Sensemaking: building a new kind of resilience in times of distress

Why this, why now?

Global health is now on the top of the political agenda, safety and security is a national concern, prevention is key, and cure is critical. At the same time, in this current crisis we are facing information and emotional overload at the personal level as we listen to the news, follow prophets or scientists on social media and feel compassion for our frontline workers. Many are grieving over the loss of what was, and what we may have taken for granted, or worse, loss of loved ones.

For many this is stressful, unhealthy and some would even say soul destroying. In overwhelm, and in the absence of physical human contact, we rely on information from academics versus trusting our own senses and intuition. Individual sense making is crucial at this time when we can all too quickly betray our own inner wisdom and truth as we listen to the voices of academics and political authority. We need both.

Of course, facts and data are what we need to make decisions. It’s important we listen to information to make discerning choices. We also need space and time to interpret what we hear and importantly to integrate what we feel. Our senses are the foundation from which we build our capacity for truth, beauty, goodness and conscious action. They are our GPS through which we navigate our life. The body is constantly seeking to restore itself; when overheated our sense of temperature produces sweat; in movement our sense of balance ensures we stay upright, to mention just two. Understanding, nourishing and developing our senses is crucial in expanding our awareness and maintaining acuity, a healthy sensitivity and rich connection to all of life. This is a time; we need to be fully awake.

Most of us have been socialised by our parents and peers, in the country in which we were raised. We grew into fully functioning, relational human beings, resilient and capable by adapting to the social norms expected of us. Yet if we are not fully aware of the full repertoire of our senses, as advanced tools of perception and creativity, we cannot unlock our greatest potential. It is our senses that enable us to create spaces, places and conversations that bring a deep and meaningful experience to our everyday living in an entirely new way. This time is about waking up and coming to our senses, metaphorically and practically.

The Past can inform the Future

Back in the 80s, I trained as an alternative health care professional, learning about the human form in all its expressions and capacities — physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. For years I focused on the body; the senses, sensuality, nutrition and exercise. Finally, my passion for learning led me to discovering the healing art of Aromatherapy: a form of plant medicine using essential oils. The historical and current use of essential oils provides us an intimate connection to nature, to ourself and others via olfaction and touch. At the same time I began studying Anthroposophy, the work of Rudolf Steiner. It was he, who brought the teachings of the 12 senses and saw these as the foundation of developing a more embodied conscious way of living, enhancing our experiences of life and opportunity of leading a better-quality life. This has become a corner stone of my work in understanding what it takes to flourish.

For 13 years I studied and specialised in these fields of spirituality and healing, building a successful international business based on wholistic health care practices, working with both scientific research and the contemplative traditions. I later discovered this qualified me as a ‘conscious business leader’. For the past two decades I have been working with business leaders around the world to facilitate conversations and programmes on conscious leadership.

Taking care of ourselves and our environment

In recent years I have witnessed an escalation in mental health disorders, nervous breakdowns from stress and anxiety and the rise of panic attacks and traumatic episodes, as people are exposed to greater pressures in the corporate world.Now we are presented with a global pandemic which changes everything. We will have to create new ways of living and leading. We will need to pay greater attention to self-care, health care, wellbeing; nourishing ourselves and others to continue to live well during these difficult times and build our resilience to face an uncertain future.

Environments can be created to nurture and nourish: We all feel the difference between the ambience of a church or that of a night club. Each can provoke a unique feeling in us the moment we enter the place and become aware of our surroundings; this is the power of intentional space. This inner ability to sense and feel without touching enables us to discern an enriching or harmful environment. Now with so many of us in isolation it’s important to create environments that nourish and nurture. We each have within our reach the ability to choose and to create the mood of the space we inhabit.

Touch and smell are the senses of connection and intimacy: When we smell an article of clothing belonging to a loved one, we are immediately transported to them. Smell is one of the most intimate and provocative of our senses. Science has revealed that we are attracted or repelled to another by their pheromones, the natural odoriferous hormones exuded by the body that are unique to each of us, just like an odoriferous fingerprint. It is almost impossible to be with someone if you are offended by their unique smell imprint — their pheromones. When we are distancing and isolating, we need to be more imaginative to keep these senses alive. Using aromatics to create specific moods, giving ourselves a hug, massaging our own bodies each day with anti-viral essential oils builds our resilience.

