For the Senses

May the touch of your skin

Register the beauty

Of the otherness

That surrounds you.

Divinity Rising by Autumn Skye Morrison

 

May your listening be attuned

To the deeper silence

Where sound is honed

To bring distance home.

 

May the fragrance

Of a breathing meadow

Refresh your heart

And remind you you are

A child of the earth.

 

And when you partake

Of food and drink,

May your taste quicken

To the gift and sweetness

That flows from the earth.

 

May your inner eye see

Through the surfaces

And glean the real presence

Of everything that meets you.

 

May your soul beautify

The desire of your eyes

That you might glimpse

The infinity that hides

In the simple sights

That seem worn

To your usual eyes.

 

 

“For the Senses” by John O’Donohue, from To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings. © Harmony, 2008. 

How it Is

When people see some things as beautiful,
other things become ugly.
When people see some things as good,
other things become bad.

Being and non-being create each other.
Difficult and easy support each other.
Long and short define each other.
High and low depend on each other.
Before and after follow each other.

Therefore the Master
acts without doing anything
and teaches without saying anything.
Things arise and she lets them come;
things disappear and she lets them go.

She has but doesn’t possess,
acts but doesn’t expect.
When her work is done, she forgets it.
That is why it lasts forever.

Lao Tzu
Tao Te Ching

There is no such thing as failure. There is only Sweet and Sour reality …..

The I Ching hexagram, ‘Oppression‘, comes to mind:

“… Hard times shrivel our spirits, and give rise to a multitude of “crows” in the form of troublesome worries. Times of great loss or personal failure break weaker people; but the strong of heart can bend with fate …”

Valentine’s Day has a habit of highlighting the Sweet and Sour around us.  For every kiss that ‘begins with K’ there’s a lonely heart sitting at home.

No, this isn’t about affairs of the heart … more like it’s about Challenges and Change, and relationships are examples we can understand.

When things go sideways, it doesn’t mean the entire experience was a fail.  Not every lesson lasts a lifetime, and it’s important to glean the wisdom we are offered and to honor the opportunity for growth.

Sometimes we resist change because we are afraid of the unknown, sometimes because we fear being seen as ‘quitters’ or failures. My thoughts are that each of us must walk our own paths, listening to our deepest instincts, and everything else is simply people on the outside looking in … opinions and theories.  Background noise.

“… Keep in mind that failure – the final taboo in modern society – is but one part of the inevitable cycle of life for those who dare to live fully and completely. Never to fail at all is to fail in the biggest way.”

New experiences, new relationships, even the release from a toxic or dead relationship … Change … are all wonderful reminders of how much Life has to share with us.  These ‘re-dos’ can be blessings in disguise.  Old patterns and dead-end habits must be purged to make room for growth and fresh starts.  We see this in the cycles of Nature, the leaves that fall from trees aren’t ‘garbage’, they also become compost to nurture what will be further growth for the tree.

See?  We are the trees, and even our worst mistakes will carry something of value for us.

I was at a Yin Yoga Teacher Training recently and the instructor (the super-duper Corina Benner) read a poem that really stayed with me:

‘She Let Go’
Without a thought or a word, she let go.
She let go of fear.
She let go of judgments.
She let go of the confluence of opinions swarming around her head.
She let go of the committee of indecision within her.
She let go of all the ‘right’ reasons.
Wholly and completely, without hesitation or worry, she just let go.
She didn’t ask anyone for advice.
She didn’t read a book on how to let go.
She just let go.
She let go of all the memories that held her back.
She let go of all of the anxiety that kept her from moving forward.
She let go of the planning and all of the calculations about how to do
it just right.
She didn’t promise to let go.
She didn’t journal about it.
She didn’t write the projected date in her Day-Timer.
She made no public announcement.
She didn’t check the weather report or read her daily horoscope.
She just let go.
She didn’t analyze whether she should let go.
She didn’t call her friends to discuss the matter.
She didn’t utter one word.
She just let go.
No one was around when it happened. There was no applause or
congratulations.
No one thanked her or praised her. No one noticed a thing.
Like a leaf falling from a tree, she just let go.
There was no effort. There was no struggle.
It wasn’t good. It wasn’t bad.
It was what it was, and it is just that.
In the space of letting go, she let it all be.
A small smile came over her face. A light breeze blew through her.
And the sun and the moon shone forevermore.
Here’s to giving ourselves the gift of letting go…
There’s only one guru ~ you.

The author of this poem is unclear. A few sites list Ernest Holmes as the author, another Jennifer Eckert Bernau, and still another Rev. Safire Rose.

Wow, right?

 

 

 

 

A Wandering Sunday

I love lazy mornings in bed!  You know the kind, those days where there really is a l-o-n-g list of things you ‘should’ be doing, but you don’t? The luxurious pleasure of NOT staring at the clock and counting the minutes?

As I look out my window I see the early morning fog – swirly and misty, painting most of my world white.  Closing my eyes seems like the right thing to do.  I listen to the different birds calling outside as I enjoy the stillness of a house where children are fast asleep.  Squirrels are chasing each other along the tree branches, geese honk out calls as they fly by, the blue jays work on their nest…

So many times I tell my boys that we don’t live in the land of ‘what if’, that ‘life isn’t fair’, and a whole host of cliches that suddenly have me sounding a lot like my mother! But sometimes, yes … sometimes, it’s OK to let your mind roam free,  to pause on whatever thought strikes your fancy.

No conclusions, no deadlines, no problem solving. Much like a butterfly fluttering from one flower to the next.  To see and enjoy the world and it’s gifts and rhythms as they unfold, like a baby discovering its own feet – Such a wonderful lazy morning!

I am reminded of a poem, “Wonderment”, by Jamie K. Reaser

For more of her beautiful work, please check out www.talkingwaters-poetry.blogspot.com and/or the Talking Waters page on FB.

Oh dear … the alpha male cat is throwing his fur around, he looks like an oversized Tasmanian devil, and the turkeys are on my roof. They sound like a herd of tap-dancing cows … sigh.

It WAS peaceful for a spell.