Month: March 2019

I thought I was walking more slowly because my body was starting to slow down. It just might have something to do with getting older. Then I began to realize it wasn’t that simple. I began to notice that I was moving more slowly at the same time that I was much more aware that I was walking.

I quickly discovered that it wasn’t that much of a problem for me to walk more quickly. Perhaps I still did not walk as fast as my sons. It just was no longer my habit to walk fast.

The past couple of years I have become accustomed to paying attention to my walking when I would go across a parking lot. It became my normal practice as I would leave my car in the parking lot to go into Target or Menards. I would deliberately pay attention, be mindful that I was walking. I was alert and aware of my surroundings, I consciously felt the hard asphalt surface as each foot pressed against it. My hands and face would feel the air. It gradually became a very engaged tactile experience.

Then I started paying attention out of habit, but the experience had changed. It was no longer just my feet that were in touch, my whole body had become alert to what was happening. My attention wasn’t so focused on my feet or my hands and face anymore. I clearly felt different.

Maybe its has been as simple as my no longer really paying attention. However, I don’t think that is what has been happening because I have a deeper, richer sense of being present. There still are times when I am very aware, perhaps deliberately aware that my feet are moving forward, one in front of the other. Now, however, my awareness is more general, more global.

I feel more like I am walking in a bubble of alert awareness. I am simply there. The experience is typically less tactile, more deeply felt. I move more slowly. My body moves through space with more deliberateness. I have a deeper sense of being in the place that I seem to occupy. My whole body tingles, not just my feet or my hands and face. There is no urgency to hurry or move forward.

I have a similar experience of slowness when I am around people or just about anything else. It almost feels like a kind of abstract, formless awareness. And I find that I move more slowly, more deliberately. I listen more attentively. I look at things with a deeper awareness that almost seems like I am looking through them.

I experience more things in unfamiliar ways. My experience is less tactile, and more deeply felt. It also feels like it happens in slow motion.

It still remains relatively easy for me to return to the tactile, sensory experience. I can be intently aware of the hardness of the pavement I step on, the rough surface of the tree I touch with the palm of my hand, the soft warmth of the person I wrap in a lingering hug. That happens relatively easily when I focus on the sensory connection.

But the experience has become pervasively more deep and rich. What lingers, colors and slows my movements has become less sensory and more an experience of my heart. My days unfold in this background of subtle awareness that opens me to a slow moving current of joy.

Perhaps I still look like an old man who walks slowly. How would anyone suspect that I am basking in a feeling of being intensely alive. Neither would they understand how that feeling of being alive would probably evaporate the second I sped up my pace.

I suspect that this all has something to do with being open to the feeling of being present. It is an experience that is most pervasive in the early part of the day. Most of the time it diminishes as I approach evening. At that point, I am probably just moving slowly because I am tired.

I think that language can be so confining. It causes me to make mistakes in my thinking and in my speech. Language can be misleading and often a mistake. When I said “I love you” to a dear and deep friend, I misspoke. I confined to language and concept what cannot be confined.

I made a mistake. I wish I had realized that there is no “you” and there is no “I” when it comes to love and in what I meant to say. It was a mistake to suggest that there is a giver and a receiver in what was happening at that moment.

What I meant to say is that we have entered the arena where love is deeply experienced and readily flows. We have surrendered to a field of love and allowed it to penetrate our every fiber without resistance. The energy of love is now allowed to flow.

I made a mistake by not remembering that love is a natural state of the universe, and all I can do is decide whether to resist it. It is not something I can do, there is no action to take as suggested in “I love you.” It is not something I can receive except to yield to this force that has already penetrated the essence of who we are. It is the core of our nature.

To say “I love you” is a mistake if I imply anything less or more than I see and witness how we are connected and how love flows between us. I not only do not resist that connection, but I let go of any attempt I might make to confine it. I do not place any conditions or promises on it because that would be like a cage around a wild falcon.

I do not think that love is something that we pass from one cup to another. It is, instead, an ocean in which we swim, live and breathe. It is in every fiber of our being and not something we give to one another.

Even though there may be times that I think that I can genuinely say “I Love you,” I also realize that it is a mistake to think of a “you” and a “I.” Perhaps I can truly say that my heart is open and I am stepping in to a remarkable kind of engagement. It is an engagement in which we relax, let go, allow the connection between us to be evident.

