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Posts from the ‘Clarity’ Category

Nov 13

Gifts of Listening

“God is more time than schedules, more grace than boundaries, more everything than the imaginable.”― Kaitlin B. Curtice, Native

“Help me resist the urge to dispute whether things are true or false which is like arguing whether it is day or night. It is always one or the other somewhere in the world. Together, we can penetrate a higher truth which like the sun is always being conveyed.”― Mark Nepo, Seven Thousand Ways to Listen: Staying Close to What Is Sacred

Either or
Duality
Multiple choice, one answer only
Skimming the surface
Life is not a checklist, spreadsheet, calculator, mere transactions
It’s an essay to be written, rewritten
Complexity and nuance of relationships, connections, patterns
Rhythm, dance to move with
Ebb and flow, current
Inhale and exhale
Canvas to be painted
Outside the line
All of the colors
Beneath the surface
Above the noise
Listen closely, quietly
Pay attention
Big yes, lean in, awe and wonder
The work of being rather than the regiment of doing.

“No one can teach us how to intuitively listen or trust, but the quiet courage to say yes rather than no is close to each of us. It involves holding our opinions and identity lightly so we can be touched by the future. It means loosening our fist-like hold on how we see the world, so that other views can reach us, expand us, deepen us, and rearrange us. Saying yes is the bravest way to keep leaning into life.”― Mark Nepo, Seven Thousand Ways to Listen: Staying Close to What Is Sacred

Oct 1

Temperature of Thine Own

“Mindfulness is not chasing the moment but sipping the nectar of the moment.”― Amit Ray, Mindfulness Living in the Moment – Living in the Breath

“It does seem to me, that herein we see the rare virtue of a strong individual vitality, and the rare virtue of thick walls, and the rare virtue of interior spaciousness. Oh, man! admire and model thyself after the whale! Do thou, too, remain warm among ice. Do thou, too, live in this world without being of it. Be cool at the equator; keep thy blood fluid at the Pole. Like the great dome of St. Peter’s, and like the great whale, retain, O man! in all seasons a temperature of thine own.”― Herman Melville, Moby-Dick or, The Whale

Steadiness in all seasons, circumstances
Contentment beneath waves
Ease amidst chaos
Silence below noise
Clarity above distractions
Wandering and curiosity, no map
Hope and resilience
Nectar of presence in today
Joy on the whole journey
To keep going, taking the long cut
A temperature of thine own

“It is not down on any map; true places never are.”― Herman Melville, Moby-Dick or, The Whale

Sep 13

Start Close In

“What do you think is the biggest waste of time?”
“Comparing yourself to others,” said the mole.”
― Charlie Mackesy, The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse

Start Close In by David Whyte

“Start close in, don’t take the second step or the third,
start with the first thing close in,
the step you don’t want to take.
Start with the ground you know, the pale ground beneath your feet,
your own way of starting the conversation.
Start with your own question, give up on other people’s questions,
don’t let them smother something simple.
To find another’s voice, follow your own voice,
wait until that voice becomes a private ear listening to another.
Start right now take a small step you can call your own
don’t follow someone else’s heroics,
be humble and focused,
start close in,
don’t mistake that other for your own.”

Turn down the volume.
The noise and clanging.
Others’ expectations, assumptions, opinions, fear.
Start close in.
Comparison and counting.
People pleasing and over functioning.
Should, must, have to, expectations, rules.
Start close in.
A firm pause, stillness, hard stop.
Wide space, margins.
To hear your own voice, soft whisper, home.
Start close in.
To cut your own path, one small step at a time.
Listen, foster, be gentle.
Kindness, grace, love.
Start close in.
Then go back out anew.

“Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own.”― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

Sep 9

Distinguishing

“Don’t let people pull you into their storm. Pull them into your peace.”— Pema Chödrön

“True discernment means not only distinguishing the right from the wrong; it means distinguishing the primary from the secondary, the essential from the indifferent, and the permanent from the transient. And, yes, it means distinguishing between the good and the better, and even between the better and the best.” – Sinclair Ferguson

From reporting to being the story.
Entering with curiosity.
Approaching with inquiry.
Senses ablaze.
At ease on this very ground.
Boat anchored in storms.
Sail up in winds.
Steady as she goes.
May discernment, contentment, generosity, laughter, kindness, gratitude be the path you walk each day, if even for a spell.
Pulling you deeper into peace that passes understanding.

“What is the good of your stars and trees, your sunrise and the wind, if they do not enter into our daily lives?” –E.M. Forster

Sep 3

1 Comment

Bliss of the Moment

“That’s what it means to really feel alive – to be so immersed in the passionate bliss of the moment that you don’t think about yesterday or tomorrow. You just enjoy what you’re doing and love every piece of it.”― Lori Deschene

“Practice the pause. Pause before judging. Pause before assuming. Pause before accusing. Pause whenever you’re about to react harshly and you’ll avoid doing and saying things you’ll later regret.”― Lori Deschene

Intention to action.
Attention to awareness.
Reaction to response.
Awe to gratitude.
The power of the pause, of noticing.
Immersed in today alone.
Bliss woven into simple moments.
Flow and ease.
Get out of your own way.

