By Kathleen Forbes
Teaser is still challenging after all these years.
Last week at Pilates class I had another “Iona moment.” For the last seven years I’ve been an ardent student of this powerful method of mind/body conditioning. The exercises are beautiful and subtle; emphasizing controlled breathing, proper alignment, concentration and precision of movement. Many claims are made for the benefits of Pilates. They include a longer, leaner body, improved posture and flexibility, toned abdominal muscles, and increased mental focus.
But what I value the most, when it comes, is what I call the “Iona moment.” The “Iona moment” is a feeling of profound relaxation and contemplative bliss that I often experience at the end of a Pilates session. It is a recurring reminder of the way I felt after spending a week on the sacred island of Iona, off the northeast coast of Scotland, hiking, worshiping in the ancient Abbey, and keenly observing the extraordinary natural habitat. Iona is one of the most beautiful and spiritually charged places on earth. Celtic scholars, including our own John Young, describe Iona as a “thin place,” a place where the veil between heaven and earth, between time and eternity, is very, very, thin, where the luminosity of the spiritual realm shines through the material realm, and the body and soul are one. And while Iona is a uniquely “thin” place geographically, it is also symbolic of what is most deeply true of every place and every time.
Our bodies contain an intelligence and wisdom that is beyond our cognitive mind’s capacity to understand. Pilates creates an opportunity for understanding and experiencing the unity of our own body/mind/spirit. Moving the body rhythmically and repetitively with attention to breath and inner feelings helps to tap into that “thin place” deep within us, where we discover a wellspring of joyful living and the ultimate source of our wisdom and health. Such wisdom and health is surely something that money can’t buy.
View from Iona
well said, kathleen! i love your description of thin places — ! it’s the most eloquent and intelligible description i’ve read of that concept. . . .
i’ve never tried pilates but find that meditation moves me in that same way. there’s something so simple and yet spiritual about quieting the body and mind and allowing them to catch up with our soul, even if only for brief moments at a time. meditation has brought me my own iona moments, however fleeting. . . . going within and centering myself has led to real moments of euphoria and peace.
I want to live in your Scotland picture. On a note relating to your thought provoking comment that “[o]ur bodies contain an intelligence and wisdom that is beyond our cognitive mind’s capacity to understand,” I’ve heard that our stomachs alone have more nerve endings than our brains. That tends to explain the phenomenon of “gut” instincts.
Kathleen,
That is remarkable personal experience of the mind/body interface. My experience with weight training is slightly different. I have become aware of the close connection between the conscious and subconscious mind. After a good workout, I feel heroic. I see myself as one of the “dream warriors” as shown in the movie “The 300″. This movie in dream language shows the defence of a valley by the Spartans against the Persians in classical times. I have come to realize that we can use the power that comes from the subconsious to guide us in leading a fulfilling life in the conscious world.