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Posts from the ‘Beginnings’ Category

Jan 1

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Beauty of New Beginnings

“Every morning
the world
is created.” – Mary Oliver

Beannacht: A Blessing for the New Year
by John O’Donhue

“On the day when
The weight deadens
On your shoulders
And you stumble,
May the clay dance
To balance you.

And when your eyes
Freeze behind
The grey window
And the ghost of loss
Gets in to you,
May a flock of colours,
Indigo, red, green,
And azure blue,
Come to awaken in you
A meadow of delight.

When the canvas frays
In the currach of thought
And a stain of ocean
Blackens beneath you,
May there come across the waters
A path of yellow moonlight
To bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
May the clarity of light be yours,
May the fluency of the ocean be yours,
May the protection of the ancestors be yours.

And so may a slow
Wind work these words
Of love around you,
An invisible cloak
To mind your life.”

Presence
Wonder
Awe
Gratitude
Joy
Peace
Light
Love

May these be your daily companions, gifts, blessings
To behold and partake in
The beauty of new beginnings.

“The most significant gifts are the ones most easily overlooked. Small, everyday blessings: woods, health, music, laughter, memories, books, family, friends, second chances, warm fireplaces, and all the footprints scattered throughout our days.”― Sue Monk Kidd

Dec 31

New Year’s Path, One Step at a Time

“Let the wild rumpus start!”― Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are

“What the New Year brings to you will depend a great deal on what you bring to the New Year.” – Vern McLellan

Intentions spilling into action, inaction too
What to do and what not to do
Daily steps
Consistency
Walking it out
Gentleness
Kindness
Connection
Co-creation
Collaboration
Engaging with forethought
Joy, an act of resistance
Offering peace first
Wandering and rest stops
Deep work
Light play
Unknowing
Learning
Growing
Twists and turns
Acceptance
Generosity
Awe and wonder
Reflection then motion
From divergence to convergence to emergence
Narrowing
Deepening
Laughter, lots of it
Dancing, art, music, nature
Slowing and inviting
Abiding faith, trust, love
Gratitude in, through, with all of it
All of these and more for the new year
Not resolutions as much as ways of living daily

“I think in terms of the day’s resolutions, not the years’.” – Henry Moore

Dec 29

Fresh Coat, Bright Color

“Believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it.”― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

“And now let us believe in a long year that is given to us, new, untouched, full of things that have never been, full of work that has never been done, full of tasks, claims, and demands; and let us see that we learn to take it without letting fall too much of what it has to bestow upon those who demand of it necessary, serious, and great things.”― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters of Rainer Maria Rilke, 1892-1910

Fresh coat
Bright color
Refresh
Reset
New beginnings
Each moment, day, week, year
Perspectives, approaches, frameworks
Widening the lens when too small
Narrowing the lens when too big
Inquiry, curiosity, exploration, discovery
Beauty, joy, delight woven in ordinary
For eyes to see anew.

“Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.”― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

Dec 18

Shore of this Day

“This new day is too dear,
with its hopes and invitations,
to waste a moment on the yesterdays.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson

“All that is eternal in me
Welcomes the wonder of this day,
The field of brightness it creates
Offering time for each thing
To arise and illuminate.

I place on the altar of dawn:
The quiet loyalty of breath,
The tent of thought where I shelter,
Waves of desire I am shore to
And all beauty drawn to the eye.

May my mind come alive today
To the invisible geography
That invites me to new frontiers,
To break the dead shell of yesterdays,
To risk being disturbed and changed.” – John O’Donohue

Blank canvas of a new day
Fresh beginning
Joy to be had
White space and margin for slowing
Color, shape, hue for meaning
Beauty unfolding into gratitude, grace, beholding
Invitation, welcoming, belonging
May we see the gifts on the shore of each new day.

“The chief beauty about time
is that you cannot waste it in advance.
The next year, the next day, the next hour are lying ready for you,
as perfect, as unspoiled,
as if you had never wasted or misapplied
a single moment in all your life.
You can turn over a new leaf every hour
if you choose.”― Arnold Bennett

Nov 28

Roots and Shoots

“There lives the dearest freshness deep down things.”― Gerard Manley Hopkins

“Every morning has a unique story. There are always some seeds of possibilities waiting to sprout.”― Amit Ray, Peace Bliss Beauty and Truth

Deep rising to the surface
Time and timing
Breaking through
Roots and shoots
Small sprouts, big promise
Keep planting, tending, reaching.