“The moment we decide things don’t have to be a certain way, we create the possibility that they could be better than we know to imagine them.”― Lori Deschene

Sep 2

Heart’s Wisdom

“Without reflection, we go blindly on our way, creating more unintended consequences, and failing to achieve anything useful.” – Margaret Wheatley

“Be confused, it’s where you begin to learn new things. Be broken, it’s where you begin to heal. Be frustrated, it’s where you start to make more authentic decisions. Be sad, because if we are brave enough we can hear our heart’s wisdom through it. Be whatever you are right now. No more hiding. You are worthy, always.”― S.C. Lourie

To be here
In this place and space
Reflection rather than rumination
Pause and stillness for clarity
Sensemaking and understanding
Listening, releasing, integrating
Moving forward renewed and revitalized
Fresh wings to take flight
New destinations await.

“The past influences everything and dictates nothing.”― Adam Phillips

Apr 29

Teeming

“Muddy water is best cleared by leaving it alone.”― Alan Watts

“Life is like music for its own sake. We are living in an eternal now, and when we listen to music we are not listening to the past, we are not listening to the future, we are listening to an expanded present.”― Alan Watts

May your “not to do list” grow.
From doing to being.
Speed to slow.
Blur to beauty.
From transaction and busy to relationship and connection.
In the stillness, ease.
In the depth, fullness.
In reflection, clarity.
In the music of this day, a symphony.

“For a spirit that roamed restlessly, entering into every jot of the teeming life around him, stillness must have held a deep allure. If you are everything and everywhere, how restful it must seem to be no one and no where.”― Mark Doty, What Is the Grass: Walt Whitman in My Life

Apr 17

Path Making

The Path by Lynn Ungar

“Life, the saying goes, is a journey,
and who could argue with that?
We’ve all experienced the surprising turns,
the nearly-impassible swamp, the meadow
of flowers that turned out not to be quite
so blissful and benign as we first thought,
the crest of the hill where the road
smoothed out and sloped toward home.

Our job, we say, is to remain faithful
to the path before us. Which is an assumption
as common as it is absurd.
Really? Look ahead. What do you see?
If there is a path marked out in front of you
it was almost certainly laid down for someone else.
The path only unfolds behind us,
our steps themselves laying down the road.
You can look back and see the sign posts—
the ones you followed and the ones you missed—
but there are no markers for what lies ahead.

You can tell the story of how
you forded the stream or got lost
on the short cut that wasn’t,
how you trekked your way to courage or a heart,
but all of that comes after the fact.

There is no road ahead.
There is only the walking,
the tales we weave of our adventures,
and the songs we sing
to call our companions on.”

Look back.
Progress, overcoming, grief, gratitude, clarity, weaving, connecting, growth.
Paths we didn’t choose yet took and arrived to this day.
Keep paving, laying the bricks down going forward.
Glance behind but forge ahead.
You are in the road construction business.
New paths to cut, smooth, travel.
Create your path, expect detours, delays, rerouting.
And keep going.
Bricks in the steps.

Apr 9

3 Comments

Look, Look, Look

“To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work.”― Mary Oliver

“The Place I Want to Get Back To” by Mary Oliver

The place I want to get back to
in the pinewoods
in the moments between
the darkness
and the first light
two deer
came walking down the hill
and when they saw me
they said to each other, okay,
this one is okay,
let’s see who she is
and why she is sitting
on the ground, like that,
so quiet, as if
asleep, or in a dream,
but, anyway, harmless;
and so they came
on their slender legs
and gazed upon me
not unlike the way
I go out to the dunes and look
and look and look
into the faces of the flowers;
and then one of them leaned forward
and nuzzled my hand, and what can my life
bring to me that could exceed
that brief moment?
For twenty years
I have gone every day to the same woods,
not waiting, exactly, just lingering,
Such gifts, bestowed,
can’t be repeated.
If you want to talk about this
come to visit. I live in the house
near the corner, which I have named
Gratitude.”

Look, look, look.
Not in the far-off distance.
At your feet.
Arm’s length.
In reach.
Found in the pause.
Wandering.
A walk into the woods.
Where life moves at the right pace, natural, unhurried.
Big eyes gazing.
Noticing. Present. Awake.
Not in the hurry and hustle.
In the slow and stillness.
Look, look, look.
Gratitude and grace before you.
Holy, sacred ground.

“Next it dawned on him that the former ideas were of the world, the latter God-sent; finally, worldly thoughts began to lose their hold, while heavenly ones grew clearer and dearer.”― Ignatius of Loyola, The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola

Dec 8

YES and…

“You are the sky. Everything else – it’s just the weather.”― Pema Chödrön

“i imagine that yes is the only living thing.”― E.E. Cummings

A resounding YES! to enthusiasm, beauty, life, wholeness.
A grounding, followed by trust then a leap.
Starting without knowing the exact way.
A compass rather than a map.
A pull, gravity, forward motion.
Engaging rather than merely existing, checking boxes.
We are bigger than we allow and enter.
Off autopilot and dive into life.
Yes’s and No’s appropriately placed.
Creating space for what already resides within awaiting release.
Commit.
Contemplation to action.
Yes and move.

“At the moment of commitment the entire universe conspires to assist you.”― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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