BLOG #2: Two Short Pieces on Presence

Two Short Pieces on Presence

Thanks to those of you who read my first blog: Flipping the Racial Script.  I’m excited about the opportunity to connect in different ways, so please use the comment section to share your perspective!

I will try to write in different ways and from different perspectives.  I will write about different topics.  I’ve decided to not be too overt about politics, so only rarely will there be a piece that could be seen as political “punditry.”

I’ll also try to pull themes through my writing.  Two themes are common for me.  One is paradox – I love paradox.  The 1^st blog about flipping the racial script embraces paradox because what I am saying is that it is time for white people to have less conversation about race across racial groups and more conversation within our own racial group.  That seems counter-intuitive at a time when we are supposed to be connecting more across our differences.  Yet, I think we can’t connect across a difference until we understand who we are, more fully.  And that is the paradox.

The second common theme is about presence.  I’ve been writing a lot about being present, all of it from my own journey towards more authenticity and presence.  I will share more of this soon.  This theme, like the first, will pop up in direct and indirect ways.  You will see it in today’s blog entry( below) as I share a short essay and a poem.  These are shorter and easier to read perhaps that my 1^st blog.  My cousin told me I needed to write shorter pieces, so I am listening to her (at least this week).

Anyhow, the essay Neuroplasticity of the Spirit, was written April 2019.  When I reread it recently, I realized I had started to apply during the “lockdown”, what I had been writing about the year before.  You will see that in the short poem, Pandemic and Presence. Please let me know what this stimulates in you – does it resonate with your experience?  If you are willing, use the comments section and I (and hopefully others) will respond. 

Neuroplasticity of the Spirit

MG

April 25, 2019

Neuroscientists tell us that we establish neural pathways in our brain, associating and connecting one thing with another.  It helps us to make sense of complicated and overwhelming sensory input.  These neural pathways are functional shortcuts.  They deepen over time, and pull us into them as we continually reinforce them.  While functional in some ways, this reinforcement can also keep us limited or even stuck.  Fortunately, because of neuroplasticity, we more clearly understand that we can be choiceful in how we keep, change, or establish new pathways.  Our neuroplasticity continues for most of our life.

I was once told to see myself as a part of everything, not an observer but a participant.  My spirit knows this is true, because it is always a participant.  Just sitting on the porch on this fine spring morning looking at the green field, trees about to leaf, cool breeze overcome by warm sun, I am not just watching.  I am in the scene, and my presence is as important as the stones lining the path from this porch, the geese honking as they fly by, and the bright white birch meeting my stare.

If I can see how everything is connected, then I can see how pathways form.  Looking into the field I can see a path into the woods.  This path has been a walking path for at least several decades.  Sometimes, like the pathways in my life, it is easy to see; sometimes though, it is hidden as light changes, the grass grows, or a fresh snowfall covers it.  That path, and my paths, are both a history and a guide.  I am pulled down a usual walk, comfortable and automatic.  It rewards me with its familiar view.  It also limits me as I don’t think of another path into the woods, and all that could open up.  Why even would I when such a familiar and proven path exists?  The path makes sense and it fits the scene, just like my own mental pathways, evident in my life, fit my scene.  Our pathways are self-fulfilling prophecies, like how my grassy path into the woods is maintained by human steps, enhanced by mowing, and fed by the collection of moisture in the depression.

My spirit sees my whole scene.  It sees my well-worn pathways.  It sees how everything relates, and where the paths lead.  It sees how my body’s sensations can spark a cascade of thoughts and unacknowledged emotions.  It sees how those emotions affect the body, creating physical sensations.  It sees how thoughts interact with my emotions.  It sees how the repeated and circular interaction of all the parts of me slowly dig out pathways that are both neurological and psychological.  Fortunately my spirit serves not just as a historian but also a guide, because my spirit knows paths not yet taken.

If I let it, my spirit slows me down.  It provides a holistic view of the scene and a deconstruction of the elements, like how when a stream slows the sediment settles to the bottom, the branches and leaves gather themselves, eddies form, and new pathways emerge.  When I let my green path into the woods grow out, when I walk at the edges, or when I simply go in another direction, the field looks different and other options are revealed.

This is timeless.  I can always slow down, pay attention, let things settle.  Like that stream, I can realign myself, flow more freely, and move towards new destinations.   New pathways can emerge and even deepen in their own right.  Call it spiritual plasticity.

Pandemic and Presence

MG

March 30, 2020

I slow down.

not willingly,

but gradually.

 

The distractions still flash, and pull my attention,

like how stars bring us light long after they die.

A life filled with distraction goes quickly.

A day filled with unconsciousness can go faster.

How ironic.

But if I embrace the nothingness with consciousness, time slows,

each moment more fully lived.

The extraneous shutting down

like a body dying

with the energy going to the core,

to what is essential.

What is dying is the mundane.

Layers melting away,

less and less

until less is more.

In the end we only grapple with our self.

 

But now,

for the many who will come back,

what will we have learned?

How will we be different?

Will our vision have changed, will we see ourselves more clearly, will we see each other more fully?

When we slow down can we change faster?

Reading a verse, over and over,

looking out a window with interest and curiosity,

I listen for the sake of listening.

Sitting with pen and page I ask for guidance,

in my raw presence,

willing to be lead by spirit and soul.

 

I slow down,

not gradually,

but willingly.