Establishing Our Go-To Practices

As we move along the Path to Freedom we need to realize one thing. If we want our lives to change - we need to change. Wishing or hoping for a change is not enough. One of the first and most important changes we make is establishing a habitual set of go-to-practices. Practices that we can lean into that support and empower us.

I invite you to join me for a moment of exploring what this means.

Transcript

Blessings and welcome to the path to freedom.

My name as always is Daniel Rockeo and always as always.

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And that came out weird.

Always as always,

I'm grateful that you are choosing to tune in,

That you are choosing to participate,

That you're choosing to spend a moment in raising your vibration and expanding our consciousness,

Your consciousness,

Because that's what this path of freedom is all about,

This path of awakening about us continuously expanding our consciousness so that we may release and let go of that which no longer serves,

So that more love and peace and joy and harmony and abundance and wholeness may well up from within us,

So that we may continuously allow for greater and grander expressions of who and what we are to emerge,

To come forth.

And that's it.

It is as simple as that.

Actually there is practice behind this.

This does rarely happen overnight,

But there is a continuous practice where we,

Through our practice,

Gain presence muscles,

Gain spiritual muscles,

So that we may learn to navigate through the world and through the illusion of fear and worry and doubt that the world is so trapped in,

And still retain,

Sustain our peace,

Still sustain our joy and our love and our harmony and wholeness and abundance and all of that.

But it is practice,

Which is actually what this talk is about.

The topic for today is establishing our go-to practices.

Establishing our go-to practices.

Because as we move along and as we immerse ourselves in study and high fellowship,

We eventually become aware that there are so many practices that we can use,

That we can fill our toolbox to overflowing with practices.

There are various practices of meditation and prayer,

There is studying,

There is high-minded fellowship,

There is blessing others,

Wishing others well,

There is coming back to the nowness of this moment,

There is gratitude,

There is thanksgiving,

There is forgiveness,

There is.

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And the list goes on and on and on and on and on.

And while all of these are beautiful ways that we can lean into this waking up,

What I'm finding for myself is that it can also be a bit overwhelming.

I used to have a very structured practice until a few months ago,

And then life got very intense and a lot of beautiful healings have happened and a lot of beautiful transformation is happening.

But in that,

In navigating through the shifts and changes,

I've become increasingly aware over these last,

I don't know,

Couple of weeks perhaps,

That the foundation that I used to have in terms of practice,

I no longer do have.

I've sort of lost them along the way.

It's not that they're not there,

But my habitual leaning into them has sort of dissolved.

So I want to spend some time,

As much for myself as for any one of you tuning in,

To sort of come back and find a structure for what practices to use.

Kind of like athletes.

An athlete in whatever sport,

They're very narrow skilled.

They're very specialized in a very narrow field.

Like a basketball player,

For instance,

They're very good at offense or very good at defense.

They're very good at penalty taking or something else.

But most athletes,

Including basketball players,

They are not expert at everything within their particular sport.

And so it is for us that we need to find a foundation from where to build our practice.

Hence the title for today,

Establishing Our Go-To Practices.

And for myself,

As I've been contemplating this for these last few days,

I'm realizing that the number one practice,

And actually the one practice that everything else springs from,

Is coming back to the nowness of this moment.

And then out of that,

And we're going to explore that a little bit more in a short while,

But from that,

When I am grounded,

When I'm centered,

When I'm anchored in the nowness of this moment,

It's so much easier for me to lean into the other.

The other practices sort of branch out from that foundation,

But I need that foundation.

And all these years that I've spent on this path,

I've come to the conclusion that all of this work that we're doing ultimately springs out of two practices.

As I just touched on,

Coming back to the nowness of this moment,

Being fully present here now,

Not only in meditation,

But all throughout our days.

And out of that,

Moving ever deeper and wider and higher into our conscious realization of our oneness with the Spirit,

That God is all that there is and we're one with it.

That's the liberation.

Out of that comes the liberation.

But I've also realized,

And it's been particularly clear to me these last few weeks,

That as I have lost my coming back to the nowness of this moment practice,

As my presence muscles have begun to weaken,

All the other practices,

Quote unquote,

Suffer from that.

So I'm beginning to realize more and more and more that being fully present here and now,

That is the foundation for everything else.

So what does it mean to be fully present here now?

Well,

It means there's time.

We have past and we have present and we have future.

And none of these are the nowness of this moment.

None of these are the eternal moment,

But these are the linear aspect of time.

The nowness of this moment is eternal.

It's infinite.

It has no present.

It has no future.

It has no past.

It's all this moment and this moment,

A continuation of this moment.

Many of us have a tendency to lean either into the past,

We tend to relive our past,

Whatever glories or whatever sufferings or whatever we experienced in the past.

And some of us have the tendency to lean into the future habitually,

Meaning that we project into the future,

Either that we are hoping that the future will bring us the good that we desire or that we're fearing what the future will bring us.

