We are starting a new series called listen here is a little description about it. Also keep an eye here to find further writings that go with he series:

Listen Up
The Listen Up series is focused on listening. Listening may be one of the most important human faculties. When we’re honest with ourselves, most of us could admit that we often listen just enough to find out if the message pertains to us, and how we can construct our responses. We fall short of deep listening. There is so much potential in the act of hearing. It is through hearing that we listen to the music that moves us. It is through hearing that I recognize my children’s voices. It is through hearing that we can discover aspects of each other’s souls. There is nothing more amazing in a relationship then when we create a miracle moment by opening our hearts. These are the moments when our loved ones pour their souls into our ears. When we listen to another in these moments, we give life.
An important question to ask then is how often do I give life through the words that come out of my mouth or heart? With this question in mind, what can we expect in the weeks ahead? Over the next five weeks we will be listening to many important voices. We will be listening to the voice of mystery, the voice of our heart and desire, the voice within our questions, and finally, our own voice. Each will present us with an opportunity to experience and give life through deep listening.
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Listening meditations can be different than breathing meditations in that you are not focusing the mind on internal silence, rather you are opening your awareness to an external sensation. During this series we will intentionally be listening for the “voices.” This could be the voices of others, the voices of our own longings and questions, or the voice of the Divine. Together we will choose sounds that represent these different voices and we will open the ears of our hearts to them.

Smell

Can you smell that? Can you identify the scents swirling around you in this present moment? Most of us notice scents sort of haphazardly, when we expect, or don’t expect them. We notice them when they are extreme or out of place, like the smell of oranges in a milk shake or when you drive by the water treatment center along I-10 in Tucson. Generally, this is a sense that we take as it comes. We use it as a tool to identify things that we deem pleasant or unpleasant. Yet there is a world of smell constantly around us.

Smell, like taste is wildly subjective. What smells good to one person may smell awful to another. Very rarely does something that smells bad taste good, and yet there are many things which smell great and have terrible taste. This I know from personal experience. My wife had this hair conditioner; it was oatmeal & honey conditioner. It smelled so fantastic. Even though I didn’t use this particular hair conditioner I would smell it nearly every time I took a shower. So, naturally, one day I decided to give it a taste, it was one of the most horrible tasting things I have ever put into my mouth. I learned a lot in that moment, like hair conditioner is not meant for human consumption. More than this though, I learned that smell and taste are not so intertwined, that smell exists beyond the realm of taste. Smell is its own sense, in its own right, and very powerful indeed.

Do you have a favorite smell? Think of it right now. I bet as you think of that smell right now it is not without context. Thinking of the smell probably takes you to a specific association, a memory. Smell is said to be the sense closest tied to memory. I have favorite smells; one of them is the smell of creosote after a good monsoon rain in the desert. Ah, there’s nothing quite like it. It always takes me back in time, to specific and special memories. Like the time I was exploring the desert with a good friend. We were around the base of the Tucson Mountains. I remember watching the clouds darken the sky, cool the air and how the rain swept over us as if it were being poured from a watering can over a bed of flowers. Then, as the desert began to soak it in, the wind picked up the scent of the wet creosote carrying it to my nose; we were listening to U2’s Joshua tree album. Every time I smell wet creosote I get to relive that day. What memories do your favorite scents take you to?

Have you ever sought out a smell? Seriously, have you ever associated certain smells with different pieces of your life? You may have done just this and not even realize it. This week, as we seek to be present to the moment through our wonderful sense of smell, we will be prompted to seek out meaningful scents. Each day this week is an opportunity to become alive to this sense and to take some time to experience what it means to be human, what it means to be alive. Following the prompt there is some space for you to journal your experiences. If you are reading this on the blog, and feel comfortable enough to, please share your experiences in the comments section, or you can always use your own journal. Regardless, let the aroma of this extended Advent week bring you to a deeper awareness and peace.

• Today seek out your favorite scent. Take time to appreciate it. Live in the moment and let it dictate the course of your thoughts. 
• Today seek out the scent that reminds you of traveling. The story of advent is one of journey. Joseph and Mary return to their ancestral homeland, and we find the presence of the divine in the teachings and life of the one to be born. Advent is the story of birth, of being born into a world experienced through our senses. Take time today to find a scent that brings your thoughts to rest upon the journey that is life.  
• Today find a scent that reminds you of childhood. Allow the scent to remind you of a time when you as a child discovered something that would stay with you for the rest of your life.
• Today take seek out that scent which reminds you of your parents or whomever it was that raised you.
• Today find the scent that makes you think of love.
• Today enjoy that scent which reminds you of a dear friend, a spouse, a partner or someone else without whom life would seem incomplete.
• Today find the scent that inspires hope in you. This may seem odd and be a bit challenging, it may require focused meditation, but this is worth the practice, enjoy

Just a reminder that Community Night is this Friday 1/4/08 at 6:30.  I am bringing lasagna so we just need side dishes and drinks.  Please RSVP to Michelle Curcio so that I know whether to come or not.  You can reach me at rmcurcio1@comcast.net or 591-9929.  ALL are welcome.

