Making Life Meaningful- Honouring Currents Of Change

So welcome to this meditation on making life meaningful and honoring the currents of change in our lives.

Today we're going to begin with a short spoken section and then we're going to take time to sit together to honor whatever is changing,

Whatever is shifting shape in our lives.

As humans I believe that we yearn to make life meaningful.

We want to mark the days and the months and the years as they go roaring past us.

We yearn to be witnessed,

To take a moment to stop and see that something has shifted in our lives.

Maybe we want to honor when we're in a relationship finally or out of one.

That we've moved,

We have a new job,

Something's happened with our body and its circles and cycles,

Something's happening to a loved one,

They're no longer here for some reason.

Our lives are impacted by so many things and we have so few rituals to honor that.

Amidst all of the 21st century busyness,

It seems that we're just expected to assimilate these changes and move on to the next.

We long to have our passageway through life witnessed,

To take time to honor the things that are shifting or changing.

We yearn to notice that something has happened,

Something significant in the currents of our life has changed.

Often our lives change step by step,

Day by day,

Sometimes by momentous moments.

I believe that a key part of making our life more meaningful is noticing what is happening,

Of being really here and present enough to be with it.

A key part of self-care is knowing how we feel about the events of our lives and making and taking time to do whatever we need to do to honor those changes.

The Dharma teaches that change is a constant,

And it is,

And yet like the seasons of life,

It's good to notice the changes and the shifts.

Sometimes we need to honor what needs to be honored and take care of what needs to be taken care of.

So today we'll make the space to mark a moment,

To honor something that's shifting in your life.

I don't know what that is for you exactly,

But I trust that because you're listening to this,

You want to give something in your life some space.

Sometimes we have friends and family that support us,

Sometimes we just don't have the time,

We need to use our own self-care,

Our own witness to mark something,

To honor it for our own sweet selves.

So let's begin.

Come to a meditation posture right here in this moment.

Take a seat amidst your life.

Come to a pause place amidst all you are doing and tending to.

Let the body settle,

Find some stillness.

Feel your body,

The base of the body.

Feel the tides of the breath flowing in and out.

Feel the momentum from your life that you're entering into this meditation with.

If your life has been busy or full or empty,

Check into the emotional state you're arriving with.

Mark them whatever it is.

Sometimes we wish things were different,

But we get to sit with what is,

To be with what is,

To find a wise way through what is.

And know that today is a good day to mark this moment,

To spend some time with this change that's happening in your life.

Know that we don't have to do it perfectly,

But with intention and our own attention,

We can make space to honour,

To listen into our heart and to hold what needs to be held.

Sometimes it can seem we need to go somewhere different to do this,

But I want to suggest that this is the perfect moment.

This place is the perfect place amidst the ordinariness of your life,

Or the extraordinaryness of it,

If that's how it's going for you.

Mary Oliver speaks so beautifully of finding this special place amongst the ordinary.

She says,

It doesn't have to be the blue iris.

It could be a weed in a vacant lot,

Or a few small stones.

Just pay attention.

Then patch together a few words and don't try and make them elaborate.

This isn't a contest,

But the doorway into thanks and a silence in which another voice may speak.

So as we sit together,

Notice that this is a threshold moment,

That something in your life has shifted and it's not how it was before,

That some current is changing for you.

And as you sit here,

Feel what you have walked through,

Where you have been before this change,

How it was.

Your lives shape shift,

And we may have grief or joy about that.

Take some time to honour what was,

To acknowledge it,

Oof,

That's how that was,

That's where I was,

That's where we were.

Sometimes we can only see things clearly afterwards.

When we meditate,

We get to be present to what is changing in our lives,

We get to be witness to ourselves,

To see the deeper threads that are at play in our lives,

Maybe to gain some insight of our part into them.

Working with ourselves like this is almost like offering ourselves a blessing.

So many of us yearn for elders or wise ones or grandparents or those who have walked the path before us to offer us a blessing to say,

Hey,

You're doing it okay,

I know what you're going through,

Keep going,

Kind of mentors of mindfulness.

And sometimes we're blessed with those and sometimes we're not.

We have to find our own wise one within.

So let this time of being with yourself be a kind of blessing.

John O'Donohue writes beautifully of blessings.

In the parched deserts of postmodernism,

A blessing can be like the discovery of a fresh well.

I believe each of us can bless.

When a blessing is invoked,

It changes the atmosphere.

In the light of reverence and blessing,

A person or a situation becomes illuminated in a completely new way.

In a dead wall,

A new window opens.

In dense darkness,

A path starts to glimmer.

And into a broken heart,

Healing flows like morning dew.

So it can sound a strange word to bless ourselves,

We don't usually do that.

But really just to turn to yourself with kindness.

To honour what you're holding in your heart.

To find some faith in yourself.

We can bless ourselves just by being with ourselves.

Taking this time to honour what is changing in our lives.

When Buddha reached enlightenment under the Bodhi tree,

He reached down and touched the earth for witness.

He wanted to mark that something had changed and no one was around to witness that.

So he touched the ground beneath him.

We can do that here.

We can touch the place in which we're sitting.

Calling to the earth beneath us for witness of our change.

Feel your spine,

Your breath,

The life force of your body,

The strength you have in you.

Feel yourself here with your own heart.

This amazing human ability to shape shift,

To learn new things,

To do it differently,

To grieve,

To go forwards,

To dare,

To dream,

To honour.

And from here bring to mind what you're going towards.

This new future.

We don't get to know exactly what it'll look like.

It never turns out like we plan.

But offer a spirit of welcomeness to this new reality.

This change may feel wonderful for you,

Or like it's been the end of the world and you have no idea how you're going to find your way through,

Or anywhere in between.

And yet there's changes here.

Find a feeling of welcomeness in your heart.

Oh wow,

This is what's next.

I wonder how it will turn out.

Find faith in your ability to be with it.

Maybe all the unforeseen good forces that might help us out.

If your mind wonders,

It's okay.

We're unlikely to get honouring a major life change done in a single session.

This is a process that works its way through us.

So bear to be with it as best you can,

To dare to feel it fully.

To sit with it.

To honour it.

To bless yourself by being here.

So thank you for taking this time to be with it.

Know that you can return to this space of honouring your own heart time and time again.

Of touching the earth for witness for what is changing.

It's caring to carve out some time to notice what has happened to us.

If you feel too late,

You can take some concrete action to mark this change.

You may want to pick up a stone or a rock in nature and choose to put something down to let something go.

Maybe you want to light a candle to bring something in,

To cultivate something new.

Or to plant a seed to find some way that's meaningful for you of marking this moment.

Taking time to mark the meaningful things in our life is so precious.

Find the sense of that we're really here,

Present and available for our lives.

Emotionally up to date.

Finding some faith amidst it all makes us feel that we have some agency to mark moments.

That we can choose to make our life more meaningful.

So thank you for practicing,

Thank you for being part of this community.

Thank you for taking the time to notice what's going on in your life.

To be fully here in the human existence.

I wish you so much wellness with whatever is going on for you.

You can sit here for as long as you need to.

The music will fade out but take your time.

So I thank you for your practice.

And I wish you so much wellness with whatever it is that's going on for you.

Take good care.