CORE

The core is our centeredness, our reference point and a full occupation with our felt experience. Through the core we are familiarized with our own suffering, pain, trauma, needs, joys, and exaltations that not only define us individually, but also connect us to others through compassion and empathy. How do we heal this loss that has led us astray, not just as individuals, but as community and society as well? How do we navigate the journey to find home, returning to our internal core, settling into peace and well-being? The first step to healing our internal schism is awareness. What does it mean to come into awareness? What does it mean to reclaim core? From where do we experience our sense of belonging? As the world is changing, with a worldwide web of information and shared experience unifying us all into a larger identity, do we continue clinging to a sense of belonging through place/country, ethnic group, and other prefabricated identities, or do we transcend birth/body/appearance and begin to the explore the boundless internal landscape of our inner beings? If we breathe deeply into our center, connecting with heart, spine, and core, we sense the complexity of our multiplicity. We are not singular in the sense of being just a particular family member, belonging only to one state and cultural group. From our core we trace our affinities not only to the varied aspects of ourselves, but to those persons and places that we have known somewhere in our extended experience. We expand into a realization of the depth of shared experiences inviting us out of our isolation and into membership with others, albeit often through our more painful experiences linking us with all human beings. We are part of this world, and our humanity blossoms. We begin to know that we are a part of, and not isolated from, this human world.