Hello Kindred Spirit!

On any given day, I sit down at my computer and ask ChatGPT a question. I’m grateful for AI’s ability to access and summarize vast amounts of information, presenting it in a practical and digestible way.

As a writer, I have a love/fear relationship with AI. On the one hand, it sometimes feels as if the role of “author” itself may slip into nonexistence as AI grows increasingly expressive. On the other hand, I sincerely appreciate what it can offer. I especially value its ability to make IT troubles solvable. Recent example: If I get a scan code on my iPhone, how do I scan it? ChatGPT quickly taught me how to long-tap the code to add it to my wallet.

Equally important—and far more relevant to my work as an author—AI has made marketing more fun. Two years ago, I took a How to Use AI for Book Marketing class with literary agent Wendy Keller. It was game-changing. What once took me hours of sifting and shaping now takes minutes. I can ask for help, and it feels like having a personal assistant ready to handle the heavy lifting so that I can focus on the creative heart of things.

As a child of the ’60s and ’70s, I grew up watching sci-fi heroes query “the computer” for answers, so part of me accepts the inevitability—and usefulness—of AI. Still, a deeper question lingers: What does that make me? What contribution do I offer, as a human writer, when AI is so much more adept? Perhaps the real inquiry is: What makes us human? Who are we, really?

Which brings me to today’s reflection: the mystery of being human.

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Helané Wahbeh, who leads research at the Institute of Noetic Sciences. But, before we go there, let’s pause for a moment:

What is Noetic Science?

ChatGPT tells me: Noetic science is the study of how consciousness, intuition, and inner knowing influence the physical world and human experience. The word noetic comes from the Greek noēsis, meaning “inner wisdom,” “direct knowing,” or “understanding from within.”

And here we begin to sense the distinction between AI and being human. While AI can parse data, craft sentences, and solve technical problems, it cannot settle into the mystery of being. It cannot experience embodied presence. That capacity—to touch the realm beyond knowledge—belongs uniquely to us. It’s the capacity to access inner wisdom or direct knowing, not by drawing from a database of facts but by entering the still, vibrant field of awareness itself.

As humans, we’ll never outthink artificial intelligence. But we can access, with startling clarity, another kind of intelligence altogether. It happens when we release our usual ways of understanding—when we tune into intuition and listen deeply to presence itself.

Which brings me back to Dr. Helané Wahbeh, Director of Research at the Institute of Noetic Sciences and author of The Science of Channeling, who bridges rigorous science with the exploration of human consciousness. On the show, I mentioned my own brief, long-ago channeling experience of what felt like someone else speaking through me—something I had never talked about before—and asked:

“From your research into intuition and channeling, do you see these experiences as related to presence itself—to the underlying consciousness? Might we call it a form of deep listening?”

Dr. Wahbeh took her time, noting that it was a “big” question. She spoke about the vast range of ways people receive noetic wisdom—from gut hunches and intuitive hits to mental mediumship and trance channeling. Then she went right to the heart of it, referencing my experience and how I’d described it as another entity coming through me. She invited me to consider that we are all one—interconnected—and that what I experienced was simply another aspect of myself expressing through me.

When we speak of presence—the vast, infinite field of consciousness—we begin to see that our seemingly separate selves are just different angles of that same presence perceiving itself. The ways we move through the world, the forms our knowing takes, are all variations of this great, unified awareness exploring itself.

What struck me most was that I hadn’t even noticed how I’d split my earlier channeling experience—something that happened years before my first silent retreat—into something separate from the oneness I have also touched.

How brilliant to be reminded that guidance, intuition, and inspiration can reach us through so many different doorways. All those doorways lead to the same vast, living field of awareness—presence itself. And we don’t have to wait for mystical moments to sense it. It’s available in every breath, every pause, every heartbeat.

So, how do we touch that field in everyday life? How do we remember, even for a few seconds, the mystery of being human—not as an idea, but as a felt reality?

Juicy Practice: The Taste of Presence

Today, I invite you to drop into the simple experience of being present—not as something to hold onto or strive for, but as a brief, five-second taste of embodied aliveness.
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Feel what it’s like to rest in the quiet sense of being—perhaps marked by a soft, inner “Mona Lisa” smile. Not a reaction to anything outside you, but a reflection of inner peace, steady and whole, regardless of outer circumstances.

Try this:​
• Stop.
• Be still.
• Open your senses.
• Turn your attention toward the felt sense of being.

Can you feel it? There’s a subtle, living current that hums beneath everything—a quiet aliveness that isn’t a thought or emotion but a direct, kinesthetic knowing. Some call it embodied presence.

Close your eyes for a moment and sense it now. This is the pulse of presence itself—love, clarity, and vitality, always here and always available. Just five seconds is enough to touch it.

As you rest here, sense the possibility of oneness: an awareness that includes all, where nothing is left out. Let yourself imagine that your embodied presence—this very body and mind—is consciousness savoring the experience of being human, open to wisdom and guidance through many mysterious doorways.

May you carry this quiet aliveness with you, even for a few seconds, and remember the wonder and mystery of simply being.

Upcoming events and Good News!

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· Review alert - BookLife (Publisher’s Weekly) Review of Naked in the Now​

· Radio show - Listen to the UK Health Radio show with Theresa Cheung, where I talk to Dr. Helene Wahbeh (Director of Research at the Institute of Noetic Science). I speak with her from 31.14 to 38.15.

· Workshop open - The Write Now Mind November session has started, but please get in touch with me if you'd like to join!

· Live event - Write by Red Rock, Wednesday, December 3, 2025, 12:30 pm at the Blue Diamond Library

· Magazine feature - Can We Talk About Aging Shame? Article in Spirituality & Health Magazine coming out on November 15, 2025

· Interview coming - “Divine Winks” with Theresa Cheung on her White Shores broadcast.

· Fun fact - In Dan Brown’s newest thriller, The Secret of Secrets, a noetic scientist at the edge of consciousness is silenced, and Langdon must race through Europe to uncover what it means to be human beyond the brain.

· Celebration: A dear friend and Write Now Mind participant recently won big—their essay took top honors in the San Miguel de Allende Writers Conference contest for Creative Nonfiction! I mention this because she came to Write Now Mind a couple of years ago with little writing experience. Her winning essay, a five-page piece, was the first substantial essay she had ever crafted. Folks, we all have so much untapped potential!

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Smiles,

​https://marijkemccandless.com

​Kirkus Reviews endorses Naked in the Now!​

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