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Posts from the ‘Awe’ Category

Jun 23

Seed to Tree

“Create no images of God. Accept the images that God has provided. They are everywhere, in everything. God is Change— Seed to tree, tree to forest; Rain to river, river to sea; Grubs to bees, bees to swarm. From one, many; from many, one; Forever uniting, growing, dissolving— forever Changing. The universe is God’s self-portrait.”― Octavia E. Butler, Parable of the Sower

“All that you touch
You Change.

All that you Change
Changes you.

The only lasting truth
is Change.

God
is Change.”― Octavia E. Butler

What will bloom in you today?
To what will you tend?
Hold, embrace, release
Kindness, peace, love woven through it all.
For eyes to see, open hands to receive.

“Kindness eases change
Love quiets fear”― Octavia E. Butler, Parable of the Talents

Jun 12

Poetry of Ordinary Moments

“To walk quietly until the miracle in everything speaks is poetry, whether we write it down or not.”― Mark Nepo

“Mysteriously, as elusive as it is, this moment–where the eye is what it sees, where the heart is what it feels–this moment shows us that what is real is sacred”― Mark Nepo

The mysteries
To live
Not to solve
Unfolding and unfurling
In ordinary beautiful days
For fresh eyes to see
Open heart to allow
Wide arms to embrace
Sacred ground to walk with reverence.

“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.” – Marcel Proust

Jun 5

Holy Brimming in Beauty

“Wherever you are, you live in the world, which is just waiting for you to notice the holiness in it.”― Barbara Brown Taylor, An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith

“My life depends on engaging the most ordinary physical activities with the most exquisite attention I can give them. My life depends on ignoring all touted distinctions between the secular and the sacred, the physical and the spiritual, the body and the soul. What is saving my life now is becoming more fully human, trusting that there is no way to God apart from real life in the real world.”― Barbara Brown Taylor, An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith

In naming and bucketing
We simplify, reduce, minimize
In judging and ordering
We miss nuance, depth, hue
In criticizing and complaining
We forgo joy, gratitude, delight
To notice holy woven through ordinary
Daily call.

“Human beings may separate things into as many piles as we wish—separating spirit from flesh, sacred from secular, church from world. But we should not be surprised when God does not recognize the distinctions we make between the two.”― Barbara Brown Taylor, An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith

May 28

The Beauty of Things

“It seems that intuitive listening requires us to still our minds until the beauty of things older than our minds can find us.”― Mark Nepo, Seven Thousand Ways to Listen: Staying Close to What Is Sacred

“Let’s be in awe
which doesn’t mean
anything but the courage
to gape like fish at the surface
breaking around our mouths
as we meet the air.”― Mark Nepo

Do not let this day slip by unnoticed
Brake for wonder
Pull over for delight
Make a U-turn for peace
Poetry of ordinary days
Surface for fresh air
To the beauty of things.

“To walk quietly until the miracle in everything speaks is poetry, whether we write it down or not.”― Mark Nepo

May 20

Fidelity and Flow

“A person susceptible to “wanderlust” is not so much addicted to movement as committed to transformation.”― Pico Iyer

“In an age of speed, I began to think, nothing could be more invigorating than going slow. In an age of distraction, nothing can feel more luxurious than paying attention. And in an age of constant movement, nothing is more urgent than sitting still.”― Pico Iyer, The Art of Stillness: Adventures in Going Nowhere

Fidelity to this day
Presence sought, found
Held, steady
Yolk easy
Burden light
River of joy running through it, undeterred
Slow. Attention. Stillness.
Reverence. Wanderlust. Serendipity.
Fidelity to this day.

