Image by Gerd Altmann 

Editor's Note: Above video is a short 4:08 minute recap of the article. Complete audio below.

In This Article:

• What does it mean to experience presence and be here now?
• How do spiritual teachers transmit presence to others?
• What are the transformative effects of encountering powerful presence?
• Can presence transmission happen through photos or books?
• How can you access presence directly in your daily life?

Being Here Now: Lessons from Spiritual Encounters

by Lynne Sedgmore.

Being Here Now is being fully in this moment with our whole being and attention. It is a state without the influence of any sense of the past or the future. It is a timelessness within the immediacy of now. A state in which we are free to be present to whatever is happening or arising, internally and externally, in an exact moment.

Being here now includes the realisation that we are always thinking about the past or the future, that our mind has continual conversations with itself that are difficult to turn off.

We have lots of opinions, structures, beliefs and concepts, all based on what has happened in the past or may happen into the future. Constant thinking prevents us from enjoying the moment we are in, the moment of simply being here now, experiencing things as they arise new and fresh, freed from all concepts or expectations.

The capacity to be here now, whether spontaneous or cultivated, can become a regular and constant state as we learn to relax our personality restrictions, relax our minds and experience presence viscerally and directly.

When we are deeply in presence, time stops or changes from how we usually experience it. We may feel outside of time or within a different time dimension. Our relationship to time changes as we are no longer in chronological, linear, clock time. We experience the unchanging nature of presence and we open to the awareness of no change, and therefore no time.

Presence Transmission

Presence has no form or specific location even though we recognise presence through ourselves or another person embodying and transmitting presence. When a person embodies presence, someone else, just by being in their physical proximity, can receive a direct transmission of presence through them.

Receiving a powerful transmission of presence is hard to describe yet tangible, leaving a lasting impression. We sense a palpable eminence from within and around the person of presence. Something we can sense and feel yet not literally see. It feels transformative, as it is very different from meeting someone’s constructed personality devoid of presence. I have had many direct and visceral experiences, with beneficial and transformative effects, of being deeply affected by the powerful presence of someone else.

One of my first and most profound experiences of receiving a presence transmission happened in Frankfurt while meeting with Mother Meera, a Hindu teacher, who transmits through her silent presence without any exchange of words.

***

I stand as they announce Mother Meera is entering. I feel a strong vibration in the air, a pulsation without any noise to it, it gets stronger and stronger. It fills the whole room with waves of energy. She enters, a petite, young and very beautiful Indian woman dressed in a purple sari with long, black plaited hair. A red bindi on her forehead. I feel a wave of energy, a sense of beauty and an overwhelming feeling of flow and dynamism. My eyes fill with tears and my heart bursts open. Expansion in my head. I feel deeply emotional. I am mesmerised, completely enthralled. All of me is affected.

When I kneel before her, and she gazes into my eyes I am looking into the river and flow of the universe. I am filled with love. I feel purified, clean, washed. All my boundaries have disappeared, and I am flowing within a benign, loving, powerful and palpable energy.

***

This was the moment I first experienced a direct and intentional presence transmission. A presence so immensely powerful it changed and transformed my life. Many different things were activated within me.

Changes occurred in my perception of reality and my sense of self. I shifted into an altered state of consciousness and the whole experience felt outside of the normal parameters of time, space, and distance.

During the four days I visited her daily, I was able to walk across fields in the evening darkness, without any lights. This may sound simple, yet for me it was seismic, something I could never do beforehand, as I feel terror in darkness.

On my return home I changed many of my negative actions, behaviours and relationships as I could see the toxicity in them. I can recall the impact of Mother Meera’s presence at any time as it remains palpable thirty years later.

Any response to another person’s presence is deeply subjective and may differ based on the people involved, their resonance, their vibration and their energy field. The first evening after Mother Meera had left the hall, I asked a woman sitting next to me if she had felt anything and she shook her head. Nothing had happened for her.

This was the beginning of my conscious inquiry into presence, as the impact of Mother Meera’s silent presence upon me was extraordinary. I wondered, How was it possible that someone could affect me so deeply? How had she helped me to experience presence so clearly? How was it transmitted? I continued my inquiry by receiving presence transmission from other spiritual teachers from all over the world.

When I met Pope John Paul II in the Vatican synod as part of an international interfaith conference, I must admit to feeling skeptical in advance. I wasn’t expecting a profound presence. I had decided he was an out of touch patriarch rather than a holy person.

Yet, when he held my hands in his I was filled with an overwhelming and beautiful feeling of love and the most amazing kindness. I can still feel it now as I write these words. I felt love and kindness emanating from him, through his hands, into me. I also felt a deep relaxation in every cell of my body and the sensation of softening.

He did speak to me, yet I have no recollection of his words as the sensation I was experiencing was so powerful. After he moved away I felt love for him, and for everyone in the room. I can remember thinking, and feeling, that he was truly holy, even when I hadn’t really wanted to.

The presence of the Dalai Lama felt different. He emanated lightness and joy, with a smiling face and penetrating eyes. I could feel myself smiling as he held my hands in a friendly warm embrace. I felt an uplifting and infectious joy.

In 2000, I was a participant in the United Nations Millennium World Peace Summit for Religious and Spiritual Leaders. It was the most extraordinary event I have ever attended. I was in the presence of one thousand men and women, most of whom had a powerful presence. The highlight for me was Amma, the hugging mother, who exuded love and had an energy field of love all around her.

