Ever-present Ever-presence

I’ve had dreams where I wander into situations that in waking life would be down right terrifying.  In the dream state, I just am.  There is no fear or thinking.  There is just moving through whatever scene I happen to be in.  Sometimes, I become aware in these dreams and I become curious about my lack of fear and my ability to just be solely focused taking part in whatever role I’m playing.  The sun is often shining and there is a sense of infinity about the presence that just is not perturbed in any way by the scene.

As I think about it honestly, I walk into many of the scenes of my life and play the roles that I play, not with a sense of indifference but with a wholeness and sense of ever-present-ness.  I can’t explain it.  There is a part of me that plays witness to all that I perceive.  It is a quiet and powerful part of me that is unruffled by the trials and tribulations of the ego.  It is non-competitive but just present.  It is this part of me that has allowed me to face some harrowing ordeals in my present-waking life.  It is that part of me that stands in the storm thinking, “okay, so this is a storm.”

When I can recognize this state of presence, I’m not caught up in the drama of life.  I can watch it not as a non-participant unattached and in woeful psychological denial, but as a participant fully present with infinite-seeming awareness that is pointedly focused.  In this place of presence, there is no fear and no anxiety.  There is no desire, there is no second guessing or worry about good enough or not good enough.  There is scene and role.  There is motion and sensing.  There is action but also-always extreme presence.

If I think about it too much, I begin to worry that maybe I’m doing this wrong, maybe I should be upset or I should fight back or well, whatever the normal human mind tries to come up with in judgment.  I observe this part of me too and another part of me knows just to witness those thoughts without sinking into them.  Maybe nothing surprises me any more?  Maybe I’ve seen so much that I just don’t react the same way any more?  Maybe, just maybe, I’m doing it right after all.?!  With such thoughts the witness in me stays ever-present, ever-neutral without a single ounce of judgment.  It is a magnanimous feeling place – it’s is like the perfect supportive character within.  It is wholly unconditionally present.  Curious maybe?  Knowing, a bit, maybe?  Caring some, yes, certainly.  But, never does that place within me succumb to egotistical emotion.

These facets I observe - the anxious and worried me, the fearful me, the confident me, the questioning me, the faithful and loyal me, the helping me…all of these facets are present in every moment.  It is just that in some moments the different facets take in and refract the light.  I still revel in the colors of the sunrise, a starry sky, a baby’s cry or the purr of a kitten.  A ways now past mid point in my life and all of those scenes and facets expressed, I’m comfortable in my own skin, no matter its present state…aging, battle scared and still supporting me.

Life is so funny.  It is truly like a dream and we can dive into the deep end of it and learn to swim.  We can flail at the surface or sink deep with that scary lack-of-oxygen feeling.  We can let go, relax into the flow of it all and just watch what unfolds and accept what comes.  We can fight, seek to control scenes and other actors or we can just see, experience and feel for the energy vibrating constantly beneath the superficial emotion of it all.  The TV can’t really tell us what our lives should be like, nor can our parents, friends or adversaries.  Your life is your dream and however you dream it is perfect in this much bigger sense.  There is a long game at play here and when you realize that and tap into the energy of that, you actually have more freedom to move from dreamscape to dreamscape enjoying the show for what it truly is so-to-speak.  Life is amazing and so very truly so.  I’m grateful for every experience in this life with the good actors and bad actors as judged by my ego.  My former selves did their parts perfectly with no need to worry or regret how their roles were played.  Well played self.  You’ve had a marvelous life of experiencing perception and finding beauty along the way.  It’s time for more coffee and to better appreciate this newly rising sun.  May your wanderings be fruitful and ultimately, enjoyable.  Bless.

© 2018 Jaie Hart (Photo and Words)

Visions and Dreams, Courage and Opportunity

June gloom sky, cool sea breeze, and warm coffee in hand as I contemplate my day.  Weighing heavy in the background of my thoughts is change and a new direction that has presented itself.  I love how that happens in life.  You can go for long stretches of the same thing day in and day out and just when the sameness seems to be bringing you to the breaking point of either boredom or frustration, something on the horizon shifts and changes.  You can shy away from the opportunity that presents itself and just go on keeping everything the same.  Or, or, or…you can stand up tall knowing that the potential change on the horizon could be that very thing you have waited for, prayed and hoped for.

