Chaitanya (Awareness & Perception)

Maybe holy ground isn’t where the bush burns. Maybe it’s wherever you finally stop long enough to feel the dirt. Bare. Unfiltered. Present. And maybe the next time something small disrupts your pace —a missed call, a canceled plan, a shoe slipping off — instead of cursing it… you smile a little and think: Oh. I might be standing on something sacred.

They are weary of having to explain themselves spiritually. Tired of translating their inner life into acceptable language. Exhausted by the expectation that growth must be documented in order to be real.

We explain ourselves too much. We dim what feels inconvenient. We stay in spaces that ask us to be smaller so we can be included.

Over time, this creates a spiritual posture where life is something that happens to us, rather than something we are actively in relationship with.

We speak in spirals. We see in symbols. We feel in layers. We live in myth. And linear thinkers do not understand myth. Not out of malice — but out of limitation.

It can hit you while watching your own children play. While hearing a friend describe a memory you never had. While seeing joy on someone’s face that doesn’t trigger fear. While collapsing in a moment of burnout. While being offered kindness and not knowing how to receive it. This realization is not tragedy. It is awakening. Chaitanya — sacred consciousness —opens not just the mind, but the memory of the suppressed self.

But most real awakenings look like confusion wearing holy clothes. The universe doesn’t hand out Google Maps for transformation. It drops breadcrumbs — half-buried, rained on, and sometimes eaten by squirrels.

Because tyrants don’t rise by being brilliant — they rise by being shameless. And the tools they use aren’t new inventions. They’re the same old tricks: fear and nostalgia. Fear to paralyze. Nostalgia to seduce. Together, they’re the tyrant’s favorite toolbelt.

The idea of the “good old days” is one of the most powerful spells humanity has ever cast on itself. Entire nations are run on it. Entire churches are built on it. Entire families are kept in cycles of silence because of it.

In physics, orbit is broken not by denying gravity, but by building enough momentum to push beyond it. Rockets don’t escape Earth by ignoring its pull; they slingshot around it, using the very force that binds them to launch beyond.

Fear has been my most persistent companion. Not because I want it, but because it shows up everywhere — whispering in the back of my mind, coloring the news cycle, humming in the nervous system of entire communities. Fear is the collective hum, the gravity that holds us down.

You ever notice how modern healing can feel like a loop? We go to therapy, dig into our childhoods, name our trauma roles, talk about resilience. We get insight, we feel lighter for a moment — and then, somehow, we’re right back in the same cycles.

This summer, the land around me spoke in chorus. First ghost pipes — pale, translucent plants rising like candles in the forest floor. Then mushrooms — not a few scattered here and there, but a blowout. Dozens of varieties, erupting across logs, lawns, and roots.

There are nights when Spirit speaks in whispers. And then there are nights when Spirit blows out the light in your hand to keep you from walking straight into danger. This is the story of a lantern that died, coyotes that circled, and the lesson I learned about protection that doesn’t always look like light.

Sometimes the party doesn’t happen. The people don’t show. The symbol comes too late—or too small.

But here’s the hard truth: When you’ve spent a lifetime overlooked, abandoned, or required to shrink—it can feel easier to love others than yourself.

Ananda is the sound of music across water. The laughter of friends. The grill smoking. The dance on a shaky deck. Bliss doesn’t demand perfection—it finds you when you’re barefoot with your people.

And I know some people would roll their eyes at me calling that holy. But look closer: what’s the real message? That belonging isn’t reserved for the elite. That community isn’t built on polish. That love shows up messy, raw, barefoot, sometimes drunk, sometimes broken—but still love.

The ones who cry in silence because someone else’s pain echoes too loudly. The ones who collapse after holding space all day — and still show up tomorrow. The ones who know things before they’re said… and carry them anyway.

🗓 Saturday, July 27, 2025 QFFC Pillar: Ananda (Bliss) Format : Blog + optional YouTube reflection or mini-activity 🎈 A Soulful...