This is a realm of engagement where the pulse of love might naturally be experienced. It is the realm where the power of seeds sprout and falcons soar. What I can do is attempt to align my awareness with the mysterious energy that is prepared to flow in and between us.

I cannot give love any more than I can give the rays of the morning sun. I can do my best to not cast a shadow that obstructs or distorts the full brightness and warmth of the sun. It would be a mistake to put an “I” in the path of the sun’s rays, as it would be to put an “I” between you and me.

Of course, neither is there a “you” in the engagement. There is only the awareness, the consciousness that is able to absorb the warmth and depth of the deep force which I try not to obscure or obstruct.

I may not be able to confer or to give love, but I can help another to experience the warmth and depth of the love that readily flows in the universe. I think it is possible to step beyond the constraints of language and the mental constrictions I often place on experience. I think it is possible for me to engage with another in a manner that allows love to flow and be deeply experienced.

I know my part rather well because I have learned to have an open heart that readily steps aside and allows the deep energy of love to arise and flow. I have noticed that others have a similar skill, and that gives me hope. I want to help others to have the same open experience. To do that, I am convinced that we must remove the barriers between us. That includes no longer making the mistakes of “I” and “you”.

I must not create dikes or channels to control the flow or condition the flow of love. Also, I must neither grasp or resist the flow of love. It is foolish to predict or promise the future of love. It is a mistake for my mind or language to try to control what cannot be controlled.

I’m not really sure about all that is going on, but I have this feeling of gradually going deeper and even deeper. I’m noticing how it affects the way I look at people, how they seem to have more of a richer individuality than I might have recognized in the past. It has been a slow and evolving process.

Even the walls of my room seem to have more substance and presence. My contacts with living beings, plants, animals and people all have a deeper aspect. I even see how this happens while I watch those naughty squirrels bound across my yard.

When I watched the seven performers on the Orchestra Hall stage yesterday, I was aware of them in an almost tactile way. They seemed more present than I can remember in any past experience. Today, the memory of their presence comes up with a sharpness that seems etched ever so slightly in my own heart. Something of them is still with me. I can feel it.

As I remember them, each of the seven performers is distinct in how I remember them. Each is somehow unique, each has their own characteristics, each has their own voice. It is as if I had reached out and absorbed part of each of them, four men and three women. Today I feel like I must have experienced them with a deeper alertness and awareness such that their presence lingers in me.

Even as I am recognizing this deeper way I experience the world, I am also aware that it is uncertain whether others can accompany me in this adventure. I struggle with the growing recognition that I am venturing into an assortment of experiences I will perhaps encounter all by myself, alone.

I may long for a deeper connection with people, plants and the planet. However, I am not sure how that is going to happen with people. I think that the desire to connect with people must be reciprocal. Humans have this unique power of being able to control their transparency. Even for well-meaning individuals, the ability to be present, transparent and self revealing requires a degree of self awareness.

I am finding that I can go to that deeper place with only a few of my companions. Even with them I have not enjoyed the kind of reciprocal awareness I would like to have. For now, it is wonderful just to experience the presence of one another as best we can. We are doing our best, and that is rich enough.

I see that there are an assortment of factors limiting the connections I have with others. We struggle with limits because we still have underdeveloped skills to be present. Fear of letting go and plunging deeper limits our relational awareness. We each have our chosen constraints, aspects of our life-styles, that limit the depth to which we can connect. We each struggle with a myriad of conditions, personal and circumstantial, that we have yet to overcome.

In spite of some frustration, I am noticing that my grasping is diminishing. I am slowly letting go of my attachment to my deep desire to be connected. The desire remains, but I am weakly engaging in a kind of surrender. I am not giving up, because I don’t consider deep connection a futile enterprise. I am accepting that I and my companions perhaps just need time to grow, and the deepening will occur.

While I may not be certain, I do believe that the deeper awareness will come with them or with others.

I am beginning to know what it is like for me to plunge into my inner life. I have begun not only to experience what it means to have an inner awareness. I am also growing in relational awareness. I am experiencing what it feels like to be connected to the world around me. I can sense the special, not always visible relationship I have with people, plants and the planet.

I would like to have an expanded group of companions who are ready to take that same plunge with me. My Sangha is moving more and more in that direction as we become more accustomed to speak of our inner life and allow others to plunge into those special and sometimes secure spaces with one another.

