How can we be open and loving to tense individuals?

Question: in hatha yoga there is an exercise in which one tenses every muscle in the body and then releases the tension and becomes relaxed. Is this similar to what happens in dynamic meditation?

You are not aware of the spiritual because you have so much tension in the body, so much tension in the mind. But if you are not tense in the physical and mental realms, you will automatically know the bliss of the spiritual, the relaxation of the spiritual. It comes to you; it has been waiting for you. Your whole attention is so absorbed by the physical and the mental that there is no attention left to divert to the spiritual. Only if the body and the mind are not tense can you delve into the spiritual, can you know the bliss of it. The spiritual is never tense; it cannot be. There is no spiritual tension, only bodily tension, only mental tension. Bodily tension has been created by those who, in the name of religion, have been preaching anti-body attitudes. In the West, Christianity has been emphatically antagonistic toward…

My approach is that we should drop all shoulds, that we should start accepting our nature, our reality, whatsoever we are... not in despair, not in hopelessness, but in tremendous joy and gratitude. This is the way God has made you, this is the way he wanted you. To deny this and to try to become somebody else is to deny God. To accept God means to accept oneself. And the acceptance has to be of great rejoicing -- that he has made you this way and only this way; he has given you a unique quality and a unique individuality. Relish it, celebrate it, and then bliss comes of its own accord. And it is not only that you become blissful, you become a blessing to others too. A non-tense person is a blessing; his very presence is a blessing to the world. A tense person is a curse.

It is arduous, it is very subtle, but one has to watch and work on it. Just watch.... Whenever you see that you are becoming tense because somebody is entering your territory, relax. Remember that he is just like you. We live in people, we grow with people, our whole life is entangled with people. We exist through people. We cannot exist without them. People are like the ocean and we are like fish. If the fish is afraid of the ocean, there will be trouble. One has to trust the ocean. It is our very life... we are born in it. If you were afraid of people then you would not have even been born. You entered a woman's womb; you became part of two people's love affair. You allowed two people to bring you to earth. You allowed two people to create a body for you.

There is only one thing in life that conquers death and that is love. All fear is concerned with death -- and only love can conquer death. So one thing I would like to say to you is, don't pay too much attention to fear because it becomes an autohypnosis. If you go on repeating that you live by fear, your life is governed by fear, you are dominated by fear -- and fear, fear, fear -- then you are helping it. Take note of it: that your life is governed by fear -- finished! It simply shows that love has not yet become so powerful that fear disappears. Fear is just a symptom, it is not a disease. There is no cure for it; there is no need.

Please tell us something about the tensions and relaxation of the seven bodies.

Your body can be non-tense only when you are living a moment-to-moment existence. If you are eating and the moment has become eternity, then there is no past and no future. The very process of eating is all that is. You are not doing something; you have become the doing. There will be no tension; your body will feel fulfilled. Or if you are in sexual communion and the sex is not just a relief from sexual tension but, rather, a positive expression of love -- if the moment has become total, whole, and you are in it completely -- then you will know a positive well-being in your body. If you are running, and the running has become the totality of your existence; if you are the sensations that are coming to you, not something apart from them but one with them; if there is no future, no goal…