The Reel and The Real

 How do you discern what is real for you? To what do you pay attention and listen?

Wednesday morning I lay in bed with my eyes closed and watched what looked like the grays and blacks at the end of old movie films scroll across my visual field.  This went on for quite awhile as I wondered why I was seeing film.

I noted this in my journal then went about my day. Later that evening I shared with Jerry my curiosity in determining the message in the scene I received.  He listened as I said, “It was like seeing the end of film as it comes off that round thing. What’s the word?”

“You mean ‘the reel’?” he volunteered.

Immediately I got the message as I heard ‘the real’ in ‘the reel.’

This was perfect as I contemplate how to write of the things I see and hear.  For me these voices and visions are as real as the grass that grows outside my window yet I’m mindful of how we’ve determined what is ‘real.’ 

For centuries science has been mainstream’s medium for measuring and determining proof of what is real.  There’s nothing necessarily wrong with this unless it’s used to dismiss or deny my experience, my inner knowing of what I’ve heard, seen or intuitively felt.

For example, there have been two distinct situations in which my body held so much exhaustion in the past year that I wondered if I was dying of an unknown cause.  The first time this happened was last summer as we prepared to go to Cherokee, NC the following day.  Unless something changed I knew I would not be able to get out of bed much less make the trip.  

I felt compelled to go outside and lie on one particular rock near the cliff of our property.  I had not done this previously and my conscious intent wasn’t to be cured.  All I knew was I needed to lie on a specific rock. 

I did and immediately upon laying down felt the gray boulder take my exhaustion and I wasn’t even offering it my exhaustion.  I knew I had to quit resisting and surrender to what I felt led to do.  I stood up moments later transformed every ounce of weariness gone.

Science might set about to prove or disprove what I experienced. If found valid, it would be replicated and reduced to a formula that could explain what happened.

There was a formula for my experience, a formula which began with my paying attention and listening then taking action. I do not always follow this formula or heed what I hear, yet when I do this holds the secret for living, at least for me, a life that is peaceful, meaningful and satisfying.

How do you discern what is real for you?  To what do you give your attention and listen?

Imagine the Shift.

-Dawn, The Good News Muse 24 Feb. 2012

dawn@imaginetheshift.com