I've been on the journey for a bit. I started meditating and doing yoga when I was 12. The inner world always had a pull for me. I'm a long-time dreamer and seeker.
I'll confess I haven't always had the dedication to awakening that I do now. I dabbled for decades. I've been in earnest for more than 20 years. Seriously enmeshed for the past 3 years. If you want to fully open to your creative capacity it helps to take responsibility for it.
I've been in a full-on immersion in the power of focus and how it helps or hinders the creative journey. I've done this with much success in certain areas of my life. This past year, I've been applying it pretty much daily in all areas of my world. Here's what I've noticed:
- The inner buzz is constant. (The mind is a busy little bee.)
- Things are always changing. (Life happens, random and on purpose.)
- I am always judging everything (and course-correcting or flowing with it).
- I respond more than I react. (Finally!)
- I don't share everything I think. (By now I know a lot of thinking is crazy.)
- More and more it's less personal. (Nothing is about me.)
It has been wild. There have been moments of piercing lucidity followed by blips of darkness and oceans of forgetfulness. Whatever occurs, I make peace with it and move on.
I've taken it on as more than a practice, more a way of being. Using the power of my focus and attention to engage more deeply moment-to-moment. Noticing the incongruencies in my life and letting the insights arise. Stepping out of a habitual response to one that I choose. It's a different kind of workout but I'm feeling the growth.
We miss the real by lack of attention and create the unreal by excess of imagination.
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
This practice of focus is humbling and honoring. I see the places where I am untruthful with myself. No sooner does one mask dissolve but another appears. Anger and fear have nowhere to hide. Love lights up every dark little corner.
It's been interesting to notice how the peeling away of the not me is providing me with sustained periods of peace, gratitude, and joy. I used to think this steady stuff was boring. Ha! This is the playground, darlings. This is it.
What have you noticed on the adventure? We're all onto the same destination.
