That was quite beautiful, Anita. A gentle rhythm of arising and return.

Anita, in the space you’ve just touched in surrendering, the question of non-duality begins to fade. Non-duality isn’t something to understand, it’s just a word pointing to what you’ve already felt. You surrendered not to an idea, but to the truth that the wave is never apart from the ocean. In that softening, there’s no need to define or divide. There’s only presence. Only flow. And in that flow, you can rest.

Your words yesterday stirred an image that visited me again last night: a memory, like yours, only of a young boy walking alone beneath the stars, whispering into the vastness, “Help me. PLEASE help me!” And the silence answered with nothing. An old song that has never quite left.

It wasn’t an ego’s plea, but the raw ache of loneliness and grief. That little boy had been taught that God was a noun, a fixed point, separate and distant, which only deepened the grief.

But now, when such sorrow rises like the tide the prayer has softened. “G_d” has become a verb, a rhythm I’m learning to move with. Not separate or distant, but a motion — present.

Isn’t it strange how a shift so small, from noun to verb, can change everything. Language doesn’t just describe; it builds the walls and windows we look through. And most days, we don’t notice.

Today, when the wave reaches shore or when it crashes into the rocks, I remember the invitation to return, again and again, to the ocean. A flow that has become home and prayer: Let me move with the rhythm, not grasping, not resisting. Let me be held, even when I forget the Ocean.

And I rest, not as God, not as Devil but as a wave returning.

Warmly, Peter

Dear Peter:

I will process your post from yesterday (quoting your words, responding, then reading the next part, responding, etc.), and then your post from today.

“I read your message slowly, as if we were sitting together in the quiet of early morning, letting the words rise and return.”-

I am sensing the difference between hearing or reading people’s words and seeing them as fixed, often threatening AND letting them “rise and return”. It’s a softening, a relaxing of the Fight or Flight response to perceived danger, danger perceived even in typed words.

“Presence.. (is) an experience that arises when thought returns to silence and stillness. This Presence doesn’t intervene or shield. It doesn’t rescue. It holds. Not with indifference, but with a stillness that remains even when everything else falls away.”-

Presence= Silence & Stillness (S&S).

When distressed, to not rush to intervene or shield or rescue (outward action), but to rest in S&S.

My inner monk is always meditating.”- one with Presence, silent, still.

“You asked if I would retroactively suggest transcending the ego to your younger self. No. I wouldn’t offer advice to her. I would sit beside her. I would listen. I would let her know her cry was heard.”-

Not rushing to intervene, shield, or rescue, but offer her your presence, showing/ modeling S&S.

“I want to pause and acknowledge something: I hear how deeply you’ve wrestled with silence, especially in moments of pain. I understand how that silence can feel like absence. And I’m not asking you to forget those moments, or to bypass them with spiritual language. They matter. You matter.

“When I speak of Presence, I’m not offering a solution or a fix. I’m pointing to something that doesn’t make it not so, but that holds what is. It’s not a God who intervenes in some magical way, but a stillness that remains. Not indifferent, but spacious. Not absent if quiet.

“It is in this space that something new might be born.. perhaps a something that transcends the past..”-

I want this Silence, this kind of silence.

“It’s not meant to be grasped by the mind, but remembered by the heart. And only when the heart is ready.”-

Ready to transcend the Fight or Flight lifestyle (ways of thinking, ways of reacting), to transcend that inside running in my brain/ body.. running and running with nowhere to go (thoughts, tics)

“… All I can offer is to sit beside you, in silence, and say: I hear you. And maybe, just maybe, that’s enough for now. Warmly, Peter

“I will not fix, nor mend the ache, but sit beside it, as morning breaks.

No answers come, no rescue calls, just breath between what stands and falls.

A silence not of absence made, but presence deep, where pain is laid.

So let the heart, when it is ready, remember what was always steady.

And if no words can ease the now, then let this hush be enough somehow.”-

My newly found inner nun is meditating on this.

I see now why you’ve been emphasizing going inward in many of your posts (different threads). That’s where you become one with Presence, Silence, Stillness, Source.. the ocean.

Today’s message:

“That was quite beautiful, Anita. A gentle rhythm of arising and return.”- Thank you. Gentle rhythm is new to me.

“Non-duality isn’t something to understand, it’s just a word pointing to what you’ve already felt. You surrendered not to an idea, but to the truth that the wave is never apart from the ocean. In that softening, there’s no need to define or divide. There’s only presence. Only flow. And in that flow, you can rest.”-

Resisting the flow.. the frenzied activity of the mind afraid, seeking solutions, offering solutions/ advice that wasn’t asked.. that’s the wave thinking it’s all there is, sad and alone and desperate.

“Your words yesterday stirred an image that visited me again last night: a memory, like yours, only of a young boy walking alone beneath the stars, whispering into the vastness, ‘Help me. PLEASE help me!’ And the silence answered with nothing. An old song that has never quite left.

“It wasn’t an ego’s plea, but the raw ache of loneliness and grief. That little boy had been taught that God was a noun, a fixed point, separate and distant, which only deepened the grief.

“But now, when such sorrow rises like the tide the prayer has softened. ‘G_d’ has become a verb, a rhythm I’m learning to move with. Not separate or distant, but a motion — present.

“Isn’t it strange how a shift so small, from noun to verb, can change everything. Language doesn’t just describe; it builds the walls and windows we look through. And most days, we don’t notice.

“Today, when the wave reaches shore or when it crashes into the rocks, I remember the invitation to return, again and again, to the ocean. A flow that has become home and prayer: Let me move with the rhythm, not grasping, not resisting. Let me be held, even when I forget the Ocean.

“And I rest, not as God, not as Devil but as a wave returning.

“Warmly, Peter”-

The old me would rush to fix the sorrow that rises like the tide, when it does, to fix the young boy walking alone beneath the stars.. perceiving the boy to be a separate wave out there and myself a wave a distance away.

The new me (the becoming part), all I can offer is to sit beside you, in silence, and say: I hear you. And you matter 🌅.

“PS – You were and are never an ‘only’ this or that. 🙂 The Sphinx spoke only once, and the Sphinx said, ‘A grain of sand is a desert, and a desert is a grain of sand; and now let us all be silent again’. – Kahlil Gibran”-

The inner nun is meditating on this 🙂. Thank you so much, Peter 🙏 🙏 🙏

Warmly, Anita

Dear James:

Thank you for your comment. You are welcome to join any conversation that I’m having.

You submitted the above six minutes after I submitted my new post to Peter, so I am guessing you didn’t read it. I think that it is really happening, me dropping Anita as a separate wave, one separated from the ocean (the Source, the Presence), and seeing others as separate waves as well. I think it’s happening.

“BE the LOVE. MUCH LOVE, Best Regards”-

Much love and best regards back to you 🙂

Anita