Soulful Mindfulness as "A Centering Moment"

Sign up here (a.m.) or here (p.m.) to join my Sunday Sessions — a series of freely-offered meditation and community sessions offered twice on Sundays. In these 45 minute gatherings, I offer an approach to bringing mindfulness and other contemplative practices into our daily life called “a centering moment.” It is mindfulness with soulfulness and heart. Here’s a brief introduction to this portable restorative practice.

In using the phrase “centering moment,” I draw on the historical legacy of one of the great spiritual teachers of the 20th century, the late Reverend Howard Thurman. Reverend Thurman used the phrase “centering moment” to refer to a particular way of setting aside time for quieting the scattered and divided mind as a preparation for action in the world. In that moment, for Thurman, one might experience the lifeforce or presence that was at the core of his Christian religious beliefs.

Thurman dedicated his life’s work to creating spaces, in community, where religious experience might be kindled as a support for our engagement with the hardest problems of our time. 

For Dr. Thurman, centering practice included contemplative forms of prayer and reflection. Ultimately interested in a kind of interfaith invitation to explore what practices support us, his own heritage and experience in Black prophetic Christianity – and what he pointedly called “the religion of Jesus” – was the foundation for his effort to create communities of practice supportive of religious encounters with what he called at points the Presence of God. 

Thurman was encouraged by an experience he had, in which he traveled to India in 1938 on a cultural exchange tour, centered on an opportunity to have a private meeting with Gandhi. In that conversation, Thurman reportedly heard something deeply resonant with his own evolving theology: that through practice and contemplation, a kind of force of love could be cultivated with the power to change the world. For him, meditation could open the doorway to the inner experiences that reinforce a sense of inherent belonging and the power of lifeforce within each of us. Through such practices, the “inner splendor” that rests within might be revealed in daily life to and through us all.

Thurman was raised on the coast of Florida, during the post-Reconstruction period’s restoration of the law and policy of white supremacy through the practices of racial segregation. It was a time of ever-present danger for an intelligent, sensitive boy with dark brown skin. Fortunately for him, his earliest teachers – in particular, his grandmother, a woman who was born enslaved – led him to the religious teachings and practices of Jesus, and through those, to spiritual experiences that strengthened him.

A brilliant student who became an esteemed pastor and a spiritual/religious mentor to Martin Luther King, Jr. and other civil rights movement activists, Thurman advocated making time for centering moments – time for relaxation and healing, dedicated to practices that restore one, physically and spiritually, as a deep support for their activism in the world.

I wholeheartedly agree. Taking a few minutes a day to practice intentional, calming ways of being in relationship to what is happening in your life can support opening to a deeper sense of who we are in relationship to the minutiae of everyday life. It can give rise to a momentary – or longer – recollection of the miraculous gift of being alive.  

So, what do I mean by a centering moment? 

My approach builds on Rev. Thurman’s by inviting a conscious integration of the full range of centering practices as a support not only for social activism but for remaking our world in radically-changing times.

I define it as any practice that allows you to pause, ground and reconnect yourself to the felt sense of your essential nature, and of its inherent belonging to the natural world.

In defining the concept this way, I am inspired by Thurman, of course, but also by other sources. 

As a longtime student of the teachings of the Buddha, I see similarities between the practice of centering moments and the practice of mindfulness meditation. The teachings underlying the practice of mindfulness encourage establishing a regular practice of meditation to cultivate the capacity for awareness, compassion and ethical insight that together comprise the essence of mindfulness as a quality of relationship that can accompany anyone in daily life and action.

While some mindfulness programs emphasize committing to daily periods of practice of 20 minutes or more, recent research has found that much shorter periods provide equally powerful benefits. Even five minutes a day can be significant in terms of minimizing anxiety and depression, as can bringing mindfulness into activities throughout the day.

I love meditation, but I know it may not be the best practice for everyone, or for all times. It isn’t even always the most beneficial practice for me! Throughout my life, I’ve relied on a broad range of experiences to lead me to experience a centering moment. 

Taking a walk in nature.

Listening to music. Listening to soul music, and allowing my body to move in response, has a particular centering and grounding impact on me, as listening-and-dancing is a practice to which I was introduced as a toddler by my father and his twin uncle, two men who loved James Brown and Al Green, respectively.

Journaling.

Artwork.

Mindful eating.

Reading poetry.

A cup of tea, whether imbibed alone – as I am experiencing while I write these words; or, shared with others.

There are an infinite number of ways to experience a centering moment. The key is to allow the time spent to reconnect you not merely to the senses, but to the mystery of the lifeforce accessible to you at any time. Experience the momentary joy of remembering your connectedness to presence, one breath at a time.

 

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