Can you do Focusing with something that’s like constant internal tension? Read on…
Krys writes:
I sense that Focusing could help me, but when I try to feel my feelings, I just get a constant ‘background noise’ of internal tension. My whole body feels like it’s a tense bag of electrical impulses firing uncontrollably and constantly.
Oddly, even though it is intense, it’s so ‘background’ that I can’t really ‘feel’ it in the sense I could actually find a particular piece of my body that feels that way. It’s more vague than that – like a general awareness of this constant background feeling. Is it possible to Focus on something like that?
Dear Krys:
I’m going to say Yes, it is possible — but perhaps even more important is the question whether, when something like that is going on, it is possible to Focus on anything else. And I’ll say, possibly not.
It’s a fundamental guideline of Focusing that we need to be with what IS here… and if we try to get past or ignore what is here, we’re unlikely to get anything else.
I’ve seen people try to enter Focusing with some rules about what they “should” be finding. “It should be in the body… it should be unclear… it should be emotional… it should not be from the head…”
But actually, there are no rules. What is here is what is here. Even “nothing” is something to acknowledge. Even “in the head” may be how something is speaking to you.
Krys, you’re already making a good start. You’re able to describe what this feels like, and you know what it’s like to try to be with it. So far, so good!
Next time you do Focusing, perhaps you could set the intention to simply be with this feeling, sensing it as it is. It doesn’t have to be another way—it is how it is.
And describe it freshly, as if you had never felt it before…
I think you’ll find there is more to it than appears at first, and that by bringing attention to it, quietly and with patience, you’ll be able to feel that “more.”
