Deepening Your Sense of Belonging

Close your eyes and feel the pulse of your heart. At this moment, your heart is sending blood to your lungs to receive oxygen and then to nourish every cell of your body through an intricate system of arteries. Equally amazing veins draw depleted blood back to your heart, where the cycle starts anew with each cycle of beats.

Here in our own hearts, then, lies a fundamental sacrament that all human beings (as well as many other creatures) have in common. Just as the nearness of the Mother’s heartbeat encourages her infant, so our own heart brings us a certain assurance against loneliness. By its continual supply of sustenance, it supports our very life. By beating in company with the hearts of others, it reveals us to be in relationship, even if we live alone in a far-flung corner of the world. And by its rhythmic sympathy with the ocean waves, the cycles of seasons, the orbits of planets, it unites us with our world and worlds beyond us.

Can you feel this companionship now, in your own heart? Give yourself enough time to experience – rather than just think about – the degree to which you belong. A single stream of love unites the vast diversity of life in our universe.