What if the Mayans were predicting, not the end of the world in a particular year, but an end to the way we live our lives? I’ve long been awed by the number of people in the last fifty years who’ve been seeking a spiritual path and practice. Surely, this inner migration is amazing. Something has been drawing us beyond the confines of thought toward a new way of being. So when a friend’s New Year’s greeting began, “Happy New Era!” it seemed the Moment to say, “It’s Time.”
If we were to step up to that challenge, to take responsibility for entering the New Era in each moment and in each day, what would that look like? Might it lead toward a new way of being? To a new identity as Being? To speak from Being . . . listen from it . . . live from it? How could we establish ourselves in that new way of life?
What if in each moment, we simply practiced one thing: we came to rest in our own Presence—our own Divinity—and didn’t judge or resist what that moment offered? It would not be easy. But each time we dropped down into our bodies, fully Present to the moment, to ourselves, and to each other—that would be a true letting go. For that moment, the old would pass away. Perhaps, in time, we’d come to realize that we were indeed, Beings—that what had dawned in this New Era was a Living Light—and that Together, we were a Shining. We’d manifest it, unabashed and unashamed, and pour ourselves out: our lives, our gifts and our passions. Our Light.
Filed under Awakening, awareness, Change, Consciousness, Intimacy with Life by Anne Hillman 
Conversations with Anne – 3 Free Webinars
Dear Companions, I’ve been deeply moved by your emails from around the world in response to Awakening the Energies of Love. Now, I’m longing to connect with you in a more personal way. I invite you join me in a series of three phone-in conversations:
Free Webinar Series – Thursdays, February 12, 19 and 26, from 4:30 –5:30 PM PST.
I welcome you to invite a friend, or to gather a group of friends to join us, if you’d like to share the experience. [Please ask them to email me, too].
• What is the difference between attention and awareness?
• How has your sense of identity changed?
• What is under-standing?
• How would I access life differently?
• Why does awakening matter?
Filed under Awakening, awareness, Balance, Change, compassion, Consciousness, embodiment, Inner peace, Intimacy with Life, Love, openheartedness, Support for the Spiritual Journey, Uncategorized by Anne Hillman
WINTER 2013 ~ LIVING AS BEINGS
A Two-Thousand-Year-Old Baobob Tree at Dawn
What if the Mayans were predicting, not the end of the world, but an end to the way we live our lives?
I’ve long been awed by the number of people in the last fifty years who’ve been seeking a spiritual path and practice. Surely, this inner migration is amazing. Something has been drawing us beyond the confines of thought toward a new way of being. So when a friend’s New Year’s greeting began, “Happy New Era!” it seemed the Moment to say, “It’s Time.”
If we were to step up to that challenge, to take responsibility for entering the New Era in each moment and in each day, what would that look like? Might it lead toward a new way of being? To a new identity as Being? To speak from Being . . . listen from it . . . live from it? How could we establish ourselves in that new way of life?
What if in each moment, we simply practiced one thing: we came to rest in our own Presence—our own Divinity—and didn’t judge or resist what that moment offered? It would not be easy. But each time we dropped down into our bodies, fully Present to the moment, to ourselves, and to each other—that would be a true letting go. For that moment, the old would pass away. Perhaps, in time, we’d come to realize that we are indeed, Beings—that what had dawned in this New Era is a Living Light—and that Together, we are a Shining. We manifest it, unabashed and unashamed, and pour ourselves out: our lives, our gifts and our passions. Our Light.
Photograph by Anne Hillman
See more in “Taking Root: An Unbroken Intimacy with Life” in the Fall Kosmos Journal
2013 Three Upcoming Retreats:
Toronto area, April 19-21 An Unbroken Intimacy with Life, A Weekend Retreat
Madison WI, 3 or 5-day options: April 23-25 Taking Root ~ A Depth of Intimacy with Life or with additional days, April 25-27, Depth Perception ~ The Sensation of Light
Filed under Alignment, Allurement, attention, Awakening, awareness, Balance, Change, compassion, Consciousness, Cosmic Creativity, Creativity, Inner peace, Instinct, Intimacy with Life, Intuition, living with contradictions, Love, Nature of Change, openheartedness, overcoming fear, presence, Surrender, Uncategorized, Whole-bodied attention by Anne Hillman
There is so much more to a human life, possibilities we are normally unaware of, innate gifts we might bring to the world. To learn what they are, some of us have to be broken: confronted by something that compels us to surrender. Until then, we may have been reasonably satisfied with our lives, content with our own point of view. But when we’ve been humbled by storm or earthquake, illness or shame; by loss or just the ordinary process of aging, grace comes, and with it, opportunity after opportunity to deepen our way of perceiving, so we can ‘hear’ with more of ourselves.
