It’s been more than a month since I wrote a blog post. First, it was my 60th birthday, and then I went away on retreat, and somehow, I found my feet on a winding path in a parallel life in which there was a blessed absence of deadlines and to-do lists–the kind of silent spaciousness I hadn’t known I’d missed until the horizons opened and melted into an infinite sky.

I treasure the friendships I’ve made online. I love sharing my heart in this strangely intimate, utterly public space. I’m enriched, enlivened, provoked, delighted and enlightened by your comments, your stories, by the experiences and ideas we share here together.

My friendships, both online and off, are food and water for my spirit. Together, we create synergies that can and do change our world, make it richer, brighter, more nourishing and beautiful.

And, without solitude, I can’t take any of it in. Being an introvert by nature, I need a rhythm of connection and seclusion, as much as I need each in-breath and out-breath.

Especially when there’s a lot going on in my life, as there is right now. I need quiet in which to feel what I’m feeling, to dream new shapes of my work and my life into being, to explore the intersection between my inner genius and the needs of my world so I’ll know how to serve, what I’m being called to partner with now.

As in any dance, timing is everything. Stepping forward when the music calls. Gliding into retreat in the adagio.

How about you? How do you nurture your own inner rhythm of connection, of solitude? How do you step into this dance of the With-ness of We?

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I went for a walk this morning, and was struck by the purity of the air, which fills my lungs with sweet, life-giving oxygen. By how clean the dirt path is, under my feet. By lush and sparkling beauty all around me. Tall cedars and firs, in shades of rich viridian green, reach upwards into clear blue sky. Grasses along the side of the road sway gently in the breeze, their ripe heads nodding in blessing.

Above all, I am surrounded by silence and silver bird calls, enveloped in a friendly solitude that puts me firmly in the midst of the natural world. I pass just one other person on my walk. She waves as she jogs by. The morning is mine to savor. And savor it I do!

I’m in love with this place, this seaside village where I live, this country that is so shyly generous, that offers itself modestly, without fanfare. I’m in love with this place that is my home. My home!

I’m an egg that’s found its nest.

It wasn’t always like this. For much of my early life, I longed to belong. To my family, who gave me love, shelter and the safety of tender hearts, but to whom I remained a mystery. To the world of my school, where all the girls seemed to know the secret of How to Be that eluded me completely. To India, which embraced me in one breath and repulsed me in the next.

I longed to be like everyone else. And yet, I wasn’t. (Neither was anyone else, but I didn’t know this then!) The pain of being different is a two-edged sword—to feel separate from others shreds the heart. But the deepest cut comes from feeling separate from yourself, from your own tender, radiant spirit.

That longing to belong took me on a journey far from myself. And stranded me on alien shores, far from the hearth of my heart.

Now here I am, almost sixty years old, surprised by belonging. It slipped in when I wasn’t looking. By living my life, I’ve made a life. Here in the Pacific Northwest, halfway across the world from where I was born.

I’ve rolled into the nest that perfectly cups my heart.

Happy birthday, Canada!

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I’m still awe-struck by the incredible power, beauty and sacredness of that moment, when this new being first incarnated into her earthly body. To see a soul in all its radiance, as yet undimmed by the necessary container of the life that it will shape, and be shaped by, is to witness the Divine in a moment of breathtaking intimacy.

And to see her again, a scant four days after her monumental entry into this world, gave me the rare opportunity to witness the first handfuls of earth that form the foundation of the life that she will build–with the help of her family, her community, and each and every one of us who contribute to the world she has just stepped into with her perfect little feet.

Her mother is deeply engaged in the sacred task of birthing and nurturing this baby, who is both a powerful, limitless soul, and so utterly vulnerable, so dependent for everything on the people who love her. Landing on this earth is not an easy transition to make, and today, this baby was overwhelmed by the newness of her surroundings, including her own body, which at the moment is a foreign land.

