Our lives are guided by natural rhythms that are particular to each of us and cannot be altered by force of will alone. Life itself is a journey made up of processes and events that manifest before us only to be swept away when time marches on. Whether we envision ourselves creating a career, building a relationship, or developing the self, we instinctively know when the time has come for us to realize our dreams because all that is involved comes together harmoniously.  Yet as desperate as we are to touch these beautiful futures we have imagined, we cannot grow if we are not fully present in the evolutionary experience. The present can be challenging, uncomfortable, and tedious, but life unfolds as it will, and the universe will wait patiently as we awaken.

The fate that awaits us is not dependent on our pace, therefore there is no reason to rush through life to reach those pinnacles. Enjoying and fully experiencing the journey of life is as important as achieving goals and reaching milestones. There are lessons to be learned during those moments that seem immaterial or insignificant that we cannot learn at any other time. Appreciating these takes patience. However, because human beings tend to focus on fulfillment we often miss the negative spaces and simple joys of just being.

Haste is by its very nature vastly more stressful than serene fortitude. When you feel yourself growing impatient because the pace of your development is deceptively slow, it’s important to remember that everything will occur in its own time. Quelling your urge to rush will enable you to witness growth. If you are patient enough to take pleasure in your existence’s unfolding, the journey from one pinnacle to the next will likely take no time at all. And as we sit with this quiet rhythm of our life, it also gives way to feel our hearts.

We tend to spend a lot of time attempting to put the feelings in our hearts into words, to communicate to others our passions, our emotions, and our love. Often we are so busy trying to translate this language that we miss the most profound experience the heart has to offer, which is actually silence. Every poem arises from this silence and returns to it. When all the songs, the soliloquies and the emotions are finished being expressed, silence is what remains. As each wave of feeling rises and falls back into the silence, it gives us opportunity to connect with the vast, open, and often healing wisdom at the soundless center of our being.

Our hearts sometimes seem noisy and tumultuous so much of the time that we forget about the silence. It takes a sensitive ear to tune in to it. So close and so large that we often don’t notice it. In our quiet, we can become aware of it in the same way we become aware of the negative space in a still life, the background of a photograph, or the open sky that contains celestial awe. We are accustomed to tuning in to objects and sounds that are one-pointed, solid, and dimensional. Seeing and hearing the empty space is what brings awareness to self.

We can bring our awareness into our hearts by simply breathing and recognizing that which we take for granted. The first thing we may notice are feelings like joy or sadness and physical sensations like tightness or tenderness. We surround these feelings and sensations with breath and recognize that they are contained and held in an immeasurable substance like water or air, intangible, ineffable, but utterly real. This is the silence of the heart, of being, and the more we listen, return to it, and accept it, the more we bathe and purify ourselves in the negative space of life.