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Posts from the ‘Emergence’ Category

Still the Waters

“Poetry is what you find
in the dirt in the corner,
overhear on the bus, God
in the details, the only way
to get from here to there.”
― Elizabeth Alexander

“Acceptance is a small, quiet room.” – Cheryl Strayed

Some days.
Struggle bus.
Part of the journey.
Tough days are talking to us.
Pause to listen, to observe, to stop doing or avoiding.
What are we carrying we don’t need to?
Be still and rest.
The answers surface when we stop stirring the water with activity.
Still water, keen senses, rapt attention.
Listen.
Emergence.
Bus stop ahead.

“If you want to understand your mind, sit down and observe it.”― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

Flow of Awakening

“Let reason flow like water around a stone, the stone remains.”― Jane Hirshfield, Come, Thief

“It doesn’t matter what they will make of you
or your days: they will be wrong,
they will miss the wrong woman, miss the wrong man,
all the stories they tell will be tales of their own invention.

Your story was this: you were happy, then you were sad,
you slept, you awakened.”― Jane Hirshfield

Keep writing your story.
Observe and enter fully.
Pause to celebrate.
Dive in to participate.
The art, science, mystery of becoming.
Imperfect, unexpected, planned, unplanned.
All of it.
From still waters to rushing rapids.
The flow of awakening to life daily.
Where we are in the now.
Enjoy the journey.
It goes by fast.
Someday is today.

“if you see for yourself, hear for yourself, and enter deeply enough this seeing and hearing, all things will speak with and through you.”― Jane Hirshfield, The Heart of Haiku

Out of Rocks

“The whole present moment was a celebration; it always had been; all I needed was fresh eyes to see it.”― Narissa Doumani, A Spacious Life

“There’s something about the flower that grows through the rocks, the pavement; through logs and stone or brick walls… all roses are beautiful; but the rose that emerges unexpectedly through the asphalt has a beauty of soul. The flower that reaches through the brokenness of the wall has a beauty of spirit. You stop to look and not only to look but to cherish! Somewhere along its journey, it decided that it would reach for what was unseen, keep going in the direction of something that wasn’t felt, it decided that it would be. That it would become. And it did. And there is something irreplaceable about that.”― C. JoyBell C.

Through the cracks, crevices, under the door.
Thin spaces.
A sliver of light the guide.
Resilience, resistance, persistence.
Out of rocks.
Beautiful, gritty, brilliant bloom.
Keep going, growing, bursting through.
Fresh eyes on this day.
Emergence.
Spacious life.
Becoming daily.

“It starts with a single breath and the present moment, but where it takes you is into the vast radiance of your true nature, into a magical, spacious life.”― Narissa Doumani, A Spacious Life

Plenitude

“Life belongs to the living, and he who lives must be prepared for changes.”― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“For a New Beginning”
by John O’Donohue, To Bless the Space Between Us

“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 grow 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 grey 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 clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is 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.”

The grace and invitation of new beginnings.
Entering new spaces and places.
Becoming and unfolding.
To who you already are within, awaiting to come out to play.
Planting seeds each day, fervent ground.
Emergence of blooming, again and again.

New Paths Unfolding

“It’s not only moving that creates new starting points. Sometimes all it takes is a subtle shift in perspective, an opening of the mind, an intentional pause and reset, or a new route to start to see new options and new possibilities.” – Kristin Armstrong

“Gratitude is one of the strongest and most transformative states of being. It shifts your perspective from lack to abundance and allows you to focus on the good in your life, which in turn pulls more goodness into your reality.” – Jen Sincero

Newfound pauses
Scattered like seeds on fresh soil of the present
Depth of inquiry
Reframing and reshaping
Glancing behind and ahead
On occasion
Focus and attention on the main stage of this day
May I stay awake and aware of what lies right before me
Not fixated on what was nor predicting what will come
Command the day by shifting thoughts followed by actions
Put down the weight of the past to move into an unfolding future
New ink
Blank page
Written by us not for us.

“Sometimes you find yourself in the midst of life and you think, I don’t remember starting this, yet here I am, and sometimes you literally have to wake up and say, It’s time. Despite everything pointing south, I must go north.”― Jennifer Pastiloff

Wing Building

“If you are falling….dive.”― Joseph Campbell

“I take pleasure in my transformations. I look quiet and consistent, but few know how many women there are in me.”― Anais Nin

To be never done.
Yet content.
Unfolding.
Unfurling.
Waiting.
Slow then sudden.
Tipping points.
Becoming.
Thresholds and transitions.
Masterpieces in the making, never finished.
Trust the still small voice.
Doing the next right thing.
The stuff of transformation.
Of wing building.