I like change and it is a very necessary part of life but boy are those steps to rise up to meet it seemingly steep.  I say seemingly for a reason for the challenge is almost always a mental exercise, at least in the beginning.  So, I smile here in the low light of early morning letting my imagination run with it, see it and feel it.  What does it feel like?  How will it work?  What exactly will it take to see this change through?  Well, courage for one.  Okay, fine.  I’ve got that.  I’ve been a single parent for the better part of my adult life.  Obviously, there is courage.  What else?  Fearlessness and tenacity to stand up to the occasion.  Well, my life experience has well prepared me to meet fear, see through it and walk the path any way.  What else?  Logistics?  Oh yes, that.  Well, that is the part where I know the Universe must step in and align the stars a bit.  For that part, I will have to have patience.  Again, single mom for many years - I do think I have a lot of patience.

I love a challenge, the right kind, the good kind and for the opportunity to do something new, change something in this path of a lot of silence and stillness.  I’ve grown so comfortable with the sameness, the quiet and stillness.  It intrigues me, this opportunity that has seemingly-randomly presented itself.  I think I will meet it.  I think I will heed the call and take each step and remind myself to stay in a perpetual state of curiosity, with courage, tenacity, fearlessness and patience.  This could be something really awesome or it could be the stepping stone towards a completely unknown journey.  Who knows?  But, I know the path of my life up until now.  I see destiny as that tiny little light at the far end of the tunnel I seem to have found myself in.  I am ready to embrace new thoughts, new ideas and to explore the base of my own creativity and strength.

I have started over and over and over again in my life, each time in a new way and for different reasons but never really a reason that I chose out of the purity of silence and peace.  Perhaps manifesting from this state will challenge me in a whole new way.  My faith in my own ability rarely waivers as I am time tested in walking my own path so far.  In a vision not long ago during a meditation, I was shown 3 images:  That of a knight from times of old.  The knight was standing tall, courageous and victorious.  Then there was a giant of a man, very strong and full of muscles and confidence.  Finally, there was before me an old white bearded, robed and hooded man.  His very existence exuded time tested wisdom with a little (or a lot) of mystery.  When I asked why I was being show these three archetypes, my guide said, these are really obvious symbols you already know the answer to.  I then thought, Courage, Strength and Wisdom were attributes I needed to learn to embody better than I have.  My guide nodded. 

This was just a month or so ago before I had any inkling of the potential change coming my way.  I don’t want to make too much of it at this point because, well, it is somewhat of a private journey for now but the guidance I was given prepared me for this.  Can I embody, Courage, Strength and Wisdom as I walk this part of the path?  I think that I can and along with that, I also have faith in myself to meet the journey well prepared, open and curious too.  Life changes can be scary sometimes but good things are often disguised within the heart of change.  This, I have learned.  I’m grateful to have learned.  That vision held some other gifts too, one’s I’ve not yet been able to fully consider.  There were 3 more symbols presented:  A crystal stone that had a rose quartz pink and orchid-like lavender colored light all around it.  The color was incredibly soothing and energizing.  The second was a bundle of Juniper branches.  The final item was a book with blank pages and a pen.  I’m thinking these are also related to the journey that has presented itself to me.   A healing journey and a return to my natural state of curiosity and exploring through the written word or, perhaps, a cross roads in my life in which the next steps are blank…new opportunity and a time to choose my direction with intention.

I love meditative visions.  Like dreams, they can give us symbolic and even actual guidance.  If it feels right and in good alignment with the core of my being, I pay attention and in that, have never been lead astray.  So, now, I take a step, a breath and smile at the unfolding of another beautiful day on Earth.

© 2018 Jaie Hart (photos and words)

Grace and Grattitude and Life

I wonder about the world today.  Two famous suicides this week and CDC statistics not looking good for us humans trying to make a life here on planet Earth, it seems.  And that is just it, “It seems.”   I haven’t been engaging my brain much of late, except for the necessities of work and family.  I can’t help but think about the future sometimes and how on Earth I can even remotely consider achieving my goals.  Some days it seems I’m running out of time, or there are too many steps here in order for me to get there.  So, I let all of those thoughts go and take a breath in the present moment where there is nothing but life and breath.  In those moments, there is nothing but what is.  There is this quiet and peaceful place or beingness, just observing all around me...birds still singing, sirens still blazing and my thoughts just flow.

