When I’ve been in a Sydney ocean pool and I get out all tingley with my back to the sun. Watching other water addicts doing their thing! People are alive and informal at the oceans edge! I also like a full moon rise over the horizon.
Sydney rock pools are little sloshy paradise franchises. They were my favorite thing when I worked at Sydney uni, and are the main reason I'll go back (for my next sabbatical).
I don't suppose I am alone in this, but when I feel most alive is when I am lying in bed, naked and skin to skin with my aptly named wife Joy.
But, also as a woodworker, aliveness comes clearly to me when I employee a skill that has taken years to master. Sharpening my tools is one of those moments. For me, it requires slowing down and putting all of my attention into maintaining the angle of the surface to be polished just right, using slow and steady strokes. When I have finally done the stropping and see the results - a well-sharpened edge - knowing it is the result of years of perfecting my control, I still marvel at what it takes - time, care, moderation of many aspects employed, and mostly attention - then I feel alive and in touch with something marvelous, the mind and body in lovely concert.
When my body used to sink below the surface and breathe compressed air
When I walk on waters edge and light bounces off like twinkling sparklers .
When I kick the surf as I walk in the sea shore and the light mingles with the foam like fairy dust .
When I watch a burbling steam over moss sodden rocks .
When a tear seeps down my cheek at an exquisite phrase in music 🎶 or see a look a baby gives a loved one or when I have been held and satiated by my husband silent tears releasing indescribable emotions.
When I sit by the body of a loved one .. as they breathe their last days and tears freefall silently .
When I am in water, on water, of water .
Water is my recurring theme my healing, my release, my joy, my laughter, a gift .
I also love what one other commenter wrote about being alive in the presence of her daughter. Yes ! This .
Such a beautiful way to describe that profound relationship. It’s joy it’s journey , at times painful and scary but so real . I am on a learning journey as a mother .. still.. with a 22 year old and always will be . I used to weep that I didn’t know enough that this was my first ride, so that I hadn’t got experience or wisdom as I held this child this teenager this young adult that I was learning on the job ! Yeah bummer for her .
But actually recently i recognised as I wrote a piece about a photograph of my daughter and dog about what that picture meant to me .
I realised I love learning with my daughter I love the continually evolving relationship as she grows .
She may not appreciate that , because forgive me Child I have made many mistakes. But as we both grow older this gorgeous dance of life together is a liberating, challenging and Joy giving . This makes me feel alive .
Yes, and for me that happens on the dance floor. No effort: just move with the music AND on nature walks: no concern of the clock. IT IS..... beautiful!
Dipti I find this pure and beautiful. I was thinking of writing about music or nature or poetry; but you have expressed what is paramount—just being ‘when effort loosens its grip on meaning.’ Thank you. Lynn
Lynn, that means a lot. It’s strange how what feels most subtle ends up being most true, when nothing is being reached for, and yet everything is quietly here. I’m glad it resonated with you 🤍
I love how this response doesn't reach for anything -- not meaning, not identity, not even the idea of aliveness.
It feels like the moment before language, when experience is still soft around the edges.
A kind of presence that doesn't need to be witnessed or shaped. Just the quiet truth of being here, breathing, without trying to become anything at all.
You felt exactly where it was coming from… that place before the naming begins.
There’s something honest in not reaching, no grasping for meaning, no performance of depth. Just the body breathing, the moment arriving, and nothing interfering with it. Almost like aliveness reveals itself more clearly when we stop trying to hold it.
Your words carry that same softness back, like a recognition rather than a response. That kind of seeing feels rare… and quietly intimate.
At almost 81 years old, I have multiple memories of feeling fully alive, possibly too numerous to count! Stepping off of a plane into the cold, clean, crisp air of Osorno, Chile and knowing I was home, sitting with family or friends enjoying a meal I prepared for them, sitting with my coffee in the early morning just being with a small candle lit, being with a group of friends I meet with for an hour each Friday morning for almost seven years now exploring questions that keep us pushing the edges of our understanding and of course times being with my dear sister.