She is also vulnerable to the onslaught of attention from all the people in her life who love her and want to see her and hold her and welcome her into the world. So she escapes into sleep, and hangs out with her soul friends, those non-physical beings who are her closest companions, and who have supported her in choosing and then traveling to this incarnation. It will take her time, and a growing feeling of safety, to land in her body.

In many ways, the process that she’s engaged in right now—the experiences that she has and the ways in which she copes with them—will leave a lasting imprint on her life. To witness these processes at work at their very origins is to see the origins of our own adult patterns of connection and disconnection, of radiance and dimming, of opening out into our lives and contracting away from them.

If we are fortunate, we will have, as our first caregivers, women and men who not only love and adore us, but who understand both our sovereignty and our vulnerability. Who honor and see us for who we really are—the Sacred made incarnate—and who also honor and guard our vulnerability, our need for seclusion, until we are able to land more solidly in our own skin.

This baby’s mother is a wise and loving woman. She will give her daughter the precious gifts of recognition, protection, nurturance, and abiding love at the very start of her life, when she needs them most.

And yet, the essential needs of the newborn are ones that we all share. For love, acknowledgement, warmth, attention, nurturance, respect, sovereignty, tenderness.

We are, each of us, flowers that bloom from the heart of the Beloved, whose light shines within us and illuminates our world. And we are much more vulnerable than we care to acknowledge; dependent in every way. On the air we breathe; on the water that is our first element; on the earth that supports us; on the love and kindness and work and prayers of people around the world, most of whom we’ll never meet, but without whom we would have neither food nor warmth nor the shelter of the human family.

We have so much to be grateful for. And we ourselves are expressions of life’s gratitude for us. For our brave willingness to shine our light. For the commitment that we make to being the face of the Beloved for our daughters and sons, our mothers and fathers, our lovers and friends and neighbors.

I am so thankful for each of you, and for the light that you shine in our world. May you be blessed. May you continue to be a blessing.

Love,

Hiro

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Imagination and intent are among the most potent forces with which we shape our world. A Mongolian shaman once told me this story: In his tribe, the training of a shaman begins with teaching the child how to shoot with a bow and arrow. The first time the child shoots an arrow from his bow, it is often clumsily done—the arrow falls short of its mark, wobbles, lands on the side of a yurt, or on the ground. The entire village comes out to witness the child’s initiation, and, he said, “the entire village immediately forgets” these first clumsy attempts at shooting. Instead, everyone in the village “sees” the child as shooting the arrow perfectly . . . and eventually, he does.

His story tells us about the focused and conscious use of the collective imagination to support the growth and unfolding life of the tribe’s children. And it illustrates the way in which we each have the capacity to bless and support each other. By taking responsibility for how we perceive the people in our lives, we help them flow into their wholeness. We help them shape their present and future in positive ways.

A couple of weeks ago, at my son’s wedding, I met family and friends whom I hadn’t seen in several years. As I greeted and spoke with each of them, I was aware of the variety of stories or images they held of me. Some of these were based on our past experiences together. Others were projections of their own inner worlds. Some were stories they had been told, others were stories they had constructed for themselves out of their desires, beliefs or expectations about how things should be. Most of the people I reconnected with that day were loving in their intent. And yet, the particular lens through which they viewed me acted as a force that exerted a pull on my energy field to conform to the shape of the story, the image that they held of me. It took effort to stand apart from these perceptions, to be myself in that moment, to not flow into the configuration of these expectations and perceptions.

We’ve all known the feeling of ease and acceptance when we are with someone who meets us where we are, without preconceptions or projections. We feel seen, heard, and understood. We can connect with each other on a deep, heart level.

In each encounter, we have a choice. We can identify with and see only the parts. Or we can serve the wholeness in each other, and in ourselves, by inhabiting our own wholeness, the fullness of our Presence. When no part of ourselves—no matter how painful or needy or fragmented, or powerful or magnificent it might be—is left out of our hearts, then we see only wholeness. We see people as they are, in all their beauty and vulnerability, their discord and their joy. Our seeing then draws into manifestation the wholeness that lies at the heart of us all.

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