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PeterParticipantHi Anita
Sounds like you had a night 🙂“I used to think in black-and-white terms—all-or-nothing”
Sadly, the digital age, especially with algorithm-driven platforms reinforces and amplifies our tendency to either-or, all or nothing, binary thinking.
Regarding the second half of life transition, the digital culture does make it harder to slow down and listen inwardly. On the other hand, it can be a great resource to explore the wisdom traditions and such.
I wonder what role AI will play? Will we use it to amplify the noise and distraction and quick fix. Or could it become a companion for reflection, ask better questions, and access deeper knowledge. LOL – I implied a ‘either or’ when the its going to be both.
Skillful discernment something the we will all need to develop… I hope society will be up to the task.
I was recently asked what I thought was the best advice the bible had to offer and the first thought that came to mind – “But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.”
In a culture of instant reactions the advice to step back to ponder, observe, absorb, and reflect. Her response to the miraculous a profound inward stillness, fully present to the moment. Such pondering isn’t passive; it’s thoughtful engagement. She’s not simply feeling her faith, she’s examining it, cherishing it, and contemplating its meaning, a invitation to blend heart and mind.
PeterParticipantHi Anita
To the topic of suppressing vs expressing emotions. I would agreeThe thought or image was as “partners in a quiet dance”, holding the tension of paradox as connection.
Expanding the metaphor, dancing with a partner requires tension as the means to create connection, to feel where the partner is. A connection we hope neither to light nor two heavy.
In dance, that subtle resistance isn’t conflict; it’s intimacy and communication. Feeling where the other is without overpowering or collapsing, just enough to know. Emotionally, that same kind of attuned tension allows us to meet our inner experience with respect. Not rushing to express nor forcing it down. But holding it, sensing it, moving with it.
Understanding, I trust, will arise but not as a driving force, not as the intention… the intention being to dance.
Like breath, we exhale and inhale. There are moments when a feeling held back is a kindness, to ourselves or others. And moments when releasing becomes a form of truth-telling, connection, and transformation. Neither is wrong. Neither is the whole. Together, they move us toward being.
A change in perspective where suppression vs expression becomes suppression and expression. Not poles in opposition but steps in rhythm. In that middle space, the breath between action and stillness, we cultivate a presence that doesn’t demand resolution, it listens, resonates. This was the experience of stillness while dancing.
In the second half of life, I wish to lean into that, a move from the head to the heart. A move from a seemingly insatiable need to understand and cry out why, to a quite yes.
Anyone following my posts might notice how difficult letting go of understanding has been, being a defining attribute of “my type”. The mind is so good at trying to protect us by explaining everything. But the heart of the fourth chakra isn’t to explain, it’s to witness and be open. Not the end of inquiry, but a softening.
Writing that I wonder if its not all wishful thinking, the ego disguising itself still wanting to understand… but maybe…
“Grant me the grace to hear the Voice beyond voices, the one that never shames or frightens, but invites, strengthens, and clarifies. Strip me gently of illusion and hostility until even my fear forgets its name.” – Anonymous
What would such a dance look like to you?
PeterParticipantHi Everyone
“thoughts on the later half of life:”
Jung once said it takes a healthy ego to let the ego go, a truth I’ve come to embrace. I see letting go as the work of life’s second half.
Like the Hindu notion of Vanaprastha, once a literal retreat into the forest—it now symbolizes a journey into the inner forest, a conscious turning inward that rest in the heart chakra. A time when one begins to relinquish control, status, and possessions, and instead seeks wisdom, contemplation, and spiritual depth.
On my path, I began noticing a tension between duality (the river) and non-duality (the ocean), and with it, the assumption that such an experience must be one or the other. Perhaps, in hindsight, this assumption revealing a desire to escape life (suffering).
It was through ballroom dancing that I encountered stillness within movement, a paradox that began to shift my perspective. Over time I suspected that duality and non-duality (subject, object, particle wave) aren’t opposites to choose between, but partners in a quiet dance. Not two sides of a coin, but the coin itself. A coin that no matter how you divide it, all are always present.
And so, as the second half of life dawns the realization: the paradox isn’t something to resolve, but something to hold. Paradox softening into integration. It’s here, in this stillness, that ego loosens its grip, not in rejection, but in reverence. The experiences of life, deeply felt and lived, resting quietly in the heart, no longer seeking to be understood, only held.
PeterParticipantNice 🙂
I like the line “ocean waits; the river moves” not as separated happenings but existing together in the same now.PeterParticipantHi Anita and Alessa
I has been a while, busy at work and I noticed I was repeating myself.
Feels like were saying the same thing – Life worth living is one were we breathe, and breathing don’t get wrapped up in our measures – constructs.
A thought occurred to me while addressing the topic. It struck me that most self-help and self-care practices are heavily centered on the first half of life: achievement and identity, on becoming more efficient, confident, and successful, managing and repairing the past. And that these self care notions don’t prepare us well for passing the baton to the second half. Failing to prepare us for the inward journey where the focus shifts from building the self to releasing it, from striving to surrendering, from doing to being.
