Exquisite Attention
/
We live in the presence of the divine, surrounding by a spirit that is embedded in life and infused in all things. The magic of life was apparent to us as children when we looked upon everything with fresh eyes and a naïve heart. We lived close to the divine. Maturity requires a loss of innocence because it’s necessary to disconnect from the divine in order to negotiate the world. Society will tolerate dreamers if they are also contributors and consumers, or if they are cloistered, like monks and nuns, in acceptable institutions.
With exquisite attention, we can reconnect to the divine. Exquisite attention is a state of wonder, a kind of eagerness to be in the world. For most adults, stepping into the world with open arms and eager anticipation, but without narrowing life into patterned expectations, is a lost art. It is the loss of this art that so often leads us to getting lost in our lives. We are too caught up trying to shape the world to our ends to even notice the world we are in. Or we are too taken by the world to notice our place in it and we lose ourselves.
The requisite skill set for exquisite attention is to empty yourself of the need for the world, for others, or for yourself to show up any particular way. Practice cultivating an awareness of your place in the world as it is and bringing your full presence to the ground you now inhabit. Exquisite attention is childlike wonder tempered with immediate grounding in whom and where you are. You can never be lost when you bring your full presence to life because, in that moment, where you are now and where you want to be are one and the same.
Excerpt from Divine Whispering, my third book of poetry.
