The rumble of the subway car underneath me, I looked up from my book to see the handrail poll in front of me – a sight I’d seen at least two thousand times before – had more dimension to it, somehow looked more real than it ever had. I became aware of my heart pumping in my chest and felt the hair on my neck stand tall. The simple moment – me riding the subway – had a spiritual electricity, an aliveness that I’d not exactly felt before and certainly not in such a mundane moment.
This was back in 2008 and the book I was reading was The Power of Now. Smartphones had yet to be tangled into our every waking thought. People read books on the subway or just sat idle. Remember idle? Eckhart Tolle’s book laid a foundation in my perception at that time in my early adulthood: The only real thing is now. That’s not a direct quote. It’s been almost two decades since I read it and what remains is simply what I understood of it at the time.
Future is fantasy. We spend a lot of time thinking about the future, sometimes in hope, sometimes in fear. What’s going to happen? We obsess over this question. While we are obsessing our mind is distracted by the fantasy of future, the present, the throne of potentiality, the place where 100% of our power lies, gets wasted.
Past is memory. Cartwheeling backward through time, we wonder what would have happened if. We wish we had said this, or done that. We even long for sweet things we once had or experienced. Longing for what was, wading through shades on regret, getting lost in a labyrinth of mostly distorted memory, we once again are missing our life which is here now and now and now and now.
Now is Life itself happening in real time through us and around us. Each moment arrives in a way it never has exactly before and never will again. We can meet the moment ready to dance with it or we can retreat into the vast universes of memory and fantasy.
There is a layer to all of this which has been added for me in the last 5 years as I’ve said goodbye to the version of the world I used to know, and lost family members and a close friend.
Being in the present is not about forgetting the past or never remembering anything that has happened in our lives. I believe we can have a conscious and profound relationship with both the past and the future right here in the present. We can honor a memory by telling a story or spinning it into art. We can bless the future, whatever it may hold, by making intentions out of our deepest dreams. We can braid together past, present & future. Work that is done in the present, right here.
And we arrive back at now, the only real thing.
Love,
Chris
P.s ~ This piece was inspired by our last New Moon Meditation Adventure, The Altar of Now. Download it here and/or join us for the next one on May 27th.
On the Horizon
Join us for an hour-long New Moon Meditation Adventure on May 27th.
Online, from anywhere.
Using a dynamic meditation journey, we will tune into the New Moon, to your own Inner Guidance, synced up with wild-hearted women from around the world. This offering will include music, storytelling, meditation, journaling prompts & intention-setting.
Can’t make it live? No worries. All participants will receive a copy of the recording with 24 hours of the session.
We have Wild Woman Project-trained Circle facilitators is 26 countries, and 44 out of the 50 United States.
WILD WOMAN UNDERGROUND
"The Circle Leader Training Program at The Wild Woman Project was one of the most transformative and healing experiences of my life. I have received many tools, resources, support, and connections that I will carry on with me forever." ~ Hannah Devin, Graduate
Chris Maddox is the founder of The Wild Woman Project where she teaches women how to utilize the gifts of the Wild Woman Archetype in their everyday lives & how to lead women’s circles in their local communities. She is the organizer & facilitator of the beloved annual WILD WOMAN FEST, a women’s retreat-festival hybrid which fosters a deep connection to nature, a direct experience of the divine feminine & profound spiritual sisterhood among the women in attendance.
An ever student of the great mysteries of existence and nature itself, Chris believes women are holding innate gifts & tools that society at large needs – now more than ever. She is committed to helping women remember their special magic and to bring it forward into every corner of their lives, for the greater good of the planet.