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Posts tagged ‘optimism’

Dec 15

The Sound of Hope

“There is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the comparison of one state with another, nothing more. He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness. We must have felt what it is to die, Morrel, that we may appreciate the enjoyments of life.
“Live, then, and be happy, beloved children of my heart, and never forget, that until the day God will deign to reveal the future to man, all human wisdom is contained in these two words, ‘Wait and Hope.”― Alexandre Dumas

Yesterday, my sister-in-law Tina got to ring this bell of hope at the Mayo Clinic.
Well-earned and deserved after six long months of treatment for breast cancer.
Doctors appointments, surgery, several hour and half trips to Rochester, radiation rounds followed by chemo, exhaustion, side-effects, rides in ambulances when white blood cells tanked and dehydration set in.
Feeling better just in time to go back for another round.
I sat with her for a little while yesterday and then had to leave for meetings.
I didn’t get to see her ring the bell but went past it when my brother walked me to the car.
We could all hear the bell loud and clear.
The sound of hope that waits with us through struggles, twists and turns and embraces us at the finish lines.
Hope that is tough, gritty, resilient, ass-kicking.
Pulling us forward when the path is hard, uphill and rocky.
Tina moved through this journey with grace, strength, toughness, resilience.
Way to fight the good fight Tina, carry hope well, showing others what the sound of hope is through a weathering journey.
As Andy Dufresne in Shawshank Redemption wrote to Red, “Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.”
So to the good thing, the best of things called hope and those who stick the landing of hope every day on paths not of their choosing but choosing hope over despair.
The beautiful sound of hope.

“We have seasons when we flourish and seasons when the leaves fall from us, revealing our bare bones. Given time, they grow again.”― Katherine May, Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times

Dec 12

More than the Sum

“Blessed is the season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love.”― Hamilton Wright Mabie

“Still, what I want in my life
is to be willing
to be dazzled—
to cast aside the weight of facts

and maybe even
to float a little
above this difficult world.
I want to believe I am looking

into the white fire of a great mystery.
I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing—
that the light is everything—that it is more than the sum
of each flawed blossom rising and falling. And I do.”
― Mary Oliver, House of Light

We count
Compare
Weigh
Measure
Do the math
The transaction
The efficiency
The formula
Zero-sum game

Living is in the essay
The story
More than the sum
Found in nuance
Connections
Interruptions
The unfolding
Imperfection
Mystery
Beauty
Grace
Vibrant, unexpected
Getting lost only to be found
Tripping and landing where we should be but didn’t plan on

Go be light in the darkness
Hope in the struggle
Joy in the not so straight nor smooth journey
Dazzling light powered by love.

“Do not be dismayed by the brokenness of the world. All things break. And all things can be mended. Not with time, as they say, but with intention. So go. Love intentionally, extravagantly, unconditionally. The broken world waits in darkness for the light that is you.”― L.R. Knost

Dec 10

In the Particular

“Beauty always takes place in the particular.”― Elaine Scarry

“How one walks through the world, the endless small adjustments of balance, is affected by the shifting weights of beautiful things.”― Elaine Scarry

May you invite, pursue and be held in beauty.
Of ordinary things.
In small shifts.
In the particular.
The home where beauty resides.
Spend time, converse and connect with beauty each day.

“Beauty as lifesaving.

Beauty quickens. It adrenalizes. It makes the heart beat faster. It makes life more vivid, animated, living worth living.”― Elaine Scarry, On Beauty and Being Just

Dec 9

Bloom Goodness

“It is love alone that gives worth to all things.”― St. Teresa of Avila

“There is within each one of us a potential for goodness beyond our imagining; for giving which seeks no reward; for listening without judgment; for loving unconditionally.”― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

Judge less.
Love more.
Take down walls.
More doors and windows.
Let the light in.
Go out into the world.
Soak in color.
Be interrupted.
Be patient, generous and kind.
Smile, delight, listen.
Wonderstruck, childlike, filled with awe.
Bloom well.
Blessed by being a blessing.

“We often tend to ignore how much of a child is still in all of us.”― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

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

Dec 4

Own the Day

“This is the homely heart of Incarnation, this meeting of God in man with men and women, this simple face of divine graciousness in ordinary life rather than in the hymns of church fathers or in the dry elaborations of theologians.”― Eugene Kennedy, The Joy of Being Human: Reflections for Every Day of the Year

“Write it on your heart
that every day is the best day in the year.
He is rich who owns the day, and no one owns the day
who allows it to be invaded with fret and anxiety.

Finish every day and be done with it.
You have done what you could.
Some blunders and absurdities, no doubt crept in.
Forget them as soon as you can, tomorrow is a new day;
begin it well and serenely, with too high a spirit
to be cumbered with your old nonsense.

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

― Ralph Waldo Emerson, Collected Poems and Translations

 Hope, anticipation, joy.
May this be the ground you stand on each day.
To see color, light, beauty.
To hear birds, music, poetry, hums.
To feel an embrace, ease, delight.
To smell flowers, fresh air, cookies in the oven.
To be found in the searching and standing still.
Write it on your heart.
Own the day.

