Boxing
It seems there are only two professions that pay you to knock people out – Anesthesiology and Boxing.
I got to musing about one of them and remembered that successful boxers have a balanced strategy of paying attention to both the body and the head. Some flashy boxers, with less than stellar careers, are known as “headhunters.” That means they exclusively go after landing blows to an opponent’s head. This usually leaves them open to a blow to their own body, when their opponent counter punches.
The older I get the more I agree with those that say boxing is a brutal sport, but not nearly as brutal as the suffering we endure by paying exclusive attention to our head and none to our body.
Our body is our feeling center but we can’t use it when we give all our attention to our mind. Our mind tricks us to live our lives in our head. When we do that, our life becomes nothing but a mental construct – an abstraction devoid of feeling. It’s like we’re living a movie version of our life where nothing is real.
Our mind acts as though it’s the only game in town. It thinks it can figure everything out, know all the answers, make all the excuses when the answers don’t work, and formulate yet another strategy doomed to failure because it ignores the body.
Your body is the exquisite feeling apparatus to counter your one track mind.
Living in your body for 5 minutes will pay more dividends than a month’s worth of living in your head. The return on investment is unmatched.
Sensing an awareness of your body negates the chattering mind. The feeling body takes your attention away from your head, and all you have to do to engage your feeling center is to stop for a moment and become aware that it exists.
The part of you that notices isn’t your thinking mind but the awareness that’s always in the background – the awareness that does things your thinking mind can never do – beat your heart, regulate your breathing, bring you peace of mind.
When you notice that there is a noticer, you unleash this ever present awareness which will calm your mind and allow you to feel the peace in your body.
Have the presence of mind to know you have a body and you’ll negate unnecessary mental attacks.
I’m reminded of the advice I got as a 17 year old from a punch drunk fighter nicknamed “Horse”:
“If you go headhunting, you’re gonna’ get knocked on your ass.”
All the best,
John
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