Your question this morning reminds me of the only quote I know of St. Irenaeus which reads, “The glory of God is a person fully alive.” May we all have beautiful burnt hands to clap for each other often!
This is beautiful Mary. My mother, almost 85, is struggling with depression and resisting getting help. Yesterday she told me it’s a condition of aging, which I heartily objected to. I want to share this with her. ❤️
Tami, I will hold your mother in the field of compassion and love. My own mother suffered from severe depression. It is so hard to witness. I will hold you too in that field of compassion and love where I stand too.
My early morning ritual — happy to awake again to a new day, having a quiet cup of coffee at my dining room table, thinking about things, reading something, then occasionally looking out my living room windows to see a silhouette of trees in the sky and an emerging sunset (often a majestic pink), and awaiting for my wife to awake and join me in the adventure of another day together. Your question this morning Pádraig reminded me of the following quote by author and theologian Howard Thurman: “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” This quote has become somewhat of a mantra for me — daring me to live life (all of it) fully.
Finding joy in the most mundane simplicity of life’s offerings! Those moments of “awe” that capture us and free us from worry and distraction, and give us a moment of pure presence. For me, usually happens on an early morning walk with my big fury friend “Gunner”, taking in the budding trees and early morning bird songs…I breathe with the rhythm of nature and I’m truly carefree.
I feel most alive in the throes of a belly-shaking, cheek-splitting laugh; with the heat of the sun on my skin after a long winter and unreliable spring; feeling deeply understood by another by the way their gaze holds me; when the first juicy mouthful of a proper, real, ripe mango slides down my throat and tells me, after far too long, that I am home at last.
I feel most alive when I contribute to some project that demonstrates the power & beauty of community as something bigger than myself - whether as performing in the cast of a play, organizing a multicultural festival with my students or sharing authentic life struggles with members of my church family.
I feel most alive when I walk in the winter, when I viscerally feel the air enter my being, as cold and fresh rush through my nose, windpipe, and into my lungs. And when I am in the presence of my daughter, who is me and more than me. And when I am laughing with my husband over some shared silly joke.
Thanks for this reflection. It reminded me of how alive and young I feel when I get together with my sister and brother. I'm now 81 and they are in their mid seventies, but we can laugh and tease each other in a way I don't with anyone else, deep patterns from growing up together.
Hello, friends, and thank you for this one, Pádraig! I feel most alive with my hands in the dirt, planting tomatoes. That sharp, tangy green smell yanks me straight back to my adoptive father's garden in Colorado. We grew them alongside corn, cucumbers, and strawberries, and donated most of what we harvested in our church garden to those who needed it. As a kid, I complained about weeding, but I loved working side by side with my brother and sister, the Rocky Mountain air, and the sense of accomplishment when we finished. Now in Italy, decades later, when I'm planting tomatoes, I feel him (he's passed) and those lessons, the knowledge he gifted me, the continuity.
I find that same aliveness on stage when the band and I become one entity, telepathy and magic under the lights. When I'm mentoring a young poet, the lightbulb goes off. It's all the same vibrating hum in my body. That feeling of… this is the only place I want to be, when the striving stops.
“This is the place I want to be, when the striving stops.“. Yes! And while gardening, when there is no thought in my head, only the service of my hands and muscles, for the dirt and green life, worms, lizards, bees, the whole stack of beings above and under them.
Most alive. That superlative kind of catches me--as I can think of many answers for things that call me to life.
Short answer: Sunrise. Every single sunrise. Whatever nature does, often splendid but sometimes ordinary, even dull, I am reminded---I get another day.
Similar. I feel most alive when I find my rhythms with nature’s beauty, the sun, and breath. The cold air. I feel most alive when I’m more deeply connected to nature, leading me back to my own body and Source. And when my kids are around me (and in pleasant moods). Life gives life.
When the swifts soar and scream overhead. They will be returning soon (I hope) to the Devon skys and my first sighting of them always makes me cry. I have the same reaction to dolphins swimming next to a boat I'm on, but that's a rare experience.
