Here’s why her positive affect probably comes off as so fake. I think it was really shown around time last year, when you asked for a session (or possibly two sessions) during the week of the 4 year anniversary of your friend’s death and she snapped at you. She told you she’s not going to be speaking with you during her vacation and more, blah, blah, blah, in a really stern and forceful tone. I just stared at her, somewhat stunned, definitely hurt.

Then she became super positive inquiring about X, Y, and Z.

I struggled to say anything. It became quiet.

She continued to wear her huge beaming grin.

It goes without saying that she could not have gone from frustration to positivity within a thirty second span.

Yet her grin was beaming.

Fake.

No sincerity, no authenticity.

Plasticky, ignorant Western, run-of-the-mill, LMFT.

When its Fall or Winter and in the AM. There isn’t a hint of sun shone from the windows. It’s “anemic blue,” as you describe it.

I’d love to wake up this early on 8 hours of sleep and just watch the scene from the bedroom window.

The perforated leather ball in my grip, the tension between the clutch pedal and the accelerator in my left and right feet, getting off the line in peppy spirit effortlessly quicker than the Tesla beside me, I looked forward to it all and enjoyed it all. I finally “got it.” How people demand manual variants of automatic cars. Why people are so passionate about it. I have really enjoyed the car before, most of the time, and in some specific instances. But yesterday I started to ovwrhwlemingly objectively experience how special it is.

Add in looking forward ro driving it, etc

It’s so sleek.

… to sit across from her and be able to tell myself: “There is no separation between her and I.”

And feel it.

Last night I re-read notes I took from my last meeting with Aastha.

“You and your twin can only interact in the present moment.”

On the drive to my walk by the water, I asked myself: “Even if you don’t think its possible to be mindful all the time, imagine what it’d look like and feel like to be mindful right now.”

So I did. And it lasted longer than I thought it would. And as I sat on my bench looking at the water, amongst the breeze and the waves in the wake, I acheived presence.

The water seemed so alive. So “large.” A lot more than how it appears in the photo. I felt how I do when I’m at the beach standing before the ocean. Where the scene feels overwhelming and commanding.

It’s hard to capture what I felt, but if I had to, I guess I’d say: “Soon I went from being the person watching the water to: “just being.” But there was almost something so much more than that. More profound.

“This must be what it means to feel no separation from nature.”