Feeling Seen, Heard & Understood – The Way of Phi in Practice –

Music & Art – good catalysts for real meetings. Photo: Marianne Yde

Dear friends,

The first step to any real connection is simply this: to meet.

To be in the same place, at the same time.

It sounds obvious—and it is.

Yet it’s remarkable how easily we drift past it.

Over the years—perhaps even decades—I’ve noticed how often I’ve wished that people, situations, even the world itself would meet me where I am… instead of taking the time to meet them where they are.

But here’s the quiet truth: no matter how well-crafted our words, if the other person isn’t truly there—physically, emotionally, or mentally—what we say won’t reach them.

It simply vanishes into the wind.

This is easy enough to grasp in literal terms.

If you’re in Hamburg and I’m in Stockholm, and we’re not connected by some channel—no message I send will land. 

But the more common misalignment happens on subtler levels. Emotional. Mental.We assume, just because we’re in the same room—or the same Zoom—that we’re in the same place.

Not so.

Imagine one person quietly grieving the loss of someone dear, and another riding high from a recent success.

If the latter bursts in, full of celebratory energy, the first may not hear them at all.Or worse—they might feel unseen, misunderstood, even hurt.

And both might walk away sensing something was off, without quite knowing why.

They simply weren’t in the same harbour. They hadn’t truly met.

This past week, I’ve been in western Denmark, staying with a dear friend—someone with the rare gift of presence.

I’ve felt met. Seen. Heard. Understood. Often.

It’s something I experience as both deeply healing… and, if I’m honest, somewhat disorienting.

I’m not yet fully used to it.

I’m more familiar with being the one who offers the presence; the one who sees, who hears, who understands.

But I’m learning. I’m softening into it.

And the more I welcome these beautiful gifts, the more I begin to notice how many have been around me all along.

Every person is a miracle.

Every single one.

Because life itself is a miracle.

The question is:

What does it take to remember that?

With grace,

Christopher