The image that came to mind was of a river carving its way though rock and ambition meeting the estuary, the river meeting the tide of the sea where the waters churn and identities blur. The turbulence a sacred dance of transformation, river surrendering to the ocean, remembering it was always water.
Perhaps Anita you could turn the image into a poem.
PeterParticipantLife Worth Living – what is it like?
My spidy senses go off when I come across such topics. My history with such topic suggesting it will fall into the trap of measurement, labeling, comparison, if only’s, fears, discontentment – life a problem to be solved vice lived as it is.
Life being something my ego wants to fix. Anything but a seeing Life as it is and letting life be life. Which probably points to a answer.The wisdom traditions all point to the need to re-frame the topic.
– Can I look at life without the filter of what it should be?
– What does it mean to live with awareness?
– How can I be fully present in my life?
– What is arising in me when I feel my life lacks meaning?
– What does wholeness feel like, right now?All good questions but let’s be honest exhausting.
Then the ever helpful, unhelpful – A life worth living is one in which the individual becomes who they truly are – and who the heck is that.
Should the topic be addressed under the noble truths – life is suffering…We nod knowingly yes that is a truth… but we don’t like that, and not liking that a reason we suffer, a self creating loop of suffering…Even when we come to terms with such questions and advice, something happens and were right back to – is Life worth living or more honestly; I’m lonely and unhappy, and life should not be lonely, life should not hurt so much. Life should conform to my will…
Seems I landed were I started.
What would a life look like that was worth living?
One where it never occurred to me to ask such a question?What might happen when we stop trying to make life worth living, and simply let life live through us?
Or put in a way I’ve asked myself before: What if I lived what I say I believe and practicePeterParticipantHi Anita
Healing: the strange, quiet grief of leaving behind a painful but familiar identity, and the courage it takes to step into a new, uncertain, but healthier way of being.
“The bridge behind me, burned not in anger, but in grace…. There is no fairy tale here, no gleaming ever-after. Just this:
a quieter self, a steadier breath, a life that is new, not because it is perfect, but because it is mine.” – anonymousPeterParticipantThanks Anita
May 28, 2025 at 10:08 am in reply to: Fear knocked at the door. Love answered, and no one was there. #446371PeterParticipantHi Anita
So, what is love? I like how you focus kindness, goodwill, and unconditional acceptance.
I would challenge love as a feeling or attitude. Emotions, feathers caught up in the wind, Feelings become a state of mind defined by thought and mind.Life hurts, Love doesn’t hurt? I used to wonder about this and today would argue that Life is Love. Life hurts when be measure “love” and entangle it with attachment, fear, and dependency. Perhaps a ‘cosmic’ view… I’ve argued before that I convinced myself that Love has no opposite. Its is, and we are that. A “cosmic” view I trust that isn’t disconnected from the personal, but its source?
“Where there is love, there is no pain, no conflict. Pain arises when love is entangled with the self.” – Krishnamurti
I don’t take that to mean we should avoid engaging the self in life, life is movement were the self plays a important role. But I do think life calls us to awaken to the reality that engaging the self opens the door to pain, and not a flaw. Pain not the failure of love, but rather an attribute of love and an open heart.As you have hinted its possible, if not likely, I hide behind behind the comic view to avoid pain of vulnerability… Yet since engaging with the question ‘What’s love got to do with it’ (referred to in other posts) I haven’t escape pain and in some ways feel it more deeply if… different.
PeterParticipantAs I noted before I been contemplating the Lords Prayer as a Centering practice
Our Father, who dwells in realms unseen,
Hallowed be Thy many Names,
In whispers of wind, in thunder’s call.
Reverently we hold allWith eyes that see and ears that hear,
Thy kingdom come, Thy will is done
On earth as in the stars above,
A mirror of Thy boundless love.As above, so below,
Smaller than small,
Dust in the breath of the celestial sphere,
Yet stewards of the All.Give us this day our daily bread,
Teaching our hearts to be content
To cherish what is freely given,
To Live with grace and not lament.Forgive us, as we too forgive,
For in mercy, we begin to live.
As below, so above,
Bigger than big
Co-creators through Love.Lead us not where shadows lie,
Where maps replace the living sky.
Deliver us from fear’s cruel hungry thread,
The root from which all evil’s bred.For Thine is the pattern, the pulse, the flame,
The silence, the song, the sacred Name.
Forever and ever, so may it be
In the heart of the One, eternally free.PeterParticipantHi Anita
How interesting, how you phrase it.. our parents templates for understanding the sacred, or templates for understanding the unholy?
Of course templates work both ways, thus the challenge. Relating to the Jungian path of integration of the mother and father complexes/archetypes where the to good mother dies to be replaced by the stepmother representing the shadow side of the mother archetype. The nurturing force turned cold, jealous, or punishing. How love can wound and protection become control…. The “evil stepmother” not just a villain but a symbol of the inner work required to reclaim nurturing on one’s own terms. To become one’s own mother, one’s own source of care and compassion.
