Burning Man is the birthplace of Body of 9. It is not the origin of the first recognition of the fact that there are 9 physiologically different kinds of being, 9 Energy Centers that you can learn how to activate – that is a different story that will be told in a different post. But it is where Susan and Martin Fisher began their journey which created Body of 9. And the principles of Burning Man, along with Susan and Martin’s foundational Burning Man experiences have been integrated to form the core of our Body of 9 Philosophy.
At our first Burning Man in 2012, as virgins, we knew not what to expect. The first message that came to us was “It is not about you”. Each time we began to feel like we had some understanding, or were getting Burning Man Cool we would get another message from the Burniverse – “it is not about you!” This was a core understanding that we had to take into our bodies to begin the path forward to being able to share the gift of Body of 9 through the Natural Number Identification process. Self-management in the face of adversity is the first skill required to be able to see the expression of a person’s Natural Number. If you stand in front of a person and cannot hold onto your core being, your Natural Number, your soul, you will not be available to meet the soul of the person standing in front of you. Any shame, fear or disappointment will take you un-present, obscuring the obvious beauty of the body before you. If you make any aspect of the relationship with the person in front of you about yourself, you will fail.
The second lesson we learned that first year was “Choose Love.” We attended the Sunday performance of the Burning Man Choir – the message of this performance choosing love creates a different outcome of warmth and abundance and it allows you to see the people around you, In all interactions the choice of love helps combat the challenge of the first lesson – and it helps combat judgment. When we are judging (placing ourselves or other above or below something else), typically we are not choosing love as our perspective. When you stand in front of a person to identify their Natural Number you need to be clear and open. Love creates that clear and open channel. Choosing to actively feel love for the person in front of you allows you to start from a place where you may succeed.
The third lesson we learned in 2012 was that given permission to be anyone or anything we could choose, we chose to be ourselves, who we are in the current moment without stories about the past and present and without excuses or masks. We already have enough to go forward on this journey of life, just with exactly where we are in the moment.
When we got home from our first Burning Man the seeds were planted to begin to grow ourselves into the leaders of Body of 9. We were babies in our abilities to identify Natural Numbers, but we were beginning to be able to see, and we were able to learn.
Looking back from 6 years later we can see that learning to activate the 9 Natural Numbers in the body at will provides access to 8 additional frequencies of information available, from this information you can understand the gift, magic and power of each Natural Number individually and as a whole. This prepares you to be able to learn and grow. Without this ability you can only learn intellectually – listen, study, observe and make sense with your mind. Once you have access to all 9 Natural Numbers, your body becomes your teacher, each intense experience with each Natural Number opens and expands your awareness making the integration and execution of our first three lessons from Burning Man more embodied It’s not about you, manage yourself and choose love.
Once you can generate the 9 Natural Numbers in your body you begin a journey of exploration that so far appears limitless. You begin to see the presentation of the Natural Numbers is a myriad of ways. Things that you were blind to before become completely obvious. And you have no idea of what happened to change your ability to perceive.
Burning Man 2013, 2014, 2016 and 2017 we pressure cookers for us where with the heat, the dust, the multitudes of people, we were able to hone our skills of learning to see, to push, to marvel at the beauty and magic and to distill the essence of the wisdom of the Body of 9 into a concentrated enough form that we could identify quickly, provide a powerful physical experience, and speak in the unique languages of the Natural Numbers in order to provide a sustainable experience for people who came through our camp. “Body of 9 was the most important experience of my burn!” was something that we have heard 100’s of times over the last 6 years. We have built long-term, deeply connected relationships with people who we know very little about in the default world. The conventions of relationship – the sharing of life experience to find common ground, are irrelevant and distracting. Sometimes we get there eventually. The magic of getting to know a person at the soul-level, of seeing them at such a profound and honored level, cements the connection. Everything else is extra.
2017’s Burning Man lessons were again – It’s not about you – this year it was about realizing that this removes competition. Competition is an incredibly ingrained way of interacting that continues to separate us. If only, should or could,” statements become our default way of interacting. We look at each other with the judging perspective and compare ourselves. Comparison, competition and judgment bring in the voices of shame fear and disappointment – and there we go again, the fastest way to non-presence! If I am judging you or myself I am no longer receiving you in the moment. If you are wanting to identify a person’s Natural Number, learning to self-manage when the judging voices, the shame, fear and disappointment come in is the number one most important set of skills. At the center of this is choosing love – most importantly for yourself first, then the person in front of you, and next to you, for each and every person you encounter, no matter what they are bringing forward to you.
This is very hard, even in the best of circumstances and requires constant, diligent practice. In choosing to teach Body of 9 to others, this self-management skill gets called into practice at a very powerful level. If I am the teacher, a position into which I have been thrust because I learned how to activate all Body of 9, learned to self-manage and learned how to learn through my body which has taught me how to see the Natural Numbers, then believe me, I am also being judged and competed with by all my students. So have compassion for me, and for yourselves as we go through this process of teaching, learning and growing together. I have learned that the only way this process works is as a collaborative, magical, awe-filled exploration where we all learn together. I learn what I know as I attempt to teach what I have learned. Often I have no idea what I am going to teach until the moment presents itself and together we draw out the wisdom in my body in a way that connects with the wisdom in your body. It is not hierarchical, it is collaborative. If one chooses to stay in the hierarchical, competitive model of learning that exists in our world today, then this type of learning is very difficult and you will likely become discouraged and leave Body of 9.
Choosing to study Body of 9 is choosing to make it a way of life, to succeed is simply to stay with it, allowing yourself to be in all the stages of discontent, joy and elation available along the path. At each stage on this journey of development new is revealed, and that does not always feel good. There are times of separation and aloneness that happen as you progress, as someone you are working with up-levels and you take a bit more time. These are times to circle around to the wonderful lessons of Burning Man – It’s not about you, except that is all about you, notice your judgments and release them. Choose love, Choose to love yourself, choose to be yourself, progress fearlessly toward yourself, and the life you want to create here in this world. We are not victims to anything other than our own creation – I know this is highly controversial, but once we realize that conscious creation of a reality in which we choose to live is possible, we begin to make conscious choices freely from our deepest self – our deepest purpose.
This path is not for the faint of heart and requires daily re-commitment. The universal powers will test your resolve and ask for this recommitment. Martin and I have made an unwavering life-level commitment to Body of 9, to learning, growing, expanding each and everyday within the context of the Body of 9. With this context we experience much of the mysteries of the light, as they begin to take their place in the magical tapestry of our existence. All the paradoxical truths can live side by side and each teach their perspective.
