preparation takes time
to tell the truth…
I’m tired
Too tired to keep waiting
Too tired to eat
Too tired to hold back my tears
to tell the truth…
Im tired
too tired to make decisions
too tired to drive or carry or not complain
too tired to think straight
to tell the truth…
Im tired
too tired to care so much
too tired to be so nice
too tired to be so frugal
…
too tired to re-write it
too tired to take my time
too tired to give a damn at moment
😪
Amy Lloyd
COURAGE is a word that tempts us to think outwardly, to run bravely against opposing fire, to do something under besieging circumstance, and perhaps, above all, to be seen to do it in public, to show courage; to be celebrated in story, rewarded with medals, given the accolade, but a look at its linguistic origins is to look in a more interior direction and toward its original template, the old Norman French, Coeur, or heart.
Courage is the measure of our heartfelt participation with life, with another, with a community, a work; a future. To be courageous is not necessarily to go anywhere or do anything except to make conscious those things we already feel deeply and then to live through the unending vulnerabilities of those consequences.
To be courageous is to seat our feelings deeply in the body and in the world: to live up to and into the necessities of relationships that often already exist, with things we find we already care deeply about: with a person, a future, a possibility in society, or with an unknown that begs us on and always has begged us on. To be courageous is to stay close to the way we are made.
The French philosopher Camus used to tell himself quietly to live to the point of tears, not as a call for maudlin sentimentality, but as an invitation to the deep privilege of belonging and the way belonging affects us, shapes us and breaks our heart at a fundamental level. It is a fundamental dynamic of human incarnation to be moved by what we feel, as if surprised by the actuality and privilege of love and affection and its possible loss. Courage is what love looks like when tested by the simple everyday necessities of being alive.
From the inside, it can at first feel like confusion, only slowly do we learn what we really care about, and allow our outer life to be realigned in that gravitational pull; with maturity that robust vulnerability comes to feel like the only necessary way forward, the only real invitation and the surest, safest ground from which to step.
On the inside we come to know who and what and how we love and what we can do to deepen that love; only from the outside and only by looking back, does it look like courage.
…
COURAGE
Excerpted From CONSOLATIONS:
The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning
of Everyday Words
© 2015 David Whyte and Many Rivers Press
I am struggling…
to hold on to my sagacity,
to what I call my kind side,
never thought that would be a challenge.
I find more expletives in my mind now
than I have ever done before.
Thank God, they still haven’t taken to spilling
over my lips.
I couldn’t abide that. I don’t like swearing.
I mourn, each day I mourn,
for lives, for causes, for lost time…
Can you feel the earth heave in pain?
Forget making sense of all that is going on out there,
I simply do not have the capacity for it.
I will lose what softness is left to me.
Sounds selfish, I know, I am sorry,
but my family lives there, in that softness,
and the tiny share of goodness that is alloted me.
The trees live there, and the flowers,
the bees, and the birds, let’s not forget the squirrels
whom I adore, and the silent deer that
glide so gracefully, silently through the yard,
keeping to the shadows and their contemplative silence.
The hugs live there, too,
the ones that you wait for all day,
the after work ones, and the after school ones,
slightly tired, yet happy to be home ones.
I live for those hugs. Don’t we all?
And the conversations at the dinner table?
The catching up, what did you do? And you?
Where are we growing and loving and being…
Were we kind today, were we mindful..
this is where I want to begin each day
and to end it.
This is what I must guard, and hold on to
if I am to survive and make and create and live.
This is what I can give my child, to give to all the lives
he will touch.
This is my mantra, my elixir, my breath…
and in the wake of this hurtling planet,
I am going to hold on tight to this plan, to this idea,
to this love, like a child holding on to it’s mother’s skirts
and hope that it is enough,
this holding on.
🐉
Rama Ink
https://ramaink.wordpress.com/author/ramaink/
We often remain exiles, left outside the rich world of the soul, simply because we are not ready. Our task is to refine our hearts and minds. There is so much blessing and beauty near us that is destined for us, and yet it cannot enter our lives because we are not ready to receive it. The handle is on the inside of the door; only we can open it. Our lack of readiness is often caused by blindness, fear, and lack of self-appreciation. When we are ready, we will be blessed.
🍀
John O’Donohue
Excerpt from ANAM CARA
life: acoustic & amplified 