Touch is how we meet the world. Sacred touch is how we meet Spirit.
To the extent that we experience ourselves as separate individuals, we come into contact with everything outside us through some form of touch. Touch can be physical, emotional, mental, energetic, or even spiritual. Reach out and touch someone. But how do we touch them? what is the quality of our touch? what subtexts are embodied in it?
Touch can be passive or combative, defensive or seductive. All the qualities and strategies of our ego come through our touch. Sometimes we are not present in our touch, perhaps afraid and holding back, or disinterested and not paying attention, and our touch is lifeless, like the proverbial dead fish. We neither give nor receive anything more than a small symbolic acknowledgement of another’s presence. We may have come to believe that engaging the world is always a contest or battle, something about winning and losing, controlling or being controlled. Then we are likely to bring fear and anger into our touch, mistakenly believing that this is power. Here also there is little giving and no receiving.
None of this is sacred touch. Sacred touch is touching with awareness that we are sacred and that what we touch is sacred. In Spirit we are part of the web of Life, the expressed consciousness of Source. Quantum mechanics teaches that we are part of the fields that comprise the Universe. Modern society does not teach us to live, or touch, from this understanding or awareness.
When we reach out to a person from our Spirit, we do so with curiosity, compassion, and love. Touching from our own Sacred core we automatically engage the Sacred aspects of the other. As Spirit in me touches Spirit in you touching becomes a Sacred act. Nothing really fancy about it. It could happen anywhere anytime: making love with your beloved, or simply smiling at someone in the grocery store.
Sacred touch is an act of being present with someone else. It is an offer to engage, to connect, to communicate, to bridge the sense of separateness and explore something outside of our selves. Sacred touch doesn’t expect anything. It is freely offered, but not insistent. It is open to receive, but does not take. With presence and awareness touch comes alive. Awareness is listening, mindful curiosity and appreciation about what I am touching. When I touch my beloved with attention to how her arm feels in this moment, it is a very different touch than a hasty pat. She feels that difference and responds accordingly. When you receive a massage, you know immediately if the person working on you is paying attention. Their awareness is in their hands and they are present with you.
In Sacred touch there is receiving as well as giving. With attention I become aware of my beloved’s energy, her tension or relaxation. I can even become aware of how she is experiencing my touch. Giving love I empathically feel her receiving love. Separateness fades and we are creating an experience of Love and Joy together. We are touching each other. Through my hand and her arm our Spirits meet.
Sacred touch is being present in yourself and offer your presence openly to your partner or the world. When you are open to receive what you touch touches you back. Experiencing life in this way there is learning, growth and the ongoing generation of Love. Sacred touch empowers the global Love field, which nourishes us all. Thank you for playing.
(© 03/2018)
