Last night, I did Focus12 for the first time on the Gateway Experience, and I wanted to write about it now that I’ve processed it.
I'm truly enjoying the tapes and the feeling I get afterward. I love the heaviness and perfect stillness that the audio invokes in me. My overstimulated self sometimes wants, more than anything in the world, a moment of pure silence and stillness, and I feel Gateway is helping me achieve that. I also enjoy the exercises—I love imagining the scenes and the box they tell you to put your worries in. Sometimes my box is carved wood with runes. Other times, it's made of a clear pink material, full of stars and tiny moons. My balloon is sometimes vine-covered or glowing softly in the dark in shades of lilac.
Right now, my goal is to use this as a tool to handle my trauma, anxiety, and depression. Because a hallmark of depression is the inability to think about the future, I felt that a good goal for now is to power through the exercises and learn them until I reach what is called the state of Focus15. Focus3 is an introductory state. Focus10 is when one's body is still, but one's mind remains alert. Focus12 is expanding one's view beyond the limited range of experience. And Focus15? It's timelessness. I feel that confronting time in this way will help me. But I am on Wave 2, Track 2, and Focus15 is on Wave 5. So I will continue the exercises and refine my other focus states as I wait for 15! Focus12 itself was quite interesting.
I cannot claim that I felt my spirit expand whilst in Focus12, but I did feel my mind start to explore and grow in that way. I remember first thinking of my yard, then my street, and all the places I’ve lived. Then, I imagined people I do not know: a bread baker in Spain, a scientist in Germany, and a farmer here in the States. I thought of stars, the International Space Station, the teapot in Sagittarius. I thought of simple organisms on planets, galaxies, and other universes. I imagined an army of other me's... I remember feeling envy and letting that envy melt as I saw how beautiful and complex it all was. There was no perfect universe, and for each me I envied, I knew another me envied where I am now, in this time, and in this universe.
It sounds like a silly thought exercise, or something from a movie—a cheesy fast-forward of history where cells divide, people have sex, and roots grow deeper into the ground. But I feel it had its merits and was helpful.
I feel that if I continue this practice and expand my awareness more—seeing myself in this zoomed-out way—I can start thinking about myself differently. Not as a woman made of flaws, but as someone who deserves grace from herself. Someone who deserves to walk in that maze, in the stillness and safety that she craves, but who can also wisely give trust to those around her.
In this white wave
I am sinking
In this silence
In this white wave…
In this silence…
– Sarah McLachlan (Silence)