During the work today, I tried to keep Alicia’s injunction in mind: button up your energy by using muscular force to pull in the belly button and the place where you button your pants. Then zip down the abdomen to that point, and zip up the groin to that point. This combination of button and zipper flattens the abdomen, pulls in the guts, strengthens the sidewalls of one’s abdomen, and pulls the tailbone to the right position.
It’s a hard position to hold for long periods of time. And sometimes it makes my neck itch. And if I keep doing it long enough, I can usually trigger my guts into responding with a command to go to the bathroom.
But in a sense, it functions like a corset of will. I don’t have laces and stays and heavy fabric holding my guts in. I have me. I have my intention, and my continued willingness to keep using muscle power to shape my shape. And my shape obeys my dictates — within certain limits imposed by genetics and diet and so forth and so on. There are more than a few provisos here, a few caveats, and this technique doesn’t have immediate benefits. It’s an ongoing process.
Outside the house today, a snowstorm is dumping light fluffy snow. The heavy stuff is coming later. I don’t plan to shovel it all at once, but rather in small doses. So it is with button and zipper, I think — small doses daily, until the desired transformation is achieved.