So we're either predominantly in the past or predominantly in the future,

Which keeps us from being fully here and now.

So my practice,

The way I practice the presence is by using the breath,

By coming back to the breath,

Just being with the breath,

Being aware of the breath,

Being aware of how the chest rises and falls,

How the air flows in and out.

When I'm grounded and centered in the nowness of this moment,

Peace arises,

Harmony arises,

Joy arises.

I'm not getting it from the world,

But it arises out of this presence of me being present here and now,

Not two moments ago,

Not four moments into the future,

But here and in this very moment where I get to observe,

Where I get to witness everything that is happening without labeling it,

Without resisting it,

Without,

And most importantly,

Without attaching myself to it,

Regardless of whether it's a thought form or a judgment or an emotion or whatever the case may be.

When I'm firmly standing in the nowness of this moment,

That's when the peace that passes human understanding arises.

And out of that,

So that's my number one from this moment on.

This is,

As I said,

This is as much for me as it is for anyone.

This is a reminder for me and me setting an intention to stabilize my practices that have been unstabilized over a period of time.

So that will be,

And needs to be,

My number one go-to practice,

To come back to the nowness of this moment,

Using the breath to bring me back.

And from there,

I can spring into whatever I need to spring into,

Or lean into whatever I feel I need to lean into in that moment.

So you can be leaning into my go-to principles,

Like all is well,

Something wonderful is always happening,

Everything's working for the highest good.

I can lean into having a casual conversation with the Spirit,

Which simply means that I have a casual conversation with God,

Just as if God was my best friend.

I oftentimes open up with,

Hey God,

It's me,

I'm back.

This is me leaning in,

And then whatever is on my mind,

I share it.

If I feel I need help with gaining strength or clarity or something else,

I lean into that.

Or I can just have that conversation to expand my sense,

My realization of this oneness,

The sacred communion with the Spirit,

The sacred unity with God.

I can lean into blessing others,

Wishing them well.

I can lean into.

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There was a third practice that came up this morning.

I can lean into.

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It doesn't really matter.

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Oh,

Gratitude.

Yes,

Obviously.

Just allowing the consciousness to wrap itself around the fact that in every single moment there are infinite gifts and blessings in our lives,

In our experiences.

The good is all around us in every single moment.

So we can choose to turn our attention toward that.

And obviously all of these aim at expanding my consciousness,

Aim at raising my vibration,

Aim at pulling my attention away from the world of appearances,

From conditions and circumstances and situations that might be to my liking and might not be to my liking.

But regardless,

I want to come back to this moment.

I want to come back to the nowness of this moment.

So we are very wise to establish or stabilize is perhaps another word,

Stabilize our practices,

Actually establish our go-to practices so that they may be stabilized,

So that we continuously come back to the nowness of this moment,

Continuously using all our moments in between to build those presence muscles,

To come back to the breath.

And a moment in between obviously is a moment when we're not consciously preoccupied with something that requires our attention.

So a moment in between,

Driving can be a moment in between,

Going to the bathroom can be a moment in between,

Standing in the shower or taking a bath can be a moment in between,

Taking a walk,

Standing in line,

Sitting on the bus,

The airplane,

Whatever.

All these moments that we have,

Doing dishes,

Cooking,

Even watching TV can be a moment in between.

All these moments that we have when our attention is not required to be on something 100% in the external world.

It's a moment in between and we are so wise to use them,

To utilize them because they are beautiful gifts and blessings,

Beautiful spaces where we get to practice.

The choice is what are we practicing in those moments?

Many of us are practicing worry.

Many of us are practicing fear.

Many of us are practicing love and gratitude.

Many of us are practicing playing the victim card.

So we're always doing something with these moments.

The question is what are we choosing to use them for?

Which choice are we making in that moment?

We want to make choices that serve us.

We want to make choices that move us forward.

We want to be intentional in our waking up.

So we want to use these moments in between for something that support us,

That move us forward and ultimately that allows us to expand our consciousness.

Ultimately something that raises our vibration and the foundation is coming back to the nowness of this moment.

That's the whole essence of this whole talk.

To have that as a practice,

Come back to the nowness of this moment over and over and over and over and over again until we live there,

Witnessing,

Observing everything that happens.

But we live steeped,

We live fully anchored,

Fully grounded in the nowness of this moment.

Like a huge oak tree or a huge tree that have roots that go way,

Way,

Way down into the dirt,

Into the ground,

Into the soil.

So that when there's wind and it can be very windy,

It can be a raging storm,

But as the tree is so grounded in the ground,

So anchored in the ground,

It bends,

It flows with the wind,

But it stays upright.

It's not tossed around like a tumbleweed or leaf.

All right.

So thank you so,

So much for tuning in to this session of establishing our go-to practices.

Until the next time we meet,

Much,

Much love to all of us,

Knowing that there's only the one of us.

Namaste.

Reviews

Great reminder! Thank you 🙏🏼