Oh this question, Padraig… When I take in the contradictions, the sheer joy, the reckless chaos of my kids. Parenting has been particularly challenging lately, and I hadn’t considered, until now, that my experiences were ones of feeling most alive. But what else would being alive feel like? Parenting is the entirety of existential drama. At this moment my littlest has stumbled down the stairs, given me a hug, and then berated me for not having his food ready. The aliveness is present. But the challenge is to hold it tight, all of it, through the ups and downs.
I feel most alive when something in me is unlocking something in someone else through our connection, identification, openness. So many things bring me joy, but the ignition of commonality between two people is what makes me realize why we’re here and relish the chance to live it out. Especially when one of us has been afraid of the very thing that has helped us find each other. It can be a conversation on zoom, a surprise aside at a convening, or small talk in line for coffee. Small moments with large combustion.
“I feel most alive when something in me is unlocking something in someone else through our connection, identification, openness”. Powerful thought that captures being alive is such a special and deep way. We are all so interconnected!
My first response is, a) to love that question, and, b) to wonder what Pádraig would answer?
I feel most alive when I remember, even just for a few seconds, to gently corral my distractable mind back to the present. Breathe. Feel my feet on the floor. Let the pleasant and difficult be. Being present at a relative's death in a hospital room, holding my mother-in-law through it. (Sometimes life seems to thrust us into fully aliveness, thankfully.) Slowing down enough to notice my child saying something so compassionate and beyond her years, I think, hey, maybe I'm not screwing up all of this. She's going to be great - she already is. She's magic. Stepping into even just a little tiny bit of bravery to stand up against oppression, stand up for free speech, when others can't. And doing this only after being inspired by witnessing or reading stories about those who have come before me, who have given so much (or everything) to try to make life, our country, the world better. Makes me feel alive to witness others taking loving action, in any way, small or large.
I’ve felt most alive this weekend, on getting my pathology results and hearing they got it all, so a much less arduous road of final treatments ahead. I’ve felt fully at rest inside myself, a beautiful internal calm, I’ve felt reborn to today’s possibilities and tomorrow’s hopes
When I’ve been in a Sydney ocean pool and I get out all tingley with my back to the sun. Watching other water addicts doing their thing! People are alive and informal at the oceans edge! I also like a full moon rise over the horizon.
I agree with every word of this. In the ocean. By the water's edge. A full moon rising or high in the sky. Same, Deb. Same. :)
Me too!
Me three!
ahhhh mother ocean bathing, receiving her nurturing energy, her power, what a gift she is!!
Thankyou Lynda, yes the ocean and the moon.. archetypal sources of mother! Yes it works for me:)
Ooo, I love this and concur!
Sydney rock pools are little sloshy paradise franchises. They were my favorite thing when I worked at Sydney uni, and are the main reason I'll go back (for my next sabbatical).
When do I feel most alive?
Not in becoming
but in the soft undoing
of the one who becomes
when effort loosens
its grip on meaning
and nothing is being held
not even “I”
not even “alive”
just this
without centre
without second
breathing itself
as what it is
I don't suppose I am alone in this, but when I feel most alive is when I am lying in bed, naked and skin to skin with my aptly named wife Joy.
But, also as a woodworker, aliveness comes clearly to me when I employee a skill that has taken years to master. Sharpening my tools is one of those moments. For me, it requires slowing down and putting all of my attention into maintaining the angle of the surface to be polished just right, using slow and steady strokes. When I have finally done the stropping and see the results - a well-sharpened edge - knowing it is the result of years of perfecting my control, I still marvel at what it takes - time, care, moderation of many aspects employed, and mostly attention - then I feel alive and in touch with something marvelous, the mind and body in lovely concert.
When do I feel most alive ?
When I slip into the cold sea
Stand under a waterfall
Turn on my shower each morning
Let the rain fail on my eyelashes .
When I drink a glass of ice cold water .
When my kayak skims the surface of the water.
When my body used to sink below the surface and breathe compressed air
When I walk on waters edge and light bounces off like twinkling sparklers .
When I kick the surf as I walk in the sea shore and the light mingles with the foam like fairy dust .
When I watch a burbling steam over moss sodden rocks .
