Are inaction and non-productivity meaningful tools for restoring fertility or change? What’s in the pause? What happens when things are left unsown or uncultivated? Doing nothing, sitting in silence, or simply leaving things alone can be a fearsome challenge. I sometimes wonder who am I in the stillness. But often, when sitting and breathing, the question doesn’t even arise.
Last night in my Thursday night recovery meeting, I gave the lead share, a ten-minute talk on step three, “made the decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of (fill in the blank), as we understood (fill in the blank)”. Even though God or Higher Power (HP) is the preferred nomenclature, I chose to speak on presence. I told the story of how, during a recent hike, I discovered the power of taking a pause when troubling emotions emerged. In recovery, HP resides in the pause. What I attempted to describe is how the pause can provide a portal for presence. When anger bubbled up during the hike, I simply sat down on a rock and observed the felt sensations in my body. When the story faded and the fog cleared, I came to understand how I was projecting my pain on someone I care deeply about. In that moment, I discovered that instead of holding the anger, I allowed it to alchemize into compassion. All of that occurred in the space of the pause and it wasn’t planned. There was no intention behind it at all.
Intention is not always the way to roll. Unplanned activities invite unexpected experiences. The idea of moving from a place of fallow ground was introduced to me during a recent weekly herbal study group. I found the idea to be profound. It presented as a “duh” moment (duh being one of the most spiritual words in the English language). I began wondering why I’ve been fixated on intention since my early encounters with Mamacita Ayahuasca. It occurred to me how so many of the most profound experiences have arrived out of the realm of wandering and innate curiosity. Once upon a time I moved through life with openness and innocence. For example, this happened —
On my second day in Ireland, I took a long walk, hiking alone through a desolate area called the Burren, known for its wildflowers and ruins. On a hill overlooking Galway Bay, I discovered a ring fort where the Irish once watched for invaders coming from Europe. It was a warm day and I decided it would be a good idea to get naked and lie in the middle of this ancient stone structure. As I lay daydreaming away, I suddenly noticed the sound of tiny bells and hundreds of little footsteps. I thought to myself, “no, this can’t be”. I peeked through the cracked ruins and saw my faeries, a herd of goats with brass bells tied around their necks. I danced around the circle, exchanging a bit of prose with the goats and then fell back onto the moist grass. Staring up at the overcast sky, smiling at my near mystical encounter, I felt oddly at peace. Whole. It’s these glimpses that make life just mysterious enough to keep me desiring more and, at the same time, I could have died there and everything would have been just fine.
I’ve experienced this same felt sense at various times throughout my life. It’s been akin to watching a play with the characters as messengers sent by presence (or HP). Even though intention can be a useful tool, we rarely intentionally manufacture any deeply resonant experiences. Key events seem to just happen to us when we least expect it. I wonder at the mechanics of this — what if the intention isn’t to make things better but to get better at feeling our way into things? Then, at that point does intention drop away and we’re left with gifts of insight and intuition? What drew me to disrobe in that ring fort, for example? Why did I sit down in the forest and watch the storm clouds of anger dissolve? And more importantly, why do I choose to control my experiences rather than allow them to unfold?
Recently, a herd of elephants stomped on my chest as feelings of grief poured out of me and, on another day, a gigantic eagle swooped directly over my head just prior to a freak spring snowsquall. A million years ago as a child I sat in field and wild animals crawled into my lap, curious and unafraid. I’ve cherished so many of the experiences I’ve had while wandering through my life. Ghosts have spoken to me. I’ve danced with goats, dipped my toes into holy wells, stumbled into endless treasures, on land and sea, including surviving a sudden ferocious storm in the Bermuda Triangle. None of these encounters were planned. Here I am now, alone, on fallow ground, cultivating presence. The wind is howling. There’s something palpable here. I feel the goosebumps on my skin, the taste of fear on my lips.
https://stevenberger.substack.com/p/the-nature-of-reality