Embracing my Body - a meandering

My Heart calls to me to stop, to just sit
- sitting meditation - breathing -
resting in the inner Stillness of Being...

My Heart wants to commune with
the Infiniteness of Silence.

It is the Light that brings awareness
to all hidden places...

It is the Spaciousness from which all knowing
and all needed action arises
with clarity...

Heart says:
'just sit'
in the depths of Silence

breathing
with the Infinite Silence -
the inner movement of "The Mystery" -
experiencing the Embrace,
and intelligence of what lives us...

~

But, at 75, I have a body that requires a lot of attention
now, which I must attend to...  Sometimes I get
caught in the ailments of the body - its unexpected fragility;
 the body needs to be embraced,
held in the Heart - like a child...

So I started doing what I lovingly call "Body Holding."
I start with the Heart, laying both hands 
over the Heart - embracing the Heart,
until its tingly static feels calm and at peace.
Then I hold the Solar Plexus;
sometimes with both hands,
sometimes with one hand on the Heart -
until its intense waves of pressure feels smooth and calm.
Then the belly just below the navel, and hold
my hands there.  If my mind has been overactive,
as it usually is, I hold one hand on either side 
of the top of my head and feel the electrical
buzziness of thinking, until it subsides.

All the while being aware
of the miracle of my Humanness and Infiniteness -
as One Rhythm - embracing the body...

~

The Infinite manifests in the finite
The Truth of Existence...

The  Pure Vibration of Existence
in form - in a human body...
We are a whole package
an embodied humanity -
enlivened by the Source of Life.

The body is not separate.
Spirit is in matter...

The Light of our Essence is in
the body...

Our Humanity is Embraced...

Mystic Meandering
2025

Art: Mystic Meandering
 Held

 

Embrace the Day...

Rest Dear Heart, Rest...

Embrace the day with Rest,

with clarity, with ease of mind...

Feel the warm, fluid rhythm
of Life around you;
upholding you,

carrying you
through the day,
landing you safely
on evening's shore,
through the twilight
and into the night...

And out of the darkness
a shining light...

Rest , Dear Heart, Rest...

Mystic Meandering
Nov. 29, 2018

~

Photo - Wave Curl Mandala

~

In 2018 I did an "8 Day Challenge" presented by
Donna Iona Drozda, artist and educator from
Wren House Studio, on becoming aware of our
natural rhythms with life; how we orient ourselves
to the rhythm of each day.  The above mandala was
done as a part of the process, representing the rising wave
of my Inner Rhythm reaching outward to embrace the light/day.

The poem came as a result of drawing the image.

 

The Embrace...

Everything is held in the Embrace of the Luminous Unmanifest...

~

This Eternal Embrace is
a dynamic stillness of Being
that holds everything as it is;
a holding space for everything to just Be...

~

We are held in this space of Divine Embrace -
a Vastness that just Is...

~

There is only ever the Embrace -
a deep compassionate Embrace for all life,
for all that is - as it is...

"The Mystery" embracing Itself in every expression of ItSelf...

~

Everything is suspended
in this ubiquitous space...

Rest in this space within...

And when we emerge from our rest,
we realize that we ARE the Embrace -
embracing Itself.

We ARE fluidly and interchangeably the Embrace -

Divine Intimacy...

Sweet Serenity...

Notes from my journal - 2009

~

Photo from the Internet

 

The Embrace...

Everything is held in the Embrace of the Luminous Unmanifest...

~

This Eternal Embrace is
a dynamic stillness of Being
that holds everything as it is;
a holding space for everything to just Be...

~

We are held in this space of Divine Embrace -
a Vastness that just is...

~

There is only ever Embrace -
a deep compassionate Embrace for all life,
for all that is - as it is...

The Divine embracing Itself in every expression of Itself...

~

Everything is suspended
in this ubiquitous Presence of Life Itself...

Rest in This...

And when we emerge from our rest,
we realize that we ARE the Embrace -
embracing Itself.

We ARE fluidly and interchangeably the Embrace -

Divine Intimacy...

Sweet Serenity...