I don’t have any answers for the world at large about anything.  I don’t have any bright advice that might save this world.  For starters, it isn’t my job and no, I am not apathetic.  I care a great deal but I tend to focus on that which I can influence, affect or change.  But lately, it doesn’t seem like I can change anything.  There is always one thing I can change and that is me, my thoughts, what I choose to perceive or entertain.  This world can be so dark and heavy sometimes but I just can’t align with only that or carry the emotion of that.  Even in this world when life seems so very pointless, there is a little spark inside of me that says, “just keep going, you can’t see the future, you don’t know what is around the next bend or at the top of the next hill you are about to climb.”  Thank God for that little voice. Were it not there, leading me and guiding me, I might have joined the 30% who gave up or gave in many times along this road of life.  My heart goes out to them (those who decided to leave) and to their family and friends.  I feel such a sense of sadness when I think of those who have packed it all in and just bailed out.  I get it.  I understand and I hold no judgment for them.  Only compassion.

So many struggle daily just to open their eyes in the morning, to breathe, to move and to exist.  I have no answers for them but I have love and I have compassion and if nothing else, I can try with all of my might to send that energy up and out for them, not to change them but just to surround them and let them know that at least energetically, they are not alone.  I think I’m becoming more of a realist these days; dealing only with what is directly before me.  Lofty dreams and ambitions are no longer my thing.  Making a difference in life for me is about those with whom I come into contact.  Can I be a good human in a moment, lend a hand, a meaningful thought or a smile?  That seems the most important thing for me today.  I smile at strangers and make eye contact whether or not I can do a single thing for them (including the scores of homeless I see routinely, daily now).  I can save none of them.  I can change not one thing about their experience other than to acknowledge them from one human being to another as if at least to say, “I see you and you matter, you are here, I feel you.”

I’m in a good place, really, having achieved a goal over the last decade and that was really to achieve peace.  Despite the thoughts I just laid out there, I am peaceful and calm.  I take in everything around me with a deep abiding appreciation for life on its terms, not mine. I watch the leaves sway in the trees, notice the colors, notice the art in motion, people moving, living and how amazing it is that things come and go in this world, or plane of existence.  Appreciation and gratitude can be such a balm to a weary soul.  There is grace to be found at the heart of every single experience we embrace if we but believe it will be there, it is always there and it will come to each and every one in a pure moment of readiness.  This, this is what keeps me moving in life.  The amazing awe and wonder not only for the existence in this moment but the moments to come.  Life is magical, terrifying, ugly and beautiful all at once.  It is incredibly chaotic sprinkled with moments of peace.  It is what it is.  I wish you great blessings of comfort, warmth and ultimate peace.  Be so very good to yourselves out there and try if you can not to get so caught up in the drama of life or the heavier emotions of your experience...like the seasons, these things always have a beginning and an end.  This thought or perspective, I realize,  is a tough one but certainly it is not an impossible one.  If you can, maybe try to believe or better, trust that deep within your souls somewhere is a spark, a beautiful spark of grace that will speak to you, guide and carry you each day of your life. 

Rest in peace Kate and Anthony and all of the rest of you beautiful human beings who tried with all of your might to make it here.  You will all be greatly missed.

© 2018 Jaie Hart (photos and words)

Happy Mother's Day and Some Thoughts to Share

Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers out there whether you are a biological mother or one who has bravely taken on the roll to mother a child or maybe even the inner child of an adult.  At times motherhood will seem the greatest of thankless tasks.  It certainly has its own rewards but most days you’ll feel anything but rewarded.  Do it any way and give your all to that child in your care for one day that child will become a full-fledged adult and go out into the world and carve a path for him or herself.  Don’t you want that to be an amazing path that inspires others?! 

