wonder
Dear Friends ~ This is the season of wonder. Wonder is the doorway to so many things, among them joy, gratitude, and wisdom. How do we open the door of wonder in our lives?
Time to apprentice again
to my earliest teachers
of wonder and mystery
Time to walk again
in the dark forest
under a night star sky
Time to walk again
through the fallen leaves
under the black shadow of tree
No longer asking
Who I am
That I am is the biggest
mystery of all
A single red leaf
One night star —
Enough to explode in me
Sunyata
States aren't real. They come and go. Only Being is real.
Wendell Berry
Leavings
I know that I have life
only insofar as I have love.
I have no love
except it come from Thee.
Help me please to carry
this candle against the wind.
If you are searching, you must not stop until you find. When you find, however, you will become troubled. Your confusion will give way to wonder. In wonder you will reign over all things.
Beatrice Bruteau
PRAYER AND IDENTITY
The first task, clearly, is to detach the sense of identity from the descriptions of yourself. This does not mean to find another description that would be the correct one. It means to realize there is no description of you.
James Naylor
Art thou in the darkness?
Mind it not, for if thou dost
it will feed thee more.
But stand still, and act not,
and wait in patience
till light arises out of darkness
and leads thee.
Valentin Tomberg
Meditations on the Tarot
If you seek Wisdom in the first place, you will find that Wisdom is joyous. If you seek the joy of Wisdom in the first place, you will fall prey to illusions.
Maurice Nicoll
The New Man
Faith is a continual inner effort, a continual altering of the mind, of the habitual ways of thought, of the habitual ways of taking everything, of habitual reactions.
Bruno Barnhart
SECOND SIMPLICITY
All those magical, predestined, and irreplaceable people and places are not really that, not really the answer. Rather, we have to stay with the hunger of the question and from its energy fill the space with our own choices, and then with the new things which will be called forth from us in the unexpected poverty and limitation in which our necessarily imperfect choices necessarily situate us.
Yehuda Amichai
A TOUCH OF GRACE
From the place where we are right
Flowers will never grow
In the spring.
The place where we are right
Is hard and trampled
Like a yard.
But doubts and loves
Dig up the world
Like a mole, a plow.
And a whisper will be heard in the place
Where the ruined
House once stood.
Raimundo Panikkar
Blessed Simplicity
Contemplation is that activity which situates us in an open space from which we can observe and contribute to the course of the universe ... that activity that delights in the well-being of all beings, that maintains the world in cohesion.
Thomas Kelly
A Testament of Devotion
The wellsprings of life are bubbling up anew each moment. So when the angel is troubling the waters, it is no time to stand on the bank and recite past wonders.
Hafiz
The Gift
Just sit there right now
Don't do a thing
Just rest
For your separation from God
Is the hardest work in this world
Let me bring you trays of food
And something that you like to drink
You can use my soft words
As a cushion for your head
Parker J Palmer
A Hidden Wholeness
The soul is like a wild animal — tough, resilient, savvy, self-sufficient and yet exceedingly shy. If we want to see a wild animal, the last thing we should do is to go crashing through the woods, shouting for the creature to come out. But if we are willing to walk quietly into the woods and sit silently for an hour or two at the base of a tree, the creature we are waiting for may well emerge, and out of the corner of an eye we will catch a glimpse of the precious wildness we seek.
Kabir Helminski
The person who makes all cares into one care— the care for simply staying present— will be cared for by that presence which is creative love.
Dear Friends ~ This morning unfolded early and briskly: A sick child woke before dawn. Our family's lovable rascal of a pet dog got himself stranded in the chicken yard and had to be rescued from the domineering hens. I waded through the texts and emails that accumulated on my phone overnight, gave my mom a call, and packed the not-sick child off to her day's activities. In a brief quiet pause, I intend to write this letter, yet I'm distracted immediately by the laundry pile that seems to raise its expectant eyebrows at me from across the room.
My wise friend, Katie, recently invited me to use a centering writing exercise; this hectic morning I give it a try. "Write a haiku," Katie urged, "that begins with the line 'I am looking at'". So I draw a breath...meet that laundry's eye...and feel unexpectedly overcome by the marvel of the colorful cotton chaos:
I am looking at
A heap of the clothes we wear
Striped socks and plaid shirts
Maya Angelou
Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now
Because of the routines we follow, we often forget that life is an ongoing adventure...and the sooner we realize that, the quicker we will be able to treat life as art; to bring all our energies to each encounter, to remain flexible enough to notice and admit when what we expected to happen did not. We need to remember that we are created creative and can invent new scenarios as frequently as they are needed.
~ Dag Hammarskjold
Markings
In the point of rest at the center of our being, we encounter a world where all things are at rest in the same way. Then a tree becomes a mystery, a cloud a revelation, each [person] a cosmos of whose riches we can only catch glimpses. The life of simplicity is simple, but it opens to us a book in which we never get beyond the first syllable.
