To Know and to Believe

Often insights appear out of intimate relating to another. The expression of those experiences with others in open and honest exploration using the written word further enables the  gathering of thoughts and  reflecting of them.  There is a  playful creating and   formulating  of words and concepts that occurs in this exchange. It arises out of the urge to capture these experiences and  related perceptions and to share them with another and often  what is shared by another in intimate communication influences what is experienced for me.

The biggest changes that I have experienced over the past few years is that there has been a lessening of attachment to words and to beliefs and what is thought to be certain and permanent. Ironically I have more of an appreciation and love for the written word being the avid reader that I am.  Maybe it is more that it comes from  a shift in the realization of what words, concepts and beliefs  truly are and an awareness of some of the consequences  of  an absolute reliance on them as a way of understsnding. There is more of an acceptance that there is no way to transfer  my deepest experiences to another through the use of  words. There can be an  artful use of words and other mediums to express the experience and it is quite possible that others will share similar experiences and recognize the commonality in that expression. But words are limited in expressing that experience and any experience for that matter.

An  intuitive awareness and connection and sharing of energy  among humans and other beings on this planet is something that is being discussed more openly and  often these days. Language is used in communicating with other humans but there is more to this exchange than is captured through the use of language and how unfortunate it is that these other ways have been largely  ignored  with the expansion of human dependence on verbal dialogue.

The letting go of belief is certainly connected to my newly emerging understanding of language and as well it is a result of a lessening of an attachment to former ideas of what I considered “Me” or “Myself” to be.  These new ways of seeing things involves  something more of an  intuitive sense; an energy that is  something similar to what I refered to in the last paragraph that has  always been a part of me,  more than I once enabled it to be. Although this energy  is not something that is measurable by conventional standards, in presence I am aware of it in myself as I am aware of many things that do not offer proof to the outside world.  Past habits of being fixated on acquiring security through knowing,  are less indulged. There is more awareness of the emptiness of the claims to know  things that can not be known through conventional means, those claims based on a refined use of words.

It is good enough that my new-found  awareness leads me to a more authentic experience of  relating to others and to life. Through that experience of relating there is a knowing. The authenticity,  openness and honesty with which I pursue understanding leads me to a more internal functioning and  of finding my place and my fit in the midst of all else. I know nothing for sure yet there is  more reliance and  trust in exploring “being”  in presence as a  way of life as it unfolds from that. The kind of curiosity and creativity we commonly think to be traits of  children as well have come to be aspects of presence that play an increasing role in living for me even at the ripe age of sixty years.

Author: Gord Clements

I find some satisfaction in the act of attempting to express my experience of life through painting, writing, language and other art forms. I have been painting for over thirty five years and combine my love of art with a meditative and contemplative way of life. I have an intuitive sense that true creativity is something that arises from beyond and through Qthe self that can be explored and shared through some form of expression although I always hope to open to the influence of that which is beyond my limited sense of self. View all posts by Gord Clements