As discussed in my editorial in IJHC Vol. 2, No. 3, the body can be understood within wholistic frameworks as a part of the person, intimately connected with emotions, mind, relationships (with other people and with environment) and with spirit.

"Focusing," an approach developed by Eugene Gendlin, directs us to attend to the felt sense of what is going on inside our body. This is the intuitive, right-brained way our unconscious mind brings to our attention the rightness and wrongness of what we are doing; the itch that says (my words), "examine what you are experiencing, because there is something out of harmony, out of alignment, misdirecting us from our proper life course."

A felt sense is unmistakably meaningful, and yet we don't know what it is. In contrast, we know the emotions when we have them.
Gendlin 1986 (p. 53)

Gendlin teaches that "the direction toward a felt sense is always into and through the feeling, never away from it." Feelings and emotions change only when we identify the felt sense associated with the feeling and seek out the roots behind this - for these are what anchor the feeling in our psyche and prevent its release.

Campbell and McMahon take Gendlin's work into spiritual dimensions.

...Focusing makes one attend to areas of hurt and weakness lodged deep in the memories of the body, which forgets nothing. Conventional beliefs and orthodoxies often merely protect us from these vulnerable areas. We fight and make war to defend these beliefs, and it is a veritable "crucifixion" to face the insecurity of surrendering them...
Robert T. Sears, S.J.
Campbell/McMahon (Foreword p. ix)

[F]aith is grounded not in formulated beliefs but in the experience of the unfolding process itself. The very process of believing gives us an analogous way of understanding its deepest ground, the triune God. "I" focus on a "felt sense" which unfolds" into who I am in the process of becoming. Analogously, the Father (I) forms his perfect Image (felt sense) which gives rise to an unfolding process of integration and self-transcendence (Holy Spirit). Focusing is a doorway beyond formulations of belief to faith or believing itself. As one moves more deeply into it, every event, every "felt-meaning," can become a religious event opening one to incarnate Spirit unfolding in evolution. Focusing does not cause this redemptive contact with Spirit. It opens the way. The transforming event itself is always perceived as gift - as grace - and a growing gratitude and reverence emerge in one who lives out this spiritual type of focusing.
Robert T. Sears, S.J.
Campbell/McMahon (Foreword p. x)

Gendlin points out that we do many things to avoid dealing with our feelings because they make us uncomfortable. If they really make us uncomfortable, we may make a habit of avoiding particular ones, or may generalize and avoid feelings altogether. This works well to reduce our discomfort in the short run, but leads to addictions of all sorts in the long run. Drinking, smoking, sex, shopping, compulsive working can all be ways of avoiding feelings.

Campbell shares his personal experience of dealing with guilt over having placed his mother in an assisted living situation.

...Every time I came near to the doorway of guilt and could feel those unpleasant stirrings in my body, I was whisked away to a temporary soothing of these feelings (through a visit to my mother) and the doorway to permanent change remained tightly shut. The untouched treasure of potential transformation in my body's way of carrying guilt remained nothing more than a hidden possibility. My guess is that such potential is rarely touched in the many lives of desperation where addictive confusion leads people away from their bodies - away from the true home of their own spirit! (p. 180)

Campbell and McMahon point out that spirituality can function in the same way as any of these addictions. For instance, they warn about "spiritualities of control."

There are spiritualities and spiritual exercises that can best be described as spiritualities of control. They easily become part of our arsenal of process-skipping devices. They protect us from change and, therefore, become a piece of the system that firmly locks addictive patterns in place. Their goal is not process but containment - the polar opposite of a healthy openness to grace. (p, 189)

Campbell considers prayers that substitute positive feelings for negative ones, such as anger. In a particular prayer he cites, whenever anger is felt, the love of Jesus is substituted for the anger.

...The deeper felt sense is neither heard nor allowed to express itself. Unprocessed anger is pushed down for a time - only to reemerge whenever another occasion arises that provokes the memory of all such unfinished business.

When this occurs, as inevitably it must, the prayer exercise and feelings of compassion for Jesus on the cross will need to be repeated once again in order to control this troublesome resurgence. Soon, a predictable and addictive scenario of process-skipping prayer willbbe born, just like I used visiting my mother to exorcise my demon of guilt. The bottom line in all this is that the anger will never change. It will just go on repeating itself over and over again until, finally, it is owned and the body's felt sense is allowed to unfold. (p.191)

If Jesus could be an encouraging presence, accompanying the person as he or she enters into and owns real inner feelings, then this could be a prayer that leads toward healing and wholeness. Here, there is no avoiding or denying what is real. There is an openness to the surprise of grace working at the heart of what we fear or avoid most inside ourselves. (p. 192)

...The surprise of grace waits at the core of what we often use prayer to run from and avoid inside ourselves. The body-life of Spirit yearns to unfold within the as yet unheard story of my anger and the hurt that sustains it. The prayer addict misses all this. An overriding need for control closes down openness to grace! Such persons become as psychologically addicted to using Jesus on the cross to manipulate their anger as others might use work, drugs, or alcohol as a means of escape. (p. 192-193)

This classic has grown in popularity over time. I cannot recommend it highly enough. My only criticism is that this otherwise excellent book lacks an index.

References

Gendlin, Eugene T. Focusing, New York: Bantam 1981.

Gendlin, Eugene T. Let Your Body Interpret Your Dreams, Wilmette, IL: Chiron 1986.