Category Archives: Meaning

What You Seek is Seeking You

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Art print of yellow flowers

What you seek is seeking you. — Rumi

Here I go again, quoting Rumi. So much of what he wrote is like a bridge between the inner and the outer worlds, the unconscious and the conscious. So when it comes to inspiration for people who are seekers, his words often resonate and inspire.

Who are seekers?

They are deep souls who take responsibility for not only who they are, but for who they are becoming. They are artists, writers, and artisans who express the beauty, mystery, and harshness in the world through what they create. They are people who feel connected to—and part of—something bigger than themselves.

Often, they are sensitive people whose focus is deeper than external, day-to-day events; they are like finely tuned instruments that resonate with the music of being alive.

Although seekers are deeply connected to their own original experiences, sometimes it can be difficult to share those experiences with others. That’s why practicing some sort of creative expression is so important.

Staying connected to our inner voices can be challenging when the demands of our lives pull us in so many different directions. If you are a seeker, an original thinker, an artist, how do you stay true to your values and your vision when you’re feeling fragmented?

Start by listening to the deep, still voice inside you. What is it telling you? What of your experience do you want to express? What is your spirit seeking?

Remember that, despite the external challenges in your life right now, whatever you are seeking is also seeking you. Like the tree within an acorn, your innate gifts want to be brought into this world. By following your own path, you bring your gifts to others who seek them.

What inside of you wants to be brought into the light and shared with others?

How do you stay on your path despite the distractions of daily life?

Don’t Go Back to Sleep

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What does this portion of a thirteenth century Rumi poem tell us about living a conscious, authentic life?

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don’t go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want.
Don’t go back to sleep.
People are going back and forth across the door sill
where the two worlds touch.
The door is round and open.
Don’t go back to sleep.

Red arch with blue sky

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. We can wake up to our inner wisdom the way we wake from a dream to this world. But just like remembering a dream, we have to hold it in our consciousness.

Don’t go back to sleep. Stay conscious; don’t forget what the wiser part of you knows.

Many times I’ve experienced an insight, only to have it fade and slip away. Sometimes, a lost insight returns some time later, and although it’s not new, it feels like I’m experiencing the insight on a deeper level.

Write down your insights. Write down your dreams. Go back and look at them. They’re stepping stones to your growth.

You must ask for what you really want. Fully participate in life. Have the courage to feel vulnerable, be honest, and take action to live your life authentically.

What do you want? Sometimes, how you describe what you want is really the result of something else. For example, if you want to feel fulfilled, that feeling is the direct result of living in alignment with your values, with who you are. And that takes action.

The clearer you are about what you value and how you want to live, the easier it is to find the path you need to take.

Don’t go back to sleep. It’s tempting to slip back into a status quo life. It’s familiar, and it seems safer. But the cost is sleepwalking through your life. Stay awake!

What you want is the result of how you live your life, every day. What changes do you need to make to have the life you want?

People are going back and forth across the door sill where the two worlds touch. We can go back and forth between an old view that no longer matches who we are, or an expanded perspective gained through looking deeper. It’s our choice.

An expanded view is not only possible, it’s necessary to change your life, to take next steps.

The door is round and open. You can step through the open door from your fears to a place of possibilities. It takes courage, support, and ultimately, a commitment to yourself.

Don’t go back to sleep.

Changing Your Perspective

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There are many ways to describe this experience of life we’re having. But whether the experience feels rich and full—or hollow—depends on our perspectives. And our perspectives depend not just on what we say we believe, but on where we focus our awareness.

Opening your awareness of the world around you deepens your experience, and allows you to see things from a new perspective.

When I was in early grade school, something happened one day that I couldn’t let go of. I can’t remember now what it was—probably someone said something that hurt my feelings or I had been embarrassed in some way.

When I came home, I went out back and sat on the center of the metal teeter-totter to think about it. I knew that it was taking up too much of my attention, but I kept going over it in my head. So I imagined looking down on myself from above. I “saw” myself on the seat of the teeter-totter in the middle of the back yard. From that perspective, I looked so much smaller, and the world seemed so much bigger. What I was worried about was tiny when compared to the vastness of the world; I let it go.

That experience helped me learn that I could manage my own anxiety. By shifting my awareness, I could change my perspective and how I experienced events. I was, and am, deeply sensitive. Learning how to discern what really mattered to me and what was trivial allowed me to stay true to myself in many ways.

I believe that we are—and everything is—connected. We can’t always detect these connections directly, but when we are open and aware, we find meaning in them. And when we sense, or feel, or intuit, some meaning in an experience, or in multiple random experiences, it deepens our experience of life.

If you pay attention to your inner voice and your life experiences, you can see meaningful connections in outwardly unrelated events.

One of my favorite experiences of synchronicity happened in Paris. I went to the Louvre early one day in October. On my way to see the Mona Lisa, I walked down a great hall filled with paintings. Although I was trying to hurry to see the Mona Lisa before the Louvre filled with people, my gaze was drawn to Domenico Ghirlandaio’s 1490 Portrait of an Old Man and a Boy, and I stopped.

Portrait of an Old Man and a Boy by Domenico Ghirlandaio

Portrait of an Old Man
and a Boy
by Domenico Ghirlandaio

I didn’t understand why, but I had the strong feeling that I needed to pay attention to it. I looked at the painting for a while. The old man in the painting had a condition known as rhinophyma, causing his nose to appear large, bulbous, and ruddy. His image, and the kindness in his eyes, stood out to me.

After I left the Louvre, I walked to the Gibert Jeune bookstore. When I left the store, I found a 2 Euro coin on the street. I picked it up and put it in my pocket.

I continued down Place Saint-Michel and passed an old man standing by an iron fence playing La Vie en Rose on the accordion. He seemed like a figure from the past. Passersby had tossed coins into a bowl beside his beat-up instrument case. Like the old man in Ghirlandaio’s painting, he had rhinophyma. For a moment, I felt like I was looking at the same man in the painting. It gave me the sensation that we are eternal, and our souls repeat lives like patterns over and over again.

But more profoundly, I realized why I had found the 2 Euro coin: I felt that it was meant for the old musician, and I, as part of the flow, was meant to bring it to him, the way a wave tosses a shell on the beach. It felt both profound and natural. And it connected a series of random events—looking at a painting, finding a coin, and seeing a street musician, in a way that felt meaningful to me.

So I turned around, went back to the old man, and put the coin in the bowl. He smiled and said “Merci, mademoiselle,” and kept playing. I walked away knowing I had experienced something special. The deep connection of these outwardly unrelated events was simply kindness: the kindness that spoke to me from the old man’s eyes in the painting, and the kindness of dropping the 2 Euro coin in the musician’s bowl.

Our experiences are full of meaning; they are made of meaning. We just have to open our awareness to see it.

When you open your awareness, what do you see?

How does your perspective change?