Hello Friends.

Our practice is not only a practice of healing from, it is also a practice of becoming. To be in the moment, in each moment, is to become a possibility. So as we offer our attnetion into our own bodies, and we release the past and ungrasp from a future that is impossible, we can be in the realness of this moment. One after another afte rnaother after another. Our days are made of moments, and our life is made of days. We are a series of these moments, and our awareness saves us from the sorrows of missing them.

All In Love,

Michael

This Substack is reader-supported. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Hello Friend.

Thank you for taking a moment in your day to invite stillness and silence into your consciousness. It is a gift that we can offer the world once we can find it for ourselves. It would appear that this is a gift that is very much needed in this world today.

To find this gift, we must offer vulnerability to receive belonging, and belonging to create the closeness we need to touch into our deepest feelings. So we breathe deeply, and we bring our awareness there with the breath.

All In Love,

Michael

Please join the conversation. Your vulnerability invites mine.

Hello Friends.

Thank you to the students of KCA for joining us on Monday mornings as part of a curriculum of learning wholeness practices for health. You are most welcome.

Today, our practice meets an understanding of the multitude of who we are. We are larger in any moment than we could imagine, and small enough to be with all of it at once in just one breath. The contradictions are glorious and make us who we are. Learning to embrace ourselves fully is learning to embrace the world.

Keeping your practice simple allows you to grasp the complexities of it. Simple is not always easy, and complex is not always complicated. Layers upon layers simply means we can move through our levels of understanding from up close to farther away with our own attention. This is beneficial when we are beginning to feel overwhelm during our practice, or anytime during our day or night.

All In Love,

Michael

Hello friends.

How do you carry your upset? Your anger? Your disappointment? As we begin to practice re-associating with our bodies, you may find the answer is “not as well as I thought”. As we encounter these feelings that are yoked to our sense of embarrassment and shame, we touch into some brutal truths about our own defense mechanisms. We have more than one of us running this game. It seems there are times when we call out the commander of defense to take control when we are faced with emotional pain. The Commander has all sorts of tricks to avoid the reality of feeling the upset for what it is…upset. We create injustices, slights, affronts, and offenses from our own preferences for not wanting to be uncomfortable. We battle the world!

I could have said things like, ‘I think there’s something happening in the world.

Everybody seems to be upset.’

Well...

Oftentimes when you think everybody seems to be upset, it’s because it’s you who’s upset.

And, what is also true: we are allowed to be upset, and we don’t have to blame anyone for our discomfort. We can be okay with not being okay.

This is the practice.

All In Love,

Michael

Hello, friends.

Thank you for your attention today. My thoughts this morning seemed to keep returning to what it is to be home. To feel at home. Having been a person without a house many times in my life, and sometimes having a house that was unsafe to be in for many different reasons, I have learned firsthand that to be at home has little to do with addresses and much more with where I can feel safe, rested, and cared for. When we have difficulty finding these ways of being in our own bodies, it can be quite challenging to want to keep a practice of embodying our present moment.

So, we practice. And we keep practicing. And we shift and we ebb and we flow and we practice. Breathing in, Breathing out.

Then we are met with the synchronous nature of being here and now. There we find our friends who meet us “in the space between what is right and what is wrong”. Today, we find bell hooks in that place.

Appalachian Elegy 32. bell hooks walking the long way home walking ever so slow talking to be wholly in this world of wonder standing still waiting standing in the center of a long and winding dirt road leading uphill to a small house surrounded by lilacs black-eyed susans roses and honeysuckle vines a bench at the bottom that bodies may rest before they climb

Be wholly in this world of wonder, friends. Be still and wait.

All In Love,

Michael

Hello, friends.

In a world seemingly built for separation, it would track that our minds are also well practiced at division. It could also be the other way around. Either way, a practice of interruption is key. We must practice interrupting our own thoughts and words that perpetuate the notion of unbelonging if we hope to feel a sense of belonging in ourselves. This is where the method of compassion presence with whatever we may be carrying, whatever may arise from within, is so critical.

Often, though, we can become mired in the muck of shaming from a new place. If we practice only accepting kindness and acceptance, but continue to reject our own rejection of what causes harm, we are no closer to connection than we were before.

We must open ourselves to being more than we think. Our heart is far larger than our mind.

Thich Nhat Hanh is a wonderful teacher of practices that bring us into harmony within and without. He does this not by trying to be “better than” anyone else, but by not allowing himself to be swept entirely away from his center by anything he thinks or feels. Recognizing thoughts and feelings as aspects of our experience, but not the experiencer. We must remember our nature, which is in this body, a temporary thing. This is true for every person you meet. We are all born with needs we cannot meet alone, and each of us lives our lives trying to meet those needs. It is through learning that we can only meet our needs together that we will find a pathway to peace and harmony.

Thank you all for being here today. Please remember to follow, like and share these practices. If you wold like to become a financial support of this offering, there is a Venmo link at the bottom of this post.

All In Love,

Michael

Generate Generosity https://venmo.com/u/journey-home-care

Hello Friends.

Today we are joined by a group of students from a local high school who are learning a meditation and mindfulness practice. We welcome them with ecstatic open arms!

There were some sound issues with the original broadcast, and with a bit of attention paid to it, I was able to repair the sound levels, so thank you for your continued patience with our learning curve with technology. I appreciate your work.

I spoke this morning a bit on why it may seem like many of our subtle voices that can and do arise in our practice seem to be uncomfortable and difficult emotions. The answer for me is that I have very little problem being present with comfortable and pleasurable feelings. It is the feelings I characterize as negative that I tend to suppress and repress, making my body a repository of suffering. It follows then that a practice of opening up to a hidden thing would open us up to the feelings we put ther eint he first place. Get comfortable with the uncomfortable.

Get comfortable with the uncomfortable.

Thanks to the students today for being present and participating in the practice, even though it is very uncomfortable. I appreciate your willingness to grow.

bell hooks magic is real! Today we read Appalachian Elegy 31 and boy howdy is it relevant to our practice this morning.

Appalachian Elegy 31. bell hooks returning to sacred places where all is one embraced belonging an intense field of possibility wondrous goodness fills the air grant us great spirits another chance to reclaim and nurture earth glorious sky divine water in everyday the blessing of weather offering change a constant passing of life into death and back again

Thanks for being here. Please like, follow, subscribe, share, and tag a friend in today's practice. Remember, we are on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube as Journey Home Meditation as well.

All In Love,

Michael

Generate Generosity

venmo.com/u/journey-home-care

Hello Friends.

Needs are non-negotiable. We cannot bargain our way out of a need, and we cannot compromise a need for a desire. We need what we need.

When we are not able to meet those needs, we function at a deficit. This means we are moving through life in a way that is passable, but not optimal for our health, be it mental, physical, or spiritual health. Unmet needs are the drivers of our unhealthy coping mechanisms. So, let’s learn to identify what we need in any moment, and then learn how to ask for what we need. It is so simple that it just might work. And what is also true is that simplicity is complex sometimes.

bell hooks hits it just right once again in Appalachian Elegy #30.

Appalachian Elegy 30 bell hooks burning pain has its own rhythm back and back shaking the foundation of trees once strong brought down by fire by fierce want uprooted all solid familiar ground naked now going once going twice leaving damaged and broken unending blackness

Thanks, bell hooks. It means the world.

All In Love,

Michael

Generate Generosity

venmo.com/u/journey-home-care