When a tear seeps down my cheek at an exquisite phrase in music 🎶 or see a look a baby gives a loved one or when I have been held and satiated by my husband silent tears releasing indescribable emotions.
When I sit by the body of a loved one .. as they breathe their last days and tears freefall silently .
When I am in water, on water, of water .
Water is my recurring theme my healing, my release, my joy, my laughter, a gift .
I also love what one other commenter wrote about being alive in the presence of her daughter. Yes ! This .
Such a beautiful way to describe that profound relationship. It’s joy it’s journey , at times painful and scary but so real . I am on a learning journey as a mother .. still.. with a 22 year old and always will be . I used to weep that I didn’t know enough that this was my first ride, so that I hadn’t got experience or wisdom as I held this child this teenager this young adult that I was learning on the job ! Yeah bummer for her .
But actually recently i recognised as I wrote a piece about a photograph of my daughter and dog about what that picture meant to me .
I realised I love learning with my daughter I love the continually evolving relationship as she grows .
She may not appreciate that , because forgive me Child I have made many mistakes. But as we both grow older this gorgeous dance of life together is a liberating, challenging and Joy giving . This makes me feel alive .
Not in becoming
but in the soft undoing
of the one who becomes Wow! Love the idea of the soft undoing….
Thank you.
Thank you.
Yes, and for me that happens on the dance floor. No effort: just move with the music AND on nature walks: no concern of the clock. IT IS..... beautiful!
I feel that soft undoing when I am with good friends.
Dipti I find this pure and beautiful. I was thinking of writing about music or nature or poetry; but you have expressed what is paramount—just being ‘when effort loosens its grip on meaning.’ Thank you. Lynn
Lynn, that means a lot. It’s strange how what feels most subtle ends up being most true, when nothing is being reached for, and yet everything is quietly here. I’m glad it resonated with you 🤍
Dear Dipti Vyas-
I love how this response doesn't reach for anything -- not meaning, not identity, not even the idea of aliveness.
It feels like the moment before language, when experience is still soft around the edges.
A kind of presence that doesn't need to be witnessed or shaped. Just the quiet truth of being here, breathing, without trying to become anything at all.
This is beautiful. And I fully agree.
Thank you so much for sharing!! XO
Danielle,
You felt exactly where it was coming from… that place before the naming begins.
There’s something honest in not reaching, no grasping for meaning, no performance of depth. Just the body breathing, the moment arriving, and nothing interfering with it. Almost like aliveness reveals itself more clearly when we stop trying to hold it.
Your words carry that same softness back, like a recognition rather than a response. That kind of seeing feels rare… and quietly intimate.
Thank you for meeting me there.
Exquisite poetic answer. Your words reflect my sense of aliveness...being real! Thank you.
Thank you Mary.
Beautiful, simply beautiful
That is fabulous, thank you. That sense of just being.
Yes. Tears of catharsis - empties the room of the soul of the unnecessary furniture.
Thank you Natalie.
At almost 81 years old, I have multiple memories of feeling fully alive, possibly too numerous to count! Stepping off of a plane into the cold, clean, crisp air of Osorno, Chile and knowing I was home, sitting with family or friends enjoying a meal I prepared for them, sitting with my coffee in the early morning just being with a small candle lit, being with a group of friends I meet with for an hour each Friday morning for almost seven years now exploring questions that keep us pushing the edges of our understanding and of course times being with my dear sister.
Your question this morning reminds me of the only quote I know of St. Irenaeus which reads, “The glory of God is a person fully alive.” May we all have beautiful burnt hands to clap for each other often!
Mary, I strive to live a live where the moments of aliveness are too many to count! Thank you for sharing your thoughts. 💕
Exactly Mary! Makes me think that each night I should ask myself, “When was I fully alive today?”
This is beautiful Mary. My mother, almost 85, is struggling with depression and resisting getting help. Yesterday she told me it’s a condition of aging, which I heartily objected to. I want to share this with her. ❤️
Tami, I will hold your mother in the field of compassion and love. My own mother suffered from severe depression. It is so hard to witness. I will hold you too in that field of compassion and love where I stand too.
