When we are able to “hold” our experience as well as allow ourselves to “be held” by something larger, we are able to trust life in a new way. We become more spontaneous and creative, more emotionally flexible, and better able to respond to the challenges that life will inevitably provide.
Even if our experience is difficult, heartbreaking, confusing, or uncertain, we come to discover that it is taking place within a vast context or space, one that may be a lot more purposive and intelligent than it appears.
Over time, as we illuminate and befriend our experience at deeper levels, we invite its wisdom, creativity, and love to disclose itself. We become more and more familiar with the space or alchemical container in which it appears. We are the material within the vas and we are also the alchemist looking in. We are the vas itself and in the most primordial way the space in which the entire display has appeared.
Through this discovery, our center of gravity begins to shift into the experiential realization that we are always, already held. In this way, holding is not something we need to manufacture, create, deserve, or “earn” by way of completing some heroic project of self-improvement or enlightenment.
These hearts, these bodies, these psyches, these souls are woven with strands of holding. We share this with the mountains, the stars, the moon, and the sea.
Photo by RitaE – Deutschland via Pixabay
Befriending Yourself - you are invited to join me and my friend Jeff Foster at our new online membership site at the intersection of spirituality, meditation, and depth psychology. Video-based teachings, live meditations, question-and-answer videos, and a moderated online support community.
The next retreat - The Deep Rest Retreat: Slowing Down and Befriending Yourself in Difficult Times - September 4-9 at Sunrise Ranch in Loveland, Colorado - registration open
My most recent book – The Path Is Everywhere: Uncovering the Jewels Hidden Within You – is available in both paperback and Kindle editions.
My next book, A Healing Space: Befriending Yourself in Difficult Times, will be published by Sounds True in 2020.
