Touching Infinity

My heart is the temple of God, the Divine, Buddha, Yahweh, Hare Krishna, whatever you call ‘IT’, my heart is the temple of Its expression. Not the physical, worldly manifested red blood, beating place of life-giving force within my body. But rather, the soulful, love-exuding, love encompassing essence of my being. That heart. That’s the one I mean.

These thoughts went drifting through my mind this morning as I meditated on a Daily Prayer on Presence my friend BettyAnne M. shared this morning.

Presence

“I pause for a moment and think of the love and the grace that God showers on me, creating me in his image and likeness, making me his temple….”

When I am present to Love, when I am conscious of grace in every aspect of my life, my life becomes a conscious celebration of all that is holy, divine, magnificent within me and around me.

When we connect through the presence of Love, we become that through which we are connected — Love. And in our connection, we celebrate that which is our greatness. That which is holy, divine, magnificent within and about eachother.

What I put my attention on grows stronger in my life.

When I focus on my fears, worries and limiting beliefs about my capacity to be great in the world, my attention slips away from seeing the wonder and awe within and around me into that place where darkness constricts my vision. In the dark, my ability to be free of my fears and worries diminishes and contracts and I begin to play small, to act little, to act out on nothing other than my fear, I am not enough.

My friend and co-creator at the Centre for Conscious Living, Howard Parsons shares his insight on being conscious of where we put our attention this morning in his Hopeful Notes from Howie J.  (Do sign-up. His short, inspiring tips on living consciously every day are always a welcome gift in my Inbox every weekday morning.)

When there is discord in your life then there is discord in your heart, writes Howie.

And it’s true. When I am operating from a place where fear, anger, worry constrict my thinking and my heart, I hurt. Physically.

When I breathe. When I consciously ask to ‘be open to expansion’, my heart beats more freely and the physical effects of my worry, fear and anger dissipate immediately. Free of their tight hold on my heart, and breath, I become more conscious of what I am choosing. In my conscious awareness of my choices, I ask myself. What do I want to create in myself and in the world? Discord or harmony? Anger or compassion?

Years ago, when I was under the thrall of a relationship that was killing me, every fibre, joint, muscle in my body hurt. I constantly thought I was going to have a heart attack. Getting up in the morning was pure agony.

And then, one day, the man who had promised to love me ’til death do us part was arrested and in one fell swoop, I was given back my freedom. I awoke the next morning and my body didn’t hurt. The band constricting my heart was gone and I could breathe freely.

It was a huge awakening.

My body had been trying to tell me something for months and months and I had been ignoring it. Trapped into the vicious cycle of my dark and fearful thoughts, I couldn’t see that I had other choices I could have made. I only believed, no. I only told myself, I cannot leave. This is all I deserve. This pain and horror of my existence in this relationship is all I am worth.

It wasn’t true.

I am worth so much more than he could or would have given me. I am worth so much more than living a life of fear and anxiety. Of walking with pain and sorrow and heartache as my companion.

I am worth freedom. I am worth beauty. I am worth expressing my divine radiance, my loving gifts, my heartfelt compassion for life, for me, for everyone I meet.

I meditated on a prayer of Presence this morning and awoke to the beauty of my being present in the world as I am created. No matter your word, God, Yahweh, Buddha… you are the divine expression of amazing grace in a world of wonder.

And in the amazing grace of expressing our magnificence in everything we do and say and are and see and become, we make a world of difference.