaviness or lightness in the toes, feet, legs, hips, pelvis, and torso… Hands, arms and shoulders… Neck, head and face…

Welcome the body now, as a unified field of sensation… Feeling the natural pulse or throbbing of the underlying life force that’s animating every atom, molecule and cell throughout the body…

And welcome and ease into the feeling of simply being… Luxuriating in this moment of simply being with nothing to do and nowhere to be… Letting go of thoughts and thinking… Thoughts like butterflies that fly about as you settle ever-more deeply into simply being… Becoming more and more absorbed not just in, but as the felt-sense of being…

From your felt-sense of being, listen to the following inquiries… Sensing answers to each inquiry from your first-hand experience as being…

First inquiry… While feeling and experiencing yourself as being, when you’re simply being, how would you describe your location in space, as being…?  Where is your innermost center and outermost periphery as being…?  When you’re simply being, do you have a distinct center, border or boundary…? Can you feel how, as being, you are a field of sensation that is everywhere and nowhere specific, yet an undeniable presence that feels both tangibly and intangibly present…?

Second inquiry… When you’re simply being, without going into thinking or memory, as being, what’s happening to your thinking mind and your experience of time…? Can you feel how the thinking mind settles down and you step out of time the more you become absorbed in being…?

Third inquiry… When you’re just being, as being, is there anything that you need to acquire that will make you any better or more perfect than you already are…? As being, do you lack, need or want for anything? Can you feel, as being, you are beyond lack, need and want, perfect and harmonious just as you are, as being…?

Fourth inquiry… When you’re simply being, as being, is your felt-sense of being unfamiliar, or can you recognize that being as something you’ve always known although may have forgotten at times…? And, as being, is there anything you need that would make you feel any more connected to being than you already are as being except to continue feeling this underlying essence of being…? Can you feel how being is familiar and easily recognizable…? Take a few moments now to feel where and how you recognize this felt-sense of being…

Fifth inquiry… When you’re simply being is there anything you need to do that by accomplishing it would make you, as being, any better or more complete and whole than you already are as being…? Can you feel how, as you settle into being, as being, you are complete and whole, just as you are…? How being has never been hurt, harmed, or in need of healing…? How being doesn’t need to be fixed, changed or healed…? How, as being, you are already whole and healthy, just as you are as being, even as your body and mind may be in need of attention and healing…?

Take time now to simply be, feeling how, as being, you are outside of space, time and lack, perfect, harmonious, complete and whole, just as you are, as being… As you rest back and become absorbed as being, as the thinking mind subsides, notice how being gives rise to a variety of qualities such as peace, ease, equanimity, love, compassion, and well-being… These qualities naturally arise as you abide as being… And you may notice, over time, as you take regular times in your daily life to simply be, how these qualities arise independent of your circumstances… These are innate qualities of your inherent unqualified felt-sense of being that you will come to realize are unshakable… Indestructible… Always readily available… Wherever you are, whomever you’re with, whatever your circumstances…

When you are ready to return to your eyes open state of consciousness, do take time, before moving about, to open and close your eyes several times while continuing to feel, nourish and reinforce this simple feeling of being, so that you bring it back with you as you re-enter your daily life…

When you are ready to move about, take a few moments to set your intention to remember and nourish your felt-sense of being… Little and often… All day long…

Then welcome anew the sensations where your body is touching the surfaces that are providing support… The touch of air on your skin… The environment and sounds around you… The light, color and texture of the objects around you… All the while continuing to experience your inherent feelings of being and wholeness…

Then, as you are ready, come fully back to feeling yourself fully alert, with your eyes open, feeling refreshed and present in this moment… Moving back into your daily life accompanied by the underlying felt-sense of being and wholeness as you move back out into the world… Feeling spacious, timeless, connected, complete and whole, just as you are, as being, amidst the daily affairs of your life…