Wonderstruck
A Collision With Grace
Listen Here - Podcast Style
There is a voice that doesn’t use words.
Listen.Rumi
Science asks questions to produce answers that may never exist. We will live into the questions. Language tries to assign words to describe a feeling. We try to put words to an experience or to a state of existence that resides beyond conscious comprehension. All words are of the mind. Some experiences are from a space beyond the mind. No words can possibly describe it.
Chills! Goosebumps! Piloerection! Wonderstruck! How can we describe a captivating moment of melting into a tapestry of being that immerses us into an unfolding beyond our senses to dance with the very essence of everything? The word presence nowhere near able to speak to this transcendence of self to hold hands with the self of selves. Is it a meeting of soul?
The word awe has been suggested. The science of this so called awe has been interesting to follow over the past twenty years. What is awe? Keltner (2003) stated awe arises in experiences that are vast and/or beyond one’s current perceptual frame of reference. These experiences leave us feeling that we are a part of something bigger than ourselves and change our conception of the world. A transcendence of self. Theses encounters change the way we see ourselves and everything around us. They change us. These encounters can be the witness of courage, being touched by kindness, with nature, collective gatherings, music, visual art, poetry, spiritual practice, epiphanies, witnessing birth and death. Awe can be observed in the hair rising stunned reverence of widened eyes and the gasp of a drop jawed mouth giving off the vagus stimulated exclamatory uttering prayer of “whoa”.
Experiences of awe enhance our mental and physical health. Neuroscience studies have found that encounters inducing awe are associated with reduced activation in the default mode network (DMN), a network of regions in the brain associated with “self” reflection. The DMN is believed to be the home of the ego, the part of our brain associated with judgement and our sense of self. When activity in the DMN falls off, our ego disappears and the boundaries we typically feel between ourselves and the world around us melt away (Carhart-Harris 2010). Awe is associated with elevated vagal tone, reduced sympathetic arousal, increased oxytocin release and reduced inflammation. Awe encounters lead to a diminished sense of self, increased social connection and integration as well as an increased sense of serving a larger meaning/purpose in life (Monroy 2023). Awe inspiring this transcendence of self has also been associated with stronger resilience (Tabibnia 2020).
Whether awe is a distinct state or even an emotion may be a long debate. As I unfold in the harvest of my own awakening I surrender to the mysterious kiss of awe. In my own writing I often refer to the word Grace to represent awe. Grace is the divine touch and glimpse of awareness beyond this body. An awareness of meeting the universe, source, spirit, that vital life force that connects us all. Love. It finds me in the forest, the mountains, at the ocean and in the raw vastness of nature. The stars on a clear night. The cosmos. It finds me in the beauty of animals. It finds me in the selfless purity and innocence of a child. It finds me in the presence of unconditional compassion. It finds me at dawn as the darkness releases her colours to the shrill of a crowing sun. Awe finds me inside of a poem. Awe finds me in the healing surrender of forgiveness that always carries me to a whole new meaning of what or who I am. I am awe when I meet my soul.
When there are no words to describe being struck in a collision with wonder I can only enter into a poem.
Collision With Grace
Once in your lifetime
She happens to you
Time suddenly disrobes
Slips her dress off
Consecrates all belonging
Angelic waves swallow your body
To meet your soul
Staring deeply into her eyes
The sweet aching arrival of home
Naked truth kissing your face
As you are baptized
In a collision
with Grace
© Jamie Millard
I believe that poetry is meant to be read out loud. Reading, writing and listening to a poem is meditative and the words create an intimate encounter with the heartfulness of presence. We enter into the awe of a poem. Poetry is a wonderful addition to a spiritual practice as it connects us to ourselves, to others, to this world and to our spirit.
Please reach out to me if I can be of any assistance to you on your journey through your own poetic awe into the wonder of being here.
Please enjoy the audio shared at the top of this article.
Lots of Love,
Jamie
References
Keltner D (2003). Approaching awe, a moral, spiritual, and aesthetic emotion. Cognition & Emotion, 17(2), 297–314.
Monroy M (2023) Awe as a Pathway to Mental and Physical Health. Perspect Psychol Sci, 18(2): 309–320.
Carhart-Harris (2010) The default-mode, ego-functions and free-energy: a neurobiological account of Freudian ideas. Brain, 133(4): 1265–1283.
Tabibnia (2020)An affective neuroscience model of boosting, resilience in adults. Neurosci Biobehav Rev, 115, 321-350.
This poem is incredible. I don't have words. Awe. Thank you for writing! I made it a daily practice to witness moments of awe. Nature provides a lot of these moments for me, especially here in Ireland. But I think we can practice to see every little thing in our day with awe. Sometimes I am in awe of what mankind was capable to produce. The very computer I am writing on. A platform that connects people throughout the whole world. New words. Never-ending creativity. I am in awe to be alive. Thank you for the reminder today!
I love this poem Jamie.
And yes, it's so difficult to explain what is really best left unexplained. To just simply be with awe itself rather than put a mental construct around it. As you say, that is when poetry comes in, as do other art forms. To explain the unexplainable. Eckhart Tolle talks a lot about consciousness, awe, wonder and to be wary of mind and word explanations about things that come from "no mind".
Have a Grace filled day Jamie. Jo 🙏