top of page

In its most basic expressions, life on Earth is teeming with inexhaustible richness. What’s more, we’ve been graced with bodies that are perfectly suited to take it all in and fully experience the beauty and abundance that it so freely offers. We truly need nothing more. Yet, for some reason, this hasn’t been enough and we’ve sought increasingly complex, abstract ways of making our way in the world and gratifying ourselves.

 

The reasons for this aren’t for our discussion here, but suffice it to say that we’ve lost touch with something essential in our nature and the greater fabric of existence. Far from improving our quality of life, our misguided, extravagant ways have actually diminished our well-being and deprived us of a more meaningful experience. Moreover, they’ve alienated us from the rest of the planetary community and dramatically degraded the ecology for all beings. If we’re to heal these relationships and restore balance to our impact on the earth, we need to reconnect to those fundamental aspects of being which affirm our true nature and purpose.

 

For every other creature on the planet, life’s daily activities are in direct relationship to their basic needs. There’s no disconnect, no abstractions, and relatively little division of labor, if any at all. Tending to life as it actually is, a profound intimacy with one’s essential experience prevails, promoting health and well-being for the individual, and unity and wholeness for the community.

 

While we must acknowledge that we’re somehow different in some ways from the rest of life on Earth, perhaps there’s something to this mode of being in which we can find wisdom, guidance, and ultimately, redemption. It wasn’t that long ago that we did live much more in tune with the natural order. This isn’t to suggest that we should simply revert to those times, but it does indicate that we have the latent capacity to embody a greater degree of connection, awareness, and intention in our daily experience.

 

As we move forward, and in doing so, consider the past, let’s establish a common understanding about where we’ve been. We can regard our collective digression in a few ways. Many see it not as any kind of wayward deviation, but rather a desirable development of evolution and progress. Others may find some of the consequences regrettable, yet view our course as inevitable and, in the end, favorable. A minority deem modern humanity to be something of an abomination and a cancer.

 

We propose another perspective. The unfoldment of our path from living naturally in harmony with the rest of life on Earth, to our current estrangement and dysfunction, is part of a greater plan. Our predecessors’ way of being was, to a large extent, instinctive and unselfconscious. It arose from true need and conformed to the time-honored patterns that had been established over eons by the collective intelligence of the whole planetary community. To be sure, it was also considered and intentional, but they really knew no other way and, thus, couldn’t fully appreciate the supreme wisdom and value that was inherent in how they lived.

 

As compromises crept in little by little over the generations, it wasn’t immediately apparent what was being lost. Some did, of course, begin to recognize that these new approaches were having unintended consequences, but their warnings were drowned out by the calls of progress. We stand now, at a point in time where we have the historical perspective to clearly see that our aberrant ways are badly flawed and aren’t working for us or the planet. In fact, we may well have reached a pivotal juncture at which our course of direction in the coming years could determine whether we can recover the abandoned ethos of our forebears, or overstep the boundary across which this possibility is irretrievably gone.

 

Our age has a monumental opportunity to redirect our errant path and come full circle. With complete awareness and perspective of the alternative, we can begin to reintroduce our forgotten wisdom and conventions, now fully knowing their profound significance to the welfare of ourselves and the rest of the world. Furthermore, this growth in consciousness could facilitate even deeper levels of insight than were available to our predecessors, and elevate the richness of our experience to an unprecedented dimension.

 

It goes without saying that life isn’t meant to be a mere mechanical exercise, plodding along half-robotically, preoccupied with checking the boxes that our programming tells us are important. Yet, to a considerable extent, this is how we’ve come to live. We tend to reduce life to a very limited spectrum, rigid and formulaic, subordinating authentic, vital, spontaneous experience to the dictums of our artificial and dubious modern values. In its essence, life is suffused with a kind of art, poetry, and musicality. Previous generations of humanity recognized this and lived better for it.

 

By no means an exceptional occurrence, we can experience this enchanting quality of life at will once we know where, or rather, how to look, and have developed the necessary sensitivity and perceptive faculties. It’s also important to remember that life doesn’t just happen around and to us, but that we’re also life itself; arising from the same source energy as everything else and just as much a participant in the great unfoldment. As such, we have the capacity to create this kind of experience for ourselves at any time. This may seem obvious, but if we truly grasped this reality, we surely wouldn’t be content to carry on in the mundane, apathetic manner that we so often do.

 

While this innate spirit of being is within all things, it’s more accessible and, perhaps, more pure when we’re engaged directly with the substance of life. The very things that humankind has strived so mightily to circumvent, outsourcing them to machines or exploited peoples elsewhere, are those aspects of living which offer the most enriching and gratifying experience, as well as providing the greatest opportunity for the growth of consciousness and divine connection. A way of life which employs our bodies and immerses our senses, far from being the arduous, dreary existence that we’ve come to believe, is actually the most invigorating and satisfying. We do know this on some level, as it is our inherent orientation, but have still generally opted for the ostensible comfort of our sedentary, screen-based reality.

 

Collectively transitioning to a more natural, harmonious way of being will be a necessarily gradual process. It’s heartening that, in recent years, many people have rediscovered the virtues of these kinds of pursuits. Although it’s probably impractical for most of us to make any significant life changes overnight, we can always bring this spirit of engagement to whatever we’re doing, thereby elevating our immediate experience and facilitating opportunities for more fundamental transformation.

