Ken Wilber, Terry Patten, Adam Leonard and Marco Morelli | June 21, 2008

As humans, we all know what it means to inhabit a body; this simple fact affects literally every moment of our lives. The Integral approach offers us a lens through which we can observe the functioning of our body, which can help us design a body practice to achieve greater body awareness, energy and health. From Integral Life Practice (forthcoming), by Ken Wilber, Terry Patten, Adam Leonard, and Marco Morelli, © 2008. Reprinted by arrangement with Shambhala Publications Inc., Boston, MA. www.shambhala.com.

What a complex, multi-functional, and miraculous thing your body is! From birth to death, all your experiences, great and small, are made possible by your body from eating to working to playing to making love, and so much more.

But of course, our bodies are also subject to illness, injury, pain, aging, and ultimately, death. In some traditions, "the body" has gotten a bad rap, just for these reasons. "Transcend the body," it is said. Yet an integral view is eager to embrace our bodily existence. After all, it is the only earthly vehicle we have for living an enlightened life. And even though we can't eliminate pain or aging, nor make our bodies perfect, we can certainly make wise use of what we've got.

One of the most important values we hold, both culturally and as a species, is to be physically "healthy," yet so often, we fail to cultivate our health. Being "healthy" in modern culture typically means only the absence of gross disease. And when disease (almost inevitably) occurs, we attempt to eliminate or control it with surgery or drugs. Sometimes, of course, extrinsic measures such as prescription drugs are necessary, and are the only way to save a life or manage a chronic illness. True health, however, is balanced wellness, which results from a healthy lifestyle, an intrinsic quality that we can develop only through practice.

An Integral approach to bodily practice aims both to establish a baseline of health and well-being, as well as to open up potentials for extraordinary health so we're not merely surviving, but thriving with intelligent vitality. An integral body practice invites more of the conscious juice of life to flow through the body. In fact, it prepares the bodily "vehicle" to handle it.

How can you become an ultimate driving machine for life? Integrally, of course. It all begins with an extraordinary insight (hold onto your steering wheel for this one): You actually have three bodies not just one and, to be fully healthy, you must exercise all three.

It Takes Three to Tango

What are these three bodies? First, there is your physical or gross body-your body of flesh and bones, organs and cells, saliva and blood. Second, you have a subtle body of various kinds of energy (e.g., chi, prana) and other subtle systems (e.g., chakras, acupuncture meridians) that are usually not recognized by Western physiology. Third, you have a causal body of utter infinite stillness, which is the body you begin to get in touch with through meditative practice.

These exterior bodies (and energies) have an important connection with your interior reality. Recall the three major states of consciousness: waking, dreaming, and deep sleep. In fact, those three states and your three bodies are interdependent and interconnected. Every major subjective state of consciousness has an objective energy or body associated with it.

"Gross," "subtle," and "causal" refer to the energies or bodies associated with the three main states of consciousness (waking, dreaming, and deep sleep). Correlated with the spectrum of states of consciousness in the Upper-Left quadrant is a spectrum of bodies or energies in the Upper-Right quadrant.

Waking consciousness has a gross (or physical) body. Subtle or dream consciousness has a subtle body. And formless (or deep sleep) consciousness has a causal, or "very subtle" body, as the Tibetans call it. Each one of your states of consciousness has a bodily-energetic support.

Think about it for a moment. This is pretty amazing, isn’t it? If you actually have an exterior form for every interior state, the implications are enormous. This means that by exercising or "working out" all of your three bodies, you are simultaneously exercising your inner, conscious experience—you are "working in" or strengthening your natural states of awareness. Let’s dive a little deeper into each of the three bodies and their corresponding states.

