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 
Yesterday, I went out into a summer field and was stunned once more by the immense creativity that surrounds us. What an amazing variety of trees, grasses, scents, and birdsong! The wildflowers a riot of color! It is easy to forget this glory as we reel from the many disasters in our world. Rather than awe, we may feel helpless, frustrated, or afraid. Surely, we need to make room for these feelings. But the sheer wonder of existence is that each of us also shares in the vast creativity of the universe. It is our inheritance, and the kind of creativity that is most needed in our time. Every one of us has an inborn gift to bring to the world. It may not be ‘fancy.’ But it is uniquely ours. We may be completely unaware of what our gift is; it can be different from anything we’ve ever done. Still, we’re more likely to learn about it when we’re far from the culture’s noisy demands for attention and undistracted by a mind full of thoughts: when we’re in a field, in a forest, or on the beach, simply there: no book, no computer, no iPhone. In moments like these, nothing separates us from ourselves or from the upwelling life around us:
In the wilderness
my mind spreads out like water
pools
shines
reflects green boughs
and blue sky . . .
I listen to the trees whispering
and think no thoughts
(From Awakening the Energies of Love, p. 78)
When we sit quietly and listen, not to our thoughts, but to the silence that surrounds them, we occasionally tap a vein of intelligence that clearly doesn’t belong to us as individuals. Like a hint that bubbles up from energies moving through the cosmos, it comes out of the blue like a whisper or image arising from a deeper place than imagination. The kind of prompt our inner antenna detects rarely seems like anything important. It feels more like an inclination to do something very small. But when I actually take a step in response to that inclination, I find it becomes a way of participating in the world more fully than just by following my own ideas. I call it ‘following my thread.’ I like to think of it as one of the many threads the creative energies of the cosmos are weaving into a tapestry larger than I will ever understand.
Few of us find our creative gift all at once; we come to it by degrees when we listen to the silence, prepared to say ‘Yes!’ to what emerges. Then we follow our thread. The keys to following are these: We need to know we are enough. That what we have to give is welcome. And that the more we immerse ourselves in the natural world and listen, the more we’ll find of our real selves. Then we can give to others what we alone have to give.
In celebration of the wild creativity of the universe, and with Love,
Anne
Filed under attention, Change, Consciousness, Cosmic Creativity, Creativity, Intuition, overcoming fear, Vision by Anne Hillman
The ground is saturated here in California. The small lake over the hill is brimming, and there’s an unmistakable scent of warm mud in the air. I know that smell in my bones: After every March thaw in New England, we’d put our lawn chairs on some bare ground between patches of snow and sunbathe. We knew it wouldn’t last: it would snow again in April. But the smell of mud held a promise of new life and we reveled in it. We lived our little bit of spring in the midst of winter.
Once in a while, we get a glimpse of something new half-seen in another person or an event, a promise of something that wants to be born. It signals a different take on things and a manner of living it fully. Even in the midst of discouragement and fear, all of us can develop skills that will lend energy and impetus to that kind of creative possibility.
It is very difficult to see the many kinds of suffering around us and to live with the infinite slowness of change. We want to solve these problems and get results. Much as we long for solutions, they don’t always happen on our watch. Then it’s easy to become disappointed, discouraged, and afraid. Fear is a powerful god. For some of us, the more natural response to fear is to recoil, give up, or get cynical. Others may be more likely to take sides and try to trounce the opposition. These old kinds of reactions, the winter we live in, are taking a huge toll on all of us. But there is a more creative way. The alternative, when things go very wrong, is learning to give our attention to two things at once: To focus directly on the pain (rather than denying, ignoring or repressing it), and at the same time, hold it in a much larger awareness than thought. This capacity to embody and live from a mind that is not divisive, but instead heals, is available to all of us. You can find several examples in Awakening the Energies of Love and The Dancing Animal Woman. Even as things fall apart, we need to hold the larger vision, together. We can hope to live spring in the midst of winter!
Filed under attention, Change, Creativity, Love, Nature of Change, overcoming fear, Vision 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
I have always been grateful for the work of artists and as some of you know, relied entirely on art and photography to express the first intimations of what eventually became the book, Awakening the Energies of Love.If you haven’t yet learned about the free link to that presentation, The Evolution of Stress, please see the sidebar. When I look at that sequence of paintings now, I’m still astonished at how visionary those artists were! It was as if they’d painted the conflict, the confusion, and the feelings we are experiencing in our time, as well as the beauty of their potential resolution.
Last month, another painter, Mary Southard, created a glimpse of that potential in her graceful poster of ‘The Song of Love’ from Awakening the Energies of Love. It can be seen on the Ministry of the Arts website and would make a lovely gift for yourself, or for a friend, a grandchild, or someone’s graduation. Though their catalog shows the framed version here, it is also available for $10, unframed. MOTA produced the poster and will receive all the income.
Brian Swimme calls this creative process ‘Fire igniting fire igniting fire!’ So let’s ignite some creativity together! I was amazed at the breadth of responses that The Dancing Animal Woman inspired, among them, stained glass windows, CD’s for a cancer support program, videos at a celebration with indigenous peoples, calendars, and more. There’s now a page on my website for your own creative work. If something from Awakening the Energies of Love has inspired you, I’d be honored to display it with a link to your url. Please send your creative work here. In the meantime, here are the words on Mary’s poster of ‘The Song of Love’.
The Song of Love
You are loved. You are accepted, held in a vast embrace. There is nothing in you, nothing of character or tendencies, race or sexuality, accomplishment or failure that is not held, not needed. You are a child of God. That which you are is deeply wanted.
You are not alone, not left to your own devices. There is more going on than can be seen. You belong to an activity that is beyond comprehension. Trust it.
You are known. That which you have sought is seeking you. That which you want to offer life is greatly needed. You may not yet know what it is, but it is exactly the right gift and only yours to give. Give it.
You are part of a great leap of loving such as the world has never known. You have work to do. Begin it. There is only one ancient and forever work of art: the slow fashioning of life and the gradual flowering of Love. Find your way. Find your companions. Give your life to Love.
The world sings in its many voices,’Do you love me?’ It stumbles across your path a hundred times a day. Respond.
Be bread. Be broken. Let go of what you know. Find in your heart what your mind can’t comprehend. Moment by moment . . . place by place . . . person by person . . . wound by wound. Dance! Fall! Fail! You will be busy, but not with the busy- ness of the world.
In the heart of you lies Love. Without your opposition, it shines through you. You have only to let yourself be held in the larger embrace, let yourself be loved, let yourself be known as you are—and you will be lit up.
Thomas Merton said, ‘There’s no way of telling people they’re walking around shining like the sun.’
You are a shining. You are not only the small being who wants to be safe.
You are Love. You are Life. You are Light.
Go Shining.
Filed under Creativity, Love by Anne Hillman