As a mother of 3 adult children and one running to get there, I have been through moments of great joy, endless nights of worrying whether I did this right or that right and always trying to keep my wits about me even tired, tried and completely spent so that I could create the best opportunities for each of them in my own way.  It wasn’t easy but it is worth it.  My kids may not be the best or the brightest from the perspective of others but they are something by far more important in my eyes.  They are good people and to me, they are absolutely the very best.  They have morals and values, they question the status quo, they stand up for themselves and for others and they follow their hearts as they carve their own paths in this life.  That!  That makes me a very proud mama.

I still work hard to see clearly, the grown persons that they are beyond the little chubby faces and hands wrapped up in a blanket snuggled close as I rocked them to sleep.  Do we ever lose that ability?  To see the tiny precious child we have wrapped in our arms?  You know, every person we meet was a child just like that.  I wonder what it might be like if every person we encountered, we could flash back to that moment they were a tiny, precious, swaddled and loved child?  Would we be able to treat everyone we meet as if they were our own child?  I mean from the perspective of love and respect just for having made it to adulthood here in this frame?  What if we could look at ourselves with that same love and respect each time we looked into the mirror, forgetting completely about the years of tears and environmental psychology?

It takes so very long for a human child to grow into adulthood, self-functioning and reliant.  Some do it so well and some, maybe, not at all but I think they are still deserving of the love and respect from some place within them, from some place within the heart of all of us.  The world is full of children, just at different ages and various stages of progression.  Can we not find a way to love something in them all?  If we take this further and remember the smaller children…they want what they want when they want it and can become very frustrating people to have to deal with!  But, we love them any way, no matter what they do and no matter how crazy they seemingly make us.  What if we could hold that perspective for all of humanity, the good, the bad and the ugly?

All have gifts they bring to this awareness we all share.  I can appreciate that whether or not I agree with someone else’s behavior.  If I can look at every child and even the inner child of the adults I encounter as if he or she were my own, I could honor them at least with unconditional love or respect without sacrificing my own discernment as to whether or not I will participate along with them in anything I feel borders on the unsavory.  It feels to me that this perspective relieves me of my need to be better or best because we are all children dreaming this dream, learning to play nice in the sandbox who will one day grow up and look at the path that we have carved into this world.

I pray every day for my own children and the children of every mother who ever was and ever will be.  That prayer includes that each finds his or her own heart, that each finds a way to conquer the things they maybe should not have had to learn, that they embrace the paths towards awareness, self love, self-care and care for others they encounter on the path.  The ability to love with out fear is a challenge for many but as children, remember that we once loved without fear?  No matter what life has taught us in this regard we can RE-Remember what it was like, find that place again that truly unites us all and we can love the world and her children.  From this place of love, I greet this morning openly, aware, hopeful, filled with faith that the tiny fearless loving heart of every person on this planet will awaken.  Maybe they could find a place of gratitude for the life they were given and realize regardless of biology, they’ve had many mothers in their lifetime who have taught them amazing things that will influence their lives for the better.  There is that one person somewhere and some how who inspired in love and we knew that a part of our hearts remained alive and giving as a result.  I think there is a little mother within us all that guides us every day in our thoughts and good deeds great and small.  Cherish this not so very silent parent, this Source of our truest love.

Happy Mother’s Day.  I am grateful for all of you, for all that you do, for the hardships you master and the love you always find a way to give.

Copyright 2018, Jaie Hart (photo/words)

Day 1, Flow

Like many thousands across the globe, I woke up to a whole new year.  I wonder what it will bring but I won’t wonder too much.  I stopped making resolutions a long time ago.  Instead, I set goals and take steps to achieve them.  I don’t spend much time in review any more, I find living through some things once is more than enough.  I don’t take much time to sit in regret because I now trust myself more than any one and know that at any given moment in time, I did the absolute best that I could and things turned out exactly the way they were supposed to.

It has been so very quiet inside of my head for so long now.  It feels as if I were a ship with seas so quiet you could hear a pin drop.  No wind for my sails for a prolonged period gave me much time to just feel and be, rather than do and go.  I’ve not created much in a while, hardly a posting.  It troubled me briefly until I began to truly understand that it was not a lack in connection I suffered but a time of being fully connected to experiencing everything from an ever-expanding perspective and on each experiences’ own terms.