Marilynne Robinson
GILEAD
When things are taking their ordinary course, it is hard to remember what matters. There are so many things you would never think to tell anyone. And I believe they may be the things that mean most to you...
John O'Donohue
BEAUTY
Each morning we awaken to the light and the invitation to a new day in the world of time; each night we surrender to the dark to be taken to play in the world of dreams where time is no more. At birth we were awakened and emerged to become visible in the world. At death we will surrender again to the dark to become invisible. Awakening and surrender: they frame each day and each life; between them the journey where anything can happen, the beauty and the frailty.
Herman Hesse
MY BELIEF
Accustom yourself every morning to look for a moment at the sky and suddenly you will be aware of the air around you, the scent of morning freshness that is bestowed on you between sleep and labor. You will find every day that the gable of every house has its own particular look, its own special lighting. Pay it some heed if you will have for the rest of the day a remnant of satisfaction and a touch of coexistence with nature. Gradually and without effort the eye trains itself to transmit many small delights, to contemplate nature and the city streets, to appreciate the inexhaustible fun of daily life.
Virginia Woolf
THE WAVES
Happiness is in the quiet, ordinary things. A table, a chair, a book with a paperknife stuck between the pages. And the petal falling from the rose, and the light flickering as we sit silent.
Mary Oliver
DEVOTIONS
Rumi said, There is no proof of the soul.
But isn't the return of spring and how it
springs up in our hearts a pretty good hint?
Dacher Keltner
HOW AWE MAKES US MORE HUMAN
Yes, awe arises during the extraordinary: when viewing the Grand Canyon, touching the hand of a rock star like Iggy Pop, or experiencing the sacred during meditation or prayer. More frequently, though, people report feeling awe in response to more mundane things: when seeing the leaves of a Gingko tree change from green to yellow, in beholding the night sky when camping near a river, in seeing a stranger give their food to a homeless person, in seeing their child laugh just like their brother.
Thomas Moore
Care of the Soul
Every day you have choices. You can do things that wound your soul, like being dominated by the work ethic or compulsively seeking more money and possessions, or you can be around people who give you pleasure and do things that satisfy a desire deep inside you. Make this soul care a way of life, and you may discover what the Greeks called eudaimonia—a good spirit, or, in the deepest sense, happiness.
Gabor Mate
IN THE REALM OF HUNGRY GHOSTS
It's a subtle thing, freedom. It takes effort; it takes attention and focus to not act something like an automaton. Although we do have freedom, we exercise it only when we strive for awareness...
Speechless
speechless before
these budding green spring leaves
in blazing sunlight
More mundane things
Yes, awe arises during the extraordinary: when viewing the Grand Canyon, touching the hand of a rock star like Iggy Pop, or experiencing the sacred during meditation or prayer. More frequently, though, people report feeling awe in response to more mundane things: when seeing the leaves of a Gingko tree change from green to yellow, in beholding the night sky when camping near a river, in seeing a stranger give their food to a homeless person, in seeing their child laugh just like their brother.
The quiet, ordinary things
Happiness is in the quiet, ordinary things. A table, a chair, a book with a paperknife stuck between the pages. And the petal falling from the rose, and the light flickering as we sit silent.
A world where all things are at rest
In the point of rest at the center of our being, we encounter a world where all things are at rest in the same way. Then a tree becomes a mystery, a cloud a revelation, each [person] a cosmos of whose riches we can only catch glimpses. The life of simplicity is simple, but it opens to us a book in which we never get beyond the first syllable.
Every day you have choices
Every day you have choices. You can do things that wound your soul, like being dominated by the work ethic or compulsively seeking more money and possessions, or you can be around people who give you pleasure and do things that satisfy a desire deep inside you. Make this soul care a way of life, and you may discover what the Greeks called eudaimonia—a good spirit, or, in the deepest sense, happiness.
Of all ridiculous things
Of all ridiculous things the most ridiculous seems to me, to be busy — to be a man who is brisk about his food and his work.
To bring all our energies to each encounter
Because of the routines we follow, we often forget that life is an ongoing adventure...and the sooner we realize that, the quicker we will be able to treat life as art; to bring all our energies to each encounter, to remain flexible enough to notice and admit when what we expected to happen did not. We need to remember that we are created creative and can invent new scenarios as frequently as they are needed.
Awakening and surrender
Each morning we awaken to the light and the invitation to a new day in the world of time; each night we surrender to the dark to be taken to play in the world of dreams where time is no more. At birth we were awakened and emerged to become visible in the world. At death we will surrender again to the dark to become invisible. Awakening and surrender: they frame each day and each life; between them the journey where anything can happen, the beauty and the frailty.
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