“When she transformed into a butterfly, the caterpillars spoke not of her beauty, but of her weirdness. They wanted her to change back into what she always had been. But she had wings.”― Dean Jackson

Sacred Shaping

“The soul speaks its truth only under quiet, inviting and trustworthy conditions…If we are willing to walk quietly into the woods and sit silently for an hour or two at the base of a tree, the creature we’re waiting for may well emerge.” – Parker J. Palmer, Let Your Life Speak

“The miracle, upside-down work of God is that our failure isn’t an obstacle, it’s an opportunity to remember to sink into God. Not having what it takes is not a liability, it’s a prerequisite. Maybe there is hope for us after all.”― Emily P. Freeman, A Million Little Ways: Uncover the Art You Were Made to Live

In the putting down.
In rest and reflection.
In slowing.
Clenched fists opening.
Seeds falling.
Seeds taking root.
To receive something not of our doing, efficiency and striving.
Borne of our not doing, of our very being.
Wintering to prepare for the brilliance of spring.
In the putting down, in the pause, in the stillness.
We discern what to pick up again.
What to leave behind.
Reshaped, renewed, refreshed.
Sacred shaping at work.

“Be faithful to plant. Release the growing to God. Open up clenched fists and let the seeds drop into the ground, let them burrow down deep and do their secret work in the dark. Sacred shaping happens in the waiting.”― Emily P. Freeman, A Million Little Ways: Uncover the Art You Were Made to Live

No Longer and Not Yet

“In every place, no matter where you look, there are nooks that one seems to see, odd little spaces and hidden corners that hide from the world in plain sight. In every single square inch of the world, no matter how populated, there are what could be called liminal places, tiny little spaces, sometimes vast stretches, where the average laws of space and time are not wholly adhered to, you might say.”― John Kreiter, The Art of Transmutation

“Honor the space between no longer and not yet.”― Nancy Levin

Losses
Shifts
Changes
Transitions
Seasons
Sameness
Suddenness
Twists
Turns
Straight lines
Deadends
Bridges
One, some, all
In different measure
A multitude of things
Concrete and abstract
Emergence
What to do with it all?
Invite and entertain
Joy
Beauty
Light
Hope
Reflection
Kindness
Inquiry
Attunement
Empathy
Compassion
Trust
Faith
Transformation
Enthusiasm
In the known and especially in the unknown
In the unseen but brewing
In the simmer before the boil
In the frozen ground preparing for bud
Doors and windows in all walls and boundaries
Exits and entrances all at once
Thresholds to cross
Reverence, wonder, awe in the knowing and unknowing, the present moment.

“God does not give us more than we can handle,” I am told but I wonder if God doesn’t overestimate me just a little. Or perhaps, and this is likely, I underestimate God.”― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

Row Your Boat

“Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart.
…live in the question.”― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

“We must row in whatever boat we find ourselves in.”― Christie Watson, Tiny Sunbirds, Far Away

Less angst, paralysis and analysis about the boat you are in.
Or comparing to other boats.
More rowing.
In action rather than inaction.
Listening, faith, movement.
The path unfolds in the traveling, the daily rowing.
Unknowing, unlearning to see what lies beneath the surface.
Emergence at the right time, slower than our demands.
Ready and steady.
Answers and more questions leading to more clarity, discernment.
Live in, with and through the questions.
Row the boat. Your boat.

“We make our way through Everything like thread passing through fabric, giving shape to images that we ourselves do not know.”― Rainer Maria Rilke

Emergence of Wonder

“Always be on the lookout for the presence of wonder.”― E.B. White

“I embrace emerging experience.
I participate in discovery.
I am a butterfly.
I am not a butterfly collector.
I want the experience of the butterfly.”― William Stafford

Change your mind.
Think differently about things for a minute.
Give the benefit of the doubt.
Offer second and third chances.
Longer glances.
Put space between stimulus and response.
Respond thoughtfully rather than react habitually.
Assume good intentions and be proven wrong.
Put down rules, judgment, assumptions to invite connection, expansion.
Foster understanding.
Don’t have an opinion about everything.
Offer empathy, compassion and kindness.
Watch what grows.

Keep looking for the good.
Be awed by beauty.
Carried by hope.
Surprised by joy.
Held in peace.

“But hope has an astonishing resilience and strength. Its very persistence in our hearts indicates that it is not a tonic for wishful thinkers but the ground on which realists stand.”― Kathleen Norris, Acedia & Me: A Marriage, Monks, and a Writer’s Life