“As long as thanks is possible, then joy is always possible.”― Ann Voskamp, One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are

Nov 26

Path of Plenitude

“I will be the gladdest thing under the sun! I will touch a hundred flowers and not pick one.”― Edna St. Vincent Millay

“For a New Beginning
In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.
For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.
It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.
Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.
Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life’s desire.
Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.”
― John O Donohue

Into the grace of beginning
Crossing the threshold
Of new things blooming, unfolding
Seen with awakened senses
Light spirit
Hope-filled heart
Trusting the journey
Gratitude, praise, awe
And for the choice to live there each day, with delight.

“Fullness of joy is discovered only in the emptying of will.”― Ann Voskamp

Sep 3

Class in Session

“I’M TALKING TO THAT PART OF YOU Today, I’m talking to that part of you who yearns for more. The part of you who knows exactly what you want beyond all else. To that part of you who effortlessly believes that anything is possible, and that it’s possible in an instant. I’m talking to that part of you who longs to break right on through that self-imposed ceiling your mind has created out of fear, lack, should, and could. To smash and shatter it into a billion little pieces. I’m talking to that part of you who longs, who dreams, who dances, who wishes. To the part of you that cheers, that laughs, that leaps, that bounds. To that part of you who truly wants the best for others because it deeply knows that there is more than enough to go round. I’m talking to that part of you who knows what you want and the exact next step to take to get it. To that part of you who knows you’re not broken and isn’t the slightest bit interested in perpetuating the story that says it’s so. To that part of you who knows the way and longs to guide the rest of you back home. Today, that’s the part of you I’m talking to. And I’m asking it to step forward and lead the way.”― Rebecca Campbell, Light is the New Black

Back to school.
Not just for kids.
Keep learning, growing, expanding.
Unlearning and exploring.
Be curious.
Inquiry and enthusiasm.
Reflection and wisdom.
Class is in session.
Course of a lifetime.

“Start before you feel ready. You don’t need to know where it’s all going. You’ll work it out along the way.”― Rebecca Campbell, Light is the New Black

Aug 7

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Cusping

“Be where you are; otherwise you will miss your life.” – Buddha

You do not always have to be producing, creating, harvesting. Learn to be idle. Learn to rest.”― Joyce Rupp, The Circle Of Life: The Heart’s Journey Through The Seasons

Making space, creating margins
Ordinary days, simple joys, laughter, color, hue
Flow and ease of being present, on the ground of this day
Cusping and leaping
Free falling
Trusting and seeking
Slow and deliberate
Idle and rest
Intention and direction
Honing and glistening
Choosing “and” rather than “or”
Present over perfect
Gratitude over comparison, calculation, counting
Essay rather than equation
All of these things and more
No “to do” lists or bucket list but one
To be fully alive both in reflection, projection and real time.

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”― Søren Kierkegaard

May 29

Eyes to Begin Anew, Again and Again

“Nature is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty if only we have the eyes to see them.”― John Ruskin

“Suddenly, sun. Over my shoulder
in the middle of gray November
what I hoped to do comes back,
asking.

Across the street the fiery trees
hold onto their leaves,
red and gold in the final months
of this unfinished year,
they offer blazing riddles.

In the frozen fields of my life
there are no shortcuts to spring,
but stories of great birds in migration
carrying small ones on their backs,
predators flying next to warblers
they would, in a different season, eat.

Stunned by the astonishing mix in this uneasy world
that plunges in a single day from despair
to hope and back again, I commend my life
to Ruskin’s difficult duty of delight,
and to that most beautiful form of courage,
to be happy.” – Jeanne Lohmann

Seasons, circles, rhythms.
Ebb and flow of living present.
Awake and aware.
Unfolding and becoming.
Familiar yet not the same.
As Heraclitus’ said “no man ever steps in the same river twice”
Our daily work?
To be in this day alone and know that we have arrived.
In being not doing.
To the difficult duty of delight.
With courage to be happy now, not someday when.
Senses honed, fresh eyes to take in beauty, abase and abound.

“Let every dawn of morning be to you as the beginning of life, and every setting sun be to you as its close.”― John Ruskin, The Two Paths

Apr 23

Hardly Noticed Moments

“Out of the quiet emerges the sheer incarnational presence of the world, a presence that seems to demand a moving internal symmetry in the one breathing and listening equal to its own breathing, listening elemental powers.”― David Whyte, Consolations

“In that first hardly noticed moment in which you wake,
coming back to this life from the other
more secret, moveable and frighteningly honest world
where everything began,
there is a small opening into the new day
which closes the moment you begin your plans.” – David Whyte

Cracks
Small openings
Thin spaces
Harvest of presence
Rapt attention
Possibility, mystery, inquiry
Awe, wonder, delight
Taking shape, unfolding, emerging
In this new day
Stay out of the way
Linger here a bit longer
Let beauty in

“Beauty is the harvest of presence.”― David Whyte, Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning

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