Here is another guest post from my wife, Gina Lake's, blog. Gina's blog is located on the home page of her website at www.radicalhappiness.com, which is dedicated to spiritual awakening and living in the Now. It provides tools for moving out of the ego and into the Now, where true happiness--radical happiness--lies. This is an excerpt from her book Embracing the Now: Finding Peace and Happiness in What Is, available on Amazon.com.

The only thing that exists is the present moment, the Now, but we, as human beings, have a particular relationship with our thoughts that takes us out of the experience of the moment. Thoughts create an alternate reality, a subplot to the Now. We get lost in that pretend subplot and don’t notice other things about the moment. When we bring that alternate reality into the moment, our experience of the Now changes. It colors the Now. We are no longer experiencing the moment purely, but through the lens of the ego, which generates our thoughts and feelings.

Our thoughts and feelings come and go in the Now. But unlike sights, sounds, and the other things that come and go in the Now, thoughts and feelings change our experience of the Now when we identify with them. Nothing else that comes and goes in the Now has the same effect on our experience of the moment. The Now is just what it is, but our experience of it changes if we are identified with thoughts or feelings. If we aren’t identified with a thought or a feeling, we will feel the peace of the Now. If we are identified with a thought or a feeling, we will feel anxious, restless, discontent, and possibly some other negative feelings.

I have fallen in love with truth
I only want to be with her
I can not stand to be apart
I would gladly go to the ends of the earth
or I would never again move from this spot
just to be sure to inhale her fragrant perfume
with my dying breath

I have fallen in love with truth
her every wish my command
I simply must obey
for she has captured my soul
and taken complete control
of even my innermost thoughts
freeing me to find repose
in her unadorned splendor

I have fallen in love with truth
with exquisite tenderness she shows me
the perfection in my every flaw
no need for pretense
for she knows everything about me
and yet takes me in her arms
with complete abandon
until only she remains

(Sample more free spiritual poetry)

We often look into our mind to know something, and so when we want to know ourselves, we often look into the mind for that also. But the mind is full of thoughts about what we want to know and never the thing itself. You will never find an apple or a lover or a sunset or anything in your mind, just thoughts about these things. And you will never find your true Self in the mind, just a lot of thoughts about the true Self. That is just what the mind is made of and so that is what you find in there.

What if you sense in your heart instead? I am not suggesting you think about what you might find in your heart. What if you actually sense the space inside your chest? What is actually here right now within the space of your body? It can be helpful to rest your hands over your chest, and then simply notice what is really present beneath your hands. No need to think much about it, just directly sense what is here.

First of all, how mysterious is it that there is a body with a heart? And even more mysterious is the simple existence of space beneath the hands resting on your heart. What is this simple mystery of a place called here? Why is there a "here" that holds your body and everything else that is present? What is that space itself under your hands like? If for just a moment you do not think about what is here and instead just sense the actual space under your hands, what do you find?