I won’t waste time in sorrow over anything in the last year that has come and gone.  All came perfectly; all went perfectly.  I do appreciate discovering lessons and I learned once again, my strength flourished in abundance in many appreciated and unexpected ways.  So, thank you Universe, Mother-Father God Goddess for the opportunity to be and breathe and exist here in this frame.

Life is fairly simple when we are not over-complicating it with expectation.  I spent the year living in a state of non-expectation.  I have to say, my last year went better than most I can remember.  I kept my consciousness close to the moment, mastered some fears and realized I had more I would contend with in time.  I discovered I had great love for many a thing and patience as vast as the Universe. 

I was tired at year’s end so took some time off for rest.  That was a very good decision, I think.  This next year will be very busy at work and I have new goals to work on for no other reason than to improve upon my surrounds and greater appreciation for being.  I’ll let go some more of the past that I’ve carried and embrace the empty spaces left behind with much love, wonder and excitement for life. 

So, another year on planet Earth is complete.  I hope to take the magic and wishes of the holidays with me through each day of this next year.  I’ve never really tried that before but it seems like this next year will need a little more magic than most and perhaps it’ll show us a bit of its own.  I smile at the thought and let it go with a warm and delicious sip of coffee on this cool, dark and quiet January 1.

I hope that you have a heart full of dreams, a mind filled with wonder and a sense of great peace about you every day of this next year.  Make it amazing with your ab-soul-ute best effort in every moment.  When this time next year comes around, you’ll be glad that you did for no other reason than a string of truly treasured experiences.

Wishing you great flows of beautiful energy, Blessings and much love.

Jaie 

(copyright 2018, Jaie Hart-photo and words)

The Familiar and Peace

Off in the distance I can hear the drone of the cars moving speedily down the freeway.  I think when it is cold out, like it is this morning, the sounds are more crisp and clear.  I’m sipping warm coffee and contemplating the week I had.  After dinner and some Christmas shopping last night, we listened to Christmas music.  My memory was flooded not with pictures and words but a myriad of feelings so intense.  It was truly beautiful.

As I sit here quietly tapping away on my keyboard, I can hear the buzz of cell phones in the house, social media and push notifications starting early.  Isn’t it simply amazing how physically we are connected now?  Within minutes, we know just exactly what is happening in some other part of the world so very far from where we are.

My little kitten yawns and stretches as my newly become adult child, who forgot to go to sleep in her own room last night, snoozes away so peacefully.  I relish the quiet time of the morning before my family starts moving.  It is peaceful and I can reach with my mind and being out into the world as if to send it the very best thoughts I can muster.  I’m grateful in this moment to be sitting in my home, that I have a home and with sleeping family, that I am also so very grateful to have.

Such a busy day we have today but I don’t have to think about that now.  I can continue to listen to the comforting sounds coming from the free way off in the near distance.  So many people coming and going, moving and thinking.  This place is incredibly wonderful with all of the science and gadgets we have at our finger tips.  To be honest, I take some things for granted.

I remember growing up, also not far from a very busy freeway.  In the wee hours of the morning, I would listen to the cars while the sun came up.  There were no social media push notifications on cell phones buzzing about the house then.  The mourning doves would sing the sun up and there wasn’t coffee for me then.  Just wonder about the day would hold.  I didn’t think as much then but I felt and what I felt was a strange peace and powerful energy that permeated everything.  I’d usually get up early, dress quickly and head outside to climb the tall pine tree in the front yard.  I always tried to see the freeway but I couldn’t quite get high enough.  In the branches of that tree I felt not only peace but a great comfort.  To be cradled by a tree is magical.

My thoughts meander now to all the trees and homes lost in the fires still burning in California.  It’s strange to me that we have a Fire Season.  We’ve always had it and so many days, even as I child, do I recall walking to school to see ashes floating through the air like it was a normal and ordinary occurrence at this time of year. 

Times have changed in so many ways.  The Earth grows hotter in my little corner of the world.  It is December and we’re to see 85 degrees today.  Not very Christmas-y.  I suppose we’ll have to just hold the spirit of it in our hearts and pray that all those of our neighbors affected by this year’s fire season are ultimately safe.  I ask for blessings now from the 4 directions and I send them out across the globe.  May the peace and reverence surround all, may the love and wonder of the world bring endless curiosity and gratitude for all of the wisdom of each of our respective experiences in life.  I wish you joy this day and great blessings for all of the rest of your days.

