Welcome to this meditation centering in uncertainty.
This meditation will begin with a guided visualization and some thoughts on the nature of uncertainty.
It will end with a guided meditation after which I encourage you to record your inspirations in spoken form or in free writing.
To find a place now where you can experience some stillness,
Either seated or lying down or out walking,
However and wherever you feel comfortable.
With your eyes open,
Your breathing natural and your body relaxed and receptive,
Begin to attune your senses more deeply to the world around you.
Scan the horizon,
Observe the ground at your feet.
What do you see?
Other people,
Animals,
Trees,
Buildings,
A wall across the room from you or across the street.
Take in the sights and sounds around you,
Smell the air,
Feel its temperature against your skin.
Now pick out an item in your immediate surroundings.
Let your eyes and senses come to rest on this something that has captured your attention.
It can be anything at all,
A human being,
A pet,
A bird,
A tree,
Perhaps a piece of furniture,
A dish,
A book,
A stone,
A flower or some other object.
As you observe this person,
Animal or thing,
Ask yourself if you know how it got to be here.
From the time that it came into being to this very moment in which you're contemplating it,
Do you know all that transpired to bring it to you?
Before you decide,
Let your imagination roam for a moment and your memory recollect.
Now take this someone or something and observe it just as it is in this moment.
Notice even that it has changed since you first brought your attention to it.
Think about what may happen to it next and where it's headed.
Anything we consider can never really and completely be known,
Isn't it so?
Anything we consider and anything we experience.
In fact,
Everything is largely unknown.
Looking upon an object like a book or a vase,
How many events led to it being in your presence?
How many hands have touched it?
And as soon as you release it,
It will continue on its journey.
And when you encounter it again,
If you encounter it again,
You and it and everything else will have changed.
All will be new and different.
So we cannot know the true origin of anything or what will become of it or how long it will last.
The same is true if you were to hold up a mirror right now and place it in front of you.
You believe you know yourself.
You believe you know all that's transpired to bring you into this moment.
But you've forgotten so much.
You've forgotten how much has gone into guiding you here.
Much if not most of it,
You'll never fully know,
Could never completely know.
We accept so much of the world around us without ever truly knowing and understanding all there is to know about anyone or anything's origin or ending.
And yet somehow for the most part,
We're content with that.
That's how life is.
We don't really think about it.
We accept at points along the way when the uncertainty becomes almost unbearable.
We are alive in uncertainty always.
We're constantly uncertain,
Surrounded by the unknown,
The unforeseen,
The mystery.
If there's one thing we can really be sure of,
It's that we really can't be sure.
And yet consider this.
You've already done something so colossal,
Immense and mighty.
Something you flowed with,
Something you endured.
The greatest leap into uncertainty that you and I and each of us have managed to ride out and survive is the leaving of the secure world of our womb with its warmth,
Liquid and constant nourishment and all the breathing and feeding and absorbing and excreting that was done for us.
The heartbeat that was the first compliment to ours.
We left that to be born.
We let that go and we're swept into this great unknown called life where we ultimately are on our own or so it seems.
In every moment,
Hour,
Day and decade since every year that we take another turn around the sun,
We've been navigating uncharted terrain,
Mysterious dark nights of the soul,
Bright days of illumination and all the in between of adaptation,
Adaptation,
Adaptation and learning and learning and learning.
If uncertainty has been our one true companion in this experience we call life,
Then we are a student and it is our teacher.
Could we even recognize life if we knew without a doubt just how it would unfold moment to moment and where,
When and for what reason?
Life is our teacher.
The mystery,
The uncertainty and all their agents,
Our teachers.
Everything is uncertainty.
Therein lies the great propeller,
The great desire and drive for meaning and meaningfulness.
So while we can't ever know all,
We can center in the not knowing and in the unknowable.
For we ourselves are just as mysterious as anything we encounter and because we as humans are conscious and aware of our consciousness,
We can take things a step further.
We can make meaning of everything and every circumstance,
A meaning that we can live with and die with.
This is the power we have in any moment to make our own meaning of events,
To establish our own frame,
Set boundaries for who and what we permit to come into us and go out from us,
To find our ground.
Things will occur that are very,
Very difficult and unsettling.
We cannot know or predict how difficult and adverse any more than we can predict how smooth or beneficial for there are endless scenarios.
And so we have but one choice,
Moment to moment,
Day to day,
And that is to pick the scenario,
The outlook,
The belief that fits our life and circumstances right now.
Whether it's that we need to slow down,
To disconnect,
To speed up,
To connect,
To rest,
To reflect,
Whatever is most meaningful to us here and now,
Centering is listening for that meaning to emerge.
And so I invite you now to close your eyes and bring your attention once more to your breath,
To your relaxed and even natural breathing.
And as you breathe in and out,
Consider these questions which you can later revisit and mold and shape as suits you.
What is rising up and offering itself to you in this moment in time as an opportunity for you to make meaning of it?
New meaning,
Your own meaning,
Meaning you can live with.
In this reality in which all of life for all creatures is gloriously uncertain,
What is it that has the greatest meaning for you?
What world would you like to see and serve?
Directly in your own house,
Your interior indwelling house,
And then in your home,
In your neighborhood,
In your family,
Tribe,
Community,
Town and city,
In your ocean,
Forest,
River,
Desert,
Sky.
Sit with that,
Hold that in your lap,
In your hand,
In your mind's eye and in your heart.
See it,
Hear it,
Taste it,
Savor it.
Enter all your senses in it.
We are in a space between stories,
You and I.
My stranger,
My friend,
My fellow traveler,
My fellow pauser,
Our whole wide world is in a space between stories.
What are you certain that you will leave behind?
What are you certain that you will take forward?
You already know.
You are the true north who will render the meaningless meaningful.
You are the one who will sit and ask,
How am I really?
And know the answer.
How am I really?
How am I really?
How am I really?
How am I really?
You are the being at whose feet your lifelong companion and teacher,
Uncertainty,
Comes at night to rest.
What is it you wish to birth?
What do you see?
Through all the uncertainty,
What do you see?
That is your center.