Thank you Mary. I feel you here with me. Thank you.
Such lovely moments. I wish I could be with you and your friends on Friday mornings!
Thanks Mary, I also immediately thought of that wonderful quote, which I have calligraphed and hanging on a wall in my house.
My early morning ritual — happy to awake again to a new day, having a quiet cup of coffee at my dining room table, thinking about things, reading something, then occasionally looking out my living room windows to see a silhouette of trees in the sky and an emerging sunset (often a majestic pink), and awaiting for my wife to awake and join me in the adventure of another day together. Your question this morning Pádraig reminded me of the following quote by author and theologian Howard Thurman: “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” This quote has become somewhat of a mantra for me — daring me to live life (all of it) fully.
Finding joy in the most mundane simplicity of life’s offerings! Those moments of “awe” that capture us and free us from worry and distraction, and give us a moment of pure presence. For me, usually happens on an early morning walk with my big fury friend “Gunner”, taking in the budding trees and early morning bird songs…I breathe with the rhythm of nature and I’m truly carefree.
Your ritual/mantra breaths life into the old, dusty saying, "wake up and smell the coffee".
love that quote!
I have never heard that quote before. How freeing! Thank you!
When I’m sailing in a brisk wind, when the perfect word comes to me
I feel most alive in the throes of a belly-shaking, cheek-splitting laugh; with the heat of the sun on my skin after a long winter and unreliable spring; feeling deeply understood by another by the way their gaze holds me; when the first juicy mouthful of a proper, real, ripe mango slides down my throat and tells me, after far too long, that I am home at last.
Also, sorry, the Library of Congress link doesn't work :( I found the Tony Hoagland poem here: https://ronnowpoetry.com/contents/hoagland/Grammar.html
"We're all attracted to the perfume/of fermenting joy"
I love this so much.
We're all attracted to the perfume
of fermenting joy,
This is intoxicating.
Thank you for finding a link that works. And for starting my day with the visceral memory of ripe mango.
You're welcome Tami!
I adore all of this. What a rich prompt we have this week!
Thank you for painting such a beautiful picture! I am biting into that mango right now!
I envy you and hope it's a Philippine mango. We have the best in the world.
Yes! Me too
I feel most alive when I contribute to some project that demonstrates the power & beauty of community as something bigger than myself - whether as performing in the cast of a play, organizing a multicultural festival with my students or sharing authentic life struggles with members of my church family.
Yes, Dawn! And singing in a choir!
Indeed!
Yep, me too
Oh me too…
Beautiful
I feel most alive when I walk in the winter, when I viscerally feel the air enter my being, as cold and fresh rush through my nose, windpipe, and into my lungs. And when I am in the presence of my daughter, who is me and more than me. And when I am laughing with my husband over some shared silly joke.
Thanks for this reflection. It reminded me of how alive and young I feel when I get together with my sister and brother. I'm now 81 and they are in their mid seventies, but we can laugh and tease each other in a way I don't with anyone else, deep patterns from growing up together.
That sounds so fun and makes me smile!
Yes, a daughter who is me and more than me.
Me and my daughter too!!
I love what you write of your daughter .. this is something I have lately been thinking too .
Hello, friends, and thank you for this one, Pádraig! I feel most alive with my hands in the dirt, planting tomatoes. That sharp, tangy green smell yanks me straight back to my adoptive father's garden in Colorado. We grew them alongside corn, cucumbers, and strawberries, and donated most of what we harvested in our church garden to those who needed it. As a kid, I complained about weeding, but I loved working side by side with my brother and sister, the Rocky Mountain air, and the sense of accomplishment when we finished. Now in Italy, decades later, when I'm planting tomatoes, I feel him (he's passed) and those lessons, the knowledge he gifted me, the continuity.
I find that same aliveness on stage when the band and I become one entity, telepathy and magic under the lights. When I'm mentoring a young poet, the lightbulb goes off. It's all the same vibrating hum in my body. That feeling of… this is the only place I want to be, when the striving stops.
Oh yes. In the garden. Hands in the dirt. Same.
Rhythm - yes! Doing, dirt, divine, drum!
