Embodied Wisdom & Tapping Into the Divine

How do we know the presence of Spirit in our lives?

As I listened into my being, suddenly a sensation came to me. It is indescribable in words, but it felt like the most exquisite homecoming wrapped in a gift of such unspeakable tenderness! Here’s what was suddenly seen, felt, realized…

I have been a conscious follower of Spirit for most of my life. I consider our lives profoundly and essentially spiritual expressions brought to earthly perception. And so my life has been dedicated to the study – and to the cultivating of the deep inner listening into life’s questions:

"Why am I here?" "What’s my life’s purpose?" "How do I live a life of meaning?"

These are life-giving questions. They are what call out to us to find and to realize our relationship with spirit, with earth, with each other….with ourselves!

In fact the entire spiritual quest is one of entering more and more into conscious relationship with life... It is coming to realize that life is an ongoing process of being present to each moment - as it arises.

What is being present to each moment but a call to be in relationship; a call to be to present in mind, body, heart and soul with the wildly unconditional, free form, dancing relationship to all that is simultaneously and energetically manifesting now, and now! and again…now!

How alive do you dare be? How in relationship with life are you really?

In my own life work, first as a ceremonial artist and later as a Reiki master healer and more recently as author, mentor and facilitator of individual transformation and soul, arts retreats, I am constantly challenged to meet the call of relationship in new and mysterious ways.

After years of working with myself and others I’ve come to see that it is the depth with which we consciously meet (or miss) relationship each moment, that is precisely where all our angst and confusion comes in. Our own fear or unawareness of true intimacy causes so much loneliness, separation and the endless attempts to satisfy that loss with belief systems – making gods of our spiritual techniques; of consumerism, entertainment, emotional stories, addictions and limiting beliefs. What "running around" we do, trying to find "It"! We’re looking for love, but we’re looking in all the wrong places.

We haven’t quite realized that life is, at its most basic ground, a call to relationship. It is simply a call to be awake, in the body, fully engaged in the dance of relationship to "what is"…whatever is, as it arises and recedes again: Nothing to hang on to; nothing to find and keep; simply living within this sacred question:

"How alive to life’s very essence do I dare be in this moment, right now?"

If we could truly come to live in that question, all seeking and all angst would end. And true compassion and service (born of soul not of ego) would naturally flow in all our relationships. When we’re truly present (fully awake in full relationship with the moment) we are in unity with what is. And we come naturally into alignment with meaningful action, caring purpose, compassion, and a life alive with passion and genius. Can you see, feel, sense this inside of you?

If you listen inside your own being, you’ll likely feel some resonance of "yes, I sense this is so." If you’re willing, try it out right now!

What happens if you get very still, open the space beyond the mind, drop down into the body and see what you sense (not what you think but what you feel in the gut)? Can you sense how life is calling you to simply be present…..to be the eyes and ears of Divine Intelligence given the unique shape and configuration of you and of me and of all of life as it teems over with infinite possibility? Fantastic! Can you recognize that new relationship is formed in each moment, waiting to be seen afresh? Here is unconditional presence…the undercurrent of Love itself!

When we come to honoring life in this kind of listening way, then the magic starts to really flow… Or, more accurately, the magic we had missed before is discovered to have always been right here awaiting our alignment to it.

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Here’s what I have come to know. Self-realization is not a one time deal and poof; we’re now flowing in the power of now! Self-realization is a forever dynamic evolution of consciousness. Life (God, Source, Spirit) is forever evolving and deepening through each of us, and through the depth of attention we give to the relationship of spirit on earth.

Just this morning, having been experiencing a very challenging life situation for a number of months now and sitting as quietly as possible in the receptivity of life’s unfolding, it dawned on me (duh!) to put to "practice what I teach" and feel into my body instead of my normal morning meditation time. I began to just let my body move itself as and if/when it wished.

Slowly it started to talk to me: First through all sorts of pains and aches from too much holiday and not enough exercise. I watched as my mind did its big gig by trying to inflict feelings of shame and "shoulds" in commentary to the bodily sensations: "How’d I get this out of shape?" "Oh it’ll take months to get back into condition" etc. (You know the routine!)

But this time, instead of staying tuned into the soul-defacing voice that we’ve come to think of as ourselves, I did something else:

I dropped back into the body. Over and over again, when the mind came in to try and run the show, I sunk my consciousness back into a simple, pure, body presence… offering conscious relationship simply to what is at the deeper levels of being and beyond the mind’s running commentary of noise making cover-up.

I felt the tight; the places of stiffness and soreness from too much computer and not enough stretching. I stayed with the pain, not from the vantage point of my mind, but right in/as bodily presence.. I stepped right smack into it; opened to it; became it.

Something started to happen. As I let go of the mind looking at "this body" and commenting from the intellect, and instead became my body—really became it—it started to make body sounds (not mind sounds, which are very different). My body-voice started to stomp and moan and cry out in strange and wild sounds. So much held under the constraints of the mind’s language for so long! There was a releasing feel in the energetic field all around me. I was somehow both in my body and bigger than it – and way beyond the territory of the (non-stop) editorial mind!

Then these guttural sounds suddenly took on the cloak of verbal language and started yelling "I am here. I am right here!" I thought at first that it was Ronda-mind calling out to Spirit in an exasperated frustration at this difficult time I’ve been faced with…But then I realized something quite astonishing and subtle…

As I listened in to this voice, to where it was in my being, suddenly a sensation came over me. It is indescribable in words, but it felt like the most exquisite homecoming wrapped in a gift of such unspeakable tenderness! Here’s what was suddenly seen, felt, realized:

It was not Ronda crying out in appeal to Spirit. It was Spirit, Herself, calling out to that overshadowing mind-ego and proclaiming Her sacred presence right here in/as my body temple! I was being shown the embodiment of Spirit in the flesh, right here; the Lover and the Beloved in a most sensual relationship of union incarnate.

In that moment of realization, there was no more seeking; no more "out there" calling to God, but rather the tenderest celebration of awakening to the Sacred Relationship of spirit and flesh united through the open spaciousness of being fully embodied as presence.

What I found in the body this morning was fundamentally different in feel, texture, spaciousness from that which we normally use as our instruments of perception (namely the mind and emotions). It was founded in freedom, unconditional to circumstance, fully known to the body and also beyond the body – a universe! It has a quality of tenderness and loving too vast for any human word or construct.

If I had to give it words it would be something like this:

"I am here! I take my home in you. You and I are united through this vessel,. the spirit made flesh. Welcome home dearest one. I’ve waited a long time for you to discover the sacred relationship right here in this body-temple. Unity consciousness speaks through this body and it says: I Am This! I AM RIGHT HERE!

What a Divine Gift! That which we seek is forever right here, ever ready to be realized in the sacred relationship of embodied presence!

How do we embody truth? How do we walk our talk? How do we live the sacred questions? How do we know the presence of Spirit?

We embody it. We in-body the Spirit! We (in the body) are Spirit!

About the author:
Ronda LaRue is an emerging spiritual author/mentor living in Ojai, California, USA. Ronda works from a novel and contemporary approach to the ancient tradition of one-on-one sacred apprenticeship for facilitating radical transformation., healing wholeness, and direct Self-Realization. Her book "Remembering Who You Really Are", is a contemporary classic on the journey to true self Realization and Wholeness. (available from Amazon.com) See more about her private retreat programs at http://www.OjaiSoulArts.com or order her book at http://www.rondalarue.com