Connecting with Awe as a practice for healing.
Connecting with Awe has been one of the most impactful things for my own healing & process. And healing aside experiencing Awe is one of the most wonderful parts of being human.
You know, that feeling of intense wonder, the gasp that arises from the belly and out the throat, the goosebumps, the tears, a moment of pure presence and reverence. When you suddenly FEEL that you are a part of something bigger and so incredibly beautiful. It’s like our bodies were created to just be in love with this world.
Francis Weller says in his book Absence of the Ordinary…
‘‘We are designed for encounter; our senses are rivers of connection in a continuous exchange with the world around us. How deeply we experience this encounter, what we come to recognise and discover, is a question of presence, of reverence’’
Why is awe good for us?
Awe is so much more than that fuzzy feeling in your belly when you see a sunset. It’s actually incredibly good for our physical and mental health. Connecting with Awe has shown to reduce inflammation and calm our nervous systems. It also reduces anxiety and rumination by taking us out of ourselves and out into the world. It helps with our cognitive processing, increases our curiosity and helps us feel more connected.
We need AWE. We are bodies that are ecosystems that are a part of ecologies and cosmologies. This sense of wonder when we widen our senses to the world can offer us belonging, remembering, softening and aliveness. I would also argue that in these times we need to keep falling in love over and over again with the magic of life.
Awe can both sustain us and move us to action.
And Awe doesn’t bypass our grief, our rage, our pain, our illness but we can let it be a companion. These small moments of reverence that help us keep our hearts open.
CONNECTING WITH AWE
There are so many ways to connect with AWE! You don’t need to travel to some grand faraway place to find it. As Francis says, this is a practice of presence and reverence.
It might be as simple as noticing the snowdrops, taking a walk at sunrise or sunset (honestly never fails) it could be a song or a piece of music, maybe a person or community you are in awe of, it might be a painting, a photograph or perhaps just taking a moment to really connect with a tree.
Some places I have found Awe recently…
The red gold tones of my horse Pearl’s winter coat in the sun this morning.
The orchestra of birdsong in the forest atm.
The daffodils emerging.
The people of Minnesota rallying together to protect their neighbours against ICE.
The tree buds getting ready to open.
The full moon and Jupiter together in the sky last week.
Anytime I learn some new epic fact about my body.
My clients.
My never ending grief.
The book Notes on Deep Time (honestly the Earth & life is so cool)
Receiving an oral telling of Innana’s descent (Sumerian Myth)
The fog travelling up the valley of the River Teign.
And I could keep adding to this list over and over again.
You could also keep an Awe journal, writing down a couple of moments each day where you find yourself in reverence to the world.
So as Spring starts to emerge and the light returns I am extending a gentle invitation to go out and fall in Awe everyday. To connect with that moment of remembering that we really are a part of something wider and more magical, no matter how long we might have forgotten, our senses are always there to pull us back into wonder.
(Lastly, I would also recommend Dacher Keltner’s book which is simply titled AWE)