“But it isn’t easy, said Pooh. Because poetry and hums aren’t things which you get, they’re things which get you. And all you can do is to go where they can find you.” – AA Milne

Dec 3

ADVENTure

 

“Out of the Darkness, Into the Light: The Time before Christmas is the Time of Light and mutual Love.”― Sir Kristian Goldmund Aumann, 24 Days Until Christmas: 24 Christmas Poems

“God travels wonderful ways with human beings, but he does not comply with the views and opinions of people. God does not go the way that people want to prescribe for him; rather, his way is beyond all comprehension, free and self-determined beyond all proof. Where reason is indignant, where our nature rebels, where our piety anxiously keeps us away: that is precisely where God loves to be. There he confounds the reason of the reasonable; there he aggravates our nature, our piety—that is where he wants to be, and no one can keep him from it. Only the humble believe him and rejoice that God is so free and so marvelous that he does wonders where people despair, that he takes what is little and lowly and makes it marvelous. And that is the wonder of all wonders, that God loves the lowly…. God is not ashamed of the lowliness of human beings. God marches right in. He chooses people as his instruments and performs his wonders where one would least expect them. God is near to lowliness; he loves the lost, the neglected, the unseemly, the excluded, the weak and broken.”― Dietrich Bonhoeffer, God is in the Manger: Reflections on Advent and Christmas

Expectancy.
Possibility.
A tough gritty hope.
Waiting.
Preparing.
More waiting.
Pushing.
Pulling.
Sitting silent.
A softening.
A wide-open field.
An invitation for all, not some.
Light in darkness.
A warm embrace.
Never giving up or giving in.
Persistent.
Resilient.
Beyond all comprehension.
May the season of Advent, of hope, anticipation, waiting, grace, overwhelming love overtake you with peace, wonder, joy and awe.

“The message of Advent doesn’t fit neatly into a sound-bite or vignette. It’s too complex, too deep, to compete with glitter and noise; and it’s a hard sell in a culture that would rather skip straight to the big finish. But Advent is too important to be forgotten, because it is this season that prepares us to encounter our Lord.”― Kerry van der Vinne, Advent: Let Every Heart Prepare Him Room

Dec 2

The Art of Harvesting

“Breath is the finest gift of nature. Be grateful for this wonderful gift.”― Amit Ray, Beautify your Breath – Beautify your Life

“Perhaps the art of harvesting the secret riches of our lives is best achieved when we place profound trust in the act of beginning. Risk might be our greatest ally. To live a truly creative life, we always need to cast a critical look at where we presently are, attempting always to discern where we have become stagnant and where new beginning might be ripening. There can be no growth if we do not remain open and vulnerable to what is new and different. I have never seen anyone take a risk for growth that was not rewarded a thousand times over.”― John O’Donohue, To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings

Living waters, not stagnant.
Stir it up.
Beginnings and start lines.
Move forward with hope coupled with action.
Vibrancy and engagement.
Gratitude, grace and gumption to you this day.
To see anew.
Along with a side of whimsy, awe and delight.
See where these take you.
Harvest the beauty.
Plant seeds along the way.

“You must not ever stop being whimsical. And you must not, ever, give anyone else the responsibility for your life.”― Mary Oliver, Wild Geese

Nov 22

Opt In and Opt Out

“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

“your grass is green enough.”― Donna Ashworth, I Wish I Knew: Poems to Soothe Your Soul & Strengthen Your Spirit

May I Opt In to:

Patience
Kindness
Empathy
Listening
Trust
Curiosity
Growth
Faith
Learning
Grace
Joy
Peace
Beauty
Equanimity
Generosity
Understanding
Delight
Laughter
Gratitude
Grit
Praise
Awe
Resilience
Optimism
Wonder
Love

In turn, to make room for all of these multipliers, creators and expanders, may I Opt Out of all that diminishes, distracts and substracts:

Judgment
Accusation
Cynicism
Unforgiveness
Resentment
Jealousy
Comparison
Greed
Counting
Assumption
Opinion
Gossip
Anger
Spite
Despair
Hate
Othering
Ego
Rightness
Arrogance
Self-centeredness
Apathy

What we opt in and opt out of is a daily decision. Choose carefully, with intent followed by action. Green the grass your standing on now by opting in and opting out to change your perspective. Choose well, cast light.

“An opinion should be the result of thought, not a substitute for it. – Jef Mallett

Nov 1

Boundless Gift for Renewal

“World, world, forgive our ignorance and our foolish fears. Absolve us of our anger and our error. In your boundless gift for renewal, disregard our undeserving. For no reason but the hope that one day we will know the beauty of unloved things, accept our unuttered thanks.” – Margaret Renkl, The Comfort of Crows

“Enchantment is small wonder magnified through meaning, fascination caught in the web of fable and memory. It relies on small doses of awe, almost homeopathic: those quiet traces of fascination that are found only when we look for them. It is the sense that we are joined together in one continuous thread of existence with the elements constituting this earth, and that there is a potency trapped in this interconnection, a tingle on the border of our perception.”― Katherine May, Enchantment: Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age

Nature, flowers, dogs, children, music, art, prose.
Wellsprings that pull us from malaise and mechanics of daily duties into enchantment and wonder.
Don’t buy what the world is selling.
Be that crazy optimist, filled with hope, enthusiastic with anticipation, open to enchantment and awe.
Small doses everywhere,
Boundless gifts of renewal.
Seek. Keep seeking.

“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

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