 

There are countless endeavors which can serve as a gateway to a more connected, meaningful way of life, so we won’t enumerate them here. In any case, it’s up to each of us to discover for ourselves those things that inspire and enliven us. Our concern here is that quality of attention and attitude which enables us to unveil our surface experience of things and reveal their essence and multidimensionality within.

 

We can use a number of techniques to invoke this state of being. As always, a foundation of inner stillness is essential. This is often easier said than done, however, and the following practices can help to elicit such a condition of poised awareness. Consciousness is dynamic and multifaceted, and we can utilize this to indirectly induce the state that will serve us when we might otherwise be struggling to realize it.

 

These techniques may seem overly simplistic and rudimentary. We might expect that processes of this nature must involve something esoteric or magical, requiring extensive study and training. Fortunately, this simply isn’t the case. We all have the innate ability to unlock the door to this greater reality within just as we already are. The mechanisms of shifting, and ultimately, transforming consciousness are remarkably straightforward. Though not necessarily easy to sustain for any duration, what with the incessant distractions from our demanding psyche, we can engage them at any time and bring some measure of awakening into our experience, however brief.

 

The key to getting the most out of these moments is the attitude and intention with which we approach them. Needless to say, if we just go through the motions, but don’t really believe in the spirit behind them, they’re unlikely to have much effect. Conversely, when we acknowledge and attune to the truth of the process, with an earnest sincerity and expectation, a deeper experience will unfold for us. This kind of conviction won’t be immediately available for all of us, of course, but if we can let go of any preconceptions or prejudices, even just temporarily, and open up to the possibility of these unfamiliar dimensions of existence, then we give belief the opportunity to arise of its own accord.

 

The first thing that we can do to initiate a perceptive shift in our experience is to slow down. This applies, of course, to our physical movements, but it’s equally applicable to our internal dynamics. If we direct our attention and awareness inward, we can feel a sort of energetic presence or core. Even when our bodies are still, this internal energy can be quite active, even frantic. By observing how it manifests and moves throughout our body, we can learn to manipulate it in various ways, including bringing it to a relative stillness.

 

Another helpful adjustment that we can make to our inner energy is to center it within our body. Left to itself, this energetic core will tend to concentrate in the area to which we give our attention. Since we spend so much time up in our heads, this is where it often resides. If we catch ourselves for a moment when we’re lost in thought, and feel into our body, we’ll likely notice this concentrated presence, maybe a sort of pressure, within and around our head. The projection of our mind to another time and place can be so pronounced that we might even feel this energy lurching outward through the top of our head into the space above.

 

While these kinds of projections and concentrations, no doubt, have their appropriate applications, for our everyday experience, it’s best that our core energy settles down around our midsection. When it’s here, we’ll feel a greater sense of inner balance and calm. Without the weight and turbulence of it burdening our mind, our perception will open up and become clearer. As this is our natural state, we shouldn’t have to force our inner energy back into place; it should return there on its own when conditions allow. We can encourage this by simply pausing, closing our eyes, taking a deep breath, and becoming intently present with what we’re doing.

 

With our being now in better alignment, we can engage our experience with greater receptivity and intention. As we undertake an activity with this consciousness, our aim is to immerse our awareness in the sensory experience of it. Again, this may seem elementary, but it’s remarkably rare that we truly take in the full spectrum of what we’re experiencing. Inevitably, our attention drifts elsewhere and we deprive ourselves of the utmost essence of what life is offering.

 

Being available to it requires that we give our complete attention to the moment. We must closely observe our immediate environment and interactions with it, consciously receiving the input that comes to us through our various senses. Engaging our experience in this way really brings it to life, giving each sensation a vibrancy and clarity that they simply lack when we go about our day passively. Not only does this elevate the quality of our practical experience, it also aligns our consciousness squarely with the present, broadening our perception and allowing deeper realities to reveal themselves.

 

Lastly, it’s essential that we frequently give thanks. Gratitude is one of the most powerful tools that we have to orient ourselves to the true nature of things. A sincere expression of gratitude is an acknowledgment that we’re part of a greater reality, interconnected and interdependent upon an infinitude of beings and unknown forces. Attuning to this, further helps to open our consciousness and facilitates connections with these unseen energies, allowing them to contribute more in our lives and round out the multidimensional picture of our existence.

 

Putting all of this together, a new way of being emerges. Our immediate experience becomes richer, clearer, and more peaceful. We’ll also find that our intuition awakens and that we’re more decisive and intentional. As things manifest from this orientation, our activities will come alive, realizing an almost musical sense of rhythm and harmony. Feeling into this, we become supreme orchestrators of our experience, unified with the other participants in the unfolding composition, and conducting our movements with a natural ease and flow that may well begin to resemble something of a dance.

 

The universal source of life has blessed our world with extraordinary beauty of every kind, and all the opportunity to live wisely and artfully within it. Its very fundamental design encourages us to be ever present and participate directly with the primordial elements and energies of which it’s composed, working with them and collaborating with all other beings to make our own contributions to the great, infinite tapestry of creation. Although we’ve lost sight of this, it’s an essential part of our inherent nature and we need only to give attention to this aspect of being to rekindle it in our daily lives. To do so is to honor and celebrate the sacred gift of life, and sets us well on the path to fulfilling our ultimate purpose on this earth.

We welcome and encourage your input, which you may send to: contribute@anotherwaybeing.org.

REDISCOVERING THE ART OF BEING

bottom of page