Who am I, where am I found, in my memories and stories, in the grasping narrative of mind. Can I be found in the shifting landscape of the past. Is that man of memory me, can his honesty be relied upon. I think not. He was never really there.
This week, I realised and then knew something that like nothing else before brought my attention into the moment.
Within the moment of me, meet past, present and future, in a place both physical and emotional, of memory and imagination, a place that in the eternity of the universe has never before and never will exist again.
A place of unimaginable uniqueness.
There, is where I am. That meeting place of forces and feeling, of longing and loss. A place, not static, not fixed but moving, flowing and I should allow that, trust that, be witness to that flow but above all be present for it to truly live me.
I have been in the way. Doing, busy doing, looking, searching, rather than allowing the flow of the present moment that already knows the shape of me more intimately than I ever could.
It seems paradoxical, become other, to become truer but then, to find that truth hidden within excruciating vulnerability and to realise, I am not this, not that, not doing, not performing. I need do nothing but allow the unavoidably unique to be.
In the stubborn relief of surrender, I come to know just how much I must forgive. What cruelty I have inflicted upon myself and the world.
Denial has been a necessary coping strategy but prevents a complete forgiveness.
To say ” I forgive ” also means ” I accept “. Acceptance is acceptance of the unknown, unfolding mystery of self and identity.
How many of us are really here, present, not trying to be someone else, better, different but getting to know ourselves, allowing that to be revealed, rather than being held in the self protection of denial and there, bound , unable to feel lest we feel too much or, witness something about ourselves that we are not ready to accept.
Can we accept that we are not who we thought we were and simply be the witness to the mystery of our own unfoldment and in that witnessing, without fear marvel at the unknown within us.
What is this mystery but a hint at the unfathomable nature of our being. We cannot hold it and say ” this is me ” but can feel it gently flowing through us, a partial but wonderful awareness of the truth that the pain of bodily existence is a beautiful and necessary torture. We are in form reduced and must feel such agony, such loss and loneliness, yet, with achingly ecstatic closeness, feel the ineffable quality of our true being and there, find the pathway back to God.
Where is our attention.
Anima 