Jenna Milner

Biodynamic Craniosacral Work introduces us to four qualities of body: Neutral (Tissue), Fluid Tide (Fluid), Long Tide (Potency), and Dynamic Stillness (the non-physical dimension). Do these four universal expressions of embodiment represent something that everyone can enjoy? Or are they evolutionary steps that require a leap of consciousness?

To both of these seemingly opposite questions I enthusiastically assert, YES!

Shall I argue for each side?

An Argument for the Four Biodynamic Universes as our BIRTHRIGHT.

It’s organic to being human that we have access to a Neutral disposition. Neutral simply means we are free to shift in response to Primary Respiration. Primary Respiration is the health that already generated our form, sustains us in life, and repairs us when we are injured or stressed. It already exists. Neutral means we have access to it.

For the same reason, our body naturally flows with the Fluid Tide in “Zone B,” the area between the Midline and the area immediately around and beyond the skin. Sure, the Cranial Wave is the more widely expressed rhythm in our culture. Therefore, the Tissue Body is the embodied substance that predominates. But even when we inhibit the Fluid Tide, it is always available to express. And its expression represents our naturally healthy organism.

What about the Long Tide? Spirit already animated the inert material of our body with life force and consciousness. If it hadn’t, you wouldn’t be alive. A body is naturally able, then, to receive the universal signals of the Long Tide as they stream in from the vast periphery. You might have seen a short video from the 1950’s that is popular in Biodynamic circles. In this video (and in more contemporary examples on YouTube), we see a primordial life form called slime mold. Slime mold is an ancient version of the protoplasm that is the basis of our body. And in the video, we see slime mold scooped from under a tree and placed under a microscope. Particles like fat and food droplets stream along visible but changeable channels for 50 seconds in one direction, and then 50 seconds in the other. That is, of course, the very same rhythm as the Long Tide. What an uncanny image of the underlying streaming of life in our body. As Dr. Seifritz says in the video, “We must be very close indeed to the source of life.”

Finally, we couldn’t be here in physical form, without the non-physical matrix. The Dynamic Stillness is the web of interconnected oneness in which our seemingly separate body is embedded. There cannot be anything separate from the Dynamic Stillness, because by definition it is the basis of every thing. Therefore, the Dynamic Stillness underlies your body’s form, and mine, and everything else as well. Any thought, image, memory, or perception that might arise, must arise within and be permeated by the Dynamic Stillness.

So the Biodynamic enfoldments are a natural part of being in a human body.

An Argument that the Biodynamic Universes Require an EVOLUTIONARY PROCESS.

It’s a rare person who comes into my office with the capacity to saturate the whole interior of the body with awareness. Yet that’s a requirement for achieving a Neutral.

In a Neutral, the body must operate as one seamless unit of function — not a conglomerate of parts. According to Biodynamic pioneer James Jealous (and validated in my practice), it can routinely take up to 20 minutes for our client’s bodymind to coalesce into one evenly textured whole, that is, to establish a Neutral.

What about the other biodynamic enfoldments? When my clients experience the Fluid Tide, they often get teary and recognize that it’s something special.

When they sense the vitality and profundity of the Long Tide, they tend to exclaim things like, “I have never experienced anything like this before.”

And when they return from a dip into the Dynamic Stillness, they are so sublimely quiet and transformed, they generally float wordlessly out of my office.

In other words, before being able to acclimate to these zones of healing activity that we call Primary Respiration, awareness must be seated in the body and expanded beyond the body. At the very least, that process of grounding and expansion can take time, patience, and even discipline.

But time, patience, and discipline are not enough. The kind of evolutionary process I’m speaking of is not something that can be dialed up by the personal will. It actually requires something more. Not an act of grace (though that surely helps), but a letting go. And letting go is not something that we can force.

Letting go, the way I’m talking about it, is a process of widening our boundaries and letting more life in. I like to use the word “undifferentiation” to describe this evolutionary Biodynamic process. Undifferentiation points to surrendered boundaries and an increase in interconnection.

But before we can relax our boundaries, first we have to build a solid container. The journey of growing up involves differentiation. Differentiation points to enhanced boundaries and an increase in separation. Think of the infant’s utterly undifferentiated state at birth, which is superseded by the indignant “me! mine!” of the terrible twos. That two-year old has established an individual self and now sees that self as separate.

Fast forward to the boundary setting of adolescence: “I am separate from my parents, with my own desires and autonomy.”

Then hopefully, we graduate to a fully individuated adult ego: “I am responsible for my own adult life. What is my path? What is my vocation? With whom will I partner? It’s mine to define all those things.”

Optimally, we each become a fully differentiated adult moving with inner authority and autonomy and healthily relating to the web of interdependent people.

Biodynamics asserts that the state of enhanced individuation is not the end of the path. After I recognize my healthy, autonomous agency, then I can begin to let go of that sense of being so distinct, separate, and boundaried. And this is the realm of Biodynamics.

The process of Biodynamic evolution requires us to increasingly relax our boundaries and let more life in. It’s a process of undifferentiation.

In a Neutral, we evolve from having boundaries around the many separate parts to being one unit of function. Within the skin, we are seamless — that is, undifferentiated.

In the Fluid Tide, I expand my sense of self (not just my physical body) to include the space — and other beings — in the local environment. This is the transpersonal realm of soul.

In the Long Tide, I expand my sense of self to inhabit the entire universe. This is the transpersonal realm of spirit.

In the Dynamic Stillness, I no longer experience myself as limited to this body. Consciousness realizes, “I am not form. I am consciousness itself.”

Conclusion: Biodynamics does describe our birthright. But it also describes an evolution that starts at separation and spirals to more comprehensive states of wholeness.

Stay tuned for future blogs on this topic! Meanwhile, I’d love to hear your thoughts. Do you have a further argument for Biodynamics as BIRTHRIGHT or EVOLUTION? How do you experience your own development along this evolutionary trajectory? Has your Biodynamic development affected your life outside the office?