Grace in Daily Life: Receiving Stillness Beyond the Meditation Cushion
·There are times in your meditations when a superior stillness descends upon you and the room in which you sit. Within that stillness there is peace, harmony, a receiving, a grace.
Sometimes, that stillness can happen in your busy life. I have seen rooms full of people, talking, drop into silence as a stillness descends on a group. A pause in the busy minds of people in which something transcendent flows. Being comfortable with not talking while in the company of others helps to land that grace.
When you feel this, let yourself open to this peace. Let yourself expand beyond the confines of your body; for you are much bigger than your little bipod body. Let yourself be receptive to the grace being bestowed upon you. Stay absolutely motionless so that you may be lifted up and rejuvenated, for this is a nourishing moment for your soul and body.
And if you feel inclined, inside yourself, offer your thanks for whatever is relevant in your life at that moment. Stay with the experience until the moment passes.
Grace often meets the broken places. When the breaking is heartbreak, the meditation work of mending a broken heart and the metaphor of kintsugi describe the same opening — light through the cracks.
If learning to recognise and receive grace is part of the practice you want to build, the School of Knowing is a year-long course in exactly this work.