Wednesday, 27 May 2009

• presence: living from the source

  Living from one’s Source is an experience that is described across all cultures and religions in very different terms but at the heart of its description, the experience sounds very similar. It is a spiritual human experience that is life changing.

   

  “We are not human beings having a spiritual experience,

  We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”

   

  Some of the ways it is described are:

  Connected to Source

  Ground of Being

  Living with Open Hands, Open Mind, and Open Heart

  Contemplation

  Power of Intention

  Divine Intention

  Living in the Spirit

   

  Living a life:

  Full of Wonder and Awe of all creation (things and people)

  Full of Gratitude and Appreciation of all creation (things and people)

   

  Presence is another way to refer to this connected, grounded, whole experience of life. Living fully present and open to all of life is giving attentive attention and being aware of all. Not just listening, but hearing. Not just looking, but seeing. Not just perceiving, but seeking understanding. Not just feeling, but sensing.

   

  What I’m beginning to understand is that living a life of contemplation is more than living here and now with senses open to all. It is all of that AND leaning forward to the future as it emerges. This is an understanding that has been a long time in coming for me. The only way I can visualize this understanding is through imagery. In my post “Ocean Wind” I described the exhilaration of standing for a half hour on the deck of a cruise ship in the Caribbean Ocean. The wind hitting me must have been at least 30 miles an hour and left my whole body tingling with sensation. This means that the particles of water in the wind that were 44 feet away one second ago are now hitting me in the face. The future wind of 44 feet away becomes the present wind as it hits my face. This is the way life is too. We live life in the now but not apart from the emerging future. In reality, Presence is lived at the very edge of where the future becomes now and the present becomes the past. If we are to live life as the most fully human, fully alive experience, our attentive attention and full awareness needs to include all of the future possibilities as it emerges from anywhere as anything.

   

  Whether it is a conversation with the homeless man on the corner

  or with the child on the sidewalk acting out for attention,

  whether in the reaction to the car pulling in front of us

  or in reaction to the “the callous and vicious things humans display” (Bruce Cockburn lyrics, Beautiful Creatures),

  whether in the attention given to an innovative idea coming from months of uncovering problems

  or the expression of an artists heart in some medium of art.

   

  Presence is living from your heart, from the Source of your being, in the Spirit.

  Presence is living.

  Presence is living fully awake.

  Presence is living with attentive attention.

  Presence is not missing a word your child is speaking to you.

  Presence is not being absent in the presence of another human being.

  Presence is not being absent in the presence of creation.

  Presence is feeling the wind on your face, the sun energizing your body.

  Presence is realizing that in every encounter with another human being, they (nor you) do not walk away the same; they leave a changed person for the better or for the worse; are you a giver or a taker?  Is your presence life-giving?

   

  Presence is leaning forward, anticipating the future, ready for anything, ready for everything, open to all possibilities, seeing reality with your eyes wide open, sensing the situation with your heart, on the edge of your seat, ready to act from your heart as the opportunity emerges, seeing it, not hesitating, but acting from the heart right on time.

   

  In Presence, another force comes to play, synchronicity. When we are fully present, living in the power of intention, people just show up, doors open, conversations happen, ALL RIGHT ON TIME!!! Life aligns itself with the power of love as we take action from our heart. This is not just spiritual talk, this has been proven through research done globally over 10 years (see Theory U by Otto Scharmer). And it is the way of creation designed by our Creator.

   

  Such mystery, such wonder, such awe, all too much to fit in my brain, but never too much to fit in my heart; reducing me to a puddle of appreciation and gratitude.

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