Varieties of Presence
“The pine stays green in winter… wisdom in hardship.” – Norman Douglas
“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
Varieties of presence
Narrow and wide
Clear and cloudy
Middle ground of ordinary days
To bridges and thresholds
Before and after
Transitions to transformations
Pause, mark then move
Cross over, walk through, other side
Frontiers of growth.
“But high on mountains,
the pines stand praying,
their voices whisper low
as they chant together
an ageless measure,
‘Reach out and up, and grow!’
– Lorraine Babbitt, Tree Portraits
