Relax your mind

Be grateful for what you have and take time to be not in mindlessness but in consciousness. Try to be aware of all that is around you, the soft breeze, the sound of fluttering butterfly wings, bees buzzing, motors running, nature providing. See the bird circling overhead as a saw buzzes in the background.

Watch the shadows as they move with the air and the light as it reflects off the sun. See the piles of stacked shingles on the roof and the blueness of the sky. See the blades of skuff growing in the dirt being moved by the wind and hear the car going by.

Watch the airplane flying to an unknown destination growing smaller until it disappears from view and hear the dog bark two doors down. What is he being distracted by? Life is all around you, feel the essence of it and the cool water as it trickles down your throat.

Feel the beat of your heart and count the waves of the gull's wings in the sky as it pumps and then drifts and then pumps again. Hear the voices afar "come down" and smell the freshness with a faint scent of sea air. Slow your mind and your thoughts and just listen, feel, see, and become part of all-that-is. Don't think, just experience.

Know God in the vastness of the sky, in the warmth of the sun. Be touched by Him in the caress of the air, slow your breath and feel at one with everything. This is peace. The dragonfly circles the yard and then lands gently on the wooden fence. Is it resting or is it too just "becoming" as are you?

You hear the sound of a nail dropping in the distance, ping, ping, ping, then silence. What is it like to be the nail, the bird, the dragonfly, the wind, the sound of a train? To expand beyond mere self? To close your eyes and then, hear and feel and see and be?

To feel the rhythm of life around you, and within you? Nothing is separate but a symphony of motion and sound, of being touched by the universe. Sense the direction of things as it encompasses you. Breath deep and long and slow. Relax all of self.

Feel the presence of the chair, of the cement beneath your feet, the feel of the glass beneath your hand and it begins to feel as if you are all one. No inane thoughts, no worry just being one with God, the angels around you, the birds and the sky above you, the ground beneath you. All one, all feeling, breathing, existing, expanding. Now focus on God.

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