Looking Directly at Life

To see the Summer Sky
Is Poetry, though never in a Book it lie -
True Poems flee - 
Emily Dickenson (1830-1886)

In three short lines, a mere seventeen words, Emily Dickinson sums up mindfulness.  To witness the life around us and within us, we must pay direct attention to it, for it changes from moment to moment.  These days, we can add the notion that the Summer Sky doesn’t lie on a computer screen, or in a cell phone, either.  We could all use a gentle reminder to get outside and tilt our heads up rather than down, couldn’t we?  

When we place our attention directly on the sensations that arise from the movement of air into and out of our body, as we’ll do this week when we engage in Mindfulness of Breathing, we are creating the behavior that will let us look at, and actually see, taste, smell, hear, feel all that makes this life so rich.  We return to the days of uni-tasking.  We look, and we see, and we make better sense of the what’s going on, and we respond from a place of wisdom and open-heartedness. 

Hoping that you will be joining us this week as we practice looking directly at life as it unfolds moment by moment.

CMP survives on donations. All of our weekly sessions are free and open to the public, but donations are essential to our sustainability. Checks, cash and credit cards are accepted and donations are tax deductible.

Stay up-to-date on all CMP news and happenings by following us on Facebook, Instagram, Meetup and Insight Timer.  And our website CommunityMindfulnessProject.org.  

May all beings everywhere without exception breathe freely and be fully present for life as it unfolds.

Did You Know?  
Emily Dickinson wrote 1,775 poems during her lifetime, but only published nine of them (you can tell whether you are reading a poem that she didn’t intend to publish because its title will be its first line).   Her poems have unconventional punctation and capitalization and it remains a mystery to this day whether this was deliberate and what it may have signified.  She lived her entire life in one house and rarely left it, but could witness funerals at a nearby cemetery from a window and her poems often feature death.  (This information comes to us via Cassie, the CMP intern, a junior in high school and an Emily Dickinson fan).

CMP is a 501c3 nonprofit.  
Checks can be given to facilitators at our weekly sits or mailed to:

Community Mindfulness Project
P.O. Box 1713
New Canaan, CT 06840.

Credit card donations are accepted on our website: CommunityMindfulnessProject.org.  

We thank you!