September | 2015 | life: acoustic & amplified

Archive for the month “September, 2015”

30 Sep 2015

higher ground

It’s an interesting

custom, involving such in-

visible items as the food

that’s not on the table, the clothes

that are not on the back

the radio whose only music

is silence. Doing without

is a great protector of reputations

since all places one cannot go

are fabulous, and only the rare and

enlightened plowman in his field

or on his mountain does not overrate

what he does not or cannot have.

Saluting through their windows

of cathedral glass those restaurants

we must not enter (unless like

burglars we become subject to

arrest) we greet with our twinkling

eyes the faces of others who do

without, the lady with the

fishing pole and the man who looks

amused to have discovered on a walk

another piece of firewood.

🔹

Doing Without by David Ray

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Listen to Sara Bareilles sing Between the Lines http://youtu.be/s8e45WHIduM

Posted in action, attitude, awareness, beloved, Blessing, Change, Choice, commitment, connection, courage, determination, Faith, Glory, Gratitude, Growth, healing, Letting Go, Life, Love, perceptions, Reflection, Relationships, soul and spirit, strength, Trust, truth, Uncategorized, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment

29 Sep 2015

You don’t have to sit with white linen on, light your tree scented candles and channel Buddha. There doesn’t have to be a “Dream Big” journal or a fairy involved. Just slow yourself down a few times a day and check in. Why am I so overwhelmed? Why am I rushing? Why am I so angry? – Tancie Leroux

A FRIEND OF mine dreamed that he was standing in an open place out under the sky, and there was a woman also standing there dressed in some coarse material like burlap. He could not see her face distinctly, but the impression that he had was that she was beautiful, and he went up to her and asked her a question. This friend of mine described himself to me once as a believing unbeliever, and the question that he asked her was the same one that Pontius Pilate asked Jesus, only he did not ask it the way you can imagine Pilate did — urbanely, with his eyes narrowed—but instead he asked it with great urgency as if his life depended on the answer, as perhaps it did. He went up to the woman in his dream and asked, “What is the truth?” Then he reached out for her hand, and she took it. Only instead of a hand, she had the claw of a bird, and as she answered his question, she grasped his hand so tightly in that claw that the pain was almost unendurable and prevented him from hearing her answer. So again he asked her, “What is the truth?” and again she pressed his hand, and again the pain drowned out her words. And then once more, a third time, and once more the terrible pain and behind it the answer that he could not hear. And the dream ended. What is the truth for the man who believes and cannot believe that there is a truth beyond all truths, to know which is to be himself made whole and true?
🔹

-Frederick Buechner Originally published in The Hungering Dark

Out of perfection nothing can be made.
Every process involves breaking something up.

The earth must be broken to bring forth life.

If the seed does not die, there is no plant.

Bread results from the death of wheat.

Life lives on lives.

Our own life lives on the acts of other people.

If you are lifeworthy,

you can take it.

🔹

– Joseph Campbell- Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living

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Posted in attitude, awareness, beloved, Change, Choice, courage, grace, Gratitude, healing, Letting Go, Miracles | Leave a comment

28 Sep 2015

final word

There, don’t you hear it too?

Something is calling, although

The day is blank and gray.
The eye fastened on nothing,

The ear undistracted

And we with nothing to say.
But still that sense of calling,

Of something seeking attention

Beyond our consciousness.
That voice in voiceless things

When they cease to be themselves,

Losing their choice and purpose.
Joining the indiscriminate

Otherness which surrounds us

At our own times of withdrawal.
It is then that the world calls us

As if to reinterpret

Or to reconfigure.
Whose is this voice? A god’s?

Surely not. It seems

To be the voice of duty
That speaks of origins

And of relationships

Between things grown apart.
And I remember the muezzin

Singing every morning

Raptly, as if for himself.
Singing in the dark hour

At a distance, over all,

And yet outside our door.
His practised lilt spoke more

Of the puzzles of night than of

The determinations of morning.
As though the light had still

To be charmed into being

And each day a reward.
The voice is much like his,

A commanding meditation

Rising from the blankness.
Of a sleeping senselessness,

Thoughtful, improbable,

But stirring us to beauty.
And like his, the voice

Links us for a while

In its reiterations
Then ends abruptly, as if

Distracted by something else

Of no great importance.

🔹

Calling by John Fuller

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Posted in awareness, Change, Choice, connection, determination, find art at pinterest, Letting Go, Love, Patience, quiet, Relationships | Leave a comment

27 Sep 2015

walk gently into the lives of others. – unknown

Acting as a Guardian
Just Being There

by Madisyn Taylor

To act as a guardian to somebody during a difficult time is a most beautiful gift of support.

One of the greatest gifts we can give another human being is to act as their guardian. Whether this gift is related to a specific situation or is representative of an ongoing commitment, we each benefit from the association. To protect someone is to walk with them in challenging times and see them through safely to the other side. In doing this, we grow with them. And those under our guardianship derive confidence from our support and assistance, enabling them to persevere through almost any conditions.

