“Be nothing,
do nothing,
get nothing,
become nothing,
seek for nothing,
relinquish nothing,
be as you are,
rest in God.”
– Miranda Macpherson
APPROACH
In a moment, it silenced every concept I had of self, God, and world.
Prior to receiving this transmission, I had been extensively studying the world’s great wisdom traditions and practicing meditation, prayer, and psychological excavation for decades. As spiritual director of OneSpirit Interfaith foundation in London, I had also been guiding others into a life of service.
However, this transmission dissolved my familiar identity, initiated powerful changes to every aspect of my life, and required a deep letting go.
Grace comes alive through surrender.
I discovered that the more we learn to be open and undefended, the more Grace — direct experience of Divine presence — can come alive from within. It brings us back into full contact with the real love, clarity, peace, strength, and joy that is our deepest nature. I saw that Grace is the key to gaining real traction on the spiritual path, wherever we are upon it.
Grace is what gives us true inner ground, transforms our suffering into wisdom, and makes us receptive to the support and blessings we need. Most importantly, it helps us become more graceful in these times of tremendous change and uncertainty across the globe.
In the years it took to integrate my own experience, a potent body of teachings began to emerge. It brought forth a practice that brings Grace alive. I call this practice Ego Relaxation.
You cannot do spiritual transformation.
Relax the interference, and Grace finds you.
Ego Relaxation is a holistic, feminine approach to non-dual awakening. It shows you how to open in and through every aspect of your experience and let it become a gateway into deeper wisdom. This allows for authentic surrender, not by struggling to push past your personality, but by compassionately dissolving the commentary, fear and judgment that typically block access to the essential qualities of our true nature.
Ego Relaxation reconnects you to the living stream of blessings that are always available, providing the inner nourishment to deeper spiritually and to thrive in every aspect of your life.
What does Ego Relaxation address?
Ego Relaxation first SETTLES the agitation in your mind and nervous system that is caused by the tendency to reject your experience or to grasp for something different. It guides you to truly be in the present moment with compassion and curiosity.
Ego Relaxation then SOOTHES the suffering that drives your incessant ego activity, bringing loving-kindness, understanding and healing to the parts of your consciousness that cannot let go without them.
Ego Relaxation then DISSOLVES the identity of your separate self. While at first this feels vulnerable, it opens inner doors to the direct experience of boundless love, peace, clarity and joy, allowing your luminous true nature to shine forth.
Ego Relaxation then becomes EMBODIED WISDOM with which to live meaningfully, respond to everyday challenges and be more graceful with all of life.
No need to beat yourself into spiritual shape.
Yield instead to a luminous presence within.
Just as a hard block of ice will melt in contact with the warmth of the sun, so in the presence of unconditional love, your ego defenses, fear and control can melt. You can kindly be with the important themes of your life, harnessing the ordinary challenges we all face in our relationships, at work and even with our ageing bodies into gateways to deeper wisdom.
Ego Relaxation returns you to greater fluidity and freedom, from which you experience Grace not just as a beautiful state, but as the primordial foundation of life and the depth of your heart. Ego Relaxation makes your ordinary functioning and relating much clearer, liberating your natural intelligence and gifts.
How is Ego Relaxation practiced?
We engage the practice of Ego Relaxation through three primary methods that work synergistically to awaken us in body, heart and mind.
Holistic Inquiry:
My approach to inquiry provides a framework to dive into your direct experience, not just with discriminating awareness but also through somatic, felt experience. I offer precise sequences of inquiry questions to liberate obstacles and open inner doors so you can journey into deeper dimensions within. Most importantly, inquiry helps you listen to innate wisdom as the guide for right living, and discriminate truth from subtle delusion.
Meditation:
Collecting attention and quieting the mind not only reduces biological stress, it makes you receptive to subtle states of Grace. I share foundational practices to awaken belly, heart and head centers so you can stabilize in unchanging inner ground, open into the vast heart and abide in the nectar of silence. Guided meditations are also designed for parts of your soul that need healing in order to let go.
Devotion:
Prayer, Sanskrit mantra and chanting powerfully awakens the love and joy of your deep heart. They strengthen your dedication while opening the subtle body to receive non-conceptual grace. Furthermore, they make you spiritually fertile and juicy! Every teaching begins and ends in devotion.
Integrate your psychological and somatic experience.
Living the way of Grace includes psychological integration because powerful spiritual openings often dislodge hidden corners of your psyche. Despite the common misperception that psychological unpacking keeps you in your “story,” I have seen many people get stuck by trying to bypass and transcend what needs to be faced with love. Practicing with our personal stream of history reveals that what you might have thought were problems to overcome are actually gateways into deeper wisdom. This approach embraces what integral philosopher Ken Wilbur calls “waking up while growing up.”
Furthermore, to embody Grace as we walk through this world requires that we befriend our human body and value its communications. Therefore, we practice Ego Relaxation with our somatic experience, engaging contemporary insights that help unwind trauma and stress patterns within our body.
All parts of you are welcome.
If you are coming to this work from a specific wisdom tradition and existing practice, know that I fully support what has proven to be true and helpful for you. This work includes cultivating the virtues universally agreed upon by every classical tradition. I serve only to amplify and vivify your existing practice.
If you have fallen off the wagon spiritually or are a little confused about how to actually live what you believe spiritually, then may what you find here serve to plug you back into the Source and receive all you need. If you are ready for more guidance, then I bow to your sincerity—and vow to offer whatever I can to help you embody your deepest prayer.
This work of Grace and Ego Relaxation is informed by ancient wisdom traditions, especially the teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi, the embodied non-duality of Kashmiri Shaivism, A Course in Miracles and more recently the Diamond Approach. It has emerged from my own ongoing realization process and almost three decades of experience guiding others, discovering what truly works and what doesn’t.
Ultimately, this approach belongs to no one.
It has emerged as a gift to help more of us become graceful human beings, and it continues to evolve as I share it with others.
The practical value of Grace in our world.
Surprisingly, often what seems most mystical has the most power to practically change not only our inner landscape but also our world. Authentic awakening takes us beyond our self-centeredness and makes us more fully human. Non-dual awakening in particular reconnects us to the felt understanding that we are inherently part of everyone and everything. This awakens the love and compassion of our deepest heart, making us kinder, more forgiving, and more content.
The primary point of this work is that not just some of us have a gentler ride through this life, but so that more of us become spiritually mature, graceful human beings, capable of turning our primary attention to being of benefit to our world that is in need of more Grace.
May you settle into your direct experience as it is right now, greet your humanity with compassion and humbly come to live as the embodiment of the Grace you were born to be—a vessel for boundless love, beauty, clarity, pure awareness, joy and luminous gifts to extend deeper into our world.
