Sherlock looking at the sunset!
Saturated with the Holy
Do not let your senses be saturated
with so much time on your devices —
with the artificial pings and dings
that disconnect you
from the experience of being
embodied and alive.
Saturate yourself with rest.
Bathe yourself in full body breaths –
loving inhales and cleansing exhales.
Overflow your mind with patient, kind,
and encouraging thoughts about yourself.
Let your eyes rest on the beauty in your
everyday life – the iris blooming,
your dog snuggled next to you
gently snoring, the stream flowing
with last night’s rainstorm,
the devoted, aging hand of your beloved
offering you a cup of coffee.
Let your ears be consumed with
the sounds of gentle names for yourself:
Sweetheart, Beloved, Dear One, Love.
Soak your nervous system
in the stillness of the forest.
Go at a pace that allows you time
to taste your food, linger giving the hug,
hear the geese up above,
and watch the black purples of the night sky
slowly turn into golden rays of possibility.
Land here in the present.
Receive this precious moment –
so saturated with the holy.
Lisa McCrohan © 2022
Recently, Brian and I took a few days to go to the coast for our 20th wedding anniversary. One evening, we were driving back to our hotel from an event we attended. It was a perfect summer night. We had the windows down, feeling the breeze on our faces, sometimes talking, other times just being quiet as we watched fireflies flickering in the fields of the farms we passed.
I’ve been married to Brian now for 20 years. He has this deep sense of peace about him that amazes me and at the same time flabbergasts me because this is not me! But this beautiful summer evening, driving down the country roads with Brian, I felt a peace in me that has been deepening and settling in me.
Just married!
Just being together, 20 years later!
I asked Brian, “Is this kind of peace just your default?”
“Yeah, it is,” he said.
I bring spunk, delight, and adventure to our relationship. Brian brings peace. It doesn’t mean everything is perfect within him or around him. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t get anxious. But I have seen over the last two decades how peace is his default way of being.
Imagine that! Peace as your default way of being in everyday life.
Maybe it’s me turning 50, but there’s not much I want these days. This isn’t resignation, it’s a growing contentment and peace with “what is.” I’m not “settling for less,” I’m living more fully with what I have.
I spent a lot of time in my adult life accomplishing – or trying to accomplish. I’ve spent a lot of time “reaching for the stars” and “taking soul risks” to go for my dreams. There is a time for that. But right now, what is most alive for me is this: just being here.
I hear God’s invitation to just be here.
At the start of summer, when I asked, “What should I be working on?”
I heard, “Just be here.”
When I asked, “What do you want me to be about?”
I heard, “Just be here.”
When I asked, “What do I want to do next in my work?”
I heard, “Just be here.”
My son is a rising senior in high school. My daughter is a rising freshman. It’s cliche but it feels like time is speeding up. I am excited for them, and I am also aware of how our family will experience a monumental change in just one year. It might sound crazy to say that I enjoy being with my teenagers, but I do. We all annoy each other at times, but we also have a good time together. I like the people they are.
So when my daughter invites me into her room to sit on her papasan chair while we listen to music and chat, the invitation is to “just be here.” When my son and I are driving in the car together on the way to an event, the invitation is to “just be here.” When we actually sit down and eat a meal together, the invitation is to “just be here.”
The older I get, the more I really drop into the moment because I know now: this is where peace is. It’s like I say to myself, “Settle into this moment. Drop into it. Feel that anxiety wash away. This kind of peace and connection is what life is all about.”
For decades, I have woken up anxious. I have often felt anxious throughout the day. I’ve done a lot of healing work with all kinds of practitioners – I can’t imagine how my anxiety would be if I hadn’t! I try to practice what I preach to my own coaching and psychotherapy clients – I meditate (I even write and record meditations! And I listen to them, too!), I do yoga, I get outside, I exercise, I have a schedule for my day where I don’t have to hustle and grind it out. Still, anxiety has just been something I live with.
Until recently.
A peacefulness is settling within me. And I can feel that peace becoming my default – my own kind of Lisa peace.
How is it possible that peace could be the default for a person who has been anxious for decades?
Maybe you, too, have been anxious for awhile. Or maybe anxiety is a new thing for you. Maybe you wake up anxious. Maybe you just get anxious when you are flying on an airplane. Maybe you’ve noticed that you hold your breath at times. Maybe you’ve had some panic attacks. Maybe there is a constant low-grade pulse of anxiety that you have as you go about your day.
Let’s start with this practice: Just be here.
Of all the practices for healing anxiety, I have found that for myself and for those I work with, we need some training in terms of where we put our attention. There are so many different stimuli that try to grab our attention and are an assault on our senses. We are saturated with so many artificial pings and dings, as I say in the above poem, that disconnect us from the experience of being embodied and alive.
Puppy snuggles! Me and my parents’ pup
Instead, just be here and saturate yourself with rest. Full body breathes. Loving and patient thoughts of self-compassion. Beauty. Flowers blooming. Your pet snuggling with you. A rainstorm on a summer evening. Sweet names for yourself. The healing sounds of a forest. A slow pace. The kindness of your dear one. The kindness of a stranger. A nourishing bite of food. Hugs. Watching the sunset.
Anxiety is here, and so is beauty. So are six seconds of a full exhale. So is a full body stretch. So is the sound of birds chirping, the gurgling creek on your morning walk, and the willow tree swaying in the wind.
Where you place your attention matters. What you place your attention on matters.
What about sadness, panic, grief, anger, and frustration? Just be here. Yes, with them, too. Acknowledge them. Breathe with them. See them as part of the human experience, too. Then choose where you will place your attention next. Choose what you will place your attention on next.
To help guide you, I’ve written and recorded several meditations on the app, Insight Timer. Each of my meditations is here to support you in growing your capacity to “just be here.” You can find all of them here.
On my podcast, Delightful, I’d like to highlight these episodes:
67. Radical Spaciousness – Poetic Experience
53. A Guided Meditation for a Delightful Summer
Just be here. In a world that will pull you at you and distract you, to “just be here” is a sacred art and skill to practice. As we do, a peace might settle in each of us…and between us. For me, a deep sense of satisfaction is growing in me. I hope this for you, too. So saturate yourself with rest, with full body breaths, with play, with delight, with letting go, with accepting, with being right here. Just be here to feel peace making itself your default way of being. I never would have thought it was possible, but God is showing me, once again, that anything is possible – even a quantum shift like me having my own kind of Lisa peace as my default. I believe you have your own budding in you, too.
Blessings,
