A Heart Centered Life
healing the world one heart at a time

This ache sits right in the center of my chest.  It’s tighter on the left than it is on the right and its turning in on itself, hiding, not wanting to be seen.  With this ache comes fear and inability to let you in, but also, to let me out.  And so I sit, feeling small, lost, not knowing which way to go.  Turning left then right, shall i go this way or that?  I get all turned up inside of myself, my words get lost, and I let go (but not in a surrendering to God and all thats Great letting go) –  I simply give up.  While I’m in this mode, I sit, slightly disconnected from my life, watching days turn into weeks and weeks into months (and time goes so fast)  – but is THIS REALLY HOW I WANT TO BE?  

No, its not how I want to be, not from the smallness inside, nor from the larger part of me that I am only sometimes aware.  The larger part longs for, and nudges me ever so patiently, towards transparency and vulnerability, waiting for a willingness to be nude (for the whole world to see).  It encourages being alive, awake – When dear one will you finally be ready to be free?  

What will it take I wonder, to finally live in the certainty, to remember to Remember more than I slip, or fall face first, into forgetfulness?  In answer to this question, I am only half hearing, but hearing none the less, the commentator of the music station I’m listening to talk about a book she recently picked up at the airport.  What makes us extraordinary? … Focus, determination and hard work…

And so it seems, the answer comes:  Stay focused, work hard and be determined to break free of this ache, this inertia, this numbness.   Allow it to buzz you into discomfort, long enough for it to break. “Open yourself up to the love that has been knocking at your door,” I hear.

“See what needs doing and do it,” more background noise…I read a note from a beloved encouraging me to keep writing. Get an email from another saying the same.  Just for tonight, I will trust these messages, and I will, despite the ache in my chest, open myself up.  I will keep writing and I will let your love in.  I will choose joy and laughter, light and love.

And with this new found trust in you, and myself, perhaps I will move closer to living in the awareness of the Larger me that isnt afraid or feeling small, ever.

My husband is currently on a quest to find out what he’d like to do with the next chapter of his life.  I suggested that perhaps the better question to ask himself is:  Who am I? which then led me to asking myself the same question.  

Here is the answer I recieved:

I am not what has been done to me.  I am not the bad things I have done.  I am not an INFJ, what the strength finders test has assessed,  nor a scorpio with pisces rising and a libra moon.  I am, under all of those layers of identity and personality, a child of God.  Which makes me a sacred and holy being of light and Love.  Love, with a capital L – the kind that amounts to more than a moment of warm and fuzzy in my heart when my husband smiles at me, or I hear my child laugh, or the feeling of contentment that comes when I know I have done my best.  

There is a teaching in our spiritual lineage which states:  ”You think you are a small star, when in fact you contain the entire universe…”  I now see that I am in fact, that universe.  A part which contains the whole and the whole that is also a small and important part.  

Sufi’s have a spiritual practice called Dhikr, which is also known as Remembrance.  During this practice, we call the name Allah, One God, into our hearts.  I used to think i did this practice so that I could Remember Him, but I can now see how He, in His generosity (al-Karim), has given us this practice to remember Him, so we can also remember who we actually are.  

My thoughts then led me to the order in Islam to pray five times a day.  We do not pray five times a day for Allah, as He does not need our prayers, we pray five times because we need Him.  And again in His wisdom (al-Hakim) and generosity (al-Karim), He knew we would forget Him AND who we truly are, therefore He gave to us an opportunity to stop, five times throughout our often over busy and stress filled days, to be the Love that He created us to be and so that we may remember who we truly are, for and in Him.