As I listened to a speech by Kofi Annan I began to cry. His words were beautiful, yet I was affected mostly by the sense of peace and trust that washed over me and filled my whole body because I was in his physical presence. I felt safe, with an inner glowing of warmth in which I could rest on a deep, soulful level.

Even from a distance, the strength, resilience and wisdom emanating from Nelson Mandela when he gave a speech in Trafalgar Square was palpable.

Thich Nhat Hanh, a Buddhist monk, gave a Dharma talk in London where he exuded peace and calm. I loved how he rang a bell every few minutes while speaking to bring us all into presence with him. I recall a level of peace in his presence unlike any I had experienced previously.

A Portal into Presence

I undertook a two-year training as an interfaith minister because the beautiful and powerful presence of Miranda felt compelling to me. All the presence transmissions described above happened through being in close physical proximity, physical touch or looking into eyes. Each of the presence teachers seemed confident, calm and comfortable in their own skin, with an ease about them. I felt their gestures and presence, while individually different, were congruent with their teachings. I felt seen and was given their full attention in the moment of exchange. They all exuded love and openness; they felt authentic and affirming to me.

What I experienced with each of these people was something palpable, an energy field, a sense of the sacred, a radiance, an emanation. They were a portal into presence for me.

Transmission can also happen from a distance through a photograph, a dream, a recording or a book. The presence of Bede Griffiths, a Christian monk, affected me even before I met him in person.

A flyer came through my door with his photograph on it. I had never heard of him, yet as I looked at his image I felt affected. His presence emanated out of the photograph. I knew that one day I would be in his presence. He lived in India, to which I could not afford to go at that time. I bought all his books and followed his teachings for many years.

When he came to London I sat in his presence and couldn’t stop crying. I felt safe and held. I remember sitting in front of him while he talked, no longer listening to his words, just being completely suffused with feeling safe, tears rolling down my cheeks in a gentle, healing cry.

I first saw Aacharya Sushil Kumar, a Jain monk, in a dream before meeting one of his disciples, Bawa Jain. I was deeply affected by seeing his photograph, hearing recordings of him chanting, holding a mala (prayer beads) he had worn, visiting his temple in India and attending his ashram in the US. Although I never met him in the flesh, his presence deeply affected me and drew me into the ecological nonviolent teachings of the Jain faith.

A mala given to me by the Buddhist nun, Aya Kheema, many years ago still enables me to feel her presence when I hold them for chanting.

I have also gone to teachers whose presence had no effect on me or I felt a dissonance in their presence while other people were having deep and powerful positive experiences. From these experiences I understood the importance of resonance and vibrational energies being aligned or not.

Every transmission was different in kind, and I continued over twenty years to be in the presence of wise people so I could keep expanding and liberating my own presence. Their presence made it easier for me to experience presence, not only with them, but also when alone.

My personality, with all its baggage, shadow and inner noise was dissolving through the receiving of presence. I felt like a sponge constantly absorbing presence and emptying out negativity and anxiety.

Accessing Presence Directly

I no longer depend on the presence of others as I can access presence directly myself. Having said that, being in the presence of my current teacher, Almaas is always beautiful and expansive. He has a purity, incisiveness and expansiveness that consistently melts and illuminates me. I continue to learn from his physical and online presence, as well as from his books.

Each of the transmissions above deeply affected me and I was transformed by being physically close and receiving the energy, essence, radiance and impact of their Presence.

Copyright ©2024. All Rights Reserved.
Article adapted with permission
from the book: Presence Activism

Article Source:

BOOK: Presence Activism

Presence Activism: A Profound Antidote to Climate Anxiety
by Lynne Sedgmore.

In this book, author Lynne Sedgmore integrates presence, climate activism, and the alleviation of climate anxiety in an innovative and unique synthesis and new term - Presence Activism. By offering a profound solution with new perspectives, Presence Activism: A Profound Antidote to Climate Anxiety is steeped in a presence that moves activism beyond metaphors of war, enemies, and destruction, as well as the illusion of separation, into the visceral knowing of presence and interconnection, thereby making presence an important part of the way forward for current and future activism.

This book is a compendium of different perspectives and experiences of presence, as well as a powerful conceptual and thoughtful analysis of the fields of presence, climate anxiety, and climate peril.

Click here for more info and/or to order this paperback book. Also available as a Kindle edition.

About the Author

Dr. Lynne Sedgmore CBE is an activist, executive coach, non-executive board member, priestess, interfaith minister, published author, poet and former chief executive. She Chairs the Glastonbury Town Deal investment of £25 million. She has been involved in environmental and feminist campaigns and numerous protests since the 1970s. She bridges mainstream organisations and spiritual communities. She coaches individuals and senior teams in charities and organisations that inspire her. She lives in Glastonbury, UK.

Article Recap:

This article explores the transformative state of being here now and how presence transmission by spiritual teachers impacts our consciousness. Through powerful stories of encounters with figures like Mother Meera, the Dalai Lama, and Pope John Paul II, the author shares how these experiences dissolve inner noise and illuminate new dimensions of being. The piece highlights how resonance and alignment play roles in accessing presence and offers insights into finding this state independently.