Opening to mindfulness of the body is both the beginning of practice and the vehicle that carries you through the practice as the "felt sense." Embodied presence through awareness of the body is one of the fruits of practice.
The first two links of dependent origination say that ignorance gives rise to volitional formations, or impulses. This talk describes successive layers of obscurations that form from ignorance, to a belief in self, to afflictive emotions, to unskillful actions. The path undoes these layers by focusing, in order, on virtue, meditation, and wisdom, finally penetrating to Nibbana.
