Understanding the concept of A “Lens”

A lens is a way of directing our attention and life-force in any moment. It is a way of relating to our experience. In every moment, we are relating to ourselves and our environment, whether consciously or unconsciously, through various lenses or ways of seeing. For example, we often relate to our experience through a continuous stream of inner storytelling, unconsciously narrating our life and habitually judging ourselves and others.

When we consider the many different psychological and spiritual systems and traditions from the perspective of these seven lenses, we can gain an understanding around the disagreements that can often occur around what real transformation and freedom is. For example, the sages often say that only the ground of being is most important (Lens 1: The Sage) and frequently dismiss everything else. There are also those who follow the path of self-love and self-care (Lens 2: The Nurturer ), and believe that complete unconditional self-love is the most important way of experiencing reality. Meditators often believe that achieving a deep mastery of concentration of mind (Lens 3: The Warrior) is what matters most while psychotherapists tend to see the full unveiling of our unconscious mind (Lens 4: The Alchemist) to be where true freedom lies.

Underlying the “Lenses that Liberate” model is the understanding that reality is dynamic and therefore requires us to relate to our experience in many different ways using many different lenses. Indeed, if we only have access to one or two lenses, then our ways of relating can remain myopic. By honoring the truth and value of all seven lenses through which we can relate to our experience, the “Lenses that Liberates” Model provides us with a way of deeply embodying our divinity and our humanity, allowing them to co-exist in harmony. Each lens invites us, from a different angle, into a deep enquiry of what it truly means to be both human and divine and as you enter each lens fully, our life itself becomes the answer. Over time, we arrive at a place inside, which I call the “Integrated Self”, where we can naturally draw on all seven lenses of relating to our experience while remaining unbound by all of them.

HOW I WORK WITH PEOPLE

My name is Derek Sheahan and The Lenses That Liberate has developed over the last 20 years of my inner work and exploration with others, In my training, I have spent many years with meditation instructors, spiritual teachers and psychotherapy trainers and have practiced thousands of hours of meditation on silent retreat. From my own path, I have come to see that there are many important avenues for us to explore that lead to a healthy, integrated life and this model reflects and embodies an amalgamation of all of the integration and understanding that I have gained over the years. I use this model both in individual sessions with clients and also in the group work I facilitate. I work in a unique way with each person so that these seven lenses can be brought into harmony over time.

While our intellectual understanding of this model is important, it is the direct, experiential aspect of engaging with the specific practices that brings about change in us and allows our understanding of the model to become real and embodied. Please hold this map lightly as, like all maps, it is a useful tool at best. Our actual experience in any moment should be the priority.

THE LENSES THAT LIBERATE

The first level of the “Lenses That Liberate” model, is the Sage. Through the lens of the Sage we direct our attention towards the ground of our being, that place within us that has always remained unchanged. We are invited to contemplate, “What is the ground of my life?, “What never changes?”.

We all come to this model at varying levels of development in each lens and we start with practices that are suitable for where we are on our journey. Before we look through this lens, it is important that we are sufficiently rested so our focus and attention is truly available to explore. Therefore grounding and relaxation practices are often a prerequisite before we can turn towards the deeper ground of our being.

In my work at the level of the Sage and opening the ground of being, I offer a variety of practices depending on the individual and their degree of awareness at this lens. Initially, I teach grounding practices that help people connect with energy and inherent safety of the earth. When I feel people are ready for a deeper experience of their ground of being, I often use strong breathwork as I’ve found it to be a powerful resource and the most suitable tool for the majority of people to facilitate a life-changing opening. The more we can touch and rest as this ground of our Being, the more all the other levels can come into harmonious relationship as we stabilize in the true foundation of who we are.

While The Sage allows us to taste the deep freedom of Being, The Nurturer invites us to perceive life from the standpoint of what is restful and kindest in our experience. This second lens, The Nurturer, calls us to explore practices that soothe and bring our physical, emotional and psychological selves into rest and ease. Initially through this lens, we see life from the perspective of, “How can I be kindest to myself in this moment?”, “How can I nourish myself fully and feel deeply rested in my body?”. It is also through the eyes of The Nurturer that we learn to embody and celebrate the feminine aspects of ourselves; our receptivity, gentleness and goodness.

From the perspective of the Lenses That Liberate, it is usually essential that before we consciously move towards difficulties and disruptions in our system (which we are often doing unconsciously), that we activate the ground of ease and rest in our nervous system.

The foundational practices at this level involve exploring how we care for ourselves in our daily life. Fundamentally this means making wise choices in how we eat, our sleeping habits, getting regular exercise, connecting with others in nourishing ways, speaking to ourselves with kindness and respect and all of the other healthy ways that bring us to inner harmony. Through specific practices, we start to experience a deep sense of belonging at this level, to the earth, to our family and community and we regain a sense of our own inherent goodness as a person.

