Give attention to your present, give attention to your behavior, emotions, fears, moods, thoughts, desires as they occur in the moment.
There’s the past! You will realize your hurt, pain, misery you had experienced. If you can be present enough to watch all those things, not critically, or analytically but nonjudgmental, then you are dealing with the past and dissolving it through the power of your presence. You cannot find yourself by going into the past. You find yourself by coming into the present.
Body awareness keeps you in the presence. Jesus used to analogy of waiting in some of his parables. Something could happen at any moment, and if you’re not absolutely awake, absolutely still, you will miss it. In that state, all your attention is in the now (being present with your whole being). In that state, the “you” that has a past and a future, personality, your like, is hardly there anymore. Be like a servant waiting for the return of its master not knowing what time your master will arrive.
The Art of Listening
When listening to another person don’t listen with your mind, listen with your whole body. Feel the energy field of your inner body as you listen. You are giving that person space- space to be. It’s the most precious gift you can give. Most people don’t know how to listen because the major part of their attention is taken up by thinking. Of course you cannot feel someone else’s being except through your own. This is the beginning of realization of oneness, which is love. Most human relationships consist mainly of minds interaction with each other, not of human beings communicating, being in communion. No relationship can thrive that way, and that is why there is so much conflict in relationships. When the mind is running your life, conflict, strife and problems are inevitable, being in touch with your inner body manifest a healthy relationship.
Halima Aboal