the most valuable gift is...

[silent thunder]

So this realization has been revisited on me again and again in my life. Mainly because I am nearly, inconceivably wealthy in the vast amount of incredible people, animals and plants that have continually surrounded me throughout my life in every phase.

 

It's become more intense and frequent of late, last night being a whopper. So I share it.

Last night it was driven home, poignantly, almost overwhelmingly in one of those simple, shining, 'ordinary' moments just 'hanging out at home'. A moment so relaxed and simple, so authentic, it roils with potential and resonates in my inner life like some massive gong being struck and my awareness takes on a pounding presence of clarity and acute, almost overwhelming gratitude...

I'm sitting in my usual spot, cat splayed out on my lap, as my wife and son engage in deep conversation... and then awareness settles, everything becomes almost still, even with the motion of the fish swimming and the gestures going and the music playing, everything seems to get very still as I expand outward... and this concept settles on my pond like a leaf striking a gong that shakes the world.

"the most valuable thing that anyone has ever shared with me, or that I could ever offer... is complete, authentic presence."

It's profoundly humbling and empowering simultaneously.

 

A silent, immense, gratitude repeatedly pounding out in waves of love that in turn crash back into my core, as if the very air were a drum being hammered by the presence of authenticity.