Get Centered/Go Deeper

... the well remains there, whole and authentic in its presence.

Photo by Hulki Okan Tabak on Unsplash

Get centered and go deeper.

It’s both an affirmation and a promise to myself. When faced with a cultural and political landscape that is bound to get more chaotic over the next four years, set in a world of catastrophic climate events that are multiplying and growing in intensity, I need to remind myself that going deeper into my creative, spiritual work is always the answer.

I’m starting to realize the choice to go within has always been the answer, not just for our age but for every age. Our collective reaction to the challenges of our lives is always to lean more and more to the outer. We believe we must demonstrate our allegiance to one group or another, sign up for one publically congruent identity or the other. We must find our team and join the fray on the “right“ side.

Religious contemplatives have always sought to step away from this dance, into the silence that predates all culture, the way of being in the world that comes before any action. It is the way of embracing the silent presence of the sacred without limits.

I had my first movement class in years last weekend in Bend. Less a class and more a container conjured by Lynne at Soul In Motion, I was able to go deep in a way that felt witnessed and honoring. My own morning movement practice is nourishing, but working in a group always takes things to another level. Lynne effortlessly held an invitation for all of us to go within, stirring that deep cauldron that lies at the center of life.

In my morning practice I work with the spirit of Swan to ground, center and raise my energy for the day. I’m drawn to Swan for its many mythic roots in Celtic culture, its masculine grace, and the powerful way male Swans are devoted to their families. In a group setting I was able to raise more of Swan’s presence, resulting in what felt like an easy healing. That class inspired this poem:

The art of weaving of oneself into the subtle, unbound world that lies beyond the machinations of human concerns is exactly the medicine we need. Our most fervent arguments about the minutia of civilization must be welcomed into a spacious emptiness that reveals our noise for the nonsense that it is.

It’s not easy for me to do this. I was bread to be a fighter, tangling nightly at my childhood dinner table, the way many Irish-American families do. Dad might start a discussion, picking from the newsworthy topics of the day, prodding and poking until his children were exercising their brains as they chewed their food. It could be humorous, or raucous. Sometimes we were joined by other professors and their families from the university. We were rewarded with a chuckle for being clever, or right, or maybe just obtuse and tenacious.

I really love that part of me and that side of my family.

It wasn’t until later in life that I learned the power of silence, and the well of discovery that was always available in the natural world. It’s possible to turn to that well in a way that holds as much orthodoxy as our devotion to the outer does. We have a tendency to ruin everything, especially those things that are delicate and vulnerable.

But the well remains there, whole and authentic in its presence.

Becoming mindful of that choice-point is the gift of this time for me. My inward process is so strong right now, so able in so many ways, it is clearly the one thing of value I actually have to offer this moment in our cultures development. Choosing to sink into that full emptiness of being and work creatively with whatever I might find there is the one sane thing I can do in this age.

I invite you to do the same. I bow to you if you say yes to this direction, and I understand if you don’t.

Know that I will continue to rise each morning at dawn and dance, if I am able, birthing a new Swan into the world to greet the day.