This practice is simple, straightforward, and to the point. Its goal is to offer you support in developing the habit of remembering that everything you encounter, including the air you breathe, is the Sacred in form, is Spirit dressing up as all that is.
Here’s an audio version of the written information below, if you prefer to listen to it.
As you listen, please press pause when you need additional time to take in the practice.
And, please remember never to listen to these recordings when driving or using machinery.
To begin, take a moment to settle into your body, perhaps by becoming aware of the surface supporting you right now. You may find this practice easier to do if you sit down and have a bit of time to explore these steps.
Next, notice the sensations that accompany settling and allow yourself to hang out with them for a little while. As you do, notice if you settle even a bit more…
Notice, now, how your thoughts and feelings respond to your body’s settling and give yourself a bit of time to invite yourself into a quieter state of mind, a more settled emotional state.
Now, allow yourself to become aware of the fact that your body is comprised of countless earth-kin–microbes, bacteria, cellular structures creating all the various elements in your body: your bones; your muscles, tendons, and ligaments; your organs; your blood vessels, capillaries, veins, arteries; all the fluids that flow throughout your body; your digestive system; your lungs; the fascia that is connected throughout your body, just under your skin, around your organs; your skin, the largest organ of your body and one that enfolds your whole physical being like a living envelope. Your body is a collaborative community of trillions of earth-kin, of life forms, that work together to allow your body to be here, that allow your consciousness a place within which you experience physical life.
Everything you bring into awareness is comprised of particles that are from the same source as those that comprise the surface under you and the environment around you, with everything it contains. There is no physical form of any kind that isn’t comprised of these same kinds of particles, all Spirit in form, “dressed up” as different kinds of substance, as the vast array of earth-kin.
At levels you can’t perceive directly, the particles in your body are moving in patterns. Notice how it is to imagine that everything around you also has particles moving in patterns. There is life all around you, from the same source as yours.
Spend a few minutes simply being present to the fact that everything around you arises from the same source as you do, that everything around you radiates the same life energy as yours. You may be dressed up differently and you may have a different quality of consciousness, but the source is the same–the One Spirit, the Sacred essence that expresses through all that is.
Notice what arises as you take a moment to register that you are related to everything around you, that everything you encounter is an earth-kin of some kind or another. Drawing on Thich Nhat Hanh’s word “interbeing”, notice your experience when you recognize that you “interare” with everything around you, without exception, and that you are inextricably interdependent with the countless beings who share this planet with you. And, especially, that everything you encounter arises from, and is, the same Sacred presence that informs all life.
When you’re ready, bring yourself back into full everyday awareness by wiggling your fingers and toes, and then move on to whatever is next on your agenda, carrying with you the resonating tone of your experience of oneness with all that you encounter as you go forward with your activities.
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