~

Notes from my journal - 2009

~

Photo from Shutterstock
digitally altered

Embracing the Day

Rest, Dear Heart, Rest...

Embrace the day with Rest,
with clarity, with ease of mind...

Feel the warm, fluid rhythm
of Life around you;
upholding you,
carrying you
through the day,
landing you safely
on evening's shore,
through the twilight
and into the night...

And out of the darkness
a shining light...

Rest, Dear Heart, Rest...

Mystic Meandering
Nov. 29, 2018

~

Photo - Embracing the Day Mandala Art

I recently did an "8 Day Challenge"
presented by Donna Iona Drozda on becoming aware
of our natural rhythms with life; how we orient ourselves
to the rhythm of each day.  The above mandala was done
as a part of the process, representing the rising wave of our
Inner Rhythm reaching outward to embrace the day.  The
poem came as a result of drawing the image.

Iona's next "8 Day Challenge" will be in January.
You can contact her through her website:
Donna Iona Drozda Life Cycle Art/Life Programs.
Be inspired to live in balance with life!

~

"The Natural Rhythm is ever current, ever
within its organic flow,
allowing us to give voice to our
own creative expression of our Core Being
in the Heart..."

Donna Iona Drozda

One Soul - Danna Faulds

When one soul is set ablaze
by truth, the whole universe
ignites, and for an instant
light reaches every corner,
cave and crevasse.  When

the heart remembers what
it is, joined in vastness by
joy and suffering, both the
future and the past dissolve
like snowflakes on the tongue.

There is nowhere to run, no
reason to do anything but
rest in the cradle of the
cosmos, rocked in the arms
of emptiness, and held in
the near embrace of love.

Danna Faulds
From: One Soul
2003

Overwhelm - Jeff Foster

Oh sweet little boy, beloved little girl,
you are so overwhelmed by life,
I know,
by the enormity of it all,
by the myriad perspectives available to you.

You feel so pressed down sometimes,
by all the unresolved questions,
by all the information
you are supposed to process and hold,
by the urgency of things.

You are overcome by powerful emotions,
trying to control,
or at least influence,
everything and everyone around you,
trying to hold yourself together,
trying to make it all 'work out' somehow,
trying to get everything done 'on time',
trying to resolve things so fast,
even trying not to try at all.

You are exhausted, sweet one,
exhausted from all the trying
and the not trying,
and you are struggling to trust life again.
It's all too much for the poor organism, isn't it.
You are exhausted, you long to rest.
And that is not a failing of yours,
nor a horrible mistake,
but something wonderful to embrace!

For the exhaustion is pure intelligence,
and it says, let go, let go! Stop trying so hard!

Stop pushing for answers right now.
Allow everything to rest right now.
Take a sacred pause.

Allow questions to remain unanswered, for now.
Allow space for yourself to breathe today.
Allow everything to fall out of control today.
Allow yourself to not be able to hold it all up today.
Allow yourself to not know how, to not know at all.

Allow the heart to break, if it needs to,
and the body to ache, and the soul to wake.

Everything is okay, when you get down to it.

And know you are loved, little one.
Know you have always been loved,
long before you were named,
long before you were even born,
long before overwhelm came to show you the way.

Jeff Foster

There Is Always a Song - The Radiance Sutras

Strong or soft, wild or serene -
Wherever breath flows there is song.
Hear its whisper touching behind the face,
singing in the throat,
Dancing spirals in the sanctuary of your heart.

In this practice of listening,
A moment may come when you just want to lie down.
This is a doorway - surrender.
Fall into the wide-open embrace of life.
You are the instrument breath is playing.

All the meditations you have ever loved
Are vibrating in this luxurious hum,
Continuing even in sleep and dreams.
This is your school.  Just you and infinity.
The texture of the Self is untamed freedom.

Lorin Roche
The Radiance Sutras, 32

via: Being Silently Drawn

~

Photo - Mandala Art digitally altered

Where We Began - Chuck Surface

Although we are often driven by sorrow,
To seek the end of sorrows,
It is the desire for Love,
and in the end, Love itself,
Which brings us to Freedom.

