Tag Archives: awe

Jan's Blog

A Day in a Life: Staying Connected To Awe

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I lose track of the awe... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
I lose track of the awe…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

I have had to remind myself lately to not forget the experiences of awe that I have had in the past and constantly have in life. I get so caught up in the mundane, in this world, that I often lose track of where I’ve been and all of the amazing things that have transpired in my life. Jeanne suggests some useful guidance around this issue in her latest message.

Life in this world can drag us down. We become so fixated on things that are wrong, things that offend us, things that make us angry, resentful, hurt; feelings that leave us shamed, blamed, helpless and lost. The Shamans of Ancient Mexico would call all of those things issues of the ego, issues of self-importance. Lose your self-importance, they constantly suggested.

I try to be impeccable, but I am not. I try to be balanced and in perfect alignment with my spirit’s intent, but I am not. I try to be selfless, kind, and compassionate at all times, but I am not. I like to think of myself as on top of things when in reality I just am not. I’m often lazy. I had to face my imperfect, lazy self over the weekend when the hard drive on my computer crashed. I also had to face my psychic self, who kept warning me to do things that I ignored. “Make a copy of this, back this up, notice this sign and this sign that things are just not working right,” she warned me. But did I pay attention? No. And so I had to suffer.

We took my computer to the Apple Store and when they ran the diagnostics on it, a large red banner appeared that read: FAILED! Immediately, I felt like a bad person, because I knew I had not backed up at the end of the work week as I normally do and I wondered how much stuff I had lost. I did attempt a backup as soon as I noticed something was seriously wrong, but did it take? Only time would tell.

My MacMini is happy again... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
My MacMini is happy again…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

Back home again with a new hard drive, I had to face the truth. Not only that, but I had to face it with other people looking over my shoulder, my techie guy and Chuck. “Seriously,” my techie guy said, “you didn’t back up like I told you to do?” “Once a week,” I said, meekly, “but I didn’t do it last week.” “ARRGH!” This is something like what the conversation went like and boy did I feel bad, and really really stupid. “So much for impeccability,” I thought. “Jan, you suck!”

As time wore on it became clear just how much stuff I had lost. The hard drive was so corroded that my last ditch backup effort had failed. I got more depressed, felt more stupid, admitted I was a real jerk and got depressed. By the time Monday morning rolled around I wondered what I would find when I looked at the last revisions I had made on my book, had I saved them? Uh-uh. Nope. More depression. Then along came a different me, the fighter/warrior, cut-your-losses and move-on person that I can be and she said: “Get over it! This is meaningful. It’s not so bad. It’s teaching you things you need to learn about yourself.” How could I argue with that?

I have my backup machine plugged in all the time now. I backup to DropBox as well now. I found that once I let go of trying to recall the changes I had made to my book, the editing of Volume Two of The Edge of the Abyss ran smoothly, with a new precision and conciseness that had been lacking for the past month. I had gotten so bogged down in trying to finish that I was forgetting to enjoy the process. I got so caught up in the mundane that I forgot about the awe that comes along even in the most trying of times. I forgot to really savor the people in my life, and life itself.

In awe... - Photo by Jan Ketchel
In awe…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

“I want to laugh more,” I said to Chuck the other day, and then someone showed us a funny video and we laughed so hard! I forgot that you just have to ask and you receive. I forgot to lighten up and enjoy where I am. I forgot that there is awe in life every single day, you just have to see it that way. I forgot to lose my self-importance and just enjoy every moment.

There is awe in my computer crash, there is awe in my depression, there is awe in my stupidity, if I so choose to see it that way. And yes, I do choose to see it that way, thank you very much!

Feeling the awe; hope you find it too,
Jan

Chuck's Blog

Chuck’s Place: The Practice of Awe

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We are not all that we think we are. There is much to us that we don’t know about or that we find so unacceptable that we really don’t want to know about or deal with. It can be pretty scary to face the fact that there are parts of me that I simply don’t know exist. We utilize some amazing maneuvers to keep ourselves safe from disruptive intrusions from unknown parts of the self. Anna Freud, in her classic book, Ego and the Mechanisms of Defense, outlines the variety of defenses we utilize to block, distort, or rid ourselves of unknown parts of ourselves. The important thing to know about our defenses is that they don’t really operate at a conscious level.

