Unconditional Belonging & Collective Perspectives
Roots – Relations – Belonging – Being – Aligning – Perspectives – Living
The Wider Embraces Method
During a Wider Embraces session, we move through seven steps. Each step gives us a unique experience of the world we are part of.
We meet online or in person for an hour or more. One person led the others through a guided meditation. around the Wheel of WE. Everyone shares their experiences during the session.
Everything you belong to that has some kind of boundaries is an Embrace. You belong to all your wider Embraces unconditionally.
It can be your physical house, your biological family, your social community, an organisation or the continent you live on. Or it can be our widest ones: the planet, the solar system, the galaxy and the Universe.
The Embrace of planet Earth is special. It's a well-defined physical place, and we are one interrelated and interconnected life and human culture living together.
Below is a brief explanation of the seven steps of the Wheel of WE, with the Embrace of planet Earth in focus. However, the steps are the same for all Embraces we work with.
Step 1
We become aware of our common roots
Tracing the journey of the physical parts of our bodies all the way back to the start of our Universe. Inside me is the whole history of the Universe.
Recognising the over three point five billion year-long, unbroken chain of life that formed my mammal body. I'm related to all life on Earth.
Following our human history all the way back hundreds of thousands of years to when we were a tribe in Africa.
Step 2
We become aware of our deep interconnectedness
We become aware of gravity holding us and the planet together. How we are part of a solar system, a galaxy and the whole Universe.
We are part of the planetary ecosystem, living and breathing together with all life on Earth. Interdependent.
We humans love to communicate and create, and we start to form one global human culture with many variations.
Step 3
We rest in our wider Embraces, we belong, unconditionally
The first two steps are based on mental knowledge. For this third step, we move into sensing.
We sense with our whole bodies the subtle field of one of our wider Embrace, here and now. We relax and rest in the Embrace. We belong, unconditionally.
To rest in the Embrace of planet Earth is to come home and heal.
Step 4
We lean out into a wider Embrace, and become it
This is the most significant step of the Wheel of WE. After sensing one of our wider Embraces, we lean out into it and take it as our first-person perspective.
It's a distinct shift from being a person looking out through my eyes to being omnipresent, identified with the field. This may sound strange, but it's natural when you do it.
We enjoy the stillness and openness of this step. Just being.
Step 5
As the Embrace we hold and align our parts, unconditionally
We move from the stillness and beingness of step 4 into an active phase. As the Embrace, we lean slightly inwards, focusing on all our parts (including the person holding the perspective).
Letting everything slide into its optimal place, inside me, the Embrace. Effortlessly.
When we take the perspective as the Embrace of planet Earth, this aligning step feels powerful.
Step 6
As the Embrace we open up to insights from this wider perspective
At this step, we change direction and modus. From inwards and holding, to open up to insights from any direction. Lending our human minds to the perspective of the wider Embrace.
The challenge here is not to project our personal beliefs onto the Embrace, but to be open to new and sometimes surprising insights.
We, humans, have many ideas about our relationship with our planet, many of which may be disputed.
Step 7
We live together inside all our wider Embraces
At the last step of the Wheel of WE, we come back to being a single human being. Now aware of some of our wider Embraces.
We ponder what we sensed and any insights we might have gained, and think about how to live from these new insights in our daily lives.