Come eat, talk, and get to know someone new.

to my family at aldea. happy new year. i look forward to sharing life with you all in the new year. peace, jared

Well this is a very cool idea if only I could figure out how to work it.

Touch
When I think about the sense of touch, I think about a sense that is vital to our humanity. In fact, research shows that human touch is one of the most important elements to a child’s development. Babies that don’t receive loving touch from the beginning, suffer. Consider this quote from a recent study conducted on babies that required intensive care and were not able to be held.

“Researchers who study prematurely born human infants have reported that these infants receive very little comforting or contingent touch during their early days of life in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Most of the touch that preterm infants experience in the NICU is associated with medical or nursing procedures (procedural touch), and is not contingent in the infant’s cues.”

The study explains that babies need touch and not just any kind of touch; they need loving and comforting touch. Isn’t that amazing to think about? There is something miraculous about touch. Here is how the dictionary describes touch:

To come so close to (an object) as to be or come into contact with it.

A miracle is waiting in the moment that we come so close to an object that we are in contact with. Touch is one sense that I think we all could meditate on more. There are two types of touch that help center me.  First is the touch that comes through simple physical contact with something (such as prayer beads or some other kind of meditative aid) and then there is the loving touch.

During times of prayer, or any other time I need extra focus, I find it helpful to have something I can hold. This object helps center my attention on the present moment. I was made aware of the practice of using prayer beads three years ago during lent. Some friends and I decided that together we wanted to read some meditative writings during the time of lent. We added to our meditations the use of prayer beads. The beads became so meaning, during times of prayer, that I began using the prayer beads during my readings as well. I was amazed how by just having something to physically touch, my mind became so much more focused. I tested this out in different areas of my life. During important meetings or times that I was teaching I would keep a flat smooth rock in my pocket. As I was listening or speaking I would find myself gently rubbing my fingers over the rock’s surface.

Now let me say here that I know that this might sound I bit weird or maybe even a sign that I was taming some kind of attention deficit, but the truth is that the sense of touch brings your awareness into the present moment. The more I used the practice of touch, the more I found just how meaningful touch is. Using prayer beads or some other object to center my own attention revealed to me how much my touch can change the lives of those around me.

It might be more obvious that a loving touch can positively influence the development of an infant, but I don’t think we, as adults are much different. Quantum physics tells us that emotions carry with them extreme levels of energy and that energy can be transferred from one object to another without touch. That is an amazing thought. The emotional roller coaster that goes on within us on a second to second basis can affect what is around us. That is what is so amazing about touch; it can be the physical expression and transference of what is going on inside us.  It can be as complex as the life saving love of a parent being transferred to an infant. Or, it can be as simple as the compassion passed on in a handshake, hug, or kiss. I know it can be difficult sometimes to imagine physical contact as carrying that kind of weight, but really it is not that difficult is it? Sometimes, in our hours of great need, the hug from a friend is enough to release every emotion inside of us.

Think about how the sense of touch is really our nerves coming in contact with something and those nerves sending messages to our brains. Our brains then decipher those codes and that creates the interaction between the external world and us. But there is so much more isn’t there? Besides that physical touch bringing us attention to the present, there is deep meaning in every moment. There are emotions of love and hurt being transferred and there is the presence of the Divine to be felt. During this advent season take time to “get in touch” with the sense of touch. Find the present moment with the help of prayer beads, a stone, or something else. In that present moment allow yourself to become aware of the deeper meaning we can find in the miracle of touch.