Once we have spent time with the foundational practices of self-care at this level , we move to practices that are focused inwardly. Inner practices such as body scans, progressive muscle relaxation techniques and gentle breathing practices bring our body and mind into a state of deep calm and rest and allow our threshold for somatic enjoyment and grounded pleasure to grow. Each time we practice, we loosen the edges of our resistance to feeling good in our body. Gradually, feeling rested becomes our default way of relating to ourselves and ultimately, through this lens, I help people move towards a place where their life itself becomes a unique expression of the goodness of the universe.

Through the Lens of the Sage we encounter the deepest ground of our being and through The Nurturer we learn how to rest and nourish our over-activated nervous systems. Through the third lens, The Warrior, we consciously activate our willpower and an embodied masculinity in our system. As The Warrior we ask the questions, “What does my life stand for?” and “How can I direct my attention and will to what serves?”.

The Warrior is interested in building the muscles of resilience and resolve. It is looking through the eyes of the part of us that is willing to take a stand for what feels truest to us, the part of us that is disciplined and willing to develop “backbone” and true strength. We also activate the healthy Masculine so it can take root in our lives, activating our discipline, sovereignty, boundaries, determination and will-power. Meditation is the primary tool we use at the Warrior Level to develop these capacities.

In my work, I help to ignite the Inner Warrior through various practices that activate our strength and inner resolve. Before any meditation practice, I encourage clients to ensure their system is not overly agitated and strongly advise they complete some form of practices from the Nurturer. For example, I often recommend clients first engage in a simple “shaking” practice that can help to relieve the excess energy from our system which allows us to come to a natural stillness in the body rather than an imposed one.

The practice of meditation is central to The Warrior’s development. I have found it most useful to use certain “Hot Spots” in the body to anchor our attention. “Hot Spots” are places where the energy and felt-sense of the body is naturally strong and therefore easier to focus on. These Hot Spots serve as the foundation for the Somatic Meditation I teach.

The first three lenses we have explored uniquely help to build the foundational capacities for our life by developing different qualities of our being. The Sage builds the ground and foundation of our life, the Nurturer establishes the basic goodness and the Warrior invokes our natural strength. Together these three lenses form our “Foundational Self”. The fourth lens, The Alchemist, turns our attention towards a fundamentally different capacity : transformation.

Through this lens, we are not looking at resourcing ourselves but at moving towards what is unconscious and difficult in us. Through The Alchemist we direct our attention to what we are not conscious of, including our blind spots, “What am I not seeing in my experience?”, “How can I show up more fully in my life?”. As we look through this lens, we start to uncover our unconscious patterns and ways of being that no longer serve us. We address these unconscious “shadow” aspects of ourselves primarily by opening our heart to them and becoming emotionally available to ourselves and others. Bravery, honesty and vulnerability are qualities our Alchemist must develop in order to facilitate deep transformation at this level.

In my work at the level of the Alchemist, I help clients turn towards their difficulties in a consistent and resourced way. I consider it essential that for deeper transformation to happen, people have a sufficient stability and foundation in the first three levels of practice before they consciously move towards what is difficult in their experience to relate with.

I have trained in Hakomi, Gestalt and many other psycho-therapeutic modalities that I utilize at this level. Hakomi is a very gentle and heart-based form of mindfulness-centered somatic psychotherapy developed by Ron Kurtz in the 1970s. Using my skills in Hakomi, I help facilitate the gradual unwinding of our unconscious beliefs and emotional blocks so that we have increasing access to the natural peace we discovered through the lens of the Sage. We learn to move towards difficult parts of our shadow and psyche, creating a dialogue with these aspects of ourselves so that we can hear and understand their perspectives deeply.

While the first four lenses each help to form a solid bedrock for engaging fully with our life, the fifth, sixth and seventh lenses invite us to perceive our life in much more subtlety from the outset.

Through the lens of The Shaman, the fifth lens, we are invited to contemplate, “What is more subtle than the physical world?”, “What is energy?”, and “What underlies my experience of physical reality?”. At this level, we activate the capacity of subtle feeling and turn our attention to sense the subtle underlying current of energy that pervades our body. Here we encounter the inner anatomy and wonder of the subtle body.