For when all Hope is lost,
And only Despair remains,
When all paths have failed,
And all efforts proven vain.

Then we sit alone, with nothing left.
Nothing, that is...
Except what moved us at the onset.
Our Own Shining Heart,
Our Own Inherent Love.

We wander for countless ages,
In the heartbreak of conditionality and causality,
Until, when grasping is exhausted,
We simply rest as the Love we Are.

Simply Here, where we began...

...always within...


Chuck Surface
In The Garden of the Beloved
Facebook

Rest Your Heart In Love - Fred LaMotte

The purest meditation is just to rest in Love...

Our love is often toward what we know to be God.
The "toward" of love is like an in-coming or out-going breath.
Its flow may proceed from my heart toward the Divine,
or from the Divine toward my heart,
until the two tides equalize in one serenity;
the silence between breaths... inhalation kisses exhalation.

Words cease.
  Prayer becomes deep meditation,
 and there is no more "toward"...
It is effortless repose through love, as love...
Just be with the formless feeling.
The little thread of formless love expands to fill the cosmos,
because it has no boundary, no image.
In a moment, you have captured the ocean of love
in the cup of your heart.

The tiniest thread, the faintest impulse of love,
is a breath of the Cosmic Mother,
felt as a sense of the heart.
Surrender to that subtle intuitive sensation,
without attaching any picture or face.
This ripple of affection will lead you to the sea.
Depth calleth unto depth.
In the formless abyss of love, one depth touches another.
The depth of God merges with the depth of You.

If images of an Avatar or a Master appear, let them.
They are delightful bubbles playing on the surface of
love's formless ocean.
They are all facets of one diamond,
 the brilliance of your divine heart.
Your heart is a little hologram that contains the cosmos,
the forms of every Avatar, every God or Goddess.

Whatever sadhana we practice, just rest in the heart,
filling the empty silence where thought used to be.
This silent glory [of Love] is the substance of creation itself,
suffusing every cell of the body.
Then it pours out through our eyes, our words, and our hands
in blessing...


Fred LaMotte
Uradiance

Excerpts from a blog post.
Fred's words, my format.

Adrift - Chuck Surface

All the words I have written...
May have given you the illusion that I
have my bearings, and an understanding
of all that is unfolding...
When I am simply adrift
Without a compass...

Rudderless

Here...

In this Great Mystery

Excerpted from "Adrift"
by Chuck Surface
In the Garden of the Beloved

~*~

I woke up recently with this realization:
It is only this sense of me that feels adrift, lost, floundering -
not the Eternal Being that I am...
And, it is all happening within
the vast Ocean of the Great Mystery...
Everything happens within the Great Mystery...

And so it is all really okay, this floundering...
I accept it... Embrace it... Trust it...
It is simply where "I" am in time...

When I meet and embrace the feeling with acceptance
the grip of fear and lostness inside me lets go...
I then am able to float in the soft embrace of The Great Mystery,
and wait for the Inner Movement of
The Ineffable again...

Photo - taken by my brother...

~*~

Roam aimlessly
and find
What-Is

Wu Hsin

Courage - Oriah & O'Donohue...

I must find the ways, the people, the places, the practices
 that support me in being all
I truly am.

I must cultivate ways of being that let me feel the warmth
 of encouragement against
my heart when it is weary.
I must be fiercely and compassionately honest
with myself  about those choices and actions
that are inconsistent with my essential nature...
I must find the song lines that run through
my life, the melodies that remind me of what
I really am and call me gently back to
acting on this knowing.
I must learn to dance.

Oriah Mountain Dreamer

From: The Dance

I took her words and put then into prose poetry form.

No day or minute offers itself twice.
There is an amazing serenity
when life has been lived to the full.
When the true dream of life has been neglected
or postponed, there is helpless regret.
Life is a huge, urgent invitation.
As Rainer Rilke says:
It is so easy to lose your way -
to end up respectable, trusted and
admirably fulfilling your role.
Yet the whole time you could be suffocating
 inside and no one sees it.
So much depends on how you embrace
the world within you.
There is some limbo in which each
life is caught.
The air is poor in limbo;
grey is the one color there.
Stagnation is the status quo.
All things seem blurred in this half-sleep.
Boredom and indifference conspire to keep
the anxiety buried.
There is endless chatter, but nothing said.
Perhaps it is time to leave limbo.
To awaken: to really come alive…

John O’Donohue

These are his words that I put into
prose poetry form.