Then, we learn to give the larger life our whole-bodied attention. We ask in the moment, What now? and listen with all our faculties. We dare to follow what allures us. This is the relationship that matters now: to move with the deeper movement ‘of the earth, of spirit, of the unknown’ in an unbroken intimacy with life. In this communion, we live in time and eternity intertwined, one day, one moment at a time.
- Coyote cub allured (AH)
Filed under Alignment, Allurement, attention, Awakening, awareness, Balance, Consciousness, Creativity, Intimacy with Life, Intuition, Whole-bodied attention by Anne Hillman
We live in a Time of great upheaval, challenged on all fronts by conflicts in our world, our political systems, our religions and often those most difficult to see, the conflicts within ourselves. When what we know doesn’t seem to be working, life can seem dark, and we may feel lost and even afraid.
Times of darkness are choice points. They press us as individuals and as a species to choose from one of two ways to proceed: we can either change ourselves, meaning change our constant orientation to our thoughts, or render ourselves extinct.
We have in us, have had bestowed on us, everything we need to respond to the Time in which we’ve been born. We just need to know where and how to look,where to put our attention. There is no room for creativity in minds chock full of old ideas and old views. Perhaps, instead, we might let ourselves be lost and not know. When we’re lost, we can do three simple things: Create a quiet moment, a clearing in the forest of our activities. Sit in the stillness without trying to figure anything out. Turn our attention to the simple movement of our breath and let the thoughts drain away. And in the spaciousness of not knowing, allow the New to unfold.
Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. Blaise Pascal
www.annehillman.net Art by Joan Brady
Filed under attention, Awakening, awareness, Change, Consciousness, Creativity, Intuition, Nature of Change, presence, quiet mind, Vision by Anne Hillman
I have been reading your book Awakening the Energies of Love at one of the hardest/richest times of my life. I actually thought I was going crazy, losing my mind (I know this would have it’s upsides), maybe even bi-polar with these wild ups and downs that I have never before experienced. I believe I am slowly experiencing an awakening. I immersed in yoga and meditation this summer and began to experiencing this new sensation- somewhat disturbing! This energy I have been experiencing in my body- voltage- currents- tingling and pulsating in my feet, legs, hands at the third eye center, crown of my head, left frontal cortex- these energy currents my intellect tried to analyze, pathologize. Then- I read pages 240 and 241 and I just began to laugh!!! . . . It is my body- reminding me everyday, with greater and greater intensity that something has changed!! I believe I mistakenly interpreted these sensations as fear, anxiety, panic . . . I also believe that I interpreted this as fear and insecurity out of a self-defeating pattern of “I don’t deserve this kind of joy” messaging. . . Is my story somewhat common? With Gratitude!!! Lori
Dear Lori, . . . I’m happy that you have been helped by reading Awakening the Energies of Love. It sounds like you are listening hard to your body’s messages and interpreting what you ‘hear’ in ways that are useful to you. I wish I could answer your questions, but I’m afraid don’t feel qualified to do so. . . . During the periods I described in the book, I was working with a qualified professional I could trust to guide me.
I think it can be exceedingly helpful to be guided through the process you are describing by a reliable teacher or a PhD level therapist who is fully trained and they can better answer your questions. There are a lot of junk-helpers out there; It’s important to be selective. I don’t know where you live. . . Given your financial circumstances . . . I’d be inclined to recommend that you be in touch with SEN, the Spiritual Emergence Network http://www.spiritualemergence.info/. It is a highly respected organization founded maybe 20-30 years ago specifically for people like you who may be awakening and are wondering about the kind of symptoms you describe (and other symptoms too). Best of all it is free. They are centered at ITP, the Institute for Transpersonal Psychology in Palo Alto, CA but have professional affiliates in the field of Transpersonal Psychology all over the world. You can trust this organization and its affiliates. Lori. it is a temptation to Google the subject and try to read about it and buy more books but I urge you to consider not trying to make this a “do it yourself” project. If you’ve reached the admonishments I wrote about on pages 249-250, there are very good reasons for caution as well as for celebration!
