Skip to content

Posts tagged ‘Transformation’

Aug 25

Summer and Fall Jubilee

“And the yellow sunflower by the brook, in autumn beauty stood.”― William Cullen Bryant

“That old September feeling, left over from school days, of summer passing, vacation nearly done, obligations gathering, books and football in the air … Another fall, another turned page: there was something of jubilee in that annual autumnal beginning, as if last year’s mistakes had been wiped clean by summer.”― Wallace Stegner, Angle of Repose

First dance of many
Summer and fall waltz begins
Fall soon to take the lead
Cool mornings
Earlier sunsets
Flowers bright turning to jewel tones
Thresholds
A foot on each side
Cusp of transition, change
Transformation if we choose to forego resistance
The work of seasons
To remain in the season while in it
Finding the gifts in each

“And all at once, summer collapsed into fall.”― Oscar Wilde

Aug 12

No Place to Be But Here

“Wherever you are is the entry point”― Kabir

“If you want the truth,
I’ll tell you the truth:
Listen to the secret sound,
the real sound,
which is inside you.”
― Kabir

No place to be but here

On the ground beneath
Sky above
Breath within
Beauty abound

No place to be but here

Arrive, sit, look around
Deep abiding breath
Breath inside the breath
Soft petal and center

No place to be but here

No bypass, shortcuts, turning back
Entry point, bridge, mountain, valley
Walk the path
Holy ground of presence

No place to be but here

“… What is God?
He is the breath inside the breath.”― Kabir

Aug 3

Radiance of Transfiguration

“The roots of all goodness lie in the soil of appreciation for goodness” – Dalai Lama XIV

“Dear God, Thank you for this new day, its beauty and its light. Thank You for my chance to begin again. Free me from the limitations of yesterday. Today may I be reborn. May I become more fully a reflection of Your radiance. Give me strength and compassion and courage and wisdom. Show me the light in myself and others. May I recognize the good that is available everywhere.”― Marianne Williamson, Illuminata: Thoughts, Prayers, Rites of Passage

Transaction to relationship
Efficiency to meaning
Speed to savoring
Transience to transfiguration
Awake to the good in this day, in others, in self
Beauty and light
In abundance, overflowing.

“Possibility is the secret heart of time. On its outer surface, time is vulnerable to transience. … In its deeper heart, time is transfiguration.” – John O’Donohue

Jul 29

Butterfly Work

“We are freed to free others.
We are affirmed to affirm others.
We are loved to love others.”
― Ann Weems, Kneeling in Bethlehem

“With every step of our lives we enter into the middle of some story which we are certain to misunderstand.”― G.K. Chesterton

To move from getting over things to transforming them
Caterpillar to butterfly
Beauty for ashes
Being transformed in the process
Opening and allowing
Unlearning and learning anew
Putting down the weight and walls of assumption, judgment, being right, certainty
For curiosity, discovery, unfolding, emergence, surprise, softness
Asking the next question and the next one after that
The dance of doing, being, accepting, allowing, yielding, merging, becoming
Day by day
Glory to glory
Trip and fall, get back up again and again
Laughter too, lots of it, with a side of delight
Grace overflowing
Giving and receiving
Ebb and flow
To understand rather than be understood
Dimensions rather than a flat world
Brilliant colors and hues
Peace that passes understanding
Overcoming the world while remaining in it
Salt and light
Hands and feet
Loving people exactly where they are rather than where they were or where we want them to be, especially oneself
A light, a container, a homecoming, an embrace, a warm blanket on a cool evening, a breeze on a hot summer day
Too much to ask?
Ask anyway, without ceasing.

“If I can put one touch of rosy sunset into the life of any man or woman, I shall feel that I have worked with God.”― G.K. Chesterton

May 21

Angels for Each Other

“We need to be angels for each other, to give each other strength and consolation. Because only when we fully realize that the cup of life is not only a cup of sorrow but also a cup of joy will we be able to drink it.”― Henri J.M. Nouwen

“Hospitality means primarily the creation of free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend instead of an enemy. Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place. It is not to bring men and women over to our side, but to offer freedom not disturbed by dividing lines.”― Henri J.M. Nouwen, Reaching Out: The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life

Hospitality, compassion, love
Yield, welcome, make space
To be angels for each other
To change the world and us in the offering
Give and receive
Cup of life
What each can do when it feels like there’s nothing to do
Be kind
Cast light.

“Compassion asks us to go where it hurts, to enter into the places of pain, to share in brokenness, fear, confusion, and anguish. Compassion challenges us to cry out with those in misery, to mourn with those who are lonely, to weep with those in tears. Compassion requires us to be weak with the weak, vulnerable with the vulnerable, and powerless with the powerless. Compassion means full immersion in the condition of being human.”― Henri J.M. Nouwen

May 10

A Part of the Silence

“In order to see birds it is necessary to become a part of the silence.”― Robert Lynd

“…a new day was starting, the things of the garden were not concerned with our troubles. A blackbird ran across the rose-garden to the lawns in swift, short rushes, stopping now and again to stab at the earth with his yellow beak. A thrush, too, went about his business, and two stout, little wagtails, following one another, and a little cluster of twittering sparrows. A gull poised himself high in the air, silent and alone, and then spread his wings wide and swooped beyond the lawns to the woods and the Happy Valley. These things continued, our worries and anxieties had no power to alter them.”― Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca

May nothing come of this day
Nothing produced
Done
Completed
Checked off
Taken care of
Wide open fields
Slow walks with nowhere to go
Blank canvas to fill with presence and delight
Wandering
Exploring
Quietly observing
Doing can wait
Being more than enough
Become part of the silence
Where nothing transforms into everything

“All trees and birds
sky and stars
bosoms and bangles
were seeing everything.”― Suman Pokhrel

May 4

Golden Month, Moments Too

“Mornings in May, echoed with the call of cuckoos, sunlight glowed through fresh green canopies of trees.”― Meeta Ahluwalia

“Mornings in May,
echoed with the call of cuckoos,
sunlight glowed through fresh green canopies of trees.”― Meeta Ahluwalia

“At last came the golden month of the wild folk– honey-sweet May, when the birds come back, and the flowers come out, and the air is full of the sunrise scents and songs of the dawning year.”― Samuel Scoville Jr., Wild Folk

To never grow tired of flowers abloom
In awe of blue skies abound
In gratitude for sunrises and sunsets and the in-betweens
Spring unfolding, slow, brilliant, dazzling
Outside and mostly within
To begin again, be made new
In all seasons, in each day, the gift of springs.

“But why should the daffodils and tulips
Get all the praise and blessings?
My rebirth goes unnoticed- I am worthy
Of smiles and dazzled cries of worship.”
― Lea Malot, Coffins & Rhinestones

Apr 1

Varieties of Presence, Spring Awakening

“As Spring rain softens the Earth with surprise
May your Winter places be kissed by light.
As the ocean dreams to the joy of dance
May the grace of change bring you elegance.
As day anchors a tree in light and wind
May your outer life grow from peace within.
As twilight fills night with bright horizons
May Beauty await you at home beyond.”― John O’Donohue

“At any time you can ask yourself: At which threshold am I now standing? At this time in my life, what am I leaving? Where am I about to enter? What is preventing me from crossing my next threshold? What gift would enable me to do it? A threshold is not a simple boundary; it is a frontier that divides two different territories, rhythms, and atmospheres. Indeed, it is a lovely testimony to the fullness and integrity of an experience or a stage of life that it intensifies toward the end into a real frontier that cannot be crossed without the heart being passionately engaged and woken up. At this threshold a great complexity of emotion comes alive: confusion, fear, excitement, sadness, hope. This is one of the reasons such vital crossings were always clothed in ritual. It is wise in your own life to be able to recognize and acknowledge the key thresholds: to take your time; to feel all the varieties of presence that accrue there; to listen inward with complete attention until you hear the inner voice calling you forward. The time has come to cross.” – John O’Donohue, To Bless the Space Between Us

Seasons, transitions, transformations
Thresholds, frontiers of before and after
A foot on each side, past and present, winter and spring
Between ashes and Resurrection
Spring and Lent holding hands together
Walking the external and internal journey
Of reflection, waiting, seeding, tending, blooming
Slow walk, road unfolding a step at a time
Glimpses of spring
Calling forward to cross over soon
Buds breaking ground around the corner
Beauty for ashes, joy too

“Behold, my friends, the spring is come; the earth has gladly received the embraces of the sun, and we shall soon see the results of their love!” – Sitting Bull

Mar 31

4 Comments

Not Done Yet, Soon, Not Yet

“I believe in kindness. Also in mischief. Also in singing, especially when singing is not necessarily prescribed.”― Mary Oliver

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

From 70s to 30s
The dance of winter to spring
A few more inches of snow yesterday slowly falling, clinging to trees
Spring hit the snooze button
Not quite ready to wake up yet
Wet and heavy snow
Lingering a bit longer
Soon turning to nurturing water
The ingredients of greening, budding, awakening

When we try to rush seasons
We miss the final steps of the journey
On to the next thing
The snow, a gentle reminder to let winter finish wintering
Spring is getting ready to take the lead, in due time not our time
Remain in the present in observing, asking, listening to final chords of the song of this season

To be where we are right now fully engaged and awake
Our daily work, our daily bread
Finish the sentence before moving to the next chapter
Pay attention, be astonished, singing when not prescribed
Transition to transformation work, not to be rushed.

“Instructions for living a life.
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.” – Mary Oliver

Mar 27

Springtime Advent

“Wonder. Go on and wonder.”― William Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury

“Oremus

…Let us listen to the sound of breath in our bodies.

Let us listen to the sounds of our own voices, of our own names, of our own fears.
Let us name the harsh light and soft darkness that surround us…
The world is big, and wide, and wild and wonderful and wicked,
and our lives are murky, magnificent, malleable and full of meaning.

Oremus.
Let us pray.” – Pádraig Ó Tuama

To be here and now
Fully
In the mess, chaos and the beauty
The in betweens
Not winter but not spring
The advent time of spring
The brown sure to turn to green with April rain
Followed by the first bloom to break ground and burst into color
Anticipation. Reverence. Presence.
Springtime Christmas is coming soon
Outside and in
To walk with joy, delight, wonder
Especially in “the longer than we want” waiting seasons
The what’s next
The transitions that lead to transformation
Trust the process and go on and wonder in the meantime.

“The only place to begin is where I am, and whether by desire or disaster, I am here. My being here is not dependent on my recognition of the fact. I am here anyway. But it might help if I could learn to look around.”― Pádraig Ó Tuama, In the Shelter: Finding a Home in the World

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »