Taste, Feel, Touch, Listen, See
To celebrate the temporary is to taste, to feel, to touch, to appreciate with all the senses what is around you
right now. "That's ridiculous," you may be thinking. "I do that all the time - so what's new?"
It's true, we taste, feel touch, listen and see all the time. But we do it
without awareness! Our heads are so often in another place that we don't really taste what we are eating. We don't really enjoy what we are touching, don't realize the pleasure in the simple things we are doing.
I remember the occasion when I instructed members of a workshop to take ten minutes to walk outside in silence, letting something of beauty drawn them. The workshop was being held on the grounds of a Benedictine monastery, surrounded by St. John's University in Minnesota. Several monks who lived on the campus were attending the workshop. I asked members of the group to relax, to breathe deeply, to let the beauty around them into their awareness.
A short while later the group began drifting back inside. I shall never forget one monk who said, "I've lived here most of my life. But this morning, in ten minutes, I saw things I have walked by for years and never noticed."
For most of us there is some beauty around us day by day. We sit beside it or look past it or ignore it. We fail to let it speak to our spirits, to call out to the beauty within us. We are somewhere else, living for tomorrow or fretting over the past.
I invite you to try a simple experiment for yourself. It will take only twenty or thirty minutes out of your life. Lie down on the floor, inhale and tense every muscle in your body as you hold your breath. Then exhale as you let the tension go and relax into the floor. Take another deep breath and let the tension in your body go out as you exhale. If you feel tightness somewhere, try to let it go.
When you feel relaxed, and if you have not fallen asleep, give yourself ten minutes to walk slowly, gracefully, and easily in your yard or nearby park. The experience will have more power if you are sharing it with someone else. You should remain silent during the walk, however, and share observations afterward.
Try to be present to whatever beauty calls you. It may be the intricate patterns in a single flower blossom. It may be the winter sky. It may be the variations of color and shadow in a single tree.
The main thing is not to try to program what happens. Don’t decide your route in advance.
Just be. Just flow with whatever your feelings lead you to. Just exist, with no plan, no program, no schedule. Is it too much to give yourself ten minutes just to be?
Why not try it now before you read further?
Another helpful experience to heighten your awareness is to give your total attention to one flower or leaf or tree. Study it at close range, just permitting its beauty, its color, and its shape to speak to you. Then move a little closer to the subject and study it from that vantage point. Let it call out of you the sense of wonder and appreciation – the feeling of joy. Then move closer yet. Each time you do, you will see an entirely new world which you had not noticed before. When possible, share this with a partner afterward.
I shall long remember the night Carol brought the lilacs. I was a member for a time of a small house-church group, meeting weekly for conversational sharing and creative worship. Carol had agreed to provide leadership that week. It was lilac season, and she arrived with an armful – fresh, fragrant, lavender. She gave us each a large lilac cluster and asked us to study it in silence for awhile.
It was an experience of genuine pleasure just to be with those lilacs for a time. We held them, touched them, felt their texture, smelled them, touched them to our faces. One of the most pleasant parts of the evening was sharing memories and associations with lilacs. Each of us had some childhood experiences with a lilac bush in the yard of our home or that of a neighbor.
Lilacs are a delight, and we tend to walk past them each spring without really stopping to see them, feel them, smell them, and appreciate them. We say, “Oh, isn’t that nice. The lilacs are out again.” When we next think about them, they are gone. Lilacs come and go very quickly, and to appreciate them fully we must celebrate the temporary, giving some of ourselves to the lilacs.
To celebrate the temporary
Is to lie
On your back
On the floor
In the dark
And listen
Really
Listen
To a beautiful piece
Of music
Not doing
Anything
Else
But
Listening
With every fiber
Of your being
