between the lines
on presence and connection
an audio version of this post is available below
I celebrated my 48th birthday this past November and wrote about it here — a love letter of sorts, a wish for the year ahead, a foreshadowed celebration of the experiences to come and the dreams yet to unfold.
When I reflect on what I wrote that day, first in my journal, pen to paper before sunrise, later on my laptop and eventually shared here in community, a clear thread revealed itself. Pulsing like a heartbeat, a steady, resolved undercurrent informed the trajectory of my gaze, my priorities, my intentions, and, ultimately, my future decisions.
What emerged in the spaces between the words was an unambiguous commitment to connection. Deep, meaningful, clear. No fuss. A devotion to practicing intentional, consistent connection with the miraculous, fragile, heartbreakingly swift totality of life.
Pouring through the spaces between the lines, clinging to each symbol like a vine, was an unspoken wish to dissolve my internalized duty to fill the white spaces of my days, to respond in a timely manner (whose time exactly?), to entertain a yes when a yes meant compromising something sacred to me.
What remained was a remembrance of my capacity to choose; a reminder that I am the steward of my energy and my attention. It is on me to cultivate the conditions for spaciousness to grow and presence to thrive. To open myself to the presence that nudges me, again and again, to interface and engage with anything and everything unfolding right in front of me. Presence that drops me right into the soup of life and forges a felt sense of connection by simply opening the eyes of my senses and paying attention.
So, I’m trying. And when I forget, I do my best to forgive myself and return — often, I can hear Elena Brower ‘s voice encouraging me: hand over heart repeat how human of me.
Over and over and over goes the practice. Because that’s the thing about presence, about connection. Both are right here, lingering with us, available at any moment, hanging like ripe fruit on the limbs of our days waiting for us to pluck off the branch and devour. Each bite nourishing our relationship with what we hold sacred.
And so I’m seeking to begin my days with the questions: What if opening myself to connection were the most important part of my day today? Where can I welcome a little more presence?
Then I listen. Attempt to let each seed land. Nothing dramatic, just my attention gathered, willing, noticing what floats to the surface. Connection with my body, my steadiness, my ease. Connection with my partner, my boys, my parents (in form and spirit), my girlfriends, and strangers. Connection with nature, my dreams, my creativity and creations. Connection with my priorities and my chosen work. Connection with the tiny glimmers that spark joy, with the knots of pain and the learnings they bring.
Connection with all. of. it.
More often than not I need dozens of reminders over the course of a single day to return. Gentle, quiet nudges to myself—a deep breath, a lifted gaze, a whispered affirmation “I’m right here”. Tiny rituals reorienting me toward the marrow of life brimming right in front of me. The sacred disguised as the ordinary, grazing my fingertips, awaiting my attention, inviting me to see again and again.
Love, Kate