The Way of Rest - Jeff Foster

"Oh, sweet little boy, beloved little girl,
 you are so overwhelmed by life,
 I know,
 by the enormity of it all,
 by the vastness of possibilities,
 by the myriad perspectives available to you.

 You feel so pressed down sometimes,
 by all the unresolved questions,
 by all the information
 you are supposed to process and hold,
 by the urgency of things.

 You are overcome by powerful emotions,
 trying to control,
 or at least influence,
 everything and everyone around you,
 trying to hold yourself together,
 trying to make it all ‘work out’ somehow,
 trying to get everything done ‘on time’,
 trying to resolve things so fast,
 even trying not to try at all.

You are exhausted, sweet one,
 exhausted from all the trying
 and the not trying,
 and you are struggling to trust life again.
 It’s all too much for the poor organism, isn’t it.
 You are exhausted, you long to rest.
 And that is not a failing of yours,
 nor a horrible mistake,
 but something wonderful to embrace!

 For the exhaustion is pure intelligence,
 and it says, let go, let go! Stop trying so hard!

Stop pushing for answers right now.
 Allow everything to rest right now.
 Take a sacred pause.

 Allow questions to remain unanswered, for now.
 Allow space for yourself to breathe today.
 Allow everything to fall out of control today.
 Allow yourself to not be able to hold it all up today.
 Allow yourself to not know how, to not know at all.
 Allow the heart to break, if it needs to,
 and the body to ache, and the soul to wake.

 Everything is so okay, when you get down to it.

And know you are loved, little one.
 Know you have always been loved,
 long before you were named,
 long before you were even born,
long before overwhelm came to show you the way."

Jeff Foster

~ ~ ~

Photo: Dry leaves on paper and table
color inverted…

Unbreakable Life...

“Everything is a gift on this unbreakable path
that you call your life -
the laughter,
the tears,
the times of great
sorrow,
the experience of

 profound
loss,
the pain,
the confusion,
the times you
believe
you’ll never make it,
even the overwhelming

heartbreak of love -
even if you forget that,
or cannot see that,
or lose faith.

But even the loss
of faith
in the show [life]
is part of the show.

Everything happens
for your awakening,
for your growth,
for your inspiration,
for your exploration -
even if you forget that
and fall
into
distraction
and
despair.

So you are always
exactly
where you
need
to
be

Life can be trusted absolutely,
even when trust seems
a million light-years away,
and life cannot go ‘wrong’,
for all is Life…

Understand this,
know it in your heart.
It is profoundly simple,
as simple as breathing,
as natural as gazing
up at the stars at night
and falling
into
silent
wonder.

The Universe is more beautiful
than you could
ever imagine.”

Jeff Foster

“God hugs you.
You are encircled by the arms
of The Mystery.”

Hildegard of Bingen

Embracing Wholeness...

“The realization of wholeness, or non-separation,
is simply recognizing that wholeness is
the essential state of reality,
regardless  of whether it is being experienced
that way.

The experience of wholeness is temporary
and fleeting,
as is all experience.

But wholeness remains
even though the experience passes.
One retains awareness of the truth of it
even when it is not being experienced…”

The Natural Contemplative

Everything is embraced/held by Pure Consciousness,
including what we experience as “darkness.”

Nothing is excluded,
even the “darkness”
however that manifests
in our minds.

You have to be willing to dance
with the darkness,
which only means that
you are willing to meet it,
to be with it,
and not try to push it away;
not resist it as something
absent of Light,
but seeing that the
darkness
is not the opposite
of Light.

Just dance with whatever
shows up…

The darkness is also
part of the dance.

Nothing is excluded.

Everything is embraced.

It is Love dancing with ItSelf…

Unknown author