The Depth of My Seeing

What a summer it has been.

A little too busy, perhaps, yet filled with adventure, travel, reflection, and moments of unexpected beauty.

What I have become increasingly aware of is how being truly present—really noticing what is around me—helps me create my own blueprint. Through journaling, I have been recording my dreams, my awareness of sunsets, the waters, the sky, the people, and the countries I have traveled through.

Life is so precious and filled with so much magic. Yet the question I keep asking myself is: How do we see it?

For the past two weeks, I have been in New York, a place I lived more than 30 years ago. Walking those familiar paths brought me into another kind of journey: the Biography of Social Arts.

I found myself reflecting on my life—literally from birth to today.

It was not easy to look at all those lines of life, all the experiences, choices, joys, losses, obstacles, and awakenings. Yet through this work, we were given ways to move through our stories with art.

We began with our hands, working with clay. Then we moved through the different phases of our lives, creating a head sculpture that began as an infant and changed day by day as we grew.

The deeper reflection that came to me was simple and profound:

How did I get this old?
And where has life gone?

Yet perhaps life doesn’t disappear. It changes.

We watch. We wonder. We become afraid. Sometimes we panic. Sometimes we hold on tightly. And still, life changes.

I moved through so many emotions during this process. Rather than trying to understand every one of them, I allowed myself to breathe. I noticed the experience. I allowed the feelings to move through me.

And then, on the last day, I met myself.

I created the woman I am today out of clay.

I looked at her and thought, Well, I’m certainly not the best artist.

But I loved her.

I also witnessed her life through that piece of clay. I created a story—a story about a soul who had experienced many obstacles, many beautiful moments, and many spiritual awakenings. A soul who had come to the edge of surrender, who had known moments when she wanted to give up, and yet here she was.

Still here.

A beautiful soul filled with love and gratitude for her journey.

I will be honest: when we first began this project, I wanted to throw the clay against the wall.

I didn’t know why.

I wasn’t sure where that feeling was coming from, but I was aware of it.

So each day after class, I allowed myself to walk home. I noticed. I listened. I breathed. And I gave that deeper part of me permission to speak.

That part of me that has been bombarded by life, media, work, and the constant rhythm of busy, busy, busy.

The part of me that wanted to be seen.

The part that wanted to notice the trees, the sunsets, the flowers, the butterflies.

The part that has been aching for silence, stillness, and calm.

The breath brings me back to that place.

It reminds me how important it is to simply Be and Breathe.

This morning, I woke up still very much in this place of presence. I went outside to take the garbage out, returning to my ordinary home routine.

And there it was.

Mist in the morning air.

As I walked, I noticed a beautiful spider web—and a huge spider.

Her work of art was spectacular.

I stopped.

I simply stood there in awe of her web.

For a moment, there was nothing to accomplish. Nothing to understand. Nothing to rush toward.

I simply received the gift of now.

Because I know that today will change.

Life does.

Perhaps that is what this journey has really become for me: learning to surrender to the moment. To be here now. To allow life to reveal the magnificence that is already here.

I saw that in my sculpture.

I looked at this woman I had created and realized that every part of her story had brought her here.

Every joy.

Every heartbreak.

Every obstacle.

Every awakening.

Every moment of wanting to give up.

Every moment of choosing to continue.

All of it created the woman I am today.

And perhaps the invitation is not to change the story, but to see it more deeply.

As Mary Oliver so beautifully asks:

“I don’t ask for the sights in front of me to change, only the depth of my seeing.”

And perhaps that is enough.

To breathe.

To notice.

To be present.

To receive the magic that has been here all along.