“This is the place I want to be, when the striving stops.“. Yes! And while gardening, when there is no thought in my head, only the service of my hands and muscles, for the dirt and green life, worms, lizards, bees, the whole stack of beings above and under them.
Beth! That’s it exactly, the service of our hands to...“the whole stack of beings above and under them. I love that.
Most alive. That superlative kind of catches me--as I can think of many answers for things that call me to life.
Short answer: Sunrise. Every single sunrise. Whatever nature does, often splendid but sometimes ordinary, even dull, I am reminded---I get another day.
Similar. I feel most alive when I find my rhythms with nature’s beauty, the sun, and breath. The cold air. I feel most alive when I’m more deeply connected to nature, leading me back to my own body and Source. And when my kids are around me (and in pleasant moods). Life gives life.
Finding JOY in the ordinary!
ie…angel clouds, good morning bird songs, the sun going down to the other side of the planet to offer others her light and warmth,
a floor newly swept from the day’s (week’s) dust…
When the swifts soar and scream overhead. They will be returning soon (I hope) to the Devon skys and my first sighting of them always makes me cry. I have the same reaction to dolphins swimming next to a boat I'm on, but that's a rare experience.
Yes, I really miss Swifts screaming around the houses in an evening, not seen many for years up here in Saddleworth.
That's heartbreaking.
Oh this question, Padraig… When I take in the contradictions, the sheer joy, the reckless chaos of my kids. Parenting has been particularly challenging lately, and I hadn’t considered, until now, that my experiences were ones of feeling most alive. But what else would being alive feel like? Parenting is the entirety of existential drama. At this moment my littlest has stumbled down the stairs, given me a hug, and then berated me for not having his food ready. The aliveness is present. But the challenge is to hold it tight, all of it, through the ups and downs.
So true! Parenting with all of the beautiful, raw, aching urgency of now from dawn to well after dark. I wouldn't change it for anything.
And change it will!
I feel most alive when something in me is unlocking something in someone else through our connection, identification, openness. So many things bring me joy, but the ignition of commonality between two people is what makes me realize why we’re here and relish the chance to live it out. Especially when one of us has been afraid of the very thing that has helped us find each other. It can be a conversation on zoom, a surprise aside at a convening, or small talk in line for coffee. Small moments with large combustion.
Indeed! We are relational beings and reciprocity fuels our journey to fully alive.
“I feel most alive when something in me is unlocking something in someone else through our connection, identification, openness”. Powerful thought that captures being alive is such a special and deep way. We are all so interconnected!
Like Tom, I feel most alive when I experience a soul connection with another person, especially another man.
Did you ever read a book by John O’Donoghue called “Anam Cara”? You may appreciate it based on your comment.
When I am in a gathering of thoughtful people who are sharing thoughts unthought by me.
And your comment is a beautiful example. Thought and articulated by you.
My first response is, a) to love that question, and, b) to wonder what Pádraig would answer?
I feel most alive when I remember, even just for a few seconds, to gently corral my distractable mind back to the present. Breathe. Feel my feet on the floor. Let the pleasant and difficult be. Being present at a relative's death in a hospital room, holding my mother-in-law through it. (Sometimes life seems to thrust us into fully aliveness, thankfully.) Slowing down enough to notice my child saying something so compassionate and beyond her years, I think, hey, maybe I'm not screwing up all of this. She's going to be great - she already is. She's magic. Stepping into even just a little tiny bit of bravery to stand up against oppression, stand up for free speech, when others can't. And doing this only after being inspired by witnessing or reading stories about those who have come before me, who have given so much (or everything) to try to make life, our country, the world better. Makes me feel alive to witness others taking loving action, in any way, small or large.
I’ve felt most alive this weekend, on getting my pathology results and hearing they got it all, so a much less arduous road of final treatments ahead. I’ve felt fully at rest inside myself, a beautiful internal calm, I’ve felt reborn to today’s possibilities and tomorrow’s hopes
Cindy! What wonderful news to share with us all here who are happy and inspired by it!
Congratulations! Happy for you.
Wonderful news, congratulations!