Gratitude, Love and Appreciation

“Please help me!” I used to say aloud. When I felt small, vulnerable and lost, I felt depleted of resources to help myself, to take an action, to have capacity, to feel bigger and more powerful.

Slowly, I have come to speak a new expression:

“Thank you for helping me!”

My explorations of noticing my reactions to stimuli (what someone said or did or didn’t), my pausing and listening to myself with softness and empathy, my listening to the world and my responses with the world and myself, have brought me to another place, where I am continually grateful.

The world already knows me. The trees, the air, the light, the blessed ground, the oceans already know me. Every atom in my body has been the water in a drop of ocean and rain, the air breathed by my ancestors into my DNA, a molecule of glucose made with carbon dioxide from ancient air and dissolved rocks, my iron, magnesium, zinc, potassium, sodium, calcium, sulphur – were rocks in the soil or minerals in the oceans and they remember me and are remembered in me. Every cell of my body is a piece of the world and all beings. When you see my smile, you see the world.

As well as experiencing my smallness and vulnerability, I am also vast and powerful, when I remember the resources that are already here for me and nourish me through every moment and every breath.

I see the magnificent sun set and my body trembles in receiving the unutterable beauty around me, holding me. The marvellous colours, the precious contours and shapes of the mountains, the tones and shades of the land and sky, the rippling reflections in the waters resonate so deeply in me. They ARE me.

When you see my smile, you see the world. When I see you, I see the world. We are expressions of the universe in the forms of me and you.

When I sense feelings of fear and pain, yes, some very young version of me tells a story: “I don’t matter, I am overlooked and not chosen, I am not receiving enough love, no matter how much I pour my heart into the world, there is no-one to be with me and care about me.” I might try to “fix” my sadness with reactive behaviour that arises, urgency to be wanted, to receive approval and love, to be witnessed and valued in my contributions and gifts. All of these sensations are inside me, no-one else can see them and my behaviour might appear as strong. Almost immediately, I recognise my reactions and understand that my young self needs my love and compassion, some quiet space/time to hear these stories and allow them to flow through me as not real, as constructs made in my thinking brain when it drives away from my sensing body. I slowly return to rest in wholeness, in the vast beauty, joy and pleasure that already know me and love me. These resources support me when I contemplate the terrors and fears in the world.

I see my companions and remember that I am loved, seen, heard, known and valued.

I am present in the magnificence of the light, my light, in the eternal fluidity of the ocean, my flow, held in the nourishing flux of the Present, my selfing in the continual relationships in the world and other selves. Are you with me?

Gratitude, love and appreciation for my aliveness, abundance, vitality, receptivity, grounded spaciousness, fluidity and light. Gratitude for all of us and all beings.