With blessing, Lori,
Warmly,
~ Anne ~
Filed under Awakening, awareness, Uncategorized by Anne Hillman
Kosmos — perhaps one of the loveliest journals that exists — features an article by Anne Hillman on Personal and Global Transformation in their Summer ’09 issue. Kosmos takes no advertising and has spared nothing to make it a feast for the eye, hand, and mind. The art and photography are spectacular and I love the feel and look of the print version. This particular issue is the first to go online and you can read the digital version of Personal and Global Transformation here. Unfortunately, the online version doesn’t separate an article’s headers from the text as clearly as they are in print. However, you can also get a back copy of any issue of Kosmos from their “subscribe” page. I guarantee you: to read each issue is an amazing experience! And I am still surprised and very grateful to be included in their immensely creative adventure.
Offerings — the quarterly journal from the Center for Spiritual Enlightenment in San Jose CA, is dedicated to "Spiritually Conscious Living in an Awakened World". The Summer ’09 issue includes an article condensed from the first chapter of Awakening the Energies of Love by Anne Hillman. The Center welcomes people of all traditions and as well as those who may feel spiritually ‘homeless,’ and meets countless local needs as well as those of people around the world. I am grateful for the emailed daily inspiration from Spiritual Director, The Rev. Ellen Grace O’Brian. Like all the Center’s publications, the journal is aesthetically satisfying and filled with wisdom. You can request a free copy by writing the center at info@csecenter.org
Filed under Awakening, Love, Spiritual Support, Support for the Spiritual Journey by Anne Hillman
In these early days of December, as a soft rain falls in California, I remember the first snowfall in New England; how it blanketed the earth and muffled sound—and silence became a spacious and holy presence. As the winters progressed, however, and we shoveled snow and pulled soggy socks from our children’s feet, that dark stillness often brought depression. We forgot that it held promise, hid something deeper: new life gathering itself to be born. We live in a dark time. Many of us have sought to help solve some of the immense difficulties confronting us, to learn the truth of each situation, and to grow in understanding. We’ve taken stands on countless issues and made the best decisions we knew how. But we are beginning to see that the kinds of solutions our cultures have to offer are blunt instruments—and we begin to realize we need more refined means of resolving our dilemmas.
Even as conflicts escalate the world over, we can lend the weight of our presence to a different kind of action. We are learning that it is possible to integrate a more subtle form of activism with social action, and that one can flow quite naturally out of the other. We’re discovering in groups of all kinds around the world that our lives are deeply joined; that we can participate at a level of sensibility that is complementary to problem solving and does not seek to make one side right and the other wrong. Entire groups are awakening to this truth as they dare to take the position that they do not know the answer. Instead, they choose to embrace opposing views, give focused attention to the silence, and trust. Then a common voice may arise.
This week, the Indigenous Peoples of the World are gathering in Fort Collins and Carbondale, CO at the same time the UN Climate Change Conference takes place in Copenhagen, the Parliament of World Religions in Melbourne, and the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded President Obama in Oslo. In any group in which you have more than a casual membership, I invite you to set aside conversation for a short time, postpone closure in your own mind, and listen in the silence for something new. After all, it is that time of year, and as nature has always shown us, it is out of darkness that light is born again.
Filed under Awakening, Balance, Change, Creativity, Nature of Change, overcoming fear by Anne Hillman
Jay Matternes, whose painting of “Homo Habilis Woman” is the frontispiece for Awakening the Energies of Love: Discovering Fire for the Second Time, wrote this week to say that his scientific reconstruction of the 4.4 million year old fossil, ‘Ardi’, could be seen on “Discovering Ardi” a documentary on the Discovery Channel. Last night we watched this extraordinary story of the painstaking excavation of our human progenitor—a million years older that ‘Lucy.’ It is now available on DVD. The animation based on Jay’s exacting anatomical drawings brought an ancient grandmother to life, and I was vividly reminded that several thousand years of religious development had gradually anesthetized the deep human, bodily experience of the Mystery and replaced it with abstractions like ‘consciousness’ or a disembodied, transcendent God.
Filed under Awakening, Love, Transformation by Anne Hillman