“Serendipity was my tour guide, assisted by caprice”― Pico Iyer

May 13

Altars Blooming

“The whole life lies in the verb seeing.”― Teilhard de Chardin

“The world, this palpable world, which we were wont to treat with the boredom and disrespect with which we habitually regard places with no sacred association for us, is in truth a holy place, and we did not know it. Venite, adoremus.”― Teilhard de Chardin

Autopilot off
Trance interrupted
Emergence of presence
New day, new moment
Fresh eyes
Curious mind
Spirit led
Light heart
Holy ground
Sacred space
Discovering fire, again, within, moving out
Energies of love
Cast light, color, joy, beauty, delight, laughter, awe, spring

“Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire.” – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Apr 10

Small Distillations of Beauty

“Our sense of enchantment is not triggered only by grand things; the sublime is not hiding in distant landscapes. The awe-inspiring, the numinous, is all around us, all the time. It is transformed by our deliberate attention.” ― Katherine May, Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age

“But seeking is a kind of work. I don’t mean heading off on wild road trips just to see the stars that are shining above your own roof. I mean committing to a lifetime of engagement: to noticing the world around you, to actively looking for small distillations of beauty, to making time to contemplate and reflect. To learning the names of the plants and places that surround you, or training your mind in the rich pathways of the metaphorical. To finding a way to express your interconnectedness with the rest of humanity. To putting your feet on the ground, every now and then, and feeling the tingle of life that the earth offers in return. It’s all there, waiting for our attention. Take off your shoes, because you are always on holy ground.”― Katherine May, Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age

Play break, get out, hone in.
Seeking without expectations, outcomes, productivity, measurement.
Out of the external noise, grind, churn.
Into enchantment, borne of attention, exploration, noticing.
In this very place.
Holy ground.

“That’s what you find over and over again when you go looking: something else. An insight that surprises you. A connection that you would never have made. A new perspective.

More often than not, I find that I already hold all the ideas from which my enchantment is made. The deliberate pursuit of attention, ritual, or reflection does not mystically draw in anything external to me. Instead, it creates experiences that rearrange what I know to find the insights I need today. This is how symbolic thought works. It offers you a repository of understanding that can be triggered by the everyday, and which comes in a format that goes straight to the bloodstream.”― Katherine May, Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age

Mar 29

Perpetual Revival

“Each of us experiences the perpetual revival of the self. We constantly recast our connate emotional index by perceiving each encounter in life as a marvel, impedance, problem, disaster, or nothing at all. Living in the moment allows us to escape the lonely landscape of self-interest and be part of a larger world filled with beauty, reverence, and adoration.”― Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls

Volume low.
Brilliant color.
Light bright.
Anchor and attune.
In the ordinary and small.
Transformed by attention and reverence.

“Mind the little things.
Appreciate them.
Revere them, too.”― Shellen Lubin

Mar 28

First Temples

“Forests were the first temples of God and in forests men grasped their first idea of architecture.”― James C. Snyder, Introduction to Architecture

“As we live and as we are, Simplicity – with a capital “S” – is difficult to comprehend nowadays. We are no longer truly simple. We no longer live in simple terms or places. Life is a more complex struggle now. It is now valiant to be simple: a courageous thing to even want to be simple. It is a spiritual thing to comprehend what simplicity means.”― Frank Lloyd Wright, The Natural House

Architecture
Convergence of science and art
Trees to forest
Bricks to buildings
Scaffolding to structure
Convergence, bridges, connectors
Cathedrals of beauty, nature, life
Simplicity, awe, wonder.

“the systems of mutual connections and influences of which we are generally unaware, but which we discover by chance, as surprising coincidences or convergences of fate, all those bridges, nuts, bolts, welded joints and connectors” – Olga Tokarczuk

Mar 23

Bringing to Life

“The natural world is built upon common motifs and patterns. Recognizing patterns in nature creates a map for locating yourself in change, and anticipation what is yet to come.”― Sharon Weil, ChangeAbility

“Tenderness is the art of personifying, of sharing feelings, and thus endlessly discovering similarities. Creating stories means constantly bringing things to life, giving an existence to all the tiny pieces of the world that are represented by human experiences, the situations people have endured and their memories. Tenderness personalizes everything to which it relates, making it possible to give it a voice, to give it the space and the time to come into existence, and to be expressed.” – Olga Tokarczuk

Easy to harden in this world.
To check out.
Autopilot.
Surface and skim.
Do not succumb.
Till the dry soil.
Let fresh air in.
Wander with wonder.
Anticipation, hope, joy, delight, tenderness, laughter, gentleness, enthusiasm.
Let beauty, light, grace in to awaken, abide, transform.
Easy threads weaving together the tapestry of this day.

“A gentle heart is tied with an easy thread.”― George Herbert

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