How we feel dictates how we act: Our senses are the compass we use to navigate our relationships and our world. They are how we decide what nurtures and nourishes us, what we accept and what we reject. Positive impressions upon this inner world of the senses are much needed by all of us to directly enhance the quality of life and to create a future in which we flourish.

Nature is one of the very unique environments in which regardless of faith, religion, prejudice or bias, we are enriched. In nature, beauty abounds, and our senses are uplifted. Most of us can access some element of nature, or inhale the aromatics of essential oils, to uplift mood and rebalance emotions.

Building ‘true’ resilience through the 12 Senses

If you could leave aside all theories on sense perception you’ve heard, or all that you’ve learned about your sense organs, you might begin to recognise that through your own experiences, on any given day, your senses are providing nourishment and guidance for the thoughts you have, the feelings that arise and the actions you take. You have a ‘gut feel’, ‘something smells fishy’, ‘I don’t like the feeling of this’, all of our senses are helping us to discern and make choices. Largely we ignore them.

Historically, scientists have researched and documented 5 human senses — those that could be observed and measured. However, mystics, sages, and spiritual teachers have spoken of more than 5 senses, which we unconsciously use in our everyday life. With attention and intention, we can build our resilience through working with all of our senses that most of us were never taught.

The 5 SENSES which science determined, based on those we can directly experience, see and measure;

Touch — our access to intimacy with ourselves and another, a confirmation for what is so; we touch to affirm, soft or hard

Taste — we enter into the experience of substance, it becomes a part of us, taste is an intimate process inside our body

Smell — we learn what is a good or bad smell, it is the sense of instinct and intuition and directly connected to memory

Hearing — hearing is distinct from listening, we hear a dog bark but listen to music and the sound enters our entire being

Sight — where we encounter deep emotions (tears of joy or sorrow), witness great beauty, some say the eyes are the window to the soul

The additional 7 SENSES

Sense of Balance — which gives us our orientation in the world, we know when we are out of balance, it a dynamic flow

Life Sense — our sense of being energised or depleted, our overall sense of wellness and vitality — pain or comfort

Sense of Self-Movement — our sense of how we move through the world and allows us to make choices in the actions we take

Speech Sense — access to externalising the internal, bringing our inner thoughts and truth into the world

Temperature Sense — our sense of comfort and the ability to self-regulate our bodily function

Concept sense — deepens our understanding and grasp of the world and events through interpretation and meaning

Ego sense — the sense of ‘I’ in the world, the power of will to realise our in the world

The Shadow side

There is also a shadow side to our senses, when we have overindulged in greed with our insatiable appetite for the ‘good things in life’ or become enslaved to our desires and sensations which can often lead to making us ill and then transpires into feelings of guilt. An example of the shadow or over indulgent ‘ego’ is when we strive for accumulation, accolade and grandiose approval which fulfils our desire for attention and notoriety versus a using our unique qualities to fulfil our purpose. We need this egoic force to step forward, but we also need to pause and examine ‘what is our action on behalf of’, ‘who does it serve, me and my Ego or others and my purpose for greater good?’

Today our greed and consumption has played out on a macro scale in the drive for excessive economic growth and ever ‘higher standards of living’ consuming more than our own sense of sufficiency. We can turn this around with a healthy relationship to our desires and compulsions by listening to our senses.

In Summary

The knowledge of these senses can become the advanced tools of perception and creativity and unlock even greater potential for us to create spaces, places and conversations that bring rich experience to our everyday living in an entirely new way. A new world order is coming, new levels of understanding and consciousness is needed. When we understand the full repertoire of our 12 senses we can nurture and nourish ourselves and others in a more soulful way.

We are more than our intellect. Sense-making is a unique capacity we humans have. Let’s maximise our potential and build our personal agency by fully engaging with these remarkable resources.

What is needed at a deep personal level in this time of confusion, overwhelm and isolation:

• Working with the 12 senses in order to operate from a higher level of perception, intuition, and creativity

• Enhancing our ability to create places and spaces that fulfil our physical and emotional needs

• Develop our sensory acuity and sensitivity to ensure we stay on our true path and develop our potential

• Initiate daily rituals that enhance the quality of our environment and relationships

To learn more about my work and forthcoming online programmes please contact: karen@theflourishinitiative.com

Or visit www.theflourishinitiative.com