Gross

The waking state is closely associated with the gross physical body. This is the body associated with the miracle of nature. Empirical science studies the patterns or "laws" that this physical nature obeys. When you’re awake, you experience this gross sensory data: rocks, trees, buildings, people, voices, sounds, smells. If someone pinches your physical body, you feel it. When you kick a ball, you can sense the equal and opposite reaction against your foot and leg. You can see that ball obey the laws of physics and sail though the air before arcing back to earth, pulled by gravity. Because the gross realm almost always behaves according to the laws of science, it can seem like an incredibly complex machine. This is the aspect of it that is predictable and orderly (which not all of it is—e.g., the quantum level with its "uncertainty principle"). But it’s also simply miraculous—you are an incredible, organic formation of countless parts and processes, all working together seamlessly to give rise to your physical reality.

Subtle

But when you fall asleep at night, it’s an entirely different story: your gross body disappears. No more physical rocks, trees, or buildings. Instead, you’re aware of emotions, images, visions, ideas, dream worlds, and archetypes. You find yourself in realms where earthly physics goes out the window and down the rabbit hole.

In dream states, your energetic support vehicle is not a solid, gross body, but a spectrum of relatively fine or dense subtle energies of radiance, mind, sound, emotion, and life force. This is the subtle body. The bands of this spectrum were traditionally associated with almost all of the chakras, and the subtle body is sometimes subdivided into different levels that are called by such names as enteric, astral, mental, and psychic, referring to the Upper-Left states with which they are correlated.

Your dream body can change shape, walk through walls, and even fly. The subtle body flows freely through fluid domains, through ecstasies and nightmares, and different times and places. It may be associated with gross sensory realities but it is not tied to them. It is closely aligned with intuitions, feelings, ideas, intentions, desires, and emotions. It is also, in a sense, more free, because not bound by physical circumstances. That’s why you can “have a dream” (or idealistic vision) which inspires you and others to action. Your subtle body can lead the way for revolutionary changes—in your life, your creative expressions, and even in a whole society.

Your densest subtle energies are more closely associated with the gross physical body, and you encounter them in auras, acupuncture meridians, and life force. Subtler bands of energy are associated with sexuality and emotions; subtler still with the mind and insight; and the highest bands of subtlety are associated with supramental, blissful, intuitive intelligence—a kind of crowning glory to the radiance of your subtle being.

Causal

When the dream ends, you fall into formless deep sleep. Now both gross and subtle experiences subside. You are released into a still and silent realm. In this unbounded, vast, and spaceless space, nothing at all is happening.

Paradoxically, awareness is wide-open, present, and unobstructed. Consciousness simply is, without distraction by the moving objects of experience. Although there are no specific qualities or experiences arising, this nothingness is inherently characterized by utter well-being, the complete absence of suffering.

This almost infinite conscious expanse has an extremely subtle, almost indescribable body or energy—the causal body. Still and silent, infinite and infinitesimal, this body defies normal description and conceptual categories. It is the energetic embodiment of the ever-present Witness consciousness. It is the opening within which all experiences arise. The causal domain is the cause, space, and support from which your subtle and gross energies and bodies arise. It’s intimately present as the deepest source of you.

Your three bodies—gross, subtle, causal—exist simultaneously right now, in waking consciousness. Every time you enter subtle states through meditation, thoughts, visions, or emotions, you’re animating your subtle body. Whenever you rest in the silence of pure awareness and release to infinity, you are attuning to your causal body.

Integral body practices help you pay attention to all three dimensions of bodily existence: gross, subtle, and causal. Through integral body practices, you can consciously exercise all dimensions of your body-mind-spirit-shadow, including the highest aspects of your being.

As you take your integral practice further, you can even bring awareness into the dream and deep dreamless sleep states. In other words, your physical body can be sleeping but YOU can remain awake while inhabiting your subtle and causal bodies. What might you learn from such an experience? How might your understanding of reality change? You'll find out if you pursue a 3-body practice far enough. But the benefits of an Integral body practice are also practical and immediate, helping you to feel more alive, filled with energy, and capable of taking in more of life, as it arises.

From Integral Life Practice (forthcoming), by Ken Wilber, Terry Patten, Adam Leonard, and Marco Morelli, © 2008. Reprinted by arrangement with Shambhala Publications Inc., Boston, MA.