What are we reflecting?

We don’t say to ourselves, “I’m going to PROJECT a part of me that I’m afraid of onto my neighbor, and build a fence to keep him at bay so I can avoid that part of myself!”

We don’t say to ourselves, “I’m going to RATIONALIZE how I interpret this situation at work so I don’t have to see some part of myself that I’m unaware of that has just acted out and caused a problem.”

These defenses operate outside of full conscious awareness. They have to. If we were fully aware of our use of defenses they simply wouldn’t work, since we’d be directly confronted with the hidden truths of the parts of ourselves we seek to avoid! And so, it’s important to suspend judgment of our defensive egos. We’ll never get to know who we really are if we hate ourselves for using defenses to avoid scary things! On the other hand, we must take full responsibility for all that we are, even if we don’t know who that is!

If we can successfully suspend judgment—the shame of not knowing, the shame of feeling bad and unacceptable—and instead become archeologists and anthropologists of the soul, fascinated by and curious as we excavate, discover and trace the origins of the self, we arrive at a place of fuller knowing, accepting, and integrating all that we are. The shamans would call this a Practice of Awe: Awe for the Awesomeness of what is.

A comfy stack of meditation pillows and our breath...

A pragmatic process to support a practice of awe is meditation. In meditation we learn to be in stillness and calm as we are confronted with the cogitations of mind, emotions, sensations, and truths that come to greet us as we place our awareness on our breath. In meditation we return again and again to simply observing our breath entering and leaving our nostrils. We notice our awareness being taken to thoughts, reflections, feelings and sensations—hundreds, thousands of times. And each time, we simply acknowledge what has come to greet us, without judgment, without further attention or attachment, and gently return our awareness to our breathing, over and over—hundreds, thousands of times—without judgment, in gentle calm.

There is no failure; there is no success in a practice of meditation. There is simply being with and accepting all that is. As we practice we notice more of what we are. We withstand the knowing; we are not wiped out or thrown for a loop by what comes; we let emotions flow through us; we shift back to our breathing.

An old favorite...

Judgments are released as we shift constantly to our breathing, as we become observers of ourselves, in command of our awareness, in full acceptance, in awe of the awesome. We become curious travelers into the deeper self, no longer needing to defend an illusory self, because we have discovered instead, all that we are—perhaps for infinity!

In calmness, in awe,
Chuck

A special note on a special day: Today we honor Jeanne on the 10th anniversary of her departure from this world into the awe of infinity. Sending her love, as she continues her most amazing journey.

Messages from Jeanne

Readers of Infinity: Be Open to Possibility

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Another side of the spectrum?

Look beyond your daily lives to another reality. Perceive life as one side of a many faceted spectrum of possibility. You live most of the time focused on one side of that spectrum. Know that there are many others.

Continue to be open to life as it comes to you, but always with awareness that there is indeed more to life than what you now perceive. Seek not explanation at this point, but do seek experiences.

Ask the universe to provide you with a glimpse of a new reality—even just a brief one—and you will begin to understand the possibilities that exist, just waiting to be encountered, even in that world you now live in.

Encounters of awe are the awakenings that the human spirit dares to expect yet often rejects. I ask you now to remain open and nonjudgmental. Without trying to figure things out in a rational way, let yourself be open to the possibility that anything can happen and everything is possible. That’s all you need to begin to perceive differently: Be open to possibility! Let it come to you in whatever way it finds appropriate.

And just what is possibility?

Possibility is the unimaginable experience that shifts you, the moment of awe that lifts your heart and frees your mind. It is the moment when everything becomes clear. Grasp that moment in memory, in deep knowing, for sure enough, as quick as it arises, so will it sink away again, far from conscious awareness.

But the memory will linger in the sinews of your body; have no doubt. The awe will course through you and you will know its possibility to both affect you and eventually change you.

Look for those moments of awe and possibility. Without denial of such possibility, go into your day and your week with innocent hopefulness, without doubt, and without fear. Ask for experiences of awe, with openness, alertness, and willingness to be changed.

And then, when the time is right, ask to be shown why you are given those moments, those glimpses of awe. What do they mean? What are they asking you to do to change your life, your circumstances—inner and outer—and perhaps your future, in this world and another?

Channeled from infinity by Jan Ketchel.