We take refuge in our collective, growing awareness of an inner life we all possess and are willing to share.

I have companions who are willing to take that same plunge with me and together explore those intimate recesses. At this point, nearly every one is constrained by factors that limit the degree to which we can share in a joint plunge. Perhaps this is just part of being human and living in a relative, conditioned world.

I am aware of some of the constraints that temper the plunge. They are conditions that limit and restrict our freedom to plunge together. The constraints include such things as time, distance, life commitments, cautions, awareness …… all of which restrict our freedom to plunge. Perhaps this too can change.

Yesterday, I sat across the kitchen table from one of my dearest friends, talking for the longest time. We each slowly, carefully, trustingly unfolded the pages of our current lives. With transparent courage, we revealed the contours of our lives to one another.

Today, I understand better, not only how she now experiences life, but how I experience my own inner life as well. I am aware how we each were engaging in a loving form of midwifery, mutually supporting and encouraging the exploration and presentation of our inner selves.

I became aware of realities which were not so clear or apparent before we sat down across from one another. I understood aspects of myself that were not so obvious earlier. I hope the service of midwifery she gave to me was reciprocated in what I offered to her in mirrored fashion.

This is what I want to do on a daily basis with every person, plant and rock I meet. It is what making love with the world, especially one another, is all about. It is what I do when I help someone else to experience the joy of living in their own skin. It is the gift we give to one another by our speech, by our looks, by our touch. I want to summon from others the joy of participating in the energy of the universe, the deep pleasure of being aware, the exuberance of being alive.

I engage in a small form of midwifery every time I am in contact with others. I especially affirm their presence and deep value when I acknowledge them in the fullest way I can, when I am fully present myself and clearly communicate that.

This is what I did last evening as I sat down in a circle of the members of my Sangha. When I first settled down, I relaxed into being deeply present. I then extended the invitation to be present to all those sitting to either side of me. Together we relaxed as we faced the center of the circle. We let go into a loving time of being in a common space.

We were quiet together, we spoke of the contours of our hearts. We revealed aspects of our lives and practice with trusting transparency. We listened attentively and drew awareness out of one another. We each took turns engaging in loving midwifery.

Again and again, I find myself taking antidotes for most of what I have been taught. The constraints, the rules, the norms of my culture need to be broken so that I can escape from the chrysalis of my transformation. Each move I make towards freedom is an antidote that dissolves the forms and confines of my past.

Mindfulness is my favorite, most effective antidote. It detoxifies all the constraints of forms and concepts I once was so lavishly taught. The experienced joy of a relaxed and concentrated mind has freed me from the rigors I so studiously examined, learned and absorbed.

My sitting in meditation may be a relatively small part of my day. But it has become an important lesson in the skilled antidote of no effort, of release, of letting go. I carry that antidote with me throughout the day. It is a skill that I am elated to have discovered. It is an antidote that, like micro-dosing, infuses my evolving awareness with freedom and joy.

My aloneness is an antidote that continues to have a slight bitterness and sting. However, I am aware of its powerful effect. I may still resist its bitter taste, but I also know that it brings me a love of my own self, my no-self.

This is something I seldom experienced when living with a partner, and I believe that living alone has become my needed antidote to marriage. Marriage may be a necessity in our culture for many, especially for the young so that they may experience a taste of security and apparent permanence. But it is also a solution with serious side effects.

The alluring taste of a promised secure future is the bait in a trap that imperils intimacy. Intimacy is not fostered where there is no freedom. The proffered forbidden fruit of a certain future is a lie that attempted to shield me, like many others, from a world that is uncertain and unpredictable. The antidote has come to me by being open to and embracing a world that is fundamentally ambiguous, uncertain and unpredictable.

Relationship and singularity is an antidote to the lie of separateness and duality I have been taught. I have repeatedly tasted the joy of overcoming separation and becoming related to people, plants and the planet. I see myself intertwined with much of what I experience. I relax into a connection I never saw or was ever taught to see by my culture.

I embrace the relationship and connection I have with the woods, my friends, my garden, the people on the bus, the joys and anguish of all I see. I am learning the antidote that allows me to expand and absorb it all. The relationship antidote has made me larger, stronger and more full of life.

