Presence is contextual

Most of these Daily Reminders are lighthearted pointers for you to remember something that you already know to be true, but have forgotten, because you’re human.

Our experience of life is one big illusion and it’s so easy to get sucked into the drama of our thinking, that we can go for days… weeks… years… lifetimes even, without waking up to the dream.

But every now and again I’ll outline something I see as being Really Important. Something that I see lots of people—everyone, to some degree—tripping over. A little insidious belief that keeps people either stuck (which is unfortunate), or, more commonly, unwilling to even look in this direction (which is heartbreaking).

This is one of those Really Important ones, so LISTEN UP, people!! 😆

It’s funny how the mind works, with its categories and its rules about:

•   📦 how-things-should-be, and
•   📦  what-things-are-like

This is bad enough when it turns its attention to people and things and situations—which are visible and easy for it to talk about—but when it comes to the formless, it’s completely out of its depth and it starts talking utter balderdash.

So when it comes to the exploration of how we experience life and who we really are, one of its favourite things to do is to fabricate a set of rules about:

  (And I’m using the word ‘presence’ here, but I could slap on any number of language-based, mind-created metaphors, to point to that space before ‘personal’ thought.)

It’s hilarious to me that the mind thinks it’s qualified to do this, because presence itself—The Now—is something that is defined by its absence! 😆

The mind cannot know the space before itself.

But that doesn’t stop it trying!

So, chances are, reading this, your S.E.C. (Subscriber Ego Construct 📦) will already have furnished you with a list of characteristics, constraints, and boundaries, all invoked by the word ‘presence’.

(Just thank your lucky stars I’m not referring to it as ‘God’ – that usually gets the hornet’s nest a-buzzing real good! 🐝😂)

As if ‘presence’ could possibly be ‘like’ any one thing.

Minds, honestly 🙄

The problem is, when the mind does this, it goes hand in hand with a big old accompanying story, that includes:

•   📦 how-it-should-feel
•   📦 what-happens-there
•   📦 what’s-required-to-get-there
•   📦 consequences-of-being-there
•   📦 what-you-have-to-give-up-when-you’re-there…

…and so on, and so on.

In fact, just writing that list, I’ve created the false notion that ‘presence’ is a place, and it’s somewhere or something that we’re separate from.

See what I mean?

Total minefield.

🤯

And all of this stops us. Because we believe there are rules e.g. that it’s only for certain people. That there are entry requirements. Or that it requires effort we’re not prepared to put in. Or that we’ll have to commit to doing something differently. Or that we can’t understand it so it’s just not worth exploring.

I see so much of this.

So much.

It’s why, as a species, this is where we’re at. Enslaved to ego. Forever doing its bidding and wondering why the world looks like it’s going to hell in a hand cart.

🤷🏻‍♂️

One day, I’m out in the depths of a forest with a client, and we’re exploring this notion. We see that, over the course of the walk & talk, ‘presence’ shows up in different ways:

🌳 Surrounded by nature, not attending to your so called ‘personal’ thinking, it’ll show up as awe.

👂🏻 Listening to another, not attending to personal thinking, it’ll show up as connection.

🐕 Following a footpath through someone’s back garden where a dog starts barking, not attending to personal thinking, it’ll show up as alertness; readiness for action.

We saw that ‘presence’ is beautifully, wondrously, perfectly contextual because it is life’s energy and it is made of wisdom.

More…

🧘🏻‍♀️ If you’re meditating and you’re not attending to personal thinking… it’ll show up as peace and oneness.

🏌🏻‍♂️ If you’re competing or performing and you’re not attending to personal thinking… it’ll show up as flow.

💑 If you’re with your partner and neither of you are attending to personal thinking… it’ll show up as love.

💻 If you’re super-busy and you’re not attending personal thinking… it’ll show up as productivity…

…and so on, and so on.

But if we listen to the mind’s limited view on WHAT PRESENCE SHOULD BE LIKE we’ll spend our lives missing it completely, just because it doesn’t satisfy the entry criteria, as defined by this silly little thing: 📦

In truth, it can, and does, feel like anything!

Because it’s there all the time—it’s what you actually are—and you get to experience it any moment that you’re not attending to ‘personal’ thinking.

It’ll show up. In exactly the way it needs to, for that particular context.

No entry requirements whatsoever.

Brilliant.

💟

Giles