Sight (vision)
Sight is a complex sense. It is not as easy as either having it or not; people have varying degrees of sight. A good friend of mine is fairly color blind, which really means that he has sight; he just can’t see all the same things that others can, mainly colors. Usually this is not a big deal, bar the occasional outfit that doesn’t match, but really what should he care if he can’t tell it doesn’t match? Why should he dress to please those that can see the color mismatch that he cannot? There are times, however, when his inability to see color becomes a problem. Mainly these problems arise when those who can see color forget that there are some who can’t. Recently, my friend and I met up in a big city where we were both kind of out of place. He had been there several more times than I had, so he was leading us around the underground train stations. As we were semi-lost, running late for our next meeting and staring at a large train map of the city, it began to dawn on me that this color coated map was actually doing my friend no good. I don’t know if he realized that the reason he couldn’t read the map and figure out why we were lost was because he couldn’t see that the trains were organized by color. I jumped in and pointed out which lines on the oversized jumbled mess of a map were which colors. Strangely, with his knowledge of the city and my ability to see pieces of the map he could not, we were able to work together and see something neither of us could alone.

It is this lesson learned through life that helps us see that sight is not just something that helps us physically see what is before us, but also gives us insight to what true beauty lives in what our eyes gaze upon. I think this is the point that Jesus makes to us repeatedly in his teachings. Jesus teaches us to pay attention or to open our eyes to what is before us and once we are attentive he invites us to (re)see. In fact I would have to say this is one of the main pieces of Jesus’ gospel. He is calling us to be a people who don’t just live, but to be a people who see life – and maybe something even more difficult, to be a people who bring that insight to those around them.

Take some examples from the sermon on the mountain. If someone asks for your coat, give them your shirt as well. If someone asks you to carry their bag one mile, carry it two. If someone strikes you on one check, turn your other check to them. Jesus is challenging us to see more in these moments. Each moment that Jesus uses as an example here, has deeper meaning than what meets the physical eye. Jesus is using three different examples, each which creates a sense of being violated. In one someone is taking something that belongs to you, in another someone is asking you to do their work, and in the last you are being physically attacked. What Jesus is suggesting is that in these moments you become attentive and see what could be lying under the surface. Don’t run like a coward and don’t take revenge, but instead see and give love. Almost all faith traditions and their great teachers have had something to say about this kind of
insight. The way I like to describe what Jesus says about this is “optimism.” By optimism I don’t mean some goofy naïve shiny version of life that glosses over the lonely, depressing, and ugly parts. The word optic refers to seeing and optimism refers to seeing the best. When I hear Jesus give these examples what I hear him saying is, learn to see and then learn to see what is there in a deeper way. Don’t see the destruction in life as death; see it as an opportunity to love. To go a step further would be to say: Don’t see death as destruction but embrace it with love.

A common conundrum illustrates optimism-versus-pessimism with the question, “Does one regard a glass of water filled to half its capacity, as half full or as half empty?” Modern day thought would assume the optimistic answer to be, “half full.” I don’t think this is the optimism that Jesus speaks of though. I think that Jesus’ examples and parables give us a philosophy that says: The only difference between empty and full is the insight through which you view it. Sometimes life can be full and sometimes life can be empty, but with the right eyes one can see what lies underneath. I think this Zen saying says it well, “Before enlightenment I chopped wood and carried water, after enlightenment I chopped wood and carried water.” The difference between the two is simply Enlightenment. Notice, whom Jesus calls blessed: the meek, the merciful, the pure, and the peacemaker. Each of these characteristics comes from moments where in everyday life one has insight to bring something deeper to those moments. Jesus suggests to us that with insight comes action that changes us and those around us. With mourning comes a chance to weep, with rejoicing comes a chance to laugh, with injustice comes a chance to stand, with war comes a chance to find peace, with transgression comes a chance to forgive, and with an enemy comes a chance to love. Jesus asks us to (re)see in such a way that our lives reveal insight to the Divine of every moment.

It is interesting to ponder whether color actually exist in the object we are seeing or whether it exists somewhere in the light receptors of the eyes waiting for the cells in our brains to translate what we are seeing.  In the same way, I wonder if the Divine is always present and is simply waiting for my eyes to have insight.

So during this advent season we are taking time to see. We are meditating on both the physical elements our eyes gaze upon and the hidden elements our hearts gaze upon in hopes that in doing so we can find insight.

Sight meditation
During this week let me encourage us to visually take in the season. This is such a great time of year to see things we don’t normally get to see. It is also a great time of year to have vision for things our hearts are normally close to. There are normally so many different connotations we have when we think about the life of Jesus, but at this time of year we have the opportunity to ponder the innocence, the humility and the wonder of his birth. This week open your eyes to the subtleties of life and open your heart to its message. Where is God’s presence in all that stands before your eyes? Breathe that presence in and let it give you vision to what lies beneath the surface.