Copyright 2017, Jaie Hart photo/words

Persistence of a Tree: Being with What Is

If I look back, across the entire span of my life, I see many things.  I have experienced a great share of loss, of pain, anguish, betrayal, unpleasant surprise, wounding, mistreatment and dire sadness.  If I look back at those emotions, I might see an entire life wasted in frustration and feeling too much pain.  If I shift my gaze but just a little, I can also see triumph, recovery phases, moments of epiphany when the lessons dawned on my sleeping mind and an endless well of strength from which I dealt with all of my experiences.  If I look back carefully at the entire span of my life, I can see there too, great and magical joy, bliss, discovery, wonder, amazement, curiosity and a drive to always seek deeper meaning and understanding.  It has been a good life, I can say, in my first 50 years on planet Earth.

Now, now I begin a new part, a new path, and in many ways the same direction only with a broader worldview, a less personal worldview and a more open perspective on a great many things.  I have experienced for a great while, a feeling of stasis, non-movement, and silence all with a great sense of anticipation, but for what, I just do not yet know.  So, I dial it all back to the basics with great reverence and curiosity and notice the little things that haven’t caught my attention like the young tree standing near 6 feet tall in my garden.  I sought to pull it out once many years ago and it merely persisted.  So, I let it live where it is most want to grow and I’m happy to let it.  I haven’t a clue about what kind of tree it is and it doesn’t really matter.  It is strong and healthy and it sought purchase in the tiniest strip of land.  I hope that it prospers and grows.  I am reminded that we sometimes cannot even remotely understand the seeds we have planted.  We cannot see until the evidence grows much stronger, and taller, right before our eyes.

Life is a struggle sometimes, it is hard sometimes and it is a bit too busy or quiet for our liking sometimes.  But life persists despite our mental meanderings and musings, despite our emotions or desires and even dreams.  Life persists on its terms in the way that might truly be the most beneficial for us.  So, what to do in these next steps as the path slowly emerges?  I don’t know other than taking deep and gentle breaths as I learn to walk more gently, treat this body and all beings here much more sensitively, and to love more every single stick and stone that I come across with an ever greater and endlessly unfolding sense of pure and pristine gratitude.  Everything here has great history and magic as they have become here in this place.  We seem to always be in a state of becoming here but there is always this tiny precious place within us that already just IS.  Can you imagine that?  A place within us that isn’t becoming anything, just a quiet, transparent persistence of being, the I AM, the All of Everything perhaps peering out through our being, shining light on the pathway, giving us the quiet impetus for motion? Life is a great wonder and I must say that I greatly look forward to every breath and step in this time-space for as long as I am here.

I believe that in my years of quiet contemplation and existence, I am learning to see without my physical eyes.  I see through this sense of energy and feeling, this great sense of massive expanse stemming from everything in my field of vision.  I begin to understand a more steady presence always humming in the background just below normal auditory sensation.  It just IS and I’m not sure I need to wonder about that.  I think I am taking great comfort in the ability to be a part of the beautiful energy that just IS.  I suppose I could look back in regret or over-sentimentality here and there but that just really isn’t the heart of who I am.  I’ve thought all of my life I should be this or that or engage in doing this or that not just the right way but in the most perfect way.  All of it illusory thinking.  Being a part of what IS truly is the greatest realization.  Not focused on any form of It-ness but an Is-ness is much more liberating.  It is hard to explain something that is more of a feeling and not an emotion at all but perhaps a different sense altogether.

It won’t matter much to you unless you have wondered about these things.  I’ve learned in all of this time and with all of this experience that thinking cannot get you anywhere near this feeling of being with what IS.  And, this feeling carries its own sort of magic, peace and beautiful gratitude.  It contains within it a sense of perfect flow like an unimpeded stream.  I hope that you one day experience this.  I may write some more on this topic if the thoughts ever decide to coalesce better.  Until then, grab hold of gratitude for every breath you are here to take and treat yourself with pure and beautiful gentleness along with a great reverence.  Your being is beautiful.  Blessings.

Copyright 2017, Jaie Hart (photo/words)