Listening
Reflections on presence, perception, and intuition
December 23, 2025
I observe and reflect internally to the questions that persist — the ones I recognize as important because they don’t let go. I reflect on them, noticing how intuition and perception guide me.
They return again and again, quietly insistent. These are the questions that tend to lead me to the next steps in life, even when I don’t yet know what those steps are.
They come in different ways. Sometimes quickly, almost fully formed. Other times, dreadfully slowly — or so it seems. There are long stretches when nothing arrives at all. And then, eventually, when a question truly matters, it does arrive. And it stays.
So I listen.
Lately, I’ve been listening for quiet. Quiet within busyness — not the absence of activity, but something underneath it that invites reflection and awareness. Life whirlwinds around me, and I notice a steady pull toward stillness.
The quiet appears in conversations, between visits with loved ones, and always, in solitude. It’s there in small pauses, in the spaces where nothing is required of me.
The holidays don’t carry their full megawatt power for me this year, though I still recognize their sparkle and magic. Instead, I find myself drawn to the beauty of stillness, and to whatever messages may be held within that quiet.
Everything seems to be guiding me back to it.
One place I reliably find quiet is in my painting. Each year, my work tends to gather around a theme. I don’t select it so much as notice it forming. This year, as the new one approaches, no theme has appeared yet.
I’m listening for it.
Nothing.
It feels almost trivial to ask the quiet such a question — What do I paint next year? And yet, it’s often in the trivial where I discover the deepest treasures. Other concerns can be approached intellectually, problem-solved, addressed directly. A painting theme doesn’t respond that way.
So I listen instead, within the rhythms of daily routine. Walking. Working. Preparing meals. Returning again and again to what’s ordinary.
When I lose myself in those rhythms, something subtle begins to shift. New perceptions arise. Each day brings a small consideration — not an answer, but a possibility. I hold these gently, with curiosity, and explore where they might lead.
For now, I feel the process beginning. Dreams are starting to carry fragments that feel suggestive. Conversations spark thoughts that linger longer than expected.
I’m not there yet.
I have no answers.
But it’s begun, and I remain attentive to what may emerge.
