Wide, Wide Awake

“How, then, to find the courage to speak with such authenticity, with words muscular enough to ring the doorbell of the listener’s mind, admitting the rigor and the glory of the holy through the open door of the down-to-earth, the commonplace, the very ordinary.”― Luci Shaw, An Incremental Life: Poems

“Blessed are we when we yearn, yearn for connection and love and touch. Blessed are we when we hunger for the beauty of life itself and the people to fill it. Blessed are we when we are unable to say I’m letting it go because we feel like we will be washed away into an ocean of nothingness. Teach us to hold on to the truths that enliven our spirits and fill our souls and loosen our grip on the painful untruths like that we are alone or unlovable or that desire itself is the enemy. Teach us to hunger for what is good and be filled. There will be no easy addition or subtraction, we will lose and we will gain and almost none of it will make much sense at the time. And it forces our hands open in the ebb and flow of wins and losses, comings and goings we will look for divine love in the mystery of it all. The stubbornness of flowers that still smile at us, at the grocery store and the need for endless small reminders that the pain of it all, the comedy of it all, keeps us wide, wide awake.” – Kate Bowler

In the hurry and hustle
Rush and self-imposed demands
May beauty interrupt you
Stop you in your tracks
Blue skies
Flowers smiling
Sunlight on snow
Listening and connection
Treasure woven in everyday life
Noticed in stillness, inquiry
Deep breath
Ebb and flow
Senses atune
Wide, wide awake
Blessed are we in the mix and muddle of it all.

“The people you meet in your life, you meet them for a specific purpose: To help them and to be helped by them. So, try to spot the treasure in your everyday life, because one day you may realize you had the treasure and you lost it.”― Maria Karvouni