Taste

Eating an orange

Have you ever really eaten an orange? I bet a lot of us would confess that we haven’t. We, like most of us in our culture, rush through the daily eating rituals. Our dinner tables have given way to drive-thru windows and become, more or less, self-serve filing stations. We fuel the physical and go. Some of us, even unaware, stuff food into our mouths like a drug. We eat to ease unsettled-pain. We eat without thinking, living unconsciously by the motto, “don’t think just eat.” Suffice it to say that many of us have never really tasted all the magnificence in the simple and often mundane act of eating.

So, let’s take sometime and eat an orange, fully alive and fully present to the moment. Think of an orange, if you have one near, go ahead and grab it. First notice the color from which this fruit derives its name. What does this color say to you? Maybe even think of how the color and the name of the fruit itself, may suggest its subsequent taste to you.

You may meditate on how subjective taste is, how what one loves another abhors. Taste and its being good or bad, seem to be influenced by an array of social and cultural influences and yet remain wildly nuanced to the personal. In fact, taste seems to be one of the most subjective of all the senses. The word itself has become a synonym for personal perspective. You can identify someone as having good or bad taste. Yet even this is subjective, there are probably as many “tastes” as there are people in the world. There are different cultures, different regions, and different families all that influence taste. One’s own taste can even change as you live your life. Which is why I think it is so important to spend time in the moment of eating an orange. This one moment can reveal so much about who you are.

Again, take this moment and focus on the color of the orange. Perhaps, it takes you deep into the playhouse of your mind. What is it that is recalled there? What does the color of the orange suggest? Perhaps the sun or that dress you wore as a little girl. Do you magnify the little orange orb and let it become a basketball in your mind? How amazing to be aware of how connected we are to every random piece of our lives, that an orange can bring us into beautiful nostalgias or other worldly wonders.

As you hold the orange, sense the texture of its outer skin. Notice it’s not entirely smooth and it may have imperfections indicating the earth from which it received life. The skin of the orange is so full of depth, history and life; it protects the heart of what lies beneath it. It has protected the meat of the orange through the seasons, through the rains and from the rays of the sun. It has brought to you the fruit just beneath the surface, prepared and full of life.

Now tear through that skin, slowly taking in the aroma and noticing the way it tears. It gives way to your determined purpose yielding nourishment and an awaking to the senses. Notice how the rind has its own unique aroma. Look closely and be aware of just how the skin tears from the meat of the fruit. Is there a sound that it makes?

And now take a piece of the orange, hold it purposefully between your fingers. Lift the fruit just below your nose and drink in its aroma one more time. Bite into the orange piece, don’t just throw the whole thing into your mouth, bite it, deliberately. Feel the way the flesh tears between your teeth. Let the juices of the orange fill your mouth and continue to chew, slowly, 27 times like your mother used to tell you. How does it taste? Have you ever really thought about just the pure taste before? What memories does the taste invoke? Are they happy, sad, nostalgic, or all of these. In this way, loosing track of time continue to eat the orange, letting the taste steer your thoughts, being fully alive to the moment, present to the experience.

This week I encourage you to practice this exercise at least once a day. Each day find a different taste to be present to. Everyday find a different fruit, meat, dairy, or even candy, and spend some time slowly drinking in all the wonder of the taste. If you are feeling really brave try a taste that you haven’t liked in the past, perhaps this slow eating will change the taste for you, maybe it will make it worse, nonetheless take the time to taste, at least once during each day this week.

“Taste and see that God is good…” - the words of a prophet from the Hebrew Bible.