As to the desire to hear my Voice… my first thought is that what I have been sharing on this site hasn’t come across as my voice. That may be… I might say posting on this site is a attempt to find my voice – to “discover” what I believe and live it.
Expressing ourselves is of course okay and right. I am sorry if I disappoint but feel strongly that in the forth quarter I am called to the “path of going into the woods”.
PeterParticipantHi Anita
Powerful indeed and then add the tendency to associate the attributes of the divine with our Parents. Our parents being our first templates for understanding not just human relationships, but also the sacred.
PeterParticipantPlaying with the idea of the Cosmic to the Personal
Once, I believed the way to the stars was through the self. That if I could be enough, do enough, be loved enough, I might earn my place … I mistook reflection for radiance, validation for love, and the gaze of others for the light of the divine. The personal, when used as a ladder, only led me in circles, a maze of mirrors where I lost more than I found.
Now, I begin elsewhere.
Not with the self, but with the silence behind it. Not with the need to be seen, but with the seeing itself.
From the stillness of the cosmic, compassion arises, not as a feeling, but as a field. Not as a bond, but as a breeze that touches all and clings to none. To arrive at the personal, not by building it, but by letting it be shaped by something vaster.Love, no longer a searchlight but a lantern lit from within and carried gently.
Personal experience, when rooted in the eternal, becomes tender, open, and free, no longer the path to the divine, it is the fruit of it.
PeterParticipantHi Anita
Do you ever think about love in a more personal way, beyond the big cosmic view.
How to answer? At this point in my life, I’m exploring the Buddhist path that emphasizes compassion as a broader, more selfless, and less conditional expression of love than the personal, often attachment-driven, nature of love.
That said I do wonder if that isn’t away to protect myself from the past and present… and because I wonder, know I can’t be what you seem to want me to be. For me the path of the “personal” to the “comic” hasn’t been a skillful one for me and I have a deep intuition that the path of the cosmic to the personal is better suited. I am convinced that, for me anyway, you can’t get from A to B without starting from B. I am also convinced that in the first half of life everyone will try and that such trying may even be necessary. Then maybe in the second half ‘let go’ if only to “return home to see it for the first time”.
A shift from a love that was once entangled with attachment and expectation, toward a form of compassion that is freer, more expansive, and less dependent on reciprocation or recognition. Not a retreat from love, but a reorientation of it: from possession to presence, from needing to ‘being’. A surrender as trust, not a giving up…
I hear the hurt of your posts and how the pain of the past haunts your present. I empathize with the desire to be seen and to be known. My heart breaks as I suspect that the healing sought for can only come from yourself. That each of us in our own way must discover how to give to ourselves what others, even those who should have been able to, were and or are not able to give. I know thier is little comfort in that.
I witness how though the pain you have come to amazing realizations… and I hold my breath. Will Anita open the door or return to the past in the present. Turning away from that door something I know to well…
I am reminded of Clarissa Pinkola Estes poem – Abre la Puerta – Open the door
“Step through that hole, It is an opening.
That hole is a threshold. That hole is a door.
Abre la Puerta, open the door.
Abre la Puerta, open the door.
Abre la Puerta, open the door…
… and step through.I apologize if my communication style comes across as cold and silent.
PeterParticipantA reflection the Web of Being. A work in progress
There is a sacred thread that runs through all things, a web not woven by human hands, but one in which we are delicately and inextricably intertwined. We are not the weavers, but the woven. Every thought, every action, every breath ripples through this vast tapestry of life, echoing back to us in ways seen and unseen. Smaller then small, bigger then big.
To live with awareness of this web is to awaken to the truth that nothing exists in isolation. The tree, the river, the wind, the stranger, we are all strands of the same whole. What we do to the Earth, we do to ourselves. What we withhold from others, we deny within. And what we heal in ourselves, we offer to the world.
Time, as we know it, is a construct measured out by the rising and setting of the sun, by our clocks and our calendars. But beneath this rhythm lies something deeper: the eternal now. In this space beyond time, were love abides. Not the fleeting emotion, but the boundless presence that holds all things. Love not of time. Love the ground of being.
Stillness, not the absence of movement, but the source from which all movement arises. Silence not the absence of sound, but the womb of all language. Eternity not endless time, but the fullness of this moment. And in this still, silent, eternal now, we remember: We are not separate, We are not broken, We are not lost.
We are stillness.
We are silence.
We are love.
We are whole.From this place of deep listening, we begin to see clearly. Not with the eyes of judgment or fear but with the eyes of the heart. We see what is ours to do. Not to fix the world as if it were broken, but to participate in its healing as an act of remembrance. This is the essence of tikkun olam: to restore the sacred web by living in harmony with it.
Let us return, again and again, to the still point within. Let us listen. Let us love. Let us live as if we belong because we do… and we are That.
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