In my work at this level, I help people to get in touch with their felt sense of energy, both in their body and around them. I usually start by teaching clients how to notice the sense of presence and beingness in their experience, helping them to anchor their attention in this felt sense of this presence in their body. Once people are in touch with and can rest in this presence, I help people awaken the deeper aspects of the Shaman through accessing various energetic pathways in the body. For example, The Central Channel is an energetic column that runs from the base of the spine to the top of the head in the center of the body. It can be directly experienced as the energetic birthplace of the physical body. By placing our attention in the Central Channel through particular practices, we gradually develop a felt sense of this energetic core with its vastness and subtlety. I also provide clients with maps and diagrams of this inner terrain so they can learn the inner secrets of these subtle systems and the adventure of navigating this inner world begins.

While the Lens of the Shaman explores the subtlety of energy , through the Lens of The Seer, the sixth lens, we examine the subtlety of mind,. We investigate the sub-structures of mind, asking the deepest questions such as “Who Am I?” and “What is my purpose in Life?”, allowing a deeper realization of ourselves to come to the foreground. In Level 4 we work with our psychological material and through the lens of The Seer we examine what is underneath this, “Who is the one who has been doing this psychological work?”, “Can I find a solid “me” at the core of my experience?”. The primary quality we develop as The Seer is a deep curiosity about the way things are. Through the Seer, we start to move through life with an openness and wonder rather than following our usual ideas with a fixed and rigid certainty. We activate our Higher Mind, that aspect of us that can transcend our thinking mind whilst still using the mind where necessary. The Seer possesses “a knowing” that is much deeper than mental understanding. We learn to cultivate this “subtle knowing” more and more through this lens.

In my work, I activate the inner Seer through helping to ignite a deep curiosity about our life, helping people to become curious about their moment to moment experience, curious about how their mind operates and constructs our deepest interpretations of reality. I teach various forms of introspection into our thinking processes so individuals can become increasingly clear of what they are believing and telling themselves in their daily life . As this process deepens, there naturally comes a point where a person becomes curious on the most fundamental level and asks, “Who Am I really?”. Then, I teach a form of “Somatic self-enquiry”

While the first Lens (The Sage) is concerned with seeing and living from the ground of being, The Mystic, the seventh Lens, is compelled to experience the fullness and richness of being. Through the eyes of The Mystic we are looking at “What is wholeness etc?”, “How does life want to move through me?” and “ How can I live in harmony with and stay open to everything in existence?”.

In this way of seeing, we start to look at life as one organic whole rather than as seeing it as separate parts. We move through our day with a curiosity of what it’s like to stay open to everything that happens, to honor everything as an equal expression of the one life. As we practice this more, we start to experience a sacredness to all of life, where all things start to reveal their inner radiance to us. From the lens of the Alchemist, the turbulence and apparent disharmony of our life can be easily apparent. However as we deepen through the eyes of The Mystic, we also directly sense the seemingly paradoxical perfection of life the way it already is. Ultimately, the lens of The Mystic draws us deeper and deeper into the experience of unity with all things, until we know, in the deepest place in our heart that what we are is not separate from all of life.

In my work at this level, I help to activate the inner Mystic through a variety of practices. Firstly, I help people get in touch with their deepest longing so that this way of seeing activates in a natural way, “What do I really want?”. Through the eyes of The Mystic, if we trace any longing inside of us back to its root, we may discover it leads to this longing for wholeness, for unity. Later, I often assist people to introduce increasing amounts of energy into the body, purposely utilizing the subtle body currents so that energy flows freely and strongly throughout our entire nervous system so we can somatically experience this unity.

BRINGING IT TOGETHER
~ AN EMBODIED LETTING GO

To summarize, each lens helps us activate a different way of seeing. We learn to rest in our true ground (The Sage), we are self-respecting and know what kindness is (The Nurturer), we know the value and application of strength and boundaries (The Warrior) and know how to turn towards and be with difficulty in a skillful way (The Alchemist). We also know our subtle energetic selves (The Shaman), can see through the illusions of mind (The Seer) and can perceive the wholeness of all life (The Mystic). We continue to open into all these dimensions of our human experience, allowing life to call forth in us the lens most appropriate in any moment.

How we come to embody each lens of the model can also be likened to that of learning a string instrument. First we learn the seven different modes of music, the different scales and we practice the chords and rhythms regularly. We learn to attune our ear to where we are playing out of key and develop this skill with patience and practice. We learn to play and finely tune our instrument so that eventually we can move beyond any fixed pattern and play from a deeper “flow” space. If we let go to this deeper flow prematurely before we have enough practice in the different scales and chords (i.e. developed each lens sufficiently ), the deeper part of us may still play through us but our instrument will sound out of tune and the song unpleasing. 

This analogy offers us an explanation as to why having awareness of the many Lenses that Liberate can be of such value. It gives us the ability to train our body and being in different lens of seeing so that ultimately our life can flow from a deeper place, which I call “The Integrated Self”.

BACKGROUND