Dance is an antidote to many of my physical and emotional constraints I have dutifully learned. This is a new discovery of mine as I yield to my uncertainty about how to dance, as I allow my body to move without constant mental direction, as I stare into the eyes of partners, as I float from one exchanged smile to the next. Dance is becoming an antidote to a well-ordered, controlled and distant life. For now, it keeps me from a sedentary life.

Perhaps my antidotes do more than simply free me from much of what I have learned in my earlier time of life. Besides giving me freedom and joy, my antidotes also give me an exuberant elixir of life.

I do not want much to fill my open heart with expectations and notions of the future. Gradually, in tiny steps, I am developing the habit of paying attention to what is happening right now and not searching through mirages of what might be in the future.

It is not easy to stay focused on the experience of walking through the kitchen, sitting down at my computer desk, lifting my cup of tea. My mind has been habituated to reach into and examine mirages of what might happen next or later in the day. Being able to anticipate the future is a noble human trait that has probably supported the survival of my ancestors. For me, it is time to unlearn some of the habits and skills of diving into mirages of what might lurk around the next corner, the next moment, the next encounter.

The more I am anchored in attention to the present, the less I am disturbed by changes in future plans. Things often do not turn out the way I imagined they might. If I have not clasped those future, unreal events I find it easier to flow with changing times.

Some planning is useful, but I am learning to recognize when I am invested emotionally in those orchestrated mirages. There is a point where the plans become an object of grasping, and it is difficult to deviate from the future I have not only imagined but even begun to live in.

Expectations easily cause me to grasp for what might be or could be. Many of those mirages I create involve how I will relate to something or someone. This might not be so much of a problem if I am imagining and anticipating my walk through the garden. A sudden rainfall might disperse that mirage, and hopefully this disruption of my grasping would be minor.

Much more risky is an expected experience of some kind of relatedness with another person. Humans are very changeable and unpredictable. They have a unique ability to resist what might be, and so someone else has a great power to disrupt any mirage I might have created about how we will relate to one another.

The more I pay attention to what is happening right now, the less I am drawn to invest attention and energy into what might happen in the future. The present can be a very effective distraction from mirages of future happenings.

Above all else, it is important for me to feel connected to all things. It is important for me to experience the connection that exists between everything that exists.

This is especially true for humans, who are the most potentially aware entities I know of. Humans are the most forward expression of consciousness I am aware of. We have the greatest potential to experience connection, and yet we resist. I, unlike all other non-human entities, can say no to connection.

I am encouraged to say no. I have lived in a world wickedly shaped by dualism. Men and women are separated, counties thrive on their pretense of nationalism, races are kept from being connected. All around me, there is the attempt to confine the deep feeling of eros that drives me to be connected. With all my being, I yearn to be connected to the earth, but I am taught so many ways of keeping myself not-connected. Eros is thwarted.

Sexuality has become a place that we can hide out, pretend to be a separate self. We have so many social norms and conventions that frustrate our nature of being sexual beings. I have lived all my life in a world of duality where the choice is either restriction or excess. There is a middle road of developing deep awareness but it is not a way we are taught or encouraged to follow.

I would like to be free of the personal conditioning that has kept me from being connected. I think that escape from dualism, the middle path, is a place of healing and release from the trauma of separateness.

In this culture, there is much resistance to being connected. The middle path is not a road often followed. Still, I choose it.

I don’t understand this strange and dominant attraction that calls me into a deeper experience. I feel an underlying longing for rocks, for my desk, for plants, for many living things. It seems that my core has an innate longing that reaches out. I am drawn to so many things that I encounter, even things I casually amble past.

This longing is hardly ever as strong as it is when I consider or am present with other persons. I have a longing to experience their presence with the same earnestness I feel when my hunger sits me down before a lovely meal.

The longing to be close, to join my presence with others is strong and non-discriminating. It feels like something more than a simple sensory awareness, though the longing of flesh to flesh is part of the draw. While the longing is best and most easily described in terms that include the senses, the longing is deeper and often seems to ignore the sense realm.

There also is an innate resistance to yield to this longing. The longing encounters a caution, a resistance in rocks, plants and people. They all seem reluctant to yield and suddenly become one. The separateness contradicts the longing.

Where is the secret passage? Where is the entrance that my core longs so strongly to fine? It must exist, otherwise why would this key sit burning in my hand? Otherwise, why would my heart reach out so fervent and trusting?

The longing is such a strong leaning of my heart, there must be another center of this attraction. There must be another pole to this magnetic pull.