There are many reasons we feel inspired to serve as guardians to those we care for. Sometimes just holding the space for somebody allows them to do what is necessary to grow or heal. We may simply want to see that our friend or loved one is taken care of and equipped to prevail over difficult circumstances. We may also sense that we are in possession of knowledge our loved ones are lacking yet need in their current stage of development. Our offer to serve as a guardian may also be both unsolicited and unrelated to any one situation. Instead of helping someone we care about cope with a specific challenge, we may find ourselves providing them with a more general form of emotional sustenance that prepares and strengthens them for challenges yet to come.

Our ability to empathize with those under our guardianship is our greatest asset because our comprehension of their needs allows us to determine how we can best serve them. Even when this comprehension is limited, however, the loving intentions with which we enter into our role as guardian ensure that our care and protection help others grow as individuals while living their lives with grace.

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🔹

Friends can help each other. A true friend is someone who lets you have total freedom to be yourself – and especially to feel. Or, not feel. Whatever you happen to be feeling at the moment is fine with them. That’s what real love amounts to – letting a person be what he really is.

– Jim Morrison

Posted in awareness, connection, friendship, Love, soul and spirit, strength, Trust | Leave a comment

26 Sep 2015

decisions

there is a turning point

in every life

a point of decision

to overcome

or succumb

a point of taking responsibility

for your life

or not

there’s also a point

of no return

where you draw a deep breath

and all you have chosen up to this point,

good or bad

comes out to meet you

Posted in attitude, awareness, Change, Choice, find art at pinterest, Life, Love, Reflection, soul and spirit, strength, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

25 Sep 2015

a thousand more

You could pray for 1,000 nights, visualize for 1,000 days, and give thanks for 1,000 things, but it’s when you physically prepare the way no matter how silly, tiny, or futile your efforts may seem – that 1,000 miracles will find you.

Uga-chugga, Uga-chugga –

The Universe

Thoughts become things… choose the good ones! ®

#312 magic

The simplest things in life

Are the most extraordinary

Let them reveal themselves.

– Paulo Coelho
There is magic in every little thing.

Your very breath is magic

You, showing up on this tiny planet,

at this very time in history.

The way the sun glints off your hair.

The way the trees recognize you.

The way a child can turn their head

and plunge you into grief.

it’s all miraculous.

Einstein reminds us –

We have a choice in how we live.

One of two ways –

As if nothing

As if everything

Is miraculous.

I’m so glad I chose to see the enchanted pathway.

It’s always a fine day here.

No matter what circumstance I find myself in.

Magic abounds.

💞

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Listen to Christina Perri sing A Thousand Year http://youtu.be/rtOvBOTyX00

Posted in Adventure, attitude, awareness, Beliefs, Choice, Encouragement, find art at pinterest, inspiration, Life, Love, Miracles, mystery, perceptions, soul and spirit, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment

24 Sep 2015

becoming one

The sojourning spirit is deep within each of us, if we’d listen, but it is not fundamentally about finding ‘the job’ or ‘the voice’ or ‘the degree’ or ‘the position’. The journey, at least as I know it, is a journey to union. It is a journey from fragmentation to wholeness, a journey from exile to home, a journey from attachment to union, a journey from hiding to “being hidden” in Christ, a journey from neurosis to theosis. – Chuck deGroat

Posted in action, Adventure, attitude, awareness, be, beauty, Becoming Yourself, beloved, commitment, compassion, confidence, connection, courage, Encouragement, Faith, Freedom, friendship, grace, Gratitude, Growth, Habits, Happiness, healing, intimacy, Joy, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, music, mystery, nature, Prayer, Reality, Reflection, Relationships, soul and spirit, Trust, truth, voice, Vulnerability, words, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment

23 Sep 2015

At any given moment you have the power to say this is not how the story is going to end… ~Ritu Ghatourey

words drift

but don’t land

foggy whispers

fragments of emotions

to fragile for words

I just sit with it all

letting it all go

peace moving through

like a ghost knowing no borders

allowing all things to be

just as they are

allowing things to happen

as they will

knowing all will be well

there is nothing for me to make

music moves into my soul

love cannot fail

a million diamonds sparkle on the water

this dance defines my life

I am the luckiest girl in the world
AL

what a very, very, very good morning…

Listen to the Beatles sing Let It Be http://youtu.be/WcBnJw-H2wQ
It takes a level of self-love, of dedication and determination to live your greatest life. So, look within. Look at every area of your life and ask yourself these questions: Am I on course? Am I growing mentally, emotionally and spiritually? Anything that is blocking that, anything that is preventing you from living your greatest life, make the tough decision to… let it go. — Unknown

💞

The first day of autumn here,

gardens giving away their gifts,

leaves beginning to turn the pages

of their death.
In the Southern world

it is not autumn but spring,

soil softening, seeds cracking,

branches opening their hands.
Either way

it is a season

of letting go.

__________________

Weather Report –