Sound
One of the most fascinating things about our senses is that they are truly an interaction between our external environments and our internal ability to decipher what those environments are telling us. The senses seem to be such a miracle of life. It can be hard to determine where exactly the messages our senses detect exist. Do they live in the external or do they only come into existence when our brains crack their codes? I think sound is a good example of this conundrum.
There is a common philosophical question that plays with this idea. “If a tree falls in the forest and there is nobody to hear it, does it make a sound?” This riddle raises the question, does sound exist in the act of a tree falling or does it only become sound once our brains convert those sound waves into sound. Maybe the point of the riddle is that there is no answer or maybe it is suggesting that sound requires the interaction of life. Isn’t that an amazing thought? There are some things in this world that require the senses of those things that are alive in order to take on life themselves.
The dictionary describes sounds as “vibrations that travel through the air or other medium and can be heard when they reach a person’s or animal’s ear.” I guess according to this definition, unless those vibrations are heard they are not sound. It does seem fascinating though that sound seems to have a life of its own. The air around us is being constantly distributed - vibrating its way around trying to find an ear to give it life. Being that this advent season we are meditating on the senses, it seems like a good time to slow down and be alive to those vibrations, that are sometimes patiently or sometimes not, waiting to tell us a story of what is going on around us. How often do we not hear? Or, more likely, how often do we hear but don’t give life to those sounds that are around us?
This is one reason that I think meditation is such an important practice for us. Meditation allows us to simplify that which our senses is telling us. To sit, close the eyes, breath, and listen (sometimes without sound) allows us to reset our ability to give life to the messages our senses are bringing us. My wife has been practicing yoga for about five or six years now and I occasionally join her. One of my favorite parts about the yoga practice I have engaged in is “the corpse pose.” This is a pose at the very end of your challenging practice where you lay completely still. At first, you can feel every muscle remind you of what you have just done to your body, but after a while that fades away. Your body begins to relax and your mind lets go. For 10 to 15 minutes you are at peace. Then comes my favorite part: our yoga teacher brings us back to our senses with three gentle rings of a bell. It is at this point that I am truly reminded that sound lives both outside and inside of me. Almost simultaneously, as my brain is deciphering the sound, I can feel the vibrations on my body. It is almost like the strongest gong has just been struck right next to my body, but in fact this tiny bell has been tapped across the room from me. From my head to my toes my body resounds and not only are the vibrations given life, but so are my senses. I can hear this small ring clearer than any other sound and I can feel it all over my body more than any other presence. Why do I love this moment so much? I think it is because, even if it is just for a few seconds, I am truly aware. I am aware of how powerful my senses are, I am aware of the presence of their external messengers, and I am aware how important it is to give them life so that I can learn what message they bring.
You see most of the time I treat my senses like they are just the delivers of empirical data that I then use to more efficiently navigate my life. Sight simply shows me where to go, taste tells my what foods I will tolerate to keep me alive, touch keeps me from pain, smell tells me when something is unpleasant, and hearing lets me receive information so that I can better spit out information. There are a few moments in life, however, when I give more respect to the miraculous gifts they bring. In these moments, wavelengths disrupting the air become sound. These sounds then become birds chirping, flies buzzing, my children laughing or crying, a stranger asking for help, music moving my soul, or a bell ringing. It is in these moments that the causes of wavelengths become alive and I in return feel alive. I can feel the presence of their life externally and internally.
It is not uncommon when thinking about spiritual things to ask oneself, what does the voice of God sound like? Is it a loud human voice trying to tell me information? Is it audible and would I recognize it if I heard it? Sometimes I wonder though if the Divine voice lives in the sounds I hear every day. Maybe it exists in the rustle of leaves, the voices of those around me, or even in the ringing of a bell that is awakening my senses. Let’s take time this advent to meditate on sound. Let the wavelengths that are disrupting the air all around you land on your body. Let them bring sound to your ears and give those sounds life, so that you can also be brought to life.

Thoughts on how to meditate on sound this week

During the following weeks of this advent season we will be asking you to take some time to meditate on that week’s chosen sense. This week our sense is sound, and though I know all our meditations will be personal to our own experience, I will try here to help give you some ideas.
As I suggested in the writing, let the wavelengths that are disrupting the air all around you land on your body. Let them bring sound to your ears and give those sounds life so that you can also be brought to life.
Take time to meditate in private, isolated from your daily routine. Sit somewhere removed from others, close your eyes, and let your breath catch you. Take deep inhalations and even deeper exhalations. Don’t rush this, but take your time.
Your brain will wander and you will be distracted. Some of us might even find this painfully difficult, but this is part of the meditation. (If you think about how hard it can be for us to find presence in silence, how hard must it be to find presence in the chaos of life?)
Don’t worry about whether you are doing it right or if your mind is still enough. Just continue to breath and simply listen. Listen to the clatter, the subtle noise, or even the silence. Let them all speak to you.

The second part of our meditation will be to take our meditation into our day with us. Live your life; go to work, take care of your kids, make dinner, drive your car, but make sure to listen. What do you hear? What noises surround you on a daily basis? Does taking time to intentionally slow down help you to hear?
Most importantly, ask yourself, where is the Divine voice? In which sound does it live? Maybe it lives in each sound. Either way, try to listen to what it says.
Take this week to perform the miracle of giving life to sound.

This is a place for us to discuss this year’s advent meditations. To write a post, follow the directions on the front page on how to register and then make sure to mark your post in the “Advent 07″ category. You will find this in the column on the right-hand side as